World Charter for Prostitutes' Rights
Encyclopedia
Prostitution
Prostitution is the act or practice of providing sexual services to another person in return for payment. The person who receives payment for sexual services is called a prostitute and the person who receives such services is known by a multitude of terms, including a "john". Prostitution is one of...
worldwide. It was adopted by the International Committee for Prostitutes’ Rights
International Committee for Prostitutes’ Rights
The International Committee for Prostitutes’ Rights emerged out of the prostitutes' rights movement starting in the mid 1970s. The ICPR adopted the World Charter for Prostitutes' Rights in 1985 in response to feminist arguments that all prostitution is forced prostitution...
(ICPR).
The charter
The distinction between voluntary and forced prostitutionForced prostitution
Forced prostitution, also known as involuntary prostitution, is the act of performing sexual activity in exchange for money on a non-voluntary basis. There are a wide range of entry routes into prostitution, ranging from "voluntary and deliberate" entry, "semi-voluntary" based on pressure of...
was developed by the prostitutes' rights movement in response to feminists and others who saw all prostitution as abusive. The World Charter for Prostitutes' Rights calls for the decriminalisation of "all aspects of adult prostitution resulting from individual decisions." The World Charter also states that prostitutes should be guaranteed "all human rights and civil liberties," including the freedom of speech, travel, immigration, work, marriage, and motherhood, and the right to unemployment insurance, health insurance and housing. Furthermore the World Charter calls for protection of "work standards," including the abolition of laws which impose any systematic zoning of prostitution, and calls for prostitutes having the freedom to choose their place of work and residence, and to "provide their services under the conditions that are absolutely determined by themselves and no one else." The World Charter also calls for prostitutes to pay regular taxes "on the same basis as other independent contractors and employees," and to receive the same benefits for their taxes.
In an article announcing the adoption of the World Charter, the United Press International
United Press International
United Press International is a once-major international news agency, whose newswires, photo, news film and audio services provided news material to thousands of newspapers, magazines and radio and television stations for most of the twentieth century...
reported: "Women from the world's oldest profession, some wearing exotic masks to protect their identity, appealed Friday at the world's first international prostitutes' convention for society to stop treating them like criminals."
Development of a human rights approach
The World Charter emerged out of the prostitutes' rights movement starting in the mid 1970s. It was established through the two World Whores Congresses held in AmsterdamAmsterdam
Amsterdam is the largest city and the capital of the Netherlands. The current position of Amsterdam as capital city of the Kingdom of the Netherlands is governed by the constitution of August 24, 1815 and its successors. Amsterdam has a population of 783,364 within city limits, an urban population...
(1985) and Brussels
Brussels
Brussels , officially the Brussels Region or Brussels-Capital Region , is the capital of Belgium and the de facto capital of the European Union...
(1986) which epitomised a worldwide prostitutes' rights movement and politics. The Charter established a human rights
Human rights
Human rights are "commonly understood as inalienable fundamental rights to which a person is inherently entitled simply because she or he is a human being." Human rights are thus conceived as universal and egalitarian . These rights may exist as natural rights or as legal rights, in both national...
based approach which has subsequently been further elaborated by the prostitutes' rights movement.
In 1999, the Santa Monica Mirror commented on the popularization of the term "sex worker
Sex worker
A sex worker is a person who works in the sex industry. The term is usually used in reference to those in the sex industry that actually provide such sexual services, as opposed to management and staff of such industries...
" as an alternative to "whore" or "prostitute" and credited the World Charter, among others, for having "articulated a global political movement seeking recognition and social change."
In 2000, the Carnegie Council published a report commenting on the results of the World Charter, fifteen years after its adoption. The report concluded that the human rights approach embodied in the World Charter had proved "extremely useful for advocates seeking to reduce discrimination against sex workers." For example, human rights advocates in Australia
Australia
Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...
utilized the language of human rights to resist “mandatory health tests” for sex workers and to require that information regarding health be kept confidential. However, the report also found that efforts to define prostitution as a human rights abuse had led some governments to take action to abolish the sex industry.
And in 2003, a writer in the journal "Humanist" noted that the World Charter had become "a template used by human rights groups all over the world."
Reaction
The World Charter was initially met with scepticism and ridicule. TimeTime (magazine)
Time is an American news magazine. A European edition is published from London. Time Europe covers the Middle East, Africa and, since 2003, Latin America. An Asian edition is based in Hong Kong...
reported: "Just what were all those hookers doing in the hallowed halls of the European Parliament in Brussels last week? The moral outrage echoing in the corridors may have suggested that a re-creation of Sodom and Gomorrah
Sodom and Gomorrah
Sodom and Gomorrah were cities mentioned in the Book of Genesis and later expounded upon throughout the Hebrew Bible, the New Testament and Deuterocanonical sources....
was being staged. Reason: about 125 prostitutes, including three men, were attending the Second World Whores Congress." The Philadelphia Daily News asked, "Does it contain a layoff clause?" Another writer referred to it derisively as "a Magna Carta for whores."
The Charter remains controversial, as many feminists consider prostitution
Prostitution
Prostitution is the act or practice of providing sexual services to another person in return for payment. The person who receives payment for sexual services is called a prostitute and the person who receives such services is known by a multitude of terms, including a "john". Prostitution is one of...
to be one of the most serious problems facing women, particularly in developing countries. In Jessica Spector's 2006 book Prostitution and Pornography, Vednita Carter and Evelina Giobbe offer the following critique of the Charter:
"Pretending prostitution is a job like any other job would be laughable if it weren't so serious. Leading marginalized prostituted women to believe that decriminalization would materially change anything substantive in their lives as prostitutes is dangerous and irresponsible. There are no liberating clauses in the World Charter. Pimps are not 'third party managers.'"
See also
- A Vindication of the Rights of WhoresA Vindication of the Rights of WhoresA Vindication of The Rights of Whores, is an anthology edited by Gail Pheterson with a preface by Margo St. James.The book consists of the voices of a diverse group of prostitutes, Sex worker's rights activists and feminist scholars from around the world, discussing their lives and their...
- COYOTECOYOTECOYOTE, or Call Off Your Old Tired Ethics, is an American sex worker activist organization. COYOTE's goals include the decriminalization of prostitution, pimping and pandering, as well as the elimination of social stigma concerning sex work as an occupation.Though it is frequently described as a...
- International Day to End Violence Against Sex WorkersInternational Day to End Violence Against Sex WorkersInternational Day to End Violence Against Sex Workers is observed annually on 17 December by Sex workers, their advocates, friends, families and allies....
- Margo St. JamesMargo St. JamesMargo St. James , a self-described prostitute and sex-positive feminist, founded the organization COYOTE , which advocates decriminalization of prostitution.-History:...
- Sex worker rightsSex worker rightsThe term sex worker rights encompasses a variety of aims being pursued globally by individuals and organizations that specifically involve the human and labor rights of sex workers....
- Sex workerSex workerA sex worker is a person who works in the sex industry. The term is usually used in reference to those in the sex industry that actually provide such sexual services, as opposed to management and staff of such industries...