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Global Alliance Against Traffic in Women

Human Rights
at home, abroad and on the way...

GAATW Logo

Global Alliance Against Traffic in Women

Human Rights
at home, abroad and on the way...

Events and News

The GAATW Story

The story of GAATW is the story of women; it is a story of women building alliances across borders. This story also marks a moment of maturity in the feminist movement when women

  • acknowledged that the vision of global sisterhood is fraught with numerous tensions, including those of class, race, sexuality and nationality;

  • realized that they needed to listen before speaking on behalf of other women;

  • conceded that alliances, feminist or otherwise, are built around unequal power relationships;

  • understood that solidarities for political action can only be effective if one is able to negotiate different agendas.

Many of the founding mothers of GAATW are women from the global south who had personal experiences of migration and dislocation. As politically active women all of them had engaged with issues of violence against women in various contexts: at homes, at work places, during armed conflict and through sex tourism. Years of involvement with the situation of migrant women, both in countries of origin and destination, had led them to rethink issues of migration and trafficking. As migrant women themselves, albeit with comparatively better social privileges, they were drawn to the plight of women from their own countries in the industrialized North.

As caregivers, translators, interviewers and advocates in law courts, they (women who later founded GAATW) had heard the stories of their compatriots who had undertaken multiple journeys in search of their dreams. Typically, the stories were narrated while the women (who were telling their stories) were in a difficult situation. Promises made to them by the agents/recruiters were broken, conditions at work were unbearable, or after years of hard work, they had returned home without much financial gain. However, each story was a testimony to the women

A feminist participatory action research project carried out in Thailand by the Foundation for Women, Bangkok, revealed the complexities around women