Governing sex work through crime: creating the context for violence and exploitation

Graham, Laura (2017) Governing sex work through crime: creating the context for violence and exploitation. The Journal of Criminal Law, 81 (3). pp. 201-216. ISSN 0022-0183

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Official URL: https://doi.org/10.1177/0022018317702802

Abstract

This article uses Jonathan Simon’s concept of ‘governing through crime’ as a framework to argue that the state has framed sex work, and its surrounding problems, as issues of crime. There has been a privileging and proliferation of criminal justice responses to sex work in England and Wales, at the expense of more social or welfare based responses, and at the expense of creating safer environments for sex workers to work. Criminal law is used to manage and control sex work, to reinforce other policies, such as immigration and border control, and to appear to be doing something about the ‘problem’ of sex work without providing rights to sex workers. By framing sex work as an issue of crime, with sex workers being both the perpetrators of crime and the potential victims of exploitative crime, the state is able to legitimise its actions against sex workers, while ignoring the harm done to sex workers by the state.

Item Type: Article
Uncontrolled Keywords: Governing through Crime; Sex Work; Crime; Violence; Exploitation
Subjects: M100 Law by area
Department: Faculties > Business and Law > Northumbria Law School
Depositing User: Laura Graham
Date Deposited: 25 Jan 2017 16:51
Last Modified: 12 Oct 2019 12:46
URI: http://nrl.northumbria.ac.uk/id/eprint/29355

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