Twelve bills aimed at combating human trafficking passed through the House of Representatives in January. The bills sought to disincentivize demands for illicit prostitution through stricter prosecution of clients, address reforms to the welfare system’s response to victims and encourage the implementation of a human trafficking awareness program for employees at the Department of Homeland Security. Discussion on the floor made one thing clear: Washington is aware human trafficking is the third largest transnational organized crime after the sale of arms and drugs, and politicians want to do something about it. Only time will tell what happens in the Senate, but I am optimistic important strides are being made to address the issue. There is just one problem: we don’t know enough about human trafficking to assess whether the government is making appropriate policy referenda to address the issue, or whether funds funneled into these solutions will be even remotely effective.
Despite the growing literature on trafficking, relatively few studies assess the issue holistically by questioning how the root causes of gender inequality, cultural norms and income disparities affect the problem. Statistics resulting from limited analyses have been used as authoritative foundations for advocacy and government policies, despite their academic deficiencies.
For the past decade, the United States has led the charge to curb human trafficking, but has done little to conduct rigorous academic research on the problem. In fact, since 2000, the number of studies funded by the U.S. government to research human trafficking has decreased by 89 percent. Between 2002-03, USAID sponsored 44 studies in 35 different countries on the scope, causes and economic ramifications of both sexual and labor trafficking yet between 2013-14, only five were funded, each in their own respective country.
Yet in the same period, public support for and awareness of the issue has increased dramatically. In addition to constant media coverage (as well as the 12 bills on the House floor), Human Rights First and The Freedom Fund are encouraging civil engagement by launching campaigns against corporations using forced labor and Pope Francis has galvanized the faith community with a declaration to abolish modern slavery by 2020. What is resulting is an uninformed public discourse, rooted in a disparity between how much is known about the issue and how much it is discussed.
The ramifications for being uninformed on the topic have larger implications than misallocated government funding. The State Department’s Combat Trafficking in Persons annual report has had significant ramifications internationally, as it attempts to outline the state of the issue globally and rank each country on its performance in combating the problem. Countries like Argentina, Armenia and even Israel know that poor performance is bad for publicity and hurts business. Poor performance reported in Switzerland prompted the country to close loopholes that allowed the prostitution of minors and Thailand has reformed its fishing industry based on criticisms in the report. With so many international ramifications, the United States has a responsibility to ensure the TIP report is subject to the highest statistical rigor.
Unfortunately, Luis CdeBaca — the Ambassador-At-Large for TIP — stepped down from his position in Nov. 2014 leaving a leadership void at a crucial time in the fight against trafficking. CdeBaca’s absence only further threatens the quality of TIP’s 2015 report and United States’ leverage as the preeminent expert in the field. Now, more than ever, is it imperative for the United States to renew its commitment to pursuing advancements in the understanding of trafficking. After all, the international community is relying on us.
I believe there is a viable solution that could both ensure the quality, depth and breadth of future TIP reports and raise awareness for the complicated nature of the problem. The solution is found in the involvement of American universities. I believe the government should create public fellowships for university professors and students to apply for — essentially recruiting the country’s best to collaborate in expanding the body of research on trafficking. Ideally these fellowships would be government-funded; however, research funding exists in abundance at universities with large endowments and alumni support. The State Department could potentially trade researchers the honor of a prestigious fellowship title for their study results (funded independently of the government). This would incentivize existing funding to be channeled toward research in this field.
By harnessing the existing public support for combating sexual violence in all forms, a support especially concentrated on college campuses where professors are wringing their hands on how to help, this initiative would create a buzz of university discussion on the issue, putting pressure on President Barack Obama to appoint a new Ambassador-At-Large in CdeBaca’s absence. Additionally, it would give the (relatively small) staff at TIP the capacity to direct research to fill voids in the report, instead of using an amalgamation of privately pursued studies and recent United Nations assessments to create a patchwork of policy recommendations.
At no other place in the world is there such a concentration of experts in a variety of different fields (sociology, public policy, anthropology and foreign affairs) ready and willing to collaborate on research that gets not at the policy responses to issues, but at the underpinning causes of problems. It’s time the U.S. government tapped into the existing network of researchers and funding at universities to encourage a deeper, more scholarly assessment of the causes of trafficking — ultimately resulting in more informed policy discussions across the globe.
Lauren Jackson is a Viewpoint writer.
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