Migration and Sex Work in Europe

Abstract

This book is about the ways in which current reconfiguration of the modes of governing in Europe are playing themselves out at the level of the subject and the impact they are having on individual experience of gender difference and sexuality. The topic through which I examine these transformations is that of ‘sex trafficking’, commonly understood as a process by means of which people are purposely recruited by use of force or deception for forced labour or exploitation in the sex sector. This book is, however, about more than ‘sex trafficking’. My argument is that experiences such as that of Liudmila described in the Preface offer insight into broader transformations of state sovereignty, labour markets and citizenship arising as consequences of globalisation and European enlargement. It is the aim of this book to explore the conditions under which ‘sex trafficking’ comes about and is sustained, and to make visible how these conditions are connected to broader spheres of social and political life in contemporary Europe.