Trafficking in Women, Slavery, Sex Work: Transnational Politics of "Sexual Labour" in the Second Half of the 20th Century

The subject of the doctoral project is transnational policies and debates on those forms of "sexual labour" that were described as "prostitution" and "trafficking in women" in the second half of the 20th century. The project analyses the period from the foundation of the United Nations (1945) to the Fourth World Conference on Women in Beijing (1995). The starting point of the research project is the "Convention for the Suppression of the Traffic in Persons and of the Exploitation of the Prostitution of Others" adopted by the United Nations in 1949.

Firstly, it examines the development and historical change of transnational activities and policies regarding "sexual labour" at the level of the United Nations and the commissions and working groups responsible there, as well as at the level of transnationally active women's organisations in transnational spaces, such as the World Conferences on Women. Secondly, the study examines conceptualisations and processes of negotiation in the interpretation and normative assessment of "sexual work" by transnationally active actors. The focus here is particularly on the question of the shift and differentiation of concepts of prostitution: How did which actors conceptualise and understand prostitution against the background of which assumptions and patterns of interpretation? In particular, the current common understandings of "sexual work" as either "human trafficking" and "violence against women" or "sex work" are historicised and embedded in their historical context of origin. Thirdly, patterns of interpretation and conceptualisations of "sexual labour" are examined with regard to three discursive fields: work, sexuality and human rights.

Funding:

University of Erfurt (Initialisation scholarship,June 2014 - December 2014)
German Historical Institute, Washington DC(February 2015 - March 2015)
Heinrich Böll Foundation(since October 2015)

_{Image: Dolinsek, own photo © United Nations Archives}