Calum Bennachie

THREE History of the New Zealand Prostitutes' Collective Catherine Healy, Calum Bennachie and Anna Reed Introduction This chapter describes the history of the New Zealand Prostitutes' Collective ... The New Zealand AIDS Foundation was very focused on gay men at this time ...

The successful campaign for the reform of New Zealand's sex work laws took nearly two decades. Inevitably for a law reform campaign in a vigorous parliamentary democracy, the process of law reform went through a series of largely predictable stages. Early on, the ...

This book examines the decriminalisation of all sectors of sex work in New Zealand. It provides first hand views and experience on this policy from the point of view of those involved in the sex industry, as well as people involved in developing, implementing, researching and reviewing the policies.

In this article we will discuss the first Coronavirus (Covid-19) lockdown and its immediate aftermath on the lives of migrant sex workers living and working in France, drawing on original interviews gathered between May and July 2020. Since 2016 in France, sex workers have worked under the so-called Swedish model legal framework criminalising the demand of sexual services. This has meant that sex workers, both migrant and non-migrant, have had to find various strategies to continue working within a criminalised environment      infringing upon their rights and safety. Research in the French context has largely shown that the introduction of the Swedish model increased the financial precarity and impacted in significant, detrimental ways the physical and mental health of sex workers (Le Bail & Giametta 2018). In the context of the existing hardship to which migrant sex workers were exposed under this repressive regime in France, this article investigates if and how the law enforcemen...

This article draws on the findings of the research project Sexual Humanitarianism: Migration, Sex Work, and Trafficking (SEXHUM), a study investigating migration, sex work, and human trafficking in Australia, France, New Zealand, and the US. In this article, we focus on how racialized categories are mobilized in antitrafficking practices in France. Since April 2016, the French government has enforced a prohibitionist and neo-abolitionist law criminalizing the demand for sexual services. This coincided with the targeting of Chinese and Nigerian cis-women and with the neglect of Latina trans women working in the sex industry according to racialized and sex-gendered understandings of victimhood. Whereas Chinese women tend to be presented by humanitarian rhetoric as silent victims of Chinese male-dominated mafias, Nigerian women have come to embody the ultimate figure of the victim of trafficking by an overpowering Black male criminality. Meanwhile, (sexual) humanitarian actors have neg...

This is the final SEXHUM POLICY REPORT providing policy recommendation drawing on our research findings in Australia, France, New Zealand and the United States. For more information on the SEXHUM project: www.sexhum.org Our research findings strongly suggest that: Decriminalization and labour rights ● The repeal of all repressive laws that criminalize both the sale and purchase of sexual services is the most appropriate and least harmful policymaking framework for sex work. ● The decriminalization of sex work should be accompanied by anti-discrimination measures and socio-economic resources supporting the access of sex workers, including migrants, to healthcare, housing, employment, education, financial and insurance services, parenthood rights and other key dimensions of social life. ● A work permit with sex work authorization should be available to migrants working in the sex industry. This should not mention sex work or ‘adult entertainment’ in order to avoid further stigmatization and victimization of migrants. Anti-trafficking Policies and Interventions ● Anti-trafficking interventions should separate themselves from anti migration and anti sex work law enforcement if they want to reduce the vulnerability to exploitation of the people they aim to support. ● Access to protection and support for victims of trafficking should not be conditional to collaboration with law enforcement or to the possible prosecution of their traffickers. ● Any policy and social intervention on sex work and trafficking can only have a chance of succeeding if it also includes prospective and actual migrants’ legal right to access the international and national labour markets.   Social Interventions ● Sexual humanitarian, anti-migration, and anti-sex work initiatives and interventions are harmful to the lives and rights of migrant sex workers. As such they should be defunded and the resulting resources diverted to sex worker rights associations and other organizations supporting them. ● Sex worker rights organizations and communities should be consulted before any new policies and interventions targeting sex workers are designed and implemented. Their feedback and reactions should be taken into consideration, including not proceeding with such policies and interventions. ● Peer-to-peer (migrant) sex worker community support networks, organisations and outreach projects should be specifically funded and promoted to continue providing a range of free in-language services and community spaces. Stigma, Discrimination and Abuse ● Sex workers should be able to benefit from mainstream and targeted assistance and protection measures in the context of domestic violence. ● Police who commit violence, harassment or other crimes against sex workers must be held accountable for their abusive acts. ● Since sex workers are part of different minority groups, policies addressing sex work must effectively address all structural discriminations framing it such as sexism, racism, and transphobia. ● The voices of groups representing marginalized sex workers, such as transgender sex workers, sex workers of colour, or immigrant sex workers, should be elevated. More details about project findings and their policymaking implications are available in the specific country sections of the report.

In 2003, Aotearoa New Zealand (NZ) passed the Prostitution Reform Act 2003 (PRA), which decriminalized sex work for NZ citizens and holders of permanent residency (PR) while excluding migrant sex workers (MSWs) from its protection. This is due to Section 19 (s19) of the PRA, added at the last minute against advice by the Aotearoa New Zealand Sex Workers’ Collective (NZPC) as an anti-trafficking clause. Because of s19, migrants on temporary visas found to be working as sex workers are liable to deportation by Immigration New Zealand (INZ). Drawing on original ethnographic and interview data gathered over 24 months of fieldwork, our study finds that migrant sex workers in New Zealand are vulnerable to violence and exploitation, and are too afraid to report these to the police for fear of deportation, corroborating earlier studies and studies completed while we were collecting data.

Centred on the slavery trial “Crown vs. Rungnapha Kanbut” heard in Sydney, New South Wales, between 10 April and 15 May 2019, this article seeks to frame the figure of the “Mother Tac” or the “mother of contract”, also called “mama tac” or “mae tac”—a term used amongst Thai migrants to describe a woman who hosts, collects debts from, and organises work for Thai migrant sex workers in their destination country. It proposes that this largely unexplored figure has come to assume a disproportionate role in the “modern slavery” approach to human trafficking, with its emphasis on absolute victims and individual offenders. The harms suffered by Kanbut’s victims are put into context by referring to existing literature on women accused of trafficking; interviews with Thai migrant sex workers, including Kanbut’s primary victim, and with members from the Australian Federal Police Human Trafficking Unit; and ethnographic field notes. The article unveils how constructions of both victim and offe...

ABSTRACT The article presents the findings of the SEXHUM project studying the impact of the different policies targeting migrant sex workers in Australia, France, New Zealand, and the United States. It draws on the concept of sexual humanitarianism, referring to how neoliberal constructions of vulnerability associated with sexual behaviour are implicated in humanitarian forms of support and control of migrant populations. Based on over three years of fieldwork we examine the differential ways in which Asian cis women and Latina trans women are constructed and targeted as vulnerable to exploitation, violence and abuse, or not, in relation to racialized and cis-centric sexual humanitarian canons of victimhood. Through our comparative analysis we expose how the implication of sexual humanitarian rhetoric in increasingly extreme bordering policies and interventions on migrant sex workers impacts on their lives and rights, arguing for the urgent need for social reform informed by the experiences of these groups.

Globally, sex workers have highlighted the harms that accompany anti-prostitution efforts advanced via anti-trafficking policy, and there is a growing body of social science research that has emerged documenting how anti-trafficking efforts contribute to carceral and sexual humanitarian interventions. Yet mounting evidence on the harms of anti-trafficking policies has done little to quell the passage of more laws, including policies aimed at stopping sexual exploitation facilitated by technology. The 2018 passage of the Allow States and Victims to Fight Online Sex Trafficking Act (FOSTA) in the U.S. House of Representatives, and the corresponding Senate bill, the Stop Enabling Sex Traffickers Act (SESTA), is a case study in how efforts to curb sexual exploitation online actually heighten vulnerabilities for the people they purport to protect. Drawing on 34 months of ethnographic fieldwork and interviews with sex workers and trafficked persons (n = 58) and key informants (n = 20) in ...

System-involvement resulting from anti-trafficking interventions and the criminalization of sex work and migration results in negative health impacts on sex workers, migrants, and people with trafficking experiences. Due to their stigmatized status, sex workers and people with trafficking experiences often struggle to access affordable, unbiased, and supportive health care. This paper will use thematic analysis of qualitative data from in-depth interviews and ethnographic fieldwork with 50 migrant sex workers and trafficked persons, as well as 20 key informants from legal and social services, in New York and Los Angeles. It will highlight the work of trans-specific and sex worker–led initiatives that are internally addressing gaps in health care and the negative health consequences that result from sexual humanitarian anti-trafficking interventions that include policing, arrest, court-involvement, court-mandated social services, incarceration, and immigration detention. Our analysis...

In 2003, Aotearoa New Zealand (NZ) passed the Prostitution Reform Act 2003 (PRA), which decriminalized sex work for NZ citizens and holders of permanent residency (PR) while excluding migrant sex workers (MSWs) from its protection. This is due to Section 19 (s19) of the PRA, added at the last minute against advice by the Aotearoa New Zealand Sex Workers’ Collective (NZPC) as an anti-trafficking clause. Because of s19, migrants on temporary visas found to be working as sex workers are liable to deportation by Immigration New Zealand (INZ). Drawing on original ethnographic and interview data gathered over 24 months of fieldwork, our study finds that migrant sex workers in New Zealand are vulnerable to violence and exploitation, and are too afraid to report these to the police for fear of deportation, corroborating earlier studies and studies completed while we were collecting data.

Globally, sex workers have highlighted the harms that accompany anti-prostitution efforts advanced via anti-trafficking policy, and there is a growing body of social science research that has emerged documenting how anti-trafficking efforts contribute to carceral and sexual humanitarian interventions. Yet mounting evidence on the harms of anti-trafficking policies has done little to quell the passage of more laws, including policies aimed at stopping sexual exploitation facilitated by technology. The 2018 passage of the Allow States and Victims to Fight Online Sex Trafficking Act (FOSTA) in the U.S. House of Representatives, and the corresponding Senate bill, the Stop Enabling Sex Traffickers Act (SESTA), is a case study in how efforts to curb sexual exploitation online actually heighten vulnerabilities for the people they purport to protect. Drawing on 34 months of ethnographic fieldwork and interviews with sex workers and trafficked persons (n = 58) and key informants (n = 20) in ...

RAPPORT FINAL FOCUS SUR LES POLITIQUES: résumé en langue française du rapport final du project SEXHUM et de ses implications pour les politiques en France. Pour plus d'information sur le project SEXHUM et ses résultats: www.sexhum.org

Page 1. Controlling Anti-gay Hate Speech in New Zealand The Living Word Case from beginning to end by Calum Bennachie A thesis Submitted to the Victoria University of Wellington in fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Education ...

The successful campaign for the reform of New Zealand's sex work laws took nearly two decades. Inevitably for a law reform campaign in a vigorous parliamentary democracy, the process of law reform went through a series of largely predictable stages. Early on, the ...

I examine the criminalisation of the purchase of sex from a human rights perspective with a focus on the European Convention on Human Rights. I find that any criminalisation of commercial sex creates an environment that can breed inconsistency with the right to life, right not to be subjected to degrading treatment, right to security, right to privacy, the right to a family life, the right to freedom of association and the right not to be subjected to discrimination.