Intersectionality of Race and Immigration

According to Kathryn Farr’s reading, Sex Trafficking – The Global Market in Women and Children, Organized Crime organizations are drawn to countries with struggling democracies, economic instability, and are impoverished. These conditions make a country and the people in these countries vulnerable to being trafficked as both willing and unwilling participants in sex trade business. The trafficking of women is done using intimidation, fear and isolation. Structural conditions of poverty are contributing factors in human trafficking. Poverty, gender lead to increase vulnerability to sexual trafficking and exploitation. Extreme poverty exacerbates the vulnerability of children to trafficking in countries like Thailand and Haiti.

In the reading, Migrant Children in Haiti: Domestic Labor and the Politics of Representation written by Diane M. Hoffman focus is on the intersectionality of poverty and the Restavek system of children being used as indentured servants. Children are vulnerable to trafficking and exploitation in Haiti due to cultural/social practices of sending your children away with the expectation they can get an education or have a better life.(Hoffman, 2010) The migration of children in Haiti is also a contributing factor to them being vulnerable to sexual trafficking, gendered violence and exploitation. An individual’s ethnicity and origin is linked to increased vulnerability to exploitation due to negative attitudes to these various groups.

Dehumanizing, Discriminatory Conditions and Challenges

Significant human rights issues included credible reports of: arbitrary or unlawful killings, including extrajudicial killings; torture or cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment or punishment by government agents; harsh and life-threatening prison conditions; arbitrary arrest or detention; serious problems with the independence of the judiciary; serious abuses in a conflict, including widespread civilian deaths or harm, enforced disappearances or abductions, torture, and physical abuses have been reported in Haiti.

Those issues have been investigated by several UN and human rights organizations concluded that gangs in the metropolitan Port-au-Prince area systematically employed sexual violence as a tool of degradation and community control in gang-controlled and gang violence-prone areas. Armed groups raped women, girls, men, and boys with impunity and often in public places as gangs conquered new territory, fought in intergang conflicts, and sought to maintain control over territories. Survivors reported instances of rape by multiple aggressors.

Sex trafficking is a significant problem in Haiti. The sources that were used supported the prevalence of sexual trafficking. Human trafficking in Haiti reportedly increased after the 2010 earthquake. Traffickers took advantage of desperate Haitian families and their children. The 2011 United Nations mission MINUSTAH reported a strong increase in the number of child trafficking cases, especially to neighboring countries such as the Dominican Republic, where they are sold into slavery and prostitution. (Bleszynska.K.2021)

The Fight Against Human Trafficking

The Dominican Republic is best known for its beautiful beaches, green landscape and spirited culture. However there in the shadows is this network of human trafficking and prostitution that racialized migrants find themselves in. The DR is not merely a bystander in the world of human trafficking; it acts as a source, destination, and transit country for this alarming crime. The 2022 Trafficking in Persons Report of the U.S. State Department acknowledges that the Dominican government does not yet meet the minimum standards to eliminate trafficking.  

Haiti and the Dominican Republic are also known as a destination for sexual tourism. According to the State Department’s 2022 Trafficking in Persons Report it remains a problem in both countries today. According to the reading by Angelique V. Nixon global tourism accepts certain sexual practices and behaviors as being normal and not something to panic about. Tourists from the United States and Europe come to consume the sunshine and the people. The tourist desires the cultural and sexual availability of all the Caribbean has to offer. Nixon reports very little commentary on the demand for sexual or domestic labor in the global north has been made. Despite the reported trafficking persons reports very little attention and focus of the media has occurred. Secondly, Nixon reports that there has been an incredible lack of analysis or discussion as to the structural issues involving what makes people vulnerable.    

      Part of this sexual-cultural availability for tourism is made possible through informal economies built through sexual labor; much of this has to do with conditions created in which people may be coerced into sex work, or some may choose to engage in sex work, because it generates greater economic benefits (in spite of the dangers or illegality).(Nixon, 2024) (Nixon, 2024)