Abstract
In May 2006 the South African Law Reform Commission released a discussion paper and draft legislation on human trafficking for public comment by the end of June this year. In order to successfully identify, investigate and prosecute cases of trafficking, law enforcement agencies need a clear understanding of what constitutes trafficking. But human trafficking is a slippery concept – frequently confused with human smuggling or used as a blanket term for the sexual exploitation of women and children. In evaluating national and international research on the issue, this article finds that understanding the extent and nature of the problem is complicated, not only by contending definitions, but also by the lack of representative data about trafficking nationally and internationally.
Highlights
The idea of human beings being traded, exploited and abused challenges our very notion of civilisation and demands a response from governments, non-governmental organisations, law enforcement agencies and social service support structures
Trafficking is sometimes used as a blanket term for the sexual exploitation of women and children that constitutes much of the writing about this phenomenon
SA CRIME QUARTERLY No 16 JUNE 2006 drugged and abducted by sinister immigrant procurers, waking up to find themselves captive in some infernal foreign brothel, where they were subject to the pornographic whims of sadistic, non-white pimps and brothel masters.”[1]. Doezema argues that research done at the time established that most of the alleged trafficking victims were sex workers who had migrated in search of better opportunities
Summary
The idea of human beings being traded, exploited and abused challenges our very notion of civilisation and demands a response from governments, non-governmental organisations, law enforcement agencies and social service support structures.
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