By The Southern Poverty Law Center
This report features stories from women swept up in the Immigration and Customs Enforcement raids that began on Jan. 2, 2016. The report by the Southern Poverty Law Center and the Georgia Latino Alliance for Human Rights found that the federal government has engaged in a needlessly aggressive – and potentially unconstitutional – act against immigrants with these home raids that targeted women and children from Central America.
Montgomery, AL: SPLC, 2016. 28p.
By The United States Commission on Civil Rights
This Statutory Enforcement Report examines the civil rights and constitutional concerns that the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights (Commission) “raised with the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and its component [agencies] over the treatment of adult and minor [immigrant] detainees [who are being] held under federal law in detention centers across the country.” Specifically, this report analyzes the constitutional issues surrounding DHS’s treatment of detained immigrants as well as other selected federal agencies’ efforts to comply with established Performance Based National Detention Standards (PBNDS), the Prison Rape Elimination Act of 2003 (PREA), and the federal standards for detaining unaccompanied minor children.
It is within the Commission’s mandate to examine, study, and report upon civil rights violations inconsistent with the federal civil rights laws, the United States Constitution and the federal standards applicable to all persons within the United States and its territories. By statute, the Commission is authorized to examine federal policies and procedures that have a detrimental effect on the equal protection of law guaranteed to all persons under the Constitution. With regard to immigration, in 1980, the Commission released a report entitled The Tarnished Golden Door: Civil Rights Issues in Immigration that examined the civil rights issues surrounding the enforcement of the immigration laws of the United States. That report identified numerous issues surrounding the former Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) administration and enforcement of U.S. immigration laws. Since the Commission published that 1980 report, however, federal immigration laws and their enforcement practices have undergone numerous, sweeping changes.
Washington, DC: The Commission, 2015. 276p.
By Nina Rabin
Young people in immigrant families are often characterized as a separate population in debates over immigration reform, with distinctive claims and interests as compared to their parents. Bifurcating the undocumented population between children and parents over-simplifies how immigration enforcement impacts families. This article challenges the dichotomy between children and parents by studying how young people who are not direct enforcement targets are nevertheless impacted by immigration enforcement policies, regardless of their own immigration status. These impacts, which I call “secondary immigration enforcement,” often manifest as family separations. To render secondary immigration enforcement visible, I studied 38 young people in Arizona who are living on their own – without either biological parent – at least in part because of immigration enforcement policies. Drawing on in-depth interviews and self-assessments of psycho-social functioning, I describe what secondary immigration enforcement looks like and how it operates. I illustrate that deportation statistics alone fail to capture the extent of immigration enforcement because they do not encompass the complex impacts of secondary enforcement. In addition to the acute disruptions caused by deportations of family members, the young people in the study also experienced family separation as a result of immigration enforcement’s interaction with three other key factors: family dysfunction, extreme poverty, and educational aspirations.
Tucson: The University of Arizona, James E. Rogers College of Law, 2017. 37p.
By Izabella Majcher and Michael Flynn
This Global Detention Project Special Report, commissioned by the Norwegian Red Cross, systematically compares conditions and operations at detention centres in five European countries to identify practices that may be used to develop “harm reducing” strategies in detention. The report, which the Norwegian Red Cross commissioned in an effort to identify possible reforms in Norway’s detention practices, addresses several key questions:
In Norway’s Trandum Detention Centre, multiple reports have highlighted an overzealously punitive and restrictive detention regime where detainees consider themselves to be “treated as criminals” even though they are not serving criminal prison sentences. Despite repeated recommendations from relevant experts, including the country’s Parliamentary Ombudsman, many important reforms have not been implemented.
The report highlights several key areas for promoting reforms, both at Trandum and in other facilities across Europe, including: placing immigration detainees in the custody of social welfare institutions rather than public security agencies; reforming operating rules on everything from food preparation to electronic communications; and shedding detention centres of carceral elements, including the aspect of guards and staff members and the internal layout and regime of detention centres.
Geneva: Global Detention Project, 2019. 86p.
Edited by Andrea Di Nicola, Andrea Cauduro, Marco Lombardi and Paolo Ruspini
Who is the client of trafficked prostitution? What fuels the demand for trafficked prostitution as opposed to other forms? Which are the most effective policies for what type of prostitution? The research in this book aims to answer these questions with an innovative approach. The editors have explored the hidden world of human trafficking for prostitution and profiled its clients. In doing so, they have refuted some common stereotypes about clients while inspiring the elaboration of balanced guidelines for managing prostitution, protecting the victims and thus tackling its undesired trafficking component.
Cham: Springer, 2008. 266p
Edited by Marlou Schrover, Joanne van der Leun, Leo Lucassen and Chris Quispel
Two issues come to the fore in current debates over migration: illegal migration and the role of gender in illegal migration. This incisive study combines the two subjects and views the migration scholarship through the lens of the gender perspective, investigating definitions of citizenship and the differences in mechanisms of inclusion and exclusion for men and women, producing a comprehensive account of illegal migration in Germany, the Netherlands, Great Britain, the Soviet Union, Mexico, Malaysia, the Horn of Africa and the Middle East over the nineteenth- and the twentieth centuries.
Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press, 2008. 196p.
By Vireak Chhun, Lucia Bird, and Thi Hoang
The number of women travelling from Cambodia to China for forced or arranged marriages has surged since 2016 and experienced a further spike since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic. Many Cambodian women in arranged marriages with Chinese men, whether originally consensual or not, report finding themselves in remote areas and abusive contexts. China’s one-child policy, in force between 1979 and 2015, reportedly led to sex-selective abortions by families seeking a son instead of a daughter, creating a significant gender imbalance in the country. Driven by Chinese men’s search for a wife, especially in rural areas, thousands of women from Cambodia, Laos, Vietnam, Nepal, North Korea, Pakistan, and Myanmar are transported to China to wed. Although some travel knowing that they are to be married, others are deceived. Many report suffering violence, sex abuse and forced labour. Cambodian women and girls are coerced and forced into arranged and forced marriages through various means: some are deceived and promised a job in China; others are told they need a marriage certificate in order to be eligible for well-paid work (which is not the case); some are tricked and sold by their family members, relatives and acquaintances for a lump sum or the promise of a good marriage and better life in China.
Geneva: Global Initiative Against Transnational Organized Crime, 2022. 42p.
By Natalie Gonnella-Platts, Jenny Villatoro, and Laura Collins
Violence against women and girls is often excluded from conversations on the nexus of Central American migration, regional development, and domestic immigration reform. Over the last half-century, topics such as economic empowerment, democracy, transparency, and security have dominated the root-causes conversation. The aim of these investments is to improve the overall stability and well-being of countries and communities in the region, but their effectiveness is limited by a failure to consider the impacts of gender-based violence on social and systemwide challenges. Though there has been increasing focus from US and international influencers on the levels of violence in El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras (known as the Northern Triangle) and its impact on migration, an adequate response to the gendered differences in the ways violence is perpetrated remains limited and at times nonexistent. This needs to change, especially since gender-based violence within the Northern Triangle constitutes a daily threat to women and girls—one that has been significantly worsened by corruption, weak institutions, and a culture of impunity toward perpetrators. At individual and community levels, gender-based violence drives women and girls to internal displacement, migration to the United States, or a somber third path—death either by femicide or suicide. At national levels, it seriously inhibits security, opportunity, and development. As circumstances at the southern border of the United States demonstrate, gender-based violence has a direct influence on migration flows across the region and is deeply tangled with cyclical challenges of inequity and poverty. For those who choose to seek assistance or flee their communities, high rates of revictimization and bias further obstruct access to justice and safety. Until policies and programs respond to the serious violations of agency and human rights perpetuated against women and girls (and within systems and society at large), instability in and migration from the Northern Triangle only stand to grow. As the United States and the international community consider a comprehensive plan on Central America and immigration reform, proposed strategies must anchor the status and safety of women and girls at the center of solutions
Washington, DC: Wilson Center, 2021. 24p.
By Human Rights Watch
Since 1999, advocates have gathered to commemorate transgender victims of violence on November 20, the Transgender Day of Remembrance. As of November, 2021 was the deadliest year yet of anti-transgender violence in the United States, exceeding the record 44 transgender people whose deaths were recorded the year before. Violence and harassment against transgender people are widespread in the United States; as one transgender advocate told Human Rights Watch, virtually every transgender person can recount instances when they have felt fearful for their safety and security in public. Recent debates over transgender rights have increased the visibility of transgender rights, but have increased hostility toward transgender people as well, with lawmakers and media personalities unfairly demonizing transgender individuals as “mentally ill,” predatory, or dangerous. Reports suggest that bias-motivated crimes targeting transgender individuals are increasing, and incidents when transgender people narrowly escape violence, where transgender people are reluctant to report violence to police for fear of revictimization, or where law enforcement officers fail to document and respond to violence mean that estimates almost certainly undercount the scope and prevalence of these crimes. The topic of anti-transgender violence frequently appears in news coverage when fatal violence has occurred, and the number of people killed each year is often used as a rough proxy for bias-motivated violence against transgender people more generally. But transgender people are frequently subjected to other forms of violence, including harassment and violence from strangers, family violence, intimate partner violence, and police violence, which may be even less visible to lawmakers and the public.
New York: HRW, 2021. 71p.
By Precious Diagboya
The academic and grey literature paying attention to human trafficking have primarily focused on female victims. As such, this paper argues that they have suffered a gender bias. Based on field research conducted in the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) in Abuja, the paper intends to bridge the gender gap by studying the experience of Male Sex Workers (MSWs). It points out the variety of places and networks used by this population in the FCT. It also pinpoints series of migration trends that account for the presence of MSWs in Nigeria. As such, it looks at the various biographical trajectories of Abuja MSWs and provides an outlook on the community's perceptions of trafficking, along with a comparison with the classical female sex networks
Ibadan:Nigeria: IFRA-Nigeria. 2017, 18.p.
Edited by: Aletta Biersack, Margaret Jolly, Martha Macintyre.T
The postcolonial states of Fiji, Papua New Guinea and Vanuatu operate today in a global arena in which human rights are widely accepted. As ratifiers of UN treaties such as the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women and the Convention on the Rights of the Child, these Pacific Island countries have committed to promoting women’s and girls’ rights, including the right to a life free of violence. Yet local, national and regional gender values are not always consistent with the principles of gender equality and women’s rights that undergird these globalising conventions. This volume critically interrogates the relation between gender violence and human rights as these three countries and their communities and citizens engage with, appropriate, modify and at times resist human rights principles and their implications for gender violence. Grounded in extensive anthropological, historical and legal research, the volume should prove a crucial resource for the many scholars, policymakers and activists who are concerned about the urgent and ubiquitous problem of gender violence in the western Pacific.
Canberra: Australian National University Press, 2016. 398p.
By Jean Turner-Zimmermann
An article on the Great “White Slave” Question by Jean Turner-Zimmermann, President of the Chicago Rescue Mission and Woman’s Shelter — and — The Department of Purity and Heredity of the Cook County W. C. T. U. “My sole aim in bringing this little pamphlet to you is to definitely call the attention of the men and women of the Central Western States, and especially those of the City of Chicago into whose hands it may come, to the vicious, thoroughly organized white-slave traffic of to-day, and its attendant, far-reaching, horrible results upon the young man and womanhood of our Land.” (1911) 64 pages.
By Clifford Griffith Roe.
In the past those engaged in the girl slave traffic have managed to cast a veil of mystery about that business by keeping their operations secret. In their attempt at concealment they have been unconsciously aided by the public at large, by ministers, reformers and' social workers, since the latter too often have been unwilling to talk about the details of a subject so revolting. Yet, this very secrecy has been the chief cause of the success of the nefarious system, for it has hidden from the young girls, who are in the greatest danger, all the methods and devices by which they may be entrapped. Since this, the aiding of the evil elements in their worst phases, has been the effect of our scrupulous nicety and dislike for discussing ugly things, it is evident that we must pursue a different course. In order to save hundreds from a life, horrible be- yond words, we must cast aside all false notions of modesty. We must bring to light the methods of those engaged in the business, for we can eliminate it only by education, publicity, legislation and law enforcement. With the earnest belief that this is the only means of exterminating the panders who procure girls and sell them into slavery, I have tried in the following pages to set forth thoroughly and honestly the details of the white slave traffic and to explain the artifices and methods of the panders. The facts which appear in these pages were thrust upon me in the court room. There I heard the terrible stories of the victims, and when I learned of the vast proportions of this atrocious business, I felt I would indeed be unmindful of my duty if I did not use every effort within my power to eradi- cate this evil. In mentioning specific immoral houses in the following pages, I have purposely omitted their names and locations in order to pre-vent advertising these places. The surnames of girls who were procured have likewise been omitted for obvious reasons.
New York: Fleming H. Revell, 1910. 224p.
By Clifford Griffith Roe and B. S. Steadwell.
The mighty crusade to protect the purity of our homes. "And ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.” ' That the truth may be known throughout the world con- cerning the traffic in girls and women, and that these poor fel- low beings may, through the knowledge of truth, be set free from bondage is the hope of the writers of this book. To protect the purity and sanctity of the home, to open the door of forgiveness to the prodigal daughter, as well as the prodigal son, to warn young womanhood against the snares of girl slave traders and to raise clean, honest manhood to the golden pinnacle of youth's ambition is the reason facts are here set forth often times unvarnished, ungilded and unpainted. Because in the past truth has been clothed in a mantle of mystery and facts have only been whispered in secret, traders in human souls have thrived and grown rich. These arch-enemies to society, the lowest of the lowly creatures on this earth, dwell in darkness; they welcome secrecy, ignorance and false modesty; they abhor light; they stifle truth and trample upon innocence. There is just one way to solve the social evil problem, and that is the way of education. A great campaign of education against the girl traffic, the blackest cloud overhanging civilization today, is under way in many countries. Education in the home, the school, the municipality, the state and the government.
London: Roe,1911. 490p.
by Clifford Griffith Roe and B. S. Steadwell.
Or Fighting for the Protection of Our Girls. Truthful and chaste account op the hideous trade op buying and selling young girls for immoral purposes. startling disclosures made by white slaves during the trials of many pro- curers and traders. the cruel and inhuman treatment of white slaves. the astounding confession of a pander. graphic accounts of how white slaves are ensnared and a full exposi- tion of the methods and schemes used to lure and trap the girls. —also—Containing a Full Account of the Great Fight for the Suppression of White Slavery and the Great Movement for Purity in Our Homes.
London: Roe, 1911. 494p.
By George Jackson Kneeland.
In presenting to the public this volume, the first of four studies dealing with various aspects of the problem of prostitution, it seems fitting to make a statement with reference to the origin, work and plans of the Bureau of Social Hygiene. The Bureau came into existence about two years ago, as a result of the work of the Special Grand Jury which investigated the white slave traffic in New York City during the first half of the year 1910. One of the recommendations made by the jury in the presentment handed up at the termination of its labors was that a public commission be appointed to study the social evil. The foreman of the jury subsequently gave careful con-, sideration to the character of the work which might properly be done by such a commission and the limitations under which it would operate. In this connection, sep- arate personal conferences were held with over a hundred leading men and women in the city, among whom were lawyers, physicians, business men, bank presidents, presidents of commercial organizations, clergymen, settlement workers, social workers, labor leaders and reformers. These conferences led to the conclusion that a public commission would labor under a number of disadvantages, such as the fact that it would be short-lived ; that its work would be done publicly; that at best it could hardly do...
The purpose of this volume is to set forth as accurately and fully as possible the conditions of vice as they existed in New York City during the year 19 12. It should be clearly understood that the data upon which it is based are not presented as legal evidence, but as reliable information secured by careful and experienced investi-gators, whose work was systematically corroborated. In presenting the facts contained in this report, the Bureau has no thought of criticizing any department or official of the city administration. The task which the Bureau set itself was that of preparing a dispassionate, objective account of things as they were during the period above mentioned, the forms which commercialized vice had assumed, the methods by which it was carried on, the whole network of relations which had been elaborated below the surface of society. The studies involved were made in a spirit of scientific inquiry, and it is the hope of the Bureau that all departments or officials whose work this book in any way touches may find the information therein contained helpful to them in the further direction and organization of their work.
New York: Century, 1913. 344p.
By Ernest A. Bell.
Or War on the White Slave Trade. “ A complete and detailed account of the shameless traffic in young girls, the methods by -which the procurers and panders lure innocent young girls away from home and sell them to keepers of dives. The magnitude of the organization and its workings. How to combat this hideous monster. How to save YOUR GIRL. How to save YOUR BOY. What you can do to help -wipe out this curse of humanity. A book designed to awaken the sleeping and protect the innocent.”
Chicago: G.S. Ball, 1910. 482p.
By Theo. A. Bingham.
This story is one of many that could be told to illustrate the sin- ister fact that every year thousands of young girls disappear from their homes in the cities or go from the small towns to the cities and drop out forever from all knowledge of their families. What becomes of them? Where do they go? Why do they go ? Into whose hands do they fall ? Some of them go down to nameless graves, but more go to a fate infinitely worse. What that fate is we all know, in a vague way at least; but, unfortunately, few of us are willing to realize that the thing is of any real concern to us personally. Not because we are heartless or cold or selfish do we Americans ignore the fact that we have a terrible social problem at our doors. No; our unwillingness to look the facts squarely in the face is due solely to inherited Puritanism. We have allowed ourselves to become con- vinced that we are morally superior to the people of Europe. Our belief in our superior purity is founded on ignorance or hypocrisy. We have made laws saying that the social evil shall not exist. Then we thoroughly blindfold ourselves and raise our hands in horror at any mention of the subject. The plain, shocking facts are that this American attitude encourages the growth and spread of vice. It makes it possible for a girl to disappear from your town, from your own neighborhood, and be drawn into the net of the underworld. And until we overcome our timidity and hypocrisy and go after the situation frankly, vigorously, and openly, the social evil will continue to grow. It thrives on secrecy and hypocrisy.
Read-Me.org classic reprint. Boston: R.G. Badger, 1913. 87p.
By Helena Machado and Rafaela Granja. Genetic Surveillance and Crime Control presents a new empirical and conceptual framework for understanding trends of genetic surveillance in different countries in Europe and in other jurisdictions around the world. The use of DNA or genome for state-level surveillance for crime governance is becoming the norm in democratic societies. In the post-DNA, contemporary modes of criminal identification are gradually changing through the increasing expansion of transnational sharing of DNA data, along with the development of highly controversial genetic technologies that pose acute challenges to privacy and generate fears of discrimination, racism and stigmatization. Some questions that guide this book are: How is genetic surveillance in the governance of crime intertwined with society, ethics, culture, and politics? What are the views and expectations of diverse stakeholders –scientists, police agencies, and non-governmental organizations? How can social sciences research about genetic surveillance accommodate socio-cultural and historical differences, and be sensitive to specificities of post-authoritarian societies in Europe? Taking an interdisciplinary approach focused on challenges to genetic privacy, human rights and citizenship in contemporary societies , this book will be of interest to students and scholars of social studies of science and technology, sociology, criminology, law and policing, international relations and forensic sciences. Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon ; New York, NY : Routledge, 2022. 213p.
The Hidden (Dis)integration of Europe by Nina Amelung Rafaela Granja and Helena Machado. “…the ‘hidden integration’ and ‘hidden fragmentation’ of Europe, the transnational exchange of forensic DNA data organized through the Prüm system serves as an exemplary case through which to explore the different logics of biobordering dynamics at work across the European Union. We complement an EU-level analysis with country case analysis of modes of biobordering that emphasize the legal, scientific, technical, political and ethical dimensions related to the governance and uses of biometric technologies both at a national level and in a transnational collaboration.” Palgrave (2021) 155p.
