Maintaining the Carceral Echo Chamber: Tensions Within the Anti-Trafficking Movement in Canada

Abstract

The anti-trafficking movement in Canada has grown rapidly since thelate 2000s, branding itself as a feminist human rights-based effort to eliminatehuman trafficking and taken up by the Government of Canada to position itselfas a benevolent leader on the international stage. Focusing on the membershipof an anti-trafficking coalition in Toronto, Canada, this article explores how themovement creates moral spaces that validate a wide range of anti-traffickingefforts. In unpacking how tensions between members are navigated throughthe suppression of direct conflict and an ethos of collaboration, it demonstrateshow carceral feminist approaches to imagining and eliminating humantrafficking continue to remain dominant despite a growth in the efforts ofindividual members to promote harm reduction and reduce the criminalizationof marginalized communities.