This study presents a broad portrait of trafficking in women, children and adolescents for commercial sexual exploitation. The goal of this national research was not simply to collect statistics on the problem, but also to situate it within the larger social and demographic context of Brazil, the region, and the world.
Trafficking became a part of the Brazilian public agenda due
to the efforts of civil society organizations specializing in topics
relating to women, children, and adolescents. These efforts grew out of
and were supported by larger initiatives undertaken by the United
Nations, and the Organization of American States. Specifically,
beginning in the nineties, NGOs and intergovernmental organizations
mobilized to work against commercial sexual exploitation (i.e.
trafficking for sexual exploitation; pornography; sex tourism; and
prostitution)2 of children and youth.
This resulted in a series of
international events including:
Fourth World Conference on Women in Beijing (1995);
Seminar Against the Sexual Exploitation of Children and Adolescents in the Americas, held in Brasilia (1996);
the UN Convention Against Transnational Organized Crime, in Palermo (2000),
and the First and Second World Congresses Against the Commercial Sexual Exploitation of Children, held in Stockholm (1996)
and Yokohama (2001).
The First World Congress Against Commercial Sexual
Exploitation of Children, held in Stockholm in 1996, approved a
declaration defining "commercial sexual exploitation of children as a
fundamental violation of children's rights, which includes sexual
abuse3 by adults or payment to a boy or girl and to a third person or
several third parties. The child is treated like a sexual object and a
commodity. Commercial sexual exploitation of children is a form of
coercion and violence against children, that may include forced labor
and modern forms of slavery".
When the International Human Rights Law Institute of DePaul
University started its work in the area, it broadened this focus to
include women. As noted in its report with the OAS (2000), all of
these "... victims belong to the most vulnerable social segments of
society and are in greater need of assistance. In general, people who are
subjected to this violence are marginalized, instead of being considered
people whose rights have been violated. Consequently, they are less
legally protected when authorities investigate the commercial nature of
the problem".
This study advances that effort. While women and female
children and adolescents are the primary targets of commercial sexual
exploitation, male children have also been involved and are included in
this study. However, while evidence suggests that other vulnerable or
disadvantaged social groups, such as transgender and certain adult and
adolescent males (homosexuals, transvestites and others) are also
suffering such prejudice, exploitation and violence including
trafficking, it was decided not to include them in this project. Future
research needs to consider these groups as well.
In order to develop a working definition for the term
trafficking, international legislation was used as the initial point of
reference. Of particular significance are the provisions of the Palermo
Trafficking Protocol which provides that: "... trafficking in persons
shall mean recruiting, transporting, transferring, harboring or receiving
persons, by means of threat or physical force, or other forms of
coercion, abduction, fraud, deception, abuse of power or the person's
vulnerable position, as well as giving or receiving payments or benefits
to get a person's consent and having control over another person, for
the purpose of exploitation".