Agora Journal Volume 11, 2020
The Decriminalization of Sex Work
Graham Holloway

Introduction
Sex work is defined as the exchange of sexual services, performances, or products for
material compensation (Lutnick & Cohan, 2009). Sex work is a diverse field that does not
discriminate. Sex workers can have a college level education; sex workers can be male, female,
transgender, and non-binary; sex workers can also be people of color, and while there is a
particular notion that sex workers are young adults, usually in the mid to late 20’s, older adults in
their 30’s and 40’s who have dependents to look after can also be sex workers. Benoit et al.,
(2014, pp. 3-4, 7) conducted a study to examine the many people linked to the sex trade industry
in Canada. In particular, the sample consisted of 218 sex workers. Of the 218 sex workers, the
majority were Caucasian; 15 percent reported having a Bachelor's degree or higher; half of the
workers were in intimate relationships; 39 percent reported having a dependent to look after; 77
percent identified as women; 17 percent identified as men, and 6 percent identified as non-binary
or transgender; 35 percent also identified as suffering from a long-term disability, and the
average age was around 34 years old. Sex work is often called the world's oldest profession as it
has been practiced since ancient times. Sex work is a global phenomenon, with many people all
over the world engaging in this profession. While sex work has a troubled history with the law,
some places, such as New Zealand (WHO, 2020, Prostitution Reform Act of 2003, section 3),
have decriminalized sex work, with remarkable benefits to the workers, ensuring their safety, as
they are able to move freely without regulation and fear of punishment from law enforcement
(Abel, 2010a). Other countries such as Holland have legalized sex work. Decriminalization vs
legalization are often two terms that get confused. Legalization involves heavy regulation, where
the workers are told where they can work and when they can work, as well as registration fees;
failure to comply with these regulations can often result in punishments (Center for Health and
Gender Equity, 2016, p. 8). However, decriminalization removes these restrictions and the
workers are given the same rights and protections as other workers, without the heavy regulation
1

and possible penalties (Center for Health and Gender Equity, 2016, p. 8). Currently, sex work is
illegal in Canada, where the Nordic Model is used to prosecute sex workers. While the Nordic
Model was created to protect sex workers, the regulations vary slightly from country to country,
and sex workers are still being prosecuted. Nordic Model Now (2018) states that sex workers are
often forced into this profession as a result of abuse, grooming, and betrayal; Nordic Model Now
also views sex work as inherently violent and that it damages those who are involved. Some
individuals who work in the sex trade industry, however, have heavily criticized this model.
Many sex workers in Canada feel this model endangers their lives even more, as this model
pushes sex workers underground as they attempt to work while also hiding from law
enforcement (Tucker, 2014).
Further, the Nordic Model under current law also prohibits advertising for the sale of
others sexual services, both online and in print (Tucker, 2014), despite the fact sex workers
already experience high amounts of coercion and abuse from law enforcement, excessive
amounts of social stigma, and a high rate of violence. Goffman (1963, p. 3) described social
stigma as a phenomenon whereby an individual has an attribute that is deeply discredited by their
society, and, as a result of this attribute, is rejected. The Nordic Model also does not represent a
departure from historical approaches to regulating sex work as it still views sex work as
inherently dangerous to society. Rather than offering a radical departure, the Nordic Model is
just a modern-day version of an old idea where sex workers are both criminals and victims.

Sex Work as a Profession
Sex work has been around since ancient times (Jenness, 1990), going as far back as the
ancient Greeks (Kapparis, 1999), Romans (Dillion & Garland, 2005, p. 382), and Mesopotamia
(Rathus, Nevid, Fichner-Rathus, & McKay, 2016, p. 462). While sex work is currently illegal in
many parts of the world, sex work was legal in Ancient Greece (Kapparis, 1999) and Ancient
Rome (Dillion & Garland, 2005, p. 382) with both men and women engaging in sex work.
Today, there are millions of sex workers around the world. A report by the organization
Fondation Scelles (2012, p. 5) suggests there are between 40 and 42 million sex workers
currently in the world. While some countries have legalized sex work, many others prohibit it by

2

law. New Zealand, however, has opted to decriminalize sex work, offering a possible model for
other countries to follow (Lutnick & Cohan, 2009).
The Nordic Model
The Nordic Model, as the name implies, started in Sweden after researchers concluded
that most of the prostituted women at the time were forced into prostitution as a result of abuse,
grooming, betrayal, violence, and extreme poverty (Nordic Model Now, 2018). The Nordic
Model has four key aims, according to The Global Network of Sex Work Projects (NSWP)
(2017, p. 4):
1. To create change by sending a message that society should not tolerate sex work as it is
a form of violence against women.
2. To reduce the demand for sex work. This is accomplished by criminalizing the buyers.
If there is no one to buy, there is no one to sell.
3. To reduce trafficking by reducing the client pool and making it an unattractive venture
for traffickers.
4. To convince other countries around the world that sex work is inherently violent
towards women so the buyers should be criminalized, and the ideology should be
condemned.

Adverse Effects of Criminalizing Sex Work
Sex workers are one of the most vulnerable populations who are at risk of contracting an
HIV infection (WHO, 2016). Sex workers who use drugs are at even higher risk due to
unprotected sex, syringe sharing, violence, and dependence on drugs or alcohol (Rusakova,
Rakhmetova, & Strathdee, 2014). Fear of law enforcement and incarceration discourage condom
possession, as even carrying a condom can provide officers reason enough to arrest and
prosecute them (Alexander, 2001). This fear and abuse by law enforcement also limit the time
and the methods that sex workers can use to screen their clients (Kinnell, 2006) as cited by
Campbell and O'Neill (2013) in their book Sex Work Now. Because of this fear and abuse, sex
workers may move to more isolated areas, which increases the risk of violence against them
3

(Shannon & Csete, 2010). Another harmful effect of criminalization is the stigma that comes
along with being a sex worker.
While sex workers view their jobs as legitimate, they are often seen as immoral and
deserving of punishment by many in society (including law enforcement officials who claim to
protect and serve the public). This stigma, more often than not, results in the exclusion of sex
workers from healthcare, education, and housing as a result (Mgbako, 2016; World Health
Organization, 2012). Many authorities have also shut down many online sex work forums. These
online forums allowed sex workers to screen their clients better, thus increasing protection
(Conger, 2014). Police hold power over sex workers when sex work is illegal. As a result, abuse
and unethical behaviour are commonplace for many. In Europe and Asia, many sex workers
report being sexually assaulted by police needs citation. Ninety percent of sex workers in
Kyrgyzstan said they were sexually assaulted (Crago, 2009). In Cambodia, nearly half of the sex
workers have been beaten and raped by the police (Jenkins, 2006).
In contrast, seventy-five percent of sex workers in brothels have been beaten and raped
by police (United States Agency for International Development, 2006). In places like Namibia
and Siberia, sex workers reported being raped while in police custody, often without condoms
and often as a pre-release for bail (Arnott & Crago, 2009; Rhodes et al., 2008). In many parts of
the United States, individuals convicted of sex work-related activities must register as sex
offenders, where they are required to carry documents, identifying themselves as sex offenders.
As a result, many are unable to apply for loans, scholarships, or public housing (Best Practices
Policy Project, 2010). Being labelled a sex offender may make it difficult for sex workers to find
non-sex work-related work if they so choose. Laws criminalizing sex work also have a
disproportionate effect on women and LGBTQ+ individuals as they make up a majority of sex
workers, where these laws act as a form of state control over their rights to have bodily
autonomy, sexual freedom, and expression (Slamah, Winter, & Ordek, 2010).

Positive Effects of Decriminalizing Sex Work
Arguments for decriminalizing sex work are plentiful. While sex work has remained
criminalized in Canada or the U.S., we can look at countries around the world to see the possible
4

outcomes. Even without looking to those countries, however, the World Health Organization
(WHO, 2020) states that decriminalizing sex work could lead to a 46% reduction in new HIV
infections in sex workers over ten years. The WHO also says that eliminating sexual violence
against sex workers could lead to a 20% reduction in new HIV infections. Advocates also argue
that by decriminalizing sex work, the workers will feel much safer, and it would be easier for law
enforcement and the government to focus on sex trafficking instead (The Canadian Alliance for
Sex Work Law Reform, 2017). While there is this idea that sex work and sex trafficking are
synonymous with one another, the critical distinction is consent. Within the framework of sex
work, there is consent among the workers and the buyers. In sex trafficking, there is often
manipulation, coercion, betrayal, and a lack of consent, forcing the victims to engage in activates
they do not want to but often do for fear of their lives (NSWP, 2011). Decriminalizing sex work
may enable sex workers to maximize their legal protection, giving them the ability to exercise
legal justice and access health care.
When we decriminalize sex work, we decrease the violence and stigma and increase
protection, dignity, and equality within society. After sex work was decriminalized in New
Zealand, many sex workers (around 57%) reported that police attitudes and interactions towards
them had become much more positive (Abel, 2010b, p. 235). In New Zealand, sex workers have
an increased ability to screen their clients, work in safer environments, and have better access to
security services. Sex workers are also able to inform the police when act violence is occurring
or is about to happen since they do not need to worry about prosecution from law enforcement
(Armstrong, 2014). When New Zealand decriminalized sex work, it enabled sex workers to go to
the police without this fear of prosecution (Abel, 2014, p. 6).
Decriminalization, to an extent, removes the stigma, discrimination, prosecution, and
police surveillance (Decker et al., 2015). Sex workers can also be allies to fight against sex
trafficking as sex workers in India were able to identify and support women who were part of sex
trafficking (Jana, Dey, Reza-Paul, Steen, 2014). When sex workers do not need to worry about
criminal penalties against them, they can collaborate with law enforcement to prevent sex
trafficking. Finally, decriminalization not only gives sex workers bodily autonomy, but it also
respects gender equality, privacy, and sexual rights for everyone.

5

Conclusion
A majority of sex workers, and many people not even associated with the industry, feel
that criminalizing adults for engaging in sexual activity that goes against societal norms is
incompatible with the human rights to personal autonomy, sexual freedom and expression, and
privacy. The laws against sex work are not based on research, but rather, based on subjective
morality that stems from the fact that society still accepts patriarchal norms and religious
intolerance towards sexual freedom and expression. The government should not be able to
dictate what two consenting adults do behind closed doors. Criminalizing sex work harms the
workers in various ways, wastes time and money that could be spent better on fighting sex
trafficking and provides a barrier that makes it almost impossible for workers to access health
services, education, and housing.
The best example, as outlined throughout this paper, is to follow the same plan that New
Zealand has set out. The workers are safer, the police can focus on more important issues, and
various rights are upheld and respected. When sex work undergoes decriminalization, not only is
the stigma removed from many areas of their lives, but access to health services increases.
Interactions with law enforcement officials also become more positive, education is obtainable,
and the workers have safer environments from which to work in and can adequately screen their
clients. Lastly, sex workers, like so many of us who are privileged in this world, are finally given
the inalienable rights they deserve. The right to bodily autonomy, the right to sexual expression
and freedom, the right to be treated and seen as equal without discrimination, and the right to
privacy. Sex worker rights are human rights.

6

References
Abel, G. (2010a). Taking the Crime Out of Sex Work: New Zealand Sex Workers' Fight for
Decriminalisation. Bristol: Policy Press.
Abel, G. (2010b). Decriminalisation: A harm minimisation and human rights approach to
regulating sex work (Thesis, Doctor of Philosophy). University of Otago. Retrieved from
https://www.nzpc.org.nz/pdfs/Abel,-G.,-(2010),-PhD-Thesis.pdf
Abel, G. (2014). A decade of decriminalization: Sex work 'down under' but not underground.
Criminology & Criminal Justice, 14(5), 580–592. doi: 10.1177/1748895814523024
Alexander, P. (2001). Contextual risk versus risk behaviour: The impact of the legal, social and
economic context of sex work on individual risk taking. Research for Sex Work, (4), 3-4
Armstrong, L. (2014). Screening clients in a decriminalised street-based sex industry: Insights
into the experiences of New Zealand sex workers. Australian & New Zealand Journal of
Criminology, 47(2), 207–222. doi: 10.1177/0004865813510921
Arnott, J., & Crago, A.-L. (2009). Rights Not Rescue: A Report on Female, Male, and Trans Sex
Workers' Human Rights in Botswana, Namibia, and South Africa. New York, NY: Open
Society Institute.
Benoit, C, Atchison, C, Casey, L, Jansson, M, McCarthy, B, Philips, R, Reimer, B, Reist, D, &
Shaver, F. (2014). Gender, violence and health contexts of vulnerabilities, resiliencies
and care among people in the sex industry. A "working paper" prepared as background to
Building on the Evidence: An International Symposium on the Sex Industry in Canada.
Ottawa, ON.
Best Practices Policy Project. (2010). Report on the United States of America submitted to the
U.N. Human Rights Council for the 9th Universal Periodic Review. Retrieved from:
http://lib.ohchr.org/HRBodies/ UPR/Documents/session9/ Us/Js5_%20HsRi_Joint%20
submission5_Js.pdf
Campbell, R., & O'Neill, M. (2013). Sex Work Now. Uffculme, U.K: Taylor and Francis.

7

The Canadian Alliance for Sex Work law Reform (2017). Safety, Dignity, Equality:
Recommendations for Sex Work Law Reform in Canada.
The Center For Health And Gender Equity. (2016). All Women, All Rights, Sex Workers
Included: U.S Foreign Assistance And Reproductive Health and Rights Of Female Sex
Workers. Retrieved from: https://srhrforall.org/download/all-women-all-rights-sexworkers-includedu-s-foreign-assistance-and-srhr-of-female-sex
workers/?wpdmdl=1243&refresh=5ede5ec6ac6de1591631558
Crago, A. (2009). Arrest the violence: human rights abuses against sex workers in Central and
Eastern Europe and Central Asia: Open Society Institute & Sex Workers' Rights
Advocacy Network. Retrieved from:
http://www.opensocietyfoundations.org/reports/arrest-violence-human-rights-violationsagainst-sex-workers-11-countries-central-and-eastern.
Decker, M., Crago, A.-L., Chu, S., Sherman, S., Seshu, M., Buthelezi, K., … Beyrer, C. (2015).
Human rights violations against sex workers: burden and effect on HIV. Human Rights
Violations against Sex Workers: Burden and Effect on HIV, 385(9963), 186–199.
Retrieved from https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS01406736(14)60800-X/fulltext
Dillon, M., & Garland, L. (2005). Ancient Rome: From the Early Republic to the Assassination
of Julius Caesar. London: Routledge.
Fondation Scelles. (2012). Current Assessment of the state of prostitution. Retrieved from:
https://www.fondationscelles.org/pdf/current-assessment-of-the-state-of-prostitution2013.pdf
The Global Network of Sex Work Projects (2017). Challenging the introduction of the Nordic
Model. Retrieved from:
https://www.nswp.org/sites/nswp.org/files/sg_to_challenging_nordic_model_prf03.pdf
The Global Network of Sex Work Projects (2011). Sex Work is not Trafficking. Retrieved from:
https://www.nswp.org/sites/nswp.org/files/SW%20is%20Not%20Trafficking.pdf

8

Goffman, E. (1963). Stigma: Notes on the Management of Spoiled Identity. New York, NY:
Simon & Schuster.
Hamel, D. (2003). Trying Neaira: The True Story of a Courtesan's Scandalous Life in Ancient
Greece. New Haven & London: Yale.
Jana, S., Dey, B., Reza-Paul, S., & Steen, R. (2013). Combating human trafficking in the sex
trade: can sex workers do it better? Journal of Public Health, 36(4), 622–628. doi:
10.1093/pubmed/fdt095
Jenkins, C. (2006). Violence and Exposure to HIV among Sex Workers in Phnom Penh,
Cambodia. Baltimore, MD: End Gender-based violence, The INFO Project.
Jenness, V. (1990). From Sex as Sin to Sex as Work: COYOTE and the Reorganization of
Prostitution as a Social Problem. Social Problems, 37(3), 403–420. doi:
10.1525/sp.1990.37.3.03a00090
Kapparis, K. A. (1999). Apollodoros "Against Neaira": Berlin: De Gruyter. doi:
https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110809862
Kinnell, H. (2006). Murder made easy: The final solution to prostitution?. Cited in Sex Work
Now (2013).
Kurke, L. (1997). "Inventing the "Hetaira": Sex, Politics, and Discursive Conflict in Archaic
Greece". Classical Antiquity. 16 (1): 107–108.
Lutnick, A., & Cohan, D. (2009). Criminalization, legalization or decriminalization of sex work:
what female sex workers say in San Francisco, USA. Reproductive Health Matters,
17(34), 38–46. doi: 10.1016/s0968-8080(09)34469-9
Mgbako, C. (2016). To Live Freely in This World: Sex Worker Activism in Africa. New York:
New York University Press.
Nordic Model Now (2018) What is the Nordic Model? Retrieved from
https://nordicmodelnow.org/what-is-the-nordic-model/.

9

Prostitution Reform Act of 2003. Retrieved from:
http://www.legislation.govt.nz/act/public/2003/0028/latest/DLM197815.html#DLM19782
1
Rathus, S. A., Nevid, J. S., Fichner-Rathus, L., & McKay, A. (2016). Human Sexuality in a
World of Diversity. (5th ed.). Toronto, ON: Pearson Canada.
Rhodes, T., Simic, M., Baros, S., Platt, L., & Zikic, B. (2008). Police violence and sexual risk
among female and transvestite sex workers in Serbia: qualitative study. The British
Medical Journal, 337(7669), 560–563. doi: 10.1136/bmj.a811
Rusakova, M., Rakhmetova, A., & Strathdee, S. A. (2015). Why are sex workers who use
substances at risk for HIV? The Lancet, 385(9964), 211–212. doi: 10.1016/s01406736(14)61042-4
Shannon, K., & Csete, J. (2010). Violence, Condom Negotiation, and HIV/STI Risk Among Sex
Workers. The Journal of the American Medical Association, 304(5), 573. doi:
10.1001/jama.2010.1090
Slamah, K., Winter, S., & Ordek, K. (2010). Slamah, K., Winter, S., & Ordek, K. (2010). Stigma
and Violence Against Transgender Sex Workers. Research for Sex Work, (12), 29–31.
Retrieved from https://www.nswp.org/sites/nswp.org/files/research-for-sex-work-12english-russian_0.pdf
Tucker, E. (2014). New prostitution bill criminalizes purchase of sex, limits where sex can be
sold. Retrieved from https://globalnews.ca/news/1373574/prostitution-legislation-to-beannounced-wednesday/?google_editors_picks=true
United States Agency for International Development. (2006). Violence and exposure to HIV
among sex workers in Phnom Penh, Cambodia. Retrieved from:
https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/fb4b/8d92bb89566285a7c0805e07347b7220f58b.pdf
World Health Organization (2012). New WHO guidelines to better prevent HIV in sex workers.
Retrieved from https://www.who.int/hiv/mediacentre/feature_story/sti_guidelines/en/.
World Health Organization (2020). Sex Work. Retrieved from
https://www.who.int/hiv/topics/sex_work/about/en/.

10

11