Major Controversies on Human Trafficking - Research Paper Example

Major Controversies on Human Trafficking Introduction Human trafficking is perceived to be a form of modern day slavery. To be precise, two centuries ago, trans-Atlantic slave trade was formally prohibited by the United States and Britain. Despite the ending of slavery trade practices, there exists an increase in slave labor and sex trafficking in the world today. This is because, some individuals’ belief that others are more or less than human. As a result of globalization, there is a continuous flow of services, goods, labor and capital between various countries and continents in the world. The majority of authors have diverted their attention to emerging markets and flow of capital while ignoring the plight of individuals seeking greener pastures out of their mother country (Friedman, 2000). The IOM (International Organization for Migration) approximated in 2006 that there were about one hundred and ninety one million (191M) immigrants in the globe (IOM, 2006). These people (immigrants) are often treated by the host countries as outsiders thus impacting on how they are treated. For instance, most of them are denied the rights and protection as citizens of the host country (Engstrom, 2006, Aleinikoff & Klusmeyer, 2002). This is inflamed by their status as outsiders. Immigrants are frequently exposed to various harms and forms of exploitation such as human trafficking and basic human rights violation conceived as a form of modern day slavery. Trafficking of human is a representation of an extreme way of labor exploitation. Furthermore, it is regarded as one of the negative impacts of globalization. Trafficking supplies people for purposes of street begging, prostitution, marriage, adoption, domestic work, construction, agricultural work and armed conflicts among others which form part of exploitative services or labor. Exploiting individuals for labor purposes has generated a lot of profits for those individuals involved in the acts. According to (Feingold, 2005), the approximate gained benefit is about$32billion yearly. As a result, human trafficking was defined as the worlds’ fastest expanding criminal industry by the United States of America Department of Health and Human Services (USDHHS, 2004). In comparison to enterprises that are illegal, trafficking comes second after drug trafficking. Moreover, it is linked to industries dealing with illegal arms due to its capability of generating dollars. Trafficking of humans is not only a global issue but also a domestic problem. In comparison to other countries, United States of America is the principal receiver of persons trafficked. Annually, approximately 15,000-50,000 of victims internationally trafficked get into the United States (United States Department of State [US DOS], 2005, US DHHS, 2004, UNODC, 2006). These victims can be located in a variety of United States economy sectors such as factories, prostitutions, sweatshops and the service industry (US DHHS, 2004). The data provided gives a clue about how adverse the problem is. Human trafficking as a crime is extremely under reported making it difficult to identify the victims (Hopper, 2004). Given the human trafficking’s secretive and criminal nature; victims are frequently hidden in homes, brothels and businesses. Additionally, human trafficking victims are rarely encountered by social workers, law enforcement and health care professionals. This is because of the difficulty in identifying victims that are potential to human trafficking and also the hiding of victims in areas that are not accessed easily (Diaz, 2006). Victims of human trafficking are remarkably reluctant to inquire for aid or support when they have the opportunity of accessing social services or law enforcement. This is attributed to psychological coercion and fear of trafficker retribution (United Stated Department of Justice [US DOJ], 2006). Similarly, the majority of the victims are from countries exhibiting governments that are highly oppressive thus making them to fear any authority or government official figure (Human Rights Center, 2004). The purpose of this paper is thus to analyze the five major controversies in Human trafficking. These are such as the legalization of prostitution, the demand for human trafficking, the pros and cons of media attention, the problem of immigration and the sources of aiding victims of human trafficking and eliminate the problem. The Immigration Problem For the better understanding of the immigration problem Carlo will be taken as a case study. Carlo is a Philippine aged twenty seven years. He together with ten women and men are recruited to go and offer their services in a Midwestern Hotel in America. Before flying out of their country, they were promised reasonable working hours, higher wages and benefits. As a processing fee, they were each charged $ 1200 for purposes of securing their jobs. In addition to that, a non-negotiable charge was added by the Hotel managers to cater for rent. This was a trick to coercing Carlo and his friends to work extra hours in order to pay for the debt. To make matters worse, the traffickers confiscated Carlos passport to bar him from escaping. In addition to that, the passport confiscation rendered Carlos undocumented making him subject to deportation and potential arrest by hotel premises immigration officials if caught. Working for approximately 16-18hrs a day, Carlo with his Filipinos friends had to endure hotel managers’ total control over various dimensions of their lives. For instance, where they resided, what they ate and hours they toiled. From the case study, it is clear that Carlo is a Philippine Migrant. His problem begins when his recruiter utilizes fraudulent means to offer him employment. In addition to that, Carlo pays a huge sum of cash as recruitment fee which he can only manage to pay through taking a loan. This makes Carlo susceptible to exploitation the moment he lands in the destined country (United States of America). The loan was as a result of the debt incurred during the recruitment process. This makes Carlo to be confined within the bondage of debt making him powerless in terms of mentioning his identification in a foreign country. In that case, the dignity of Carlo was robbed making him a forced labor victim. According to the Trafficking in Persons Report (TIP), various factors have triggered the migrants’ vulnerability in today’s world. This not only limits itself to minor labor exploitation but also encompasses gross exploitation. Factors engineering migrant vulnerability are such as the utilization of excessive debt as a means of manipulation, the presence of middlemen who uses fraudulent means to move millions of people across international boundaries, existence of weak laws and law enforcement that are essential in monitoring labor exploitation and lack of human trafficking understanding (Mark, 2008). Factors that enhance the migrants to depart their country of origin are the same factors that make them susceptible to exploitation by traffickers once they land in their final destinations. For instance, majority of Burmese facing severe economic conditions, political repression that is brutal and forced labor prospects at home countries have made these groups to flee their villages and homes without documents that are legal. As a result, they became vulnerable to recruiters and traffickers because of their desperate situations. It is therefore important for various authorities to highlight the distinction between human smuggling, human trafficking and illegal migration. This forms a hotly contested debate in modern day politics (Hoffmann, 1981). Policies made to conflate human smuggling; human trafficking or migrations that are illegal have potentially punished trafficking victims who seeks protection from exploitation. International instruments and US Laws view victims of human trafficking as not consenting to their problems at hand. On the contrary, if they consent initially, they afterward become victims of fraud, coercion or force as in the case of Carlo. The continued exploitation of victims of human trafficking generates illegal profits. However, the sooner the governments comprehend that migrants are human trafficking victims; the sooner individuals will develop an effective perspective. The appropriate perspective will look beyond the mechanisms of law enforcement and find adequate means of dealing with the challenges of human trafficking. The perspective will be formed based on the human dignity understanding naturally accorded to all individuals by the “Declaration of Independence principals”. For the principals to be effective, instruments for change needs to be effective to conquer the sadistic and rapacious individuals. Currently, there are policy and national laws, international instruments and bilateral accords which can be employed in servicing human dignity and eliminating the migrant’s vulnerability to trafficking (Slaughter, 2005). Legalization of Prostitution in Europe There are various controversies on whether decriminalizing or legalizing prostitution diminishes sex trafficking. There exist debates about prostitution among the feminists, legal scholars, enlightened parliamentarians and prostitution activists. In their discussions, a difference is always made between prostitution and its control socially in one dimension and a range of criminal activities. These activities are such as women trafficking and juvenile sexual exploitation. Even though these activities are linked to prostitution, they are not addressed during prostitution debates. However, proponents of legalizing prostitution argue that, enforcement of laws should base their focus on prostitution criminal corollaries instead of prostitution as an activity. As such, there is need to subject prostitution to administrative law. The law should be effective in regulating sex establishment's operations; moreover, the labor law should regulate the prostitutes working conditions. In Netherland prostitution has been legalized. In this country, the criminal law addresses criminal activities associated with prostitution such as exploitation of vulnerable groups including illegal migrants and juveniles. The enactment of the criminal law by the Dutch parliament was to accomplish three key goals. These goals are such as, emancipating prostitutes and sex establishment owners through improving their positions, ensuring transparency of prostitution scenes through monitoring and last to combat prostitution associated criminal activities. The legalizing of prostitution comes with various challenges. The most problematic is the increase in the levels of criminal activities of pimps and drug addicts and frequent clients’ muggings. In addition to that, dangerous fights often occur between drug dealers and police officers causing death of innocent individuals in the street through stabbing or shooting. Furthermore, the prostitutes are often vulnerable to serial killers and disease infections such as HIV/AIDS. This is because men are unwilling to utilize protection if they have paid for the services. In Europe as a continent, the legalizing of prostitution is a hotly contested issue. In areas such as Albania and Ukraine, selling of an individual body is not permitted. As such, men and women caught in the act of prostitution are severely punished. On the contrary, prostitution in Sweden is approached differently. For instance, the prostitute's customers are the ones punished. In other nations including Belgium, England and France the laws promoting prostitution are done away with. As a result, prostitutes residing in these nations live in the society's shadows. In countries such as Switzerland, Germany, the Netherlands and parts of Greece and Spain, prostitution is legal and it’s regulated. I n the case of Germany, prostitution is recognized as an employment choice that is legitimate. In this country, unemployed women are often coerced into prostitution. The German law highlights that, any woman who is unemployed and aged 55years is obligated to acquire any available job on the listings done internationally. If they do not take this into consideration, their unemployment benefit is withdrawn. This is what makes some women to take prostitution as a job in brothels that are legalized. In summary, there exists no policy that is uniform in terms of legalizing prostitution across the continent of Europe. These make it extremely difficult to deal with human trafficking and forced prostitution in Europe (“Europe Mull Standard Way to Deal with Prostitution”). The Pros and Cons of Media Attention Pros As observed by Potts (2003), media have a momentous responsibility in addressing controversies surrounding human trafficking. They require utmost support in their endeavor to address the controversies surrounding human trafficking. Media increased its coverage on human trafficking issues in the last few years. This was due to increased concern among humanitarian and other activist groups on the increased cases of human trafficking (Potts, 2003). Although human trafficking is old time phenomenon media coverage was limited. Media is very sensational in aiding the war against human trafficking. According to Potts (2003), one of the main intentions of the media in addressing human trafficking issue is that of broadening awareness. It is through media broadcast that human right activist get a perceptive on the magnitude of human trafficking in their area of jurisdiction. Human activity gathers a lot of information from media coverage on issues relating to human trafficking (Potts, 2003). The media coverage helps the public in getting incite on the intensity and method used in human trafficking. Such information is very relevant for protection purposes. It is though media broadcast that security and integrity agents learn about the existence of human crimes in international seen. Through its broad coverage responsibility, media assist in joining up human trafficking victims and the abolitionist groups for assistance. It broadcast initiative therefore oblige maximum support from the government and other involved parties. As noted by Potts (2003), media helps in increasing donation to the prevailing abolitionist groups. Abolitionists groups are groups premeditated with assisting the human trafficking victims. They are expected to proffer the victims with the required basic assistance. They also offer legal assistance where necessary. In this case, media aids in linking the abolitionist groups with well wisher, human activist group, and government agencies for material support (Potts, 2003). Through media coverage, the abolitionist groups get the required public representation. Public image formed by media coverage assist the public in providing the required resources and information relevant in the abolitionist endeavors. In general, media helps in increasing the tangible and intangible donation to the abolitionist groups. Abolitionists have the mandate of liaising with media services to enhance their public image as well as increasing their donation avenues. According to Kara (2011), the media has the role of pressurizing the government and other involved agencies in ensuring human trafficking menace is addressed one and for all. Media present the government with the relevant information for mitigation measures. After issuing useful information related to human trafficking, media pressurizes the government take the appropriate action (Kara, 2011). Media pressurization effort has obliged the government and other involved organization and agencies to take concrete action in rescuing the victims as well as blocking the human trafficking process. The challenges posed by the media to reluctant department serves as wakeup calls to the government. The profound combination between the governments and the media have reported productive outcome to the human trafficking victims. The pressurizing role of the media requires support from the organizations involved. According to Kara (2011), media plays a substantial role in amalgamating the human trafficking victims with their relatives and other law enforcers. It is through the media, that the public identifies their trafficked relatives. Media exposes the identified victims to the public for identification purposes. As observed by Kara (2011), in a research result released by different abolitionist group in 2011, more than three quarter of the human trafficking victims are reunited with their families through the assistance of media. On the other hand, media helps the law enforcers in identifying the people and groups accountable for human trafficking. The steps relevant in searching for a human traffic victim are publicly discussed in the media by experts to ensure citizens sensitization. The media grants the abolitionist groups a chance to link the victims and their families. Media also ensure concrete legal actions to those who are responsible for the human trafficking crimes. Media as well helps in linking the victims with law enforcers for assistant. Media effort in uniting the victims with their family and law enforcers is very credible in reducing human trafficking practice. The Cons As retaliated by Gulati (2010) despite of the media prolific contribution in addressing the controversy surrounding human trafficking, it has been challenged and condemned for various inadequacies. The media have been challenged for overstressing on prostitution facet of human trafficking and ignoring other crucial aspects. This has influenced the policies available relating to human trafficking (Gulati 2010). There are extremely numerous policies pertinent in addressing the prostitution aspects of human trafficking with very limited policies touching on other areas of human trafficking. Human traffickers have therefore dwelled on other aspect of human trafficking ignored by the media and the government agencies. The public have also associated human trafficking with prostitution trafficking (Gulati 2010). This has been facilitated by the perception developed by the media concerning the entire human trafficking predicament. There are other aspects of human trafficking which are more complicated than prostitution. Some of them include forced labour, child labour, and slavery. There is therefore need for media houses to include other aspect of human trafficking in their coverage. Coverage of the entire human trafficking arena can have a significant contribution to the reduction of human trafficking incidences. According to Kara (2011), media have also been blamed by the government and other policy makers for their close interaction with abolitionist movement. Media services work hand in hand with abolitionist movements to condemn and underrate government humanitarian effort (Kara 2011). Government policies and regulation concerning the menace surrounding human trafficking, have been ignored by media reports. They discourage their alliance with the government in addressing and tackling the human trafficking complication. In the real sense, media services are expected to be non partisan in their activities. The media overemphasis on one side of humanitarian issues has therefore attracted numerous challenges. To address abundantly the entire shortcomings brought about by human trafficking, all involved parties have to work collectively without biases or irrelevant criticism. The media have also been condemned for stereotyping the entire human trafficking process. In reference to Kara (2011), many victims who are trafficked are poor Africa people. According to media reports, significant numbers of people who are trafficked are from African continent and some parts of Asia. The main traders of human being are portrayed by the media to be white people. In the real sense, this is not the case. Human trafficking involves all people in the world. History has sited trade between African in West Africa. Therefore, to address fully the human trafficking menace media services should eliminate all biases and stereotype related to the entire process. The Demand for Human Trafficking Schloenhardt, (2001) observed that, like traditional slavery, modern slavery is driven by desire for wealth and other economic benefits. Despite of other factors which hasten human trafficking, money and economic factors is the fundamental human traffic driving forces. The human trafficking business is necessitated by the demand for their product in the market (Schloenhardt, 2001). There is increased demand for cheap and free labour in economically developed countries. Economist belief that, cheap labour reduces operation costs. It also increases the organizational profit. Human beings are pushed from t economically poor countries and pushed to countries which have higher economic level and are demanding for cheap labour (Bales, 2005). Many people are trafficked for economic purposes to other countries which are economically well up. It has been noted that, migrant into new economy get more wages than wages of their home country. The desire for people to be migrated to other country for economic purposes have increased human trafficking problem. If the demand for cheap and free labour goes down, the trafficker will lack the market for their product. In most cases human traffickers target people poor and uneducated people who cannot understand the odd associated with human trafficking (Bartilow and Eom, 2009). In this regard therefore, governments and other involved organization have the responsibility of blocking the available economic demands to address full the human trafficking problem. Lawrance (2010) stated that, human trafficking for prostitution is necessitated by the demand for prostitutes in sex industries in the receiving countries. The presence of sex brothel and other sex industries have led to increase in human trafficking. According to Lawrence, (2010) ladies admitted to be trafficked to get money reward after their services. The demand is high in the countries which have legalized sex industries. In most country, there are no laws that deter the sex industries (Lawrence, 2010). It is taken as lucrative enterprises in countries. The demand to get female to do commercial sex work has therefore increased the demand for commercial sex workers. The commercial sex work is referred by entrepreneurs as among the highly earning business with limited expenses and risks. The already recruited commercial sex workers also fuel sex trafficking. After undergoing the horror of being forced to sleep with variety of men at the same time they goes back home and recruit other ladies in the market. They initiate agencies to recruit more women thus increasing the demand in the market. According to Bales (2005), business men are therefore the one accountable for the increased human trafficking. They develop market for the trafficked people thus increasing the demand for trafficked people. Trafficked people are believed to increase the profit in different entrepreneurship. They offer cheap labour in the industries and farms. Entrepreneurs therefore demand them for cheap labour which is tantamount to increased profit. On the other hand, sex industries and brothels are believed to increase the demand of sexual workers. Commercial sex workers are believed be one of the highly earning businesses with limited risk. To address human trafficking issues, demand should be reduced in the in the concerned industries. Commercial sex work ought to be made illegal in the concerned countries. Action should also be sting for those who force young ladies to have sex. On the other hand, labour laws should be followed to the latter to reduce workers exploitation. Blocking the demand for trafficked people will have a role in reducing human trafficking. The Resources for Aiding Victims and Stopping This Problem According to Van Impe (2000), this has to do with utilization of resources in assisting the victims as well as stopping human trafficking crisis. The question which revolves around the resources is how the limited resources will be utilized. The involved government bodies as well as human activist are in contradiction on how to utilize the resources available. Businessmen who transact human trafficking are feared to be very wealth. They are known to fund other illegal businesses in the world like drug trafficking and money laundering (Van Impe, 2000). It is unfortunate that, there are very limited amount of resources to address a big problem facing the entire world. There is politic over the involved stakeholders on the best way to make use of the available resources. Humanitarian opt for using the resources in addressing the issues of the already affected victims while policy maker and politicians prefer preventing more people from being victims. In general there limited resources are expected to serve very many purposes. Childress (2012) observed that, initiative to address human trafficking issue is very expensive. It requires adequate and consistence resources. All the issues associated with human trafficking must be included in the resources politics. All the involved stakeholders have the responsibility of coming together for this common disaster. Policies for looking and managing the available resources are very relevant. Humanitarian and policy makers have to arrive at a compromise on the best ways of addressing the problem associated with human trafficking. The available resources should be shared in a transparent manner to meet the intended purposes. On the other hand, adequate amount of resources should be availed to deal with this international problem Conclusion Globally, human trafficking is not a problem that is new. However, globalization dynamics trigger its growth. Elimination of human trafficking occurrence and finding remedies to its diverse harms needs countries coalition both regionally and globally. The coalition also needs to incorporate non-governmental organizations. The coalition need to focus on three major areas such as protection, prevention and prosecution. Human traffickers’ prosecution will aid in preventing the activity from occurring through imprisoning and breaking of their trafficking networks. Protection will facilitate the easy identification of human trafficking victims. As such, immigration officers, police officers, health care professionals and social workers need to be thoroughly trained on valid means of identifying victims of human trafficking. For purposes of intervening effectively on issues dealing with human trafficking, there is a need for social workers to be aware of trafficking realities. Individuals involve in decision making need to make migration globally more human. In addition to that, they should acknowledge the trafficking processes and dynamic and effective ways of combating human trafficking. In countries legalizing prostitution, policies should be made to protect individuals who practice prostitution. They should be protected from exploitation and criminal acts such as rape, brutal murder among others. In addition to that, countries should not coerce an individual into carrying out of prostitution like in the German context. Collective effort among all stakeholders is paramount in the fight against human trafficking. Taking into consideration the suffering encountered by human trafficking victim, measures to rescue them and protect future incidences is paramount and relevant. Media require appreciation for their endless work in addressing issues affecting human trafficking. They should work collaborative with other player in addressing and sensitizing the public on the issues affecting the public. Their effort is inevitable in addressing the universal menace. However, the media have a room for improvement in their coverage. To fully address the problem of human trafficking, media have the responsibility of addressing all facets of human trafficking. The increase in modern human trafficking is brought about by increase in demand for their services. The demand for free and cheap labour among entrepreneurs has increased the demand of trafficked victims. On the other hand, demand for sex trafficking has been thickened by presence of sex companies and brothel in the economic market. International regulations to address the commercial sex should be strictly adhered to reduce human trafficking. There are very limited resources to address human trafficking issues. This has risen politic among the involved shareholders on how the available resources can be distribution among all demands. The involved shareholders have the mandate of ensuring equal distribution of resources among all shareholders. More resources are however required to fully diminish the human trafficking peril. References Aleinikoff, T. A., & Klusmeyer, D. (2002). Citizenship policies for an age of migration. Washington, DC: Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. Bales, K. (2005). Disposable people: New slavery in the global economy. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press. Bartilow, H., and Eom, K. (2009). 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