STUDY ON TRAFFICKING IN WOMEN AND CHILDREN FOR COMMERCIAL
SEXUAL EXPLOITATION IN BRAZIL
Edited by David E. Guinn
Adapted from the National Report by Maria Lucia Leal
and Maria de Fatima Leal
Efforts to study the trafficking of women and children for
purposes of sexual exploitation in Brazil face many challenges. As is
the case throughout the rest of the world, trafficking is a complex and
multifaceted problem mired in numerous controversies over how it is to
be understood and studied. Many aspects of trafficking for purposes
of sexual exploitation are illegal and, therefore, hidden.
Moreover, whether described as corruption or undue influence, the political and
economic relationships between trafficking and traffickers, on the one
hand, and the government on the other creates disincentives for
enforcement. Finally, many of the social organizations trying to
mobilize society to combat this problem have faced disillusioning
setbacks that have sapped energy from the movement.
Nonetheless, in early 2000, the Brazilian government
responded to the pressures brought to bear by interested national and
international organizations and joined forces with domestic civil
society organizations within Brazilian society to support research on
the problem of trafficking in women, children and adolescents for
commercial sexual exploitation. This effort was buttressed by local and
international organizations interested this issued who have provided
support for this study.
The goal of the study is to promote greater attention to a
problem far too often downplayed by state bureaucracy, silenced by
corruption and hidden by commercial interests. It is intended to help
understand trafficking within its social, gendered, racial and ethnic
context.
Traditionally work on this problem has focused on the
victim/offender relationship. While that will inevitably be a central
feature of any effort to study trafficking, the problem must also be
contextualized. Trafficking constitutes a criminal violation of human
rights. This demands a response that not only places responsibility on
the aggressor, but also on the State, market and society that have in one
way or another contributed to the vulnerability and exploitation of the
trafficked individuals.
From the outset, this study focused on encouraging social
participation in the research and the development of accurate
information on this topic through multidisciplinary research techniques.
At the same time it encouraged participating organizations to identify
and advocate ways to combat the phenomenon of trafficking drawing
on principles of human rights.
This study also represents a strategic
effort to develop new political practices that can be used to resolve this
problem, not only in Brazil, but also in other Latin American and
Caribbean countries and, hopefully, support the creation of a new Inter
American Convention on trafficking.
In Brazil, the study is the result of a partnership developed by
the International Human Rights Law Institute of DePaul University
College of Law with the Inter American Commission of Women and
the Inter American Children's Institute of the OAS. It was part of a
larger, regional study within Latin America and the Caribbean.