Introduction to Special Issue: Human Trafficking

Abstract

This special issue focuses on a crime that has been classified by the United Nations as the third most profitable crime in the world — human trafficking (Fichtelberg 2008). 1 The international contributions in this issue cover a range of key social, economic, political and legal issues as they relate to human trafficking. The genesis for this collection evolved out of a major project led by Philip Reichel which was completed in 2007. Reichel and an international team examined Canadian and US practices of combating human trafficking. In addition, the project explored a range of initiatives used in Europe and proposed by the United Nations.2 Before presenting an overview of the articles, we thought it instructive to provide a synopsis of some of the fundamental issues involved in human trafficking. Our thinking was that a brief discussion of these more general, descriptive, theoretical and practical issues would provide some context for readers unfamiliar with the subject of human trafficking.

Identifying human trafficking in Norway: A register-based study of cases, outcomes and police practices

“…Secondly, I analyse variations in initiation practices throughout the period 2003-13. The study thus responds to previous calls for THB studies to take features of the local context into account (Winterdyk and Reichel, 2010). Finally, I look at the THB case outcomes and examine whether these cases result in a legal decision against the person(s) charged with the crime.…”

Anatomy of a crisis: governing youth mobility through vulnerability

“…Scholarship inadvertently has buttressed an emphasis on increasingly specialised and narrow categorisations of vulnerability. At times, vulnerability is deployed in an effort to multiply categories of migrants who have access to resources and services (Turner 2019), such as unaccompanied children (Bhabha and Schmidt 2008), trafficking victims (Winterdyk and Reichel 2010), domestic violence survivors (Brownridge 2009), climate refugees (Haines et al 2006), and stateless persons (Flegar 2018). This literature adeptly details how limited legal categories of refugees and economic migrants fail to reflect the multiple and dynamic causes and experiences of displacement.…”

Labour Trafficking in Canada: At the Margins of the Anti-Trafficking Efforts

“…The antitrafficking response is characterised the predominance of a crime-control approach (prosecution of traffickers and fighting irregular migration) and therefore the weak protection mechanisms for victims (Ricard-Guay & Hanley 2015). Further, labour trafficking has been overlooked (Dandurand & Chin, 2014;Fudge & MacPhail, 2009;Hastie & Yule, 2014;Kaye & Hastie, 2015;Quarterman et al, 2012;Ricard-Guay & Hanley, 2015;Sikka, 2013;Winterdyk & Reichel, 2010).…”