The Lenient Social and Legal Response to Trafficking in Women

Abstract

Trafficking in women for prostitution remains a modern form of slavery. Paradoxically, governments and legal systems tend to target the victims (trafficked women) instead of the criminal traffickers. The present study attempted to investigate the roots of such a lenient social response. Following a consensus perspective, it was first hypothesized that this offense was considered by the public to be a relatively nonserious offense because it involved prostitutes, and second, as in other cases of male violence against women, it was hypothesized that the public views toward this offense were affected by traditional gender-role attitudes toward women. To this end, respondents from a national sample were asked to evaluate hypothetical short crime scenarios representing cases of trafficking in women and other offenses. The findings indicate that the public perceives such criminal acts as serious, both for egalitarian and traditional respondents. This finding challenges the consensual basis of the lenient approach toward traffickers in women. The implications of the findings are discussed.