In the recent years, there have been increased number of women and children who have been trafficked; however, the figures have continued to remain highly elusive. In the year 2000, the US government reported that about 45,000 and 50,000 women and children were victims of trafficking in the US from various states across the world (Chuang, 2005). By the year 2002, the US government further approximated that about 700,000 and four million men, women and children were trafficked and a greater number of them were women and girls. Other reports confirmed that annual figures of the population who are trafficked internationally are between 600,000 to 800,000 yearly. Among these numbers, 80 percent comprised of both men and women and 50 percent were minors. Therefore, human trafficking has become a global problem that requires international coordination to eradicate it completely.
In the recent years, the government established a policy aimed at controlling and eliminating human trafficking as a business. The Trafficking Victims Protection Act (TVPA) of the year 2000 is the U.S. federal policy focuses on reducing human trafficking in the U.S. and internationally. The policy operated by taking a three-pronged approach to Prosecution, Prevention, and Protection. Since the year 2000, the policy has been reauthorized four times; however, it still fails to address and combat human trafficking adequately. These shortcomings result in a significant part from the policy’s failure to take into consideration the legacy of exploitation that the US cultural and economic systems have relied upon since the first settlers arrived in North America (Schaffner, 2013).
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Federal policy has been shown to dictate the resources available to serve the trafficking victims, impacting our capability to offer competent services to clients. The TVPA has consequences for social justice, as trafficking is experienced more frequently by individuals from disadvantaged groups, particularly women and girls. This policy analysis exposed gaps within the efforts of the policy to offer the victims vital services, in addition to shortcomings in the criminal justice-based approach the policy employs (Spohn, 2014). Further, this study documents the millions of dollars that have been spent on anti-trafficking efforts, which is of primary importance to the social work profession in an era of increased accountability, budget cuts, and deficits. This analysis applies to individuals all over the globe, as trafficking is an issue that impacts people from all nations and cultural backgrounds. In particular, trafficking is influenced by factors such as poverty, gender discrimination and in addition to limited economic opportunities. The analysis illustrated strategies in which the policy could be improved to protect individuals from marginalized groups in particular better.
The evaluation criteria used to focus on the effectiveness of TVPA was through the structure outlined by Gil in his Policy Analysis Framework. In this case, the objective was to establish various issues revolving around the human trafficking policy. An additional goal was to point out potential consequences that are experienced as result of the adoption and the implementation of the policy. Both the secondary and primary sources that were utilized for this analysis included: Books, journal articles, law review articles and Government reports & publications. According to Shamir (2012), the policy was meant to curb trafficking across the US and in international economies in addition to positioning the US as one of the global leaders in the fight against trafficking. Further, it was aimed at placing more powers in the US government’s hand to monitor and enforce anti-trafficking activities worldwide and perpetuate an anti-prostitution agenda. It was to be achieved through the adoption of deterrence approach through harsh punishments for offenders, the social pressure associated with international tier rankings and economic deterrence through the monetary sanctions for countries that perform poorly.
Approximately 9, 460 prosecutions were reported to have taken place by the end of 2013 as a result of the policy implementation and among them about 1, 1199 of those prosecuted were engaging in labor trafficking. By the end of the year 2009, individuals prosecuted for human trafficking dropped rapidly since the year 2013 at the rate of 8.1% fewer prosecutions per year. The TIP report further approximated that about 44,000 victims of human trafficking were identified in 2013 and among them; 20 million victims have remained undetected (Shamir, 2012). The policy prioritizes gender-specific sex trafficking, at the expense of the human rights of other victims. New prosecution and sentencing requirements are not consistently applied, and this greatly minimizes perceived the threat of punishment for traffickers. Deterrence on the global scale suffers greatly from the inconsistent application of sanctions, and this often results from politicized decision-making on the part of the U.S. Government (Chuang, 2006).
It is important for the Social workers to advocate for legislation that will institute evidence-based, prevention-focused programs that contribute to promoting the rights of marginalized groups. The international organizations should provide funding for accessible, evidence-based trafficking-specific services for all victims (Chuang, 2014). Social workers ought to be at the forefront of the development of evidence-based direct practice approaches to serving victims of trafficking; further, they must also engage in quality quantitative studies to generate accurate statistics on trafficking victim numbers that exist in the US and abroad. It is also critical that the social workers must advocate for a paradigm shift; away from the criminal justice approach to anti-trafficking efforts. It can be achieved through advocating for a labor paradigm –works to stop exploitation before it starts, Shifts attention to international labor markets and the structures that manage them, which develops the power dynamics and coercion that lead to trafficking. It will thus eliminate the emphasis on gender-specific sex trafficking and prostitution.
References
Chuang, J. (2005). The United States as global sheriff: Using unilateral sanctions to combat human trafficking. Mich. J. Int'l L. , 27 , 437.
Chuang, J. (2006). Beyond a snapshot: Preventing human trafficking in the global economy. Indiana Journal of Global Legal Studies , 13 (1), 137-163.
Chuang, J. A. (2014). Exploitation creep and the unmaking of human trafficking law. American Journal of International Law , 108 (4), 609-649.
Schaffner, J. E. (2013). Optimal deterrence: a law and economics assessment of sex and labor trafficking law in the United States. Hous. L. Rev. , 51 , 1519.
Shamir, H. (2012). A labor paradigm for human trafficking. UCLA L. Rev. , 60 , 76.
Spohn, C. (2014). The non-prosecution of human trafficking cases: an illustration of the challenges of implementing legal reforms. Crime, Law and Social Change , 61 (2), 169-178.
