Prostitution policy must target clients

May 22, 2009 Edition 1
Errol Naidoo
The South African Law Reform Commission recently released a discussion paper on Adult Prostitution for public comment. Options put forward for comment include maintaining the status quo; partial decriminalization, full decriminalization and legalization.
Women and girls (and some boys) caught up in prostitution are harmed not only by the prostitution itself but also by pimps, boyfriends, brothel keepers, traffickers and clients. Essentially, prostitution is nothing more than the exploitation by those with greater social and economic power of those who are made vulnerable by poverty, inequality, violence and abuse.
Prostitution is not work in any conventional sense of the word. Few people make a rational decision to enter into prostitution as a career choice; it is generally a survival strategy. The average age of those entering prostitution is estimated to be about 14 internationally.
Over the last decade in South Africa various groups have lobbied for decriminalization/ legalization of prostitution and the construction of prostitution as work.
Implicit in this view is the assumption that a regulated or decriminalized industry will contain the growth of the brothel and street trade, eliminate organized crime and end child prostitution and sex trafficking.
International experience has shown that in countries such as Australia and the Netherlands, where this policy was adopted, the opposite has proved to be the case.
These nations have all experienced a significant increase in legal and illegal prostitution, child prostitution and trafficking in persons for sexual purposes.
The mayor of Amsterdam, Job Cohen, admitted that the policy of legalization has been a failure and has instituted a reversal.
He conceded that organized crime dominated the industry in which sex trafficking, exploitation, drug abuse and money laundering was rife. One third of the brothel windows have been bought out and replaced with fashion boutiques and there are plans afoot to replace a majority of the remaining windows.
Rafts of new restrictions on other aspects of the sex trade are also being introduced. Permits have also been withdrawn from dozens of sex businesses.
Tolerance zones set up for street prostitution have also proved a failure. In 2003 the central-Amsterdam Tipplezone (pick-up area) established in 1995 for street prostitutes and promoted as a way to control the problems associated with prostitution was closed.
The mayor admitted that it became a haven for traffickers, drug dealers and that it was unsafe for women. The Tipplezone in Rotterdam was closed for similar reasons.
In Australia both the policy of legalization (Victoria) and decriminalization (NSW) of the sex trade have been adopted.
The results have been the same: a significant increase in all facets of the sex industry.
Legal brothels, child prostitution and trafficking have all increased and authorities concede that the illegal sex trade is out of control.
The Sydney Morning Herald (Dec 2006) reported that almost four times the number of illegal, compared to legal sex premises, were operating in Sydney alone. top.DisplayAds('SquareL', 13, 3131); window.google_render_ad();
Prostitution was decriminalized in New Zealand in 2003.
The National Council of Women of New Zealand, which originally supported the decriminalization of prostitution, is now of the view that the only winners from the 2003 Prostitution Reform Act are males.
It is clearly not advisable for South Africa to emulate any of the above examples.
Instead the nation should follow the Swedish example in which prostitution is regarded as gender-based violence and a zero-tolerance approach is taken against buyers, procurers and traffickers.
In 1999, at approximately the same time the Netherlands opted for legalization, Sweden introduced a policy of abolition with the focus on clamping down on the demand and helping women to exit prostitution.
The purchase and attempted purchase of sexual services was criminalized for the first time. Street prostitution was reduced and more importantly a barrier was erected against trafficking.
Then there is the harm to women themselves.
In a study, Prostitution in Five Countries: Violence and Post-traumatic Stress (including South Africa) by Farley et al, 67 percent met the criteria for a diagnosis of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder.
She also noted that "over time, the constant violence of prostitution, constant humiliation and the social indignity and misogyny, result in personality changes".
Sexually transmitted infections are also unavoidable in prostitution and so-called enforceable condom policies aren't effective.
There are long and established links between organized crime, prostitution and trafficking.
In South Africa, in addition to local criminal groups, foreign organized criminal groups from Russia, Bulgaria, Thailand, China and Nigeria are already established in the local sex industry.
South Africa has high unemployment, extreme economic disparities, porous borders, pervasive corruption in all sectors of society and extremely high levels of rape, violence and abuse of women and children.
It is therefore inconceivable that policies of legalization/ decriminalization that have proved to be failures in better resourced countries will work for South Africa.
The most effective policy approach would be one that focuses on targeting the demand side of prostitution including clients, pimps, procurers and traffickers and for government, in partnership with churches and responsible NGOs, to develop sustainable exit programs to end the sexual servitude of our women and children.
Errol Naidoo is the president of the Family Policy Institute