Prostitution as violence against women

Abstract

International policies and legislation increasingly omit prostitution per se from the category of violence against women. Various governmental and non-governmental groups make efforts to distinguish and thus to legitimize certain practices of sexual exploitation, drawing distinctions, for example, between forced and free prostitution. These efforts culminated in lobbying for what would be finally included in the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action that emerged from the Fourth World Women’s Conference in Beijing. This article addresses these efforts; the NGOs who advocate such distinctions; and the consequences of revising the harm done to women in prostitution into a consenting act.