Skip to main content

Advertisement

SpringerLink
Log in

Constructing the ideal victim in the United States of America’s annual trafficking in persons reports

  • Published:
Crime, Law and Social Change Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

Human trafficking as a global phenomenon continues to elude accurate quantitative measure, and remains a controversial policy domain significantly influenced by anecdotal evidence. Drawing on the policy analysis framework of Bacchi (1999, Policy and Society, 26(3), 5–20, 2007) the problem representation of trafficking through narratives can be considered a direct antecedent of contemporary anti-human trafficking policy. This article explores the construction of human trafficking within the Trafficking in Persons Reports, published annually by the United States of America’s Department of State. An examination of the victim and offender narratives contained within the reports published between 2001 and 2012 demonstrates that human trafficking is predominantly represented as a crime committed by ideal offenders against idealized victims, consistent with Christie’s (1986) landmark criteria of ideal victimization. This representation of an ideal prototype has the potential to inform policy that diverts focus from the causative role of global socioeconomic injustice towards criminal justice policies targeting individual offenders.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Log in via an institution

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Institutional subscriptions

Similar content being viewed by others

References

  1. Agustin, L. (2007). Sex at the margins: Migration, labour markets and the rescue industry. London: Zed Books.

    Google Scholar 

  2. Bacchi, C. L. (1999). Women, policy and politics: The construction of policy problems. London: Sage Publications.

    Google Scholar 

  3. Bacchi, C. L. (2007). The ethics of problem representation: widening the scope of ethical debate. Policy and Society, 26(3), 5–20.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  4. Bales, K. (1999). Disposable people: new slavery in the global economy. Berkeley, California: University of California Press.

  5. Bernstein, E. (2010). Militarized humanitarianism meets carceral feminism: the politics of sex, rights, and freedom in contemporary antitrafficking campaigns. Signs, 36(1), 45–71. doi:10.1086/652918.

  6. Burnham, P. (2008). Research methods in politics (2nd ed.). Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.

  7. Christie, N. (1986). The ideal victim’. In E. Fattah (Ed.), From crime policy to victim policy: Reorienting the justice system. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.

    Google Scholar 

  8. Chuang, J. (2006). The United States as global sheriff: using unilateral sanctions to combat human trafficking. Michigan Journal of International Law, 27, 437–494.

    Google Scholar 

  9. Chuang, J. A. (2010). Rescuing trafficking from ideological capture: prostitution reform and anti-trafficking law and policy. University of Pennsylvania Law Review, 158(6), 1655–1728.

    Google Scholar 

  10. Desyllas, M. C. (2007). A critique of the global trafficking discourse and U.S. policy. Journal of Sociology & Social Welfare, 34(4), 57–79.

    Google Scholar 

  11. Farley, M. (2004). ‘Bad for the body, bad for the heart’: prostitution harms women even if legalized or decriminalized. Violence Against Women, 10, 1087–1125. doi:10.1177/1077801204268607.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  12. Farrell, A., & Fahy, S. (2009). The problem of human trafficking in the U.S.: public frames and policy responses. Journal of Criminal Justice, 37, 617–626. doi:10.1016/j.jcrimjus.2009.09.010.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  13. Foucault, M. (1977). Discipline and punish: The birth of the prison. London: Penguin.

    Google Scholar 

  14. Goodey, J. (2008). Human trafficking: sketchy data and policy responses. Criminology and Criminal Justice, 8(4), 421–442. doi:10.1177/1748895808096471.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  15. Hayes, S., Carpenter, B., & Dwyer, A. (2012). Sex, crime & morality. New York: Routledge.

    Google Scholar 

  16. Hoyle, C., Bosworth, M., & Dempsey, M. (2011). Labelling the victims of sex trafficking: exploring the borderland between rhetoric and reality. Social and Legal Studies, 20(3), 313–329. doi:10.1177/0964663911405394.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  17. Kangaspunta, K. (2007). Collecting data on human trafficking: Availability, reliability and comparability of trafficking data. In Savona & Stefanizzi (Eds.), Measuring human trafficking: Complexities and pitfalls. New York: Springer.

    Google Scholar 

  18. Kingdon, J. (1995). Agendas, alternatives, and public policies. New York: HarperCollins College Publishers.

    Google Scholar 

  19. Musto, J. L. (2009). What’s in a name? Conflations and contradictions in contemporary U.S. discourses of human trafficking. Women's Studies International Forum, 32, 281–287. doi:10.1016/j.wsif.2009.05.016.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  20. O’Brien, E., Carpenter, B., & Hayes, S. (2013). Sex trafficking and moral harm: politicised understandings and depictions of the trafficked experience. Critical Criminology: International Journal. doi:10.1007/s10612-013-9183-6.

    Google Scholar 

  21. O’Brien, E. (2011). Fuelling traffic: abolitionist claims of a causal nexus between legalised prostitution and trafficking. Crime, Law and Social Change, 56, 547–565. doi:10.1007/s10611-011-9334-1.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  22. O'Brien, E. (2013). Ideal victims in trafficking awareness campaigns. In K. Carrington, M. Ball, E. O'Brien, & J. Tauri (Eds.), Crime, justice and social democracy: International perspectives (pp. 315–326). Palgrave MacMillan.

  23. O’Connell-Davidson, J. (2010). New slavery, old binaries: human trafficking and the borders of ‘freedom’. Global Networks, 10(2), 244–261.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  24. Potter, W.J., & Levine‐Donnerstein, D. (1999). Rethinking validity and reliability in content analysis. Journal of Applied Communication Research, 27(3), 258–284. doi:10.1080/00909889909365539.

  25. Saunders, P., & Soderlund, G. (2003). Threat or opportunity: Sexuality, gender and the ebb and flow of trafficking as discourse. Canadian Woman Studies, 22, 35–46.

    Google Scholar 

  26. Saunders, P. (2005). Traffic violations: determining the meaning of violence in sexual trafficking versus sex work. Journal of Interpersonal Violence, 20, 343–360. doi:10.1177/0886260504272509.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  27. Segrave, M. (2009). Order at the border: the repatriation of victims of trafficking. Women's Studies International Forum, 32, 251–260. doi:10.1016/j.wsif.2009.05.006.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  28. Segrave, M., Milivojevvic, S., & Pickering, S. (2009). Sex trafficking: International context and response. Portland: Willan Publishing.

    Google Scholar 

  29. Sharma, N. (2005). Anti-trafficking rhetoric and the making of a global apartheid. NWSA Journal, 17(3), 88–111.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  30. Soderlund, G. (2005). Running from the rescuers: new U.S. crusades against sex trafficking and the rhetoric of abolition. NWSA Journal, 17, 64–87.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  31. Srikantiah, J. (2007). Perfect victims and real survivors: The iconic victim in domestic human trafficking law. Boston University Law Review, 87(1), 157–211.

    Google Scholar 

  32. Stone, D. (1989). Casual stories and the formation of policy agendas. Political Science Quarterly, 104(2), 281–300.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  33. Tyldum, G., & Brunovskis, A. (2005). Describing the unobserved: methodological challenges in empirical studies on human trafficking. International Migration, 43(1/2), 17–34.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  34. U.S. Department of State. (2004). Trafficking in persons report 2004. Accessed http://www.state.gov/j/tip/rls/tiprpt/2004/index.htm.

  35. U.S. Department of State. (2005). Trafficking in persons report 2005. Accessed http://www.state.gov/j/tip/rls/tiprpt/2005/index.htm.

  36. U.S. Department of State. (2006). Trafficking in persons report 2006. Accessed http://www.state.gov/j/tip/rls/tiprpt/2006/index.htm.

  37. U.S. Department of State. (2007). Trafficking in persons report 2007. Accessed http://www.state.gov/j/tip/rls/tiprpt/2007/index.htm.

  38. U.S. Department of State. (2008). Trafficking in persons report 2008. Accessed http://www.state.gov/j/tip/rls/tiprpt/2008/index.htm.

  39. U.S. Department of State. (2009). Trafficking in persons report 2009. Accessed http://www.state.gov/j/tip/rls/tiprpt/2009/index.htm.

  40. U.S. Department of State. (2010). Trafficking in persons report 2010. Accessed http://www.state.gov/j/tip/rls/tiprpt/2010/index.htm.

  41. U.S. Department of State. (2012). Trafficking in persons report 2012. http://www.state.gov/j/tip/rls/tiprpt/2012/index.htm.

  42. Uy, R. (2011). Blinded by red lights: why trafficking discourse should shift away from sex and the “perfect victim” paradigm. Berkeley Journal of Gender, Law & Justice, 26, 204–219.

    Google Scholar 

  43. Van den Anker, Christien. (2006). Trafficking and women’s rights: beyond the sex industry to ‘other industries’. Journal of Global Ethics, 2(2), 163–182. doi:10.1080/17449620601042862.

  44. Van Dijk, T. A. (2006). Ideology and discourse analysis. Journal of Political Ideologies, 11(2), 115–140.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  45. Victims of Trafficking and Violence Protection Act (US). (2000). http://www.state.gov/j/tip/laws/61124.htm. Accessed 24 Sept 2013.

  46. Weitzer, R. (2007). The social construction of sex trafficking: ideology and institutionalization of a moral crusade. Politics & Society, 35, 447–475.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  47. Yen, I. (2008). Of vice and men: a new approach to eradicating sex trafficking by reducing male demand through educational programs and abolitionist legislation. The Journal of Criminal Law & Criminology, 98(2), 653–686.

    Google Scholar 

  48. Zhang, S. X. (2012). Measuring labor trafficking: a research note. Crime, Law and Social Change, 58, 469–482. doi:10.1007/s10611-012-9393-y.

    Article  Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Justice, Faculty of Law, Queensland University of Technology, 2 George Street, Brisbane, Queensland, 4000, Australia

    Michael Wilson & Erin O’Brien

Authors
  1. Michael Wilson
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Erin O’Brien
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Michael Wilson.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this article

Wilson, M., O’Brien, E. Constructing the ideal victim in the United States of America’s annual trafficking in persons reports. Crime Law Soc Change 65, 29–45 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10611-015-9600-8

Download citation

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10611-015-9600-8

Keywords

Search

Navigation