Interview: Reflecting back and looking forward
In 2015 four of our European members – Ban Ying (Germany), LEFÖ (Austria), La Strada (European network) and FIZ (Switzerland) celebrated important anniversaries. GAATW-IS congratulates them for their continued commitment to improving the lives of migrant women and victims of trafficking and wishes them many more years of successful work in the promotion and protection of the human rights of migrant women.
To mark these anniversaries we talked to Paula Riedemann (Ban Ying), Evelyn Probst (LEFÖ), Suzanne Hoff (La Strada International) and Shelley Berlowitz (FIZ) who reflected back on the situation with women’s migration and human trafficking in Europe in the past 30 years and what challenges and opportunities to look forward to.
What was the situation with women’s migration in the 80s and 90s and when and why was your organisation established?
Paula Riedemann: Ban Ying was established in 1989, and the counselling centre in 1990, by a group of social workers who identified a gap in the support offered to trafficked women from South East Asia. Back then, the focus was trafficking for sexual exploitation and for marriage. In 2001 our concept became broader and since then we work with women coming from all over the world; the focus on South East Asia still exists in our counselling work, though. At the present time we work with women trafficked for sexual exploitation as well as for exploitation in other labour sectors.
Evelyn Probst: LEFÖ was established in 1985 as a self-support organisation for Latin American women political exiles in Austria. It was a place for Latin American women to engage in political activism, to organise themselves and to provide education and social and psychological support to other migrant women coming from the region. Later, in the 1990s the organisation also identified the need to work on sex workers’ rights and trafficking in women. From the very beginning, as an organisation we lobbied for identification of trafficking as a broader phenomenon, focusing on female migrants and exploitation in fields where women typically work, like domestic work and sex work, but also in marriage.
Suzanne Hoff: With the fall of the Berlin Wall and the political and economic changes in the former Eastern Bloc countries, at the end of 1980s and beginning of 1990s, many people from Eastern Europe began migrating to Western Europe in search of a better life. The transition from planned economy to market economy affected in particular women, who had been employed in lower-wage professions in the industry and agriculture. The lack of legal opportunities for them to migrate and work in Western Europe pushed them into the hands of unscrupulous agencies and middlemen, who forced them to work in the sex industry in Western Europe.
To respond to the increasing numbers of Eastern European women working and vulnerable to exploitation in the sex industry in The Netherlands, La Strada was established as a project between NGOs in The Netherlands, Poland and Czech Republic in 1995 on initiative of the Dutch Foundation against trafficking in women (now Comensha/ La Strada Netherlands), which had been founded in 1987. From 1995 to 2000 the La Strada project was joined by organisations in Belarus, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Macedonia, Moldova and Ukraine. In 2015, it was 20 years ago that the La Strada programme started, aiming to create a European network for the prevention of human trafficking and referral and support to trafficked women. La Strada International was established in 2004 as a separate association.
Shelley Berlowitz: The trigger for the establishment of FIZ was a 1981 report by Télévision Suisse Romande about the conditions in which a young Filipinas worked and lived in a Zurich nightclub. Alarmed by these circumstances, a group of people from aid agencies, church-based institutions and women’s organizations formed; their aim was to become more active in combating the conditions which led to migrant women in this country being exploited in the sex trade, imported as docile wives into Switzerland or to be exploited abroad by Swiss sex tourists. They established FIZ, then named the ‘Third World Women’s Information Centre’, in 1985. The management board spread its net wide, including women in the countries from which the exploited migrant women came. FIZ’s aim was to raise public awareness and to lobby politically in favour of migrant women. As a result of the publicity more and more migrant women turned to FIZ for advice. In addition to the political work and public awareness, counselling migrant women on subjects such as migration laws, work conflicts, domestic violence, divorce etc. came to be the second element of FIZ. In 2004 FIZ opened Makasi - the specialised support and intervention programme for women survivors of trafficking. Since 2011 FIZ runs a housing shelter project for victims of trafficking.
Why do women migrate? Is there any difference in their motivations between then and now?
PR: The reasons for migrating have not changed so much in time. Lack of perspectives in the home country, experiences of violence and extreme poverty, hope for a better life but sometimes also for adventures, were the main reasons for migrating then and still are these days. Though, due to increasing restrictive migration laws and policies, migrating to Europe has become more difficult for them, and therefore more expensive and dangerous. One big difference between then and now is that through the Internet it is much easier for the women now to keep in contact with family and friends back home.
EP: LEFÖ was founded by Latin American women political exiles, which is a specific group and a specific reason for migration. And during our 30th anniversary conference in October 2015, one of the founders of LEFÖ said that we have to keep in mind that the people who are leaving now from Syria are also exiled, they are people who have no other chance and the government doesn’t want to have them anymore. So we can see a parallel between the situation in Latin America in the 70s and 80s and the current situation in Syria, Iraq, etc. Another parallel is that in many places, both then and now, there is no perception of women as independent and women have no possibility to be politically active and actively involved in society. As an organisation that works on trafficking but also migration, we have to open up spaces where women can be perceived with all their resources and not only seen as poor victims.
SH: People migrate for various reasons - they flee from wars and conflict, as we now see with the increasing number of conflict areas, but also leave for economic and personal reasons, because they have no access to employment, or are not able to live the life they want to live, or to offer a decent life for their children. In many parts of the world, including in Europe, discrimination and exclusion of certain groups and violence against women are widely spread, so the freedom from oppression is also a powerful motivation for migration. I don’t think the motivation for migration has changed, migration is of all times.
What has changed is that people have more access to information and are more aware what is happening in and outside their own countries and regions and this might have made it easier to leave. The world has become smaller and travelling - easier. Even though in many parts of the world, women are still not treated equally, women increasingly stand up for their rights and learn from other women that did so before them. We see that migrant women, domestic workers and sex workers, are organising and claiming their rights, which is a positive change.
SB: War, conflict and economic hardship have always been and are still the most common reasons for migration, but of course there are also women who migrate for better education or out of curiosity and adventure. Gender discrimination can also be a reason to migrate – sexual violence, exploitation, stereotyping. But stereotyping continues also after migration. Women migrating to Switzerland usually find jobs in the care sector, in households or as sex workers.
Economic migration then and now is usually a strategy concerning the family and not only individuals. Women often migrate in order to make a better life for their children and their family. Migrant women leave their children with their mothers and come to Switzerland in order to take care of other people’s children. Or they leave their parents in a nursing home and look after old people here. In this so called ‘global supply chain’ migrant women take over the responsibilities of women in Switzerland who work outside of their household. What remains constant is: care work is the duty of women.
What has changed are the migration laws in Switzerland: there is an icy wind directed at migrant women here in general, and sex workers in particular. Women from countries outside the EU were able to enter Switzerland until 31 December 2015 with a temporary permit as so called Cabaret-Dancers. Now this possibility is closed. The illegalisation of women will therefore increase – and with this also their vulnerability.
What have you learned from migrant women in these past 20-30 years?
PR: Women coming to Germany are courageous. At the same time, very few of them take the step to openly tell their families how difficult it has been and all the suffering they have been though, in order to be able to send money home. As a consequence, many of them have to deal with living a kind of ‘double life’, which results in an additional burden to them.
EP: We’ve learned that women should never stop demanding their rights, they should own their rights, even in this exclusive society. And the women that we support never stop speaking up, they try to be perceived as subjects, as people who have rights and demand them.
SH: We at La Strada have learned that every migrant woman’s life story is unique. Some succeed in achieving their goals, others face difficulties along the way. We have learned that, faced with limited opportunities at home, many women choose to migrate and work in the sex industry or take low-paid jobs and do not see themselves as victims and do not want to be seen as victims. As service providers and feminists, we accept and respect these choices and believe that everyone should be able to make their own decisions for their life. Of course, there are also many who are forced to work in the sex industry or other labour sectors or are dependent on others in the country of destination which makes them vulnerable to exploitation and abuse.
SB: The experience gained in advising migrant women has been incorporated into the basic principles of FIZ. In the early days of FIZ, there were diverse opinions within FIZ. Some co-workers saw sex work, marriage migration and cabaret work as phenomena similar to trafficking in women and usually migrant women were seen as victims. Over the years, attitudes and analyses have helped FIZ draw finer distinctions. The reality, as we have learned, is rather different: sex workers and marriage migrants are NOT victims , although the sex trade (like other precarious sectors) might be prone to exploitation and violence. In practice, it has become clear to us that we need different approaches for different situations.
In recent years, the prevention of human trafficking has been rebranded as ‘safe migration’. But many women who migrate have never actually known ‘safety’ or felt safe and sometimes actually migrate to improve their safety. What, in your opinion, can be done to improve the safety of women in the process of migration but also at the destination?
PR: Regardless of the country, women need to have access to financial independence and states should consistently fight gender-based violence. Also, there is a need for more structural support for motherhood. On the other hand, for women migrating to work as care or domestic workers, there need to exist better legal ways, such as specific visas and consequent legal protection.
EP: I think it’s a positive step that the concept of ‘safe migration’ was included in the discussion on trafficking but we have to be careful how we understand it. People sometimes leave also due to unsafe situations, and if we see the difficult situations of women, who are still subjected to gender-based violence, we have to be especially careful that it can be a very harmful practice, on the way and at the destination. And the construction of the poor victim who has to be protected from her nationals, again closes visible fields for women. And we have to remain critical of specific measures introduced by states, that reduce the mobility of women. But also in countries of destination, like Austria, we have to demand of the government that there are specific spaces that migrant women can use.
SH: I think it is time that women have access to equal rights and that their rights are better protected everywhere in the world. Even here in The Netherlands, where women’s rights are well recognised and respected, there is still a lot to do to address gender inequality. If women globally have equal rights and equal access to education and employment, and are able to make their own decisions, including decisions to migrate abroad or to travel alone, they become less dependent on others, which will increase their safety. For sure information helps and also access to legal channels to migrate, as well as access to legal employment .
SB: Women migrate from unsafe and precarious situations and often encounter violence and discrimination on the way and in the country they reach. Legal status and access to basic rights and labour rights are the most essential factors for safety. Switzerland must open up more legal migration channels and must make sure that migrants have access to the same rights at their workplace as Swiss people have.
What do migrant women themselves do to improve their own safety? How do they exercise their strength and agency?
EP: Organising themselves is certainly one way, which is how LEFÖ was founded. Organising, finding and using common spaces, protecting each other… These are all examples of exercising agency.
SH: Informing themselves is key, but also organising themselves and taking informed decisions. We at La Strada, similar to other anti-trafficking NGOs, believe it is important that when people decide to migrate for employment abroad, they are prepared, know what they can expect, check as much as possible the contracts they are offered, or if they leave without a job offer, know who they can contact or where they can receive information. Women can exercise their strength and agency by learning from each other, sharing experience and support each other, but also by asking for support and claiming their rights. It remains important that they can be independent and make their own decisions whatever the situation they are in.
SB: Taking the decision to migrate is itself a decision to improve their safety. Migrant women have to be informed about their rights and options in a comprehensive way. FIZ counsellors support clients on eye level; self-determination of the women is crucial. All interventions are discussed with the client and she is the one who takes decisions about her own life.
What challenges and opportunities do you see for women’s migration in the future? What developments do you see in the area of human trafficking in the future?
EP: I feel like migrant women are made invisible in the dominant discourses at the moment, especially here in Europe, where everyone is talking about the so-called ‘refugee crisis’. We oppose this term - yes, it’s a crisis but it’s a solidarity crisis, not a refugee or migrant crisis. And we have to be aware that when we are talking about female migration, to see and acknowledge the diversity of women and focus on anti-discrimination, that we keep the space open and ensure access to rights. And to ensure cooperation among countries of origin and destination in deconstructing stereotypes.
SH: We see a growing trend in the world towards the deregulation of labour and the erosion of human and labour rights, as well as growing xenophobia and anti-migrant sentiments and more border control and restrictions of people’s movement. In the name of preventing human trafficking, women are prevented from travelling. Similarly, there a growing call for criminalisation of prostitution in the name of ‘protecting women’, which in practice, makes women working in the sex industry more vulnerable and deprives them of their income and protection. It also seems accepted that migrant workers, in particular undocumented migrants, can be exploited and work without protection and adequate pay. Governments are responsible for the protection of human rights and businesses for respecting labour rights. With the current increasing migration and refugee flows and the tendency for offering less support, I am concerned that increasingly people will become vulnerable to exploitation and abuse in the future. Moreover human trafficking will remain and it will become even more obvious that it occurs in all countries, in a variety of forms and in formal and informal labour sectors.
Women should be empowered, in particular the most vulnerable ones, like undocumented women and refugees. Labour standards should be enforced and decent working conditions should be promoted to ensure that labour rights are applied to all workers irrespective of their gender, their migration or residence status. I think it is also important that there is more awareness and information about the origins of products and services, enabling customers to make informed decisions about their purchases and to promote products and services made without labour violations. Lastly it remains above all important that we report abuse and exploitation and identify trafficked persons and others whose rights have been violated and provide them with access to remedy.
SB: We fear that in the future migration laws in Switzerland will become even more restrictive than today. Also here, as in the rest of Europe, right wing parties are on the rise. At the same time as open borders are most needed, the borders are shut. Solidarity with migrants is needed more than ever.