Table of Contents
The Theoretical Framework and General Hypothesis
Departing from the main premise of the theoretical framework of WP8, according to which violence is suffered when an experience of trauma occurs as an instance beyond discursivity, our research has aimed toward identifying the occurrences of trauma in the narratives of the interviewed “victims” (persons who have been subject to violence) and NGO activists as well as professionals working in the area, while comparing them to policy documents, both national and EU, related to migration and issues of violence in migration context. The comparative reading of the two types of discourses (the personal narratives and policy discourses) renders visible their differences in the perception of violence, and, hence, of the means of its prevention. As an international team, we have been looking at the personal narratives of victims of trafficking, migrant women workers/mothers and other narratives where the issues of gender, migration and culture crosscut. Our goal has been to explore and interpret the gendered interactions between dominant cultures and those of the marginalized communities (the cultural context they originate from and the renditions it displays in the context of a migrant community).
Working with the methodologies of the interdisciplinary field of gender studies, and more specifically, combining Judith Butler’s philosophy, i.e., her theory of violence with Lacanian psychoanalytic theory, the theoretical framework the international team shares is based on the founding presupposition that the greatest trauma occurs when discourse (of justification, ascribing meaning to the suffered experience) fails.
Complying with the above, in the analysis of the Macedonian case we have relied on the interpretation of a number of personal accounts by way of comparing them to policy documents in order to verify if the latter adequately identify and address the issue of violence in the instances of intersection of gender, migration and culture.
The Context (the National and the European)
Macedonia: The State of Affairs Regarding Migration Flows (Immigration and Migration)
According to the official data of the Statistical Office collected by the Ministry of Internal Affairs, the net flow of international migration is positive, which means that due to immigration the population of Macedonia should be growing. The sample which is limited to the citizens of Macedonia confirms this trend: for the past years Macedonians were mostly coming back instead of emigrating. The exception is the period from 2005 to 2007 when emigration of Macedonians increased. Still, these are not big figures – the outflow in 2005 was equal to 758 persons only. It should be stressed that these figures are questionably representative of the actual flows although there is a legal obligation to register in case of emigration/ immigration, considering the gray zone of temporary migrations. Yet again, according to the data made available by the United Nations, the Republic of Macedonia could be recognized as a country with significant emigration , brain drain and short-term labour migration.1. United Nations, 2008, Measuring Population Movement and Integration in a Globalized World, Economic Commission For Europe, Economic And Social Council, , Ece/Ces/2008/23 The permanent emigration flows are predominatly directed toward Canada, Australia and the US. The most significant manifestation of the problem of illegal migrations in Macedonia is the issue of human trafficking. Trafficking of human beings as one of the forms of illegal migration in the Republic of Macedonia is demonstrating a strong gender orientation.2. Badarevski Bobi, 2006, ‘Critical Discourse Analysis of the Trafficking in Women in Print Media in Macedonia: A Gender Perspective’, in: Nirman Moranjak Bamburac, Tarik Jusic, Adla Isanovic (eds.) Stereotyping: Representation of Women In Print Media In South East Europe. Sarajevo: Mediacentar U.S. State Department Report ranks Macedonia among countries that fully meet standards in fight against human trafficking.3. https://www.state.gov/g/tip/rls/tiprpt/2009, accessed on February 23, 2010. There still remains the issue of internally trafficked girls (from one part of the country to another, i.e., from East to West, marked by the predominance of different ethnic groups respectively). Due to the laws on immigration and readmission as well as other met criteria,4. Cf. The European Stability Initiative report, available at https://www.esiweb.org/pdf/schengen_white_list_project%20-%20Visa%20Grade%20Report%20Macedonia%20-%2023%20June%202009.pdf, accessed February 23, 2010. EU introduced visa liberalization for the citizens of Macedonia on December 19th 2009.5. Cf. European Parliament’s Press Release, available at https://www.europarl.europa.eu/news/expert/infopress_page/027-62352-285-10-42-903-20091012IPR62350-12-10-2009-2009-false/default_en.htm, accessed February 23, 2010
Harmonization of the Laws and Policies with the EU Acquis
With the granting of candidate status to the FYR of Macedonia, the EU has set many conditions concerning migration. It is demanded to reduce illegal migration flows, ensure safe return of illegal migrants, and build capacity to better manage migration. The country had to set a central database for all aliens covering asylum, migration, and visas. As for migration, the EU commission stressed that 2002 population census did not cover registration of emigrants and immigrants hampering the determination of net migration. To some extend this gap is covered by the Labor Force Survey conducted regularly.
One aspect of migration policy that is often ignored but is a consequence of the multidimensional nature of the issue is the bureaucratic nature of the process, which treats this issue as merely criminal rather than complex gendered and human rights issue of cultural vulnerability. Rarely is migration policy the responsibility of a single government ministry or department. Thus, to speak of "migration policy" as if it were a homogeneous and uncontested entity is deceptive, entailing the danger of essentializing it into a unity that obfuscates the intrinsic tensions and contradictions.6. Skeldon Ronald, Migration And The Policy Process, https://www.hku.hk/cupem/home/SRT/2223_March_Conference_Papers/Skeldon_paper.pdf The new laws on migration regulate and develop the EU minimum standards on: entry and admission; stay and residence; expulsion and voluntary return; irregular migration; trafficking in human beings and migration statistics and data protection.7. EU Model Alignment Strategy on Migration, Macedonia - 15th of December 2005, Brussels. The EU Alignment strategy for Macedonia was produced within the framework of a CARDS Regional Programme on the “Establishment of EU compatible legal, regulatory and institutional frameworks in the fields of Asylum, Migration and Visa matters” (CARDS AMV). The strategy obligates the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia to implement the minimum standards in the following areas for the period of the next 2 years. A new Law on Employment of Foreigners was enforced (April 2007) is on the line with the EU Acquis and follows the Migration Strategy. It deals with the details regarding the regularization of the status of the foreign nationals residing and working in the territory of the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia.8. The Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia Migration Profile, International Organization for migration (IOM), Ljubljana, September 2007., p.31 Law on Movement and Residence of Aliens (“Official Gazette of the Republic of Macedonia,” Nos. 36/92, 66/92, 26/93 and 45/02), which regulates: the entry of aliens, visas, residence of aliens, travel and other documents for aliens, sojourn and residence of aliens, records of aliens and offences against aliens. The Government of the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia has formally adopted the Law on Foreigners (adopted in February 2006; into this law “Tha Law on Assylum,” adopted in 2008, has been integrated).
With these acts, the country aligned its migration legislation with the EU Acquis. In addition to the aforementioned regulations, migration is also regulated by bilateral agreements. Republic of Macedonia signed readmission agreements with a number of countries, and continues to do so. In the context of migration, the National Action Plan on Migration and Asylum (NAP) of the Republic of Macedonia is of a significant importance. All these new laws, and issuing policies, as well as the introduction of biometric passports have been the condition made for visa liberalization in December 2009. It remains to be seen how this novelty will affect the migration flaws in the region, in particular from the aspect of gender and culture.
Trafficking
The Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia holds the status of predominantly transit country, with the growing tendency of becoming a country of origin and one of internal trafficking, according to the latest Department of State.9. Department of State Report on Trafficking in Persons, available at https://www.state.gov/g/tip/rls/tiprpt/2009/ The same Report also praises Macedonia for successfulness in the combat against human trafficking.
In terms of legal provisions, in the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, trafficking in human beings is a criminal offence punishable by the Criminal Code (Articles 148a, 148b, 148c and 148g). A “Law for witness protection” was also introduced (“Official Gazette of the Republic of Macedonia”, No. 04/02.) Prostitution is not a criminal offence, but an administrative offence. Mediation in conducting prostitution (Criminal Code Article 191) provides sanctions against a person who recruits, instigates, stimulates or entices another to prostitution, or a person who, in any kind of way, participates in turning over a person to another, for the purpose of prostitution. In 2008 the Law was amended to include one new article: Article 418 (g): Trafficking of juveniles, which provides sanctions against a person who recruits, instigates, stimulates or entices minors to prostitution, or a person who, in any kind of way, participates in turning over a minor to another person, for the purposes of prostitution; pardoning is granted if a member of the group will disclose the group before he/she commits a crime as its member or on its behalf. (“Official Gazette of the Republic of Macedonia”, No. 36/92, 66/92, 26/93, and 45/02).
Analysis of the Discourse in the Legal Documents and Policy Documents of National and International Organizations
Article 418-1 of the “Criminal Code” clearly defines trafficking as a forced illegal migration: paraphrasing the beginning of the article, trafficking occurs when it is through threat, deception, abuse of one’s position of power and of the vulnerability of the victim, such as pregnancy (etc.), by mediation (through “exchange of money”) of a third person who has control (sic!) over the potentially trafficked person, “that one illegally transports, buys, sells, provides shelter and accepts persons for the purposes of sexual exploitation, pornography, forced labor or that of a serf, slavery, forced marriage, forced fertilization, adoption or similar rapport, or illegal transplantation of human organs, shall be punished by minimum 4 years of imprisonment. “
The force, deception, tricking into illegal migration that will end as a form of slavery (being owned, being financially claimed by somebody and deprived of the basic right of the freedom of movement) seems to imply that trafficking occurs only when the trafficked person is “innocent,” when she or he unknowingly becomes part of the chain of human trafficking as its object. Thus, one is trafficked if one is innocent, if one is a – “victim” (in traditional Christian vain of victimhood that is based on the quality of innocence). It should be inferred that if one is not deceived, kidnapped, forced in any way, but straightforwardly offered what the trafficking “package” for sex work consists of (giving your passport in possession to the person who becomes your owner for some earning as a prostitute in return), and if one accepts this offer – a case of trafficking does not occur. Thus, we can conclude that at the core of the law there are unexamined cultural layers (those belonging to the fundaments of the Christian civilization) of moralizing (regarding innocence and victimhood) that have shaped the definition of the core problem in the phenomenon of trafficking as well as the status of the “victim.” Consequently, this implies how the problem of violence in the context of trafficking (and, hence, illegal migration) is identified, addressed and acted against. It would seem that the a priori of the definition of trafficking is the concept of the innocent victim; if the latter fails to present itself (if the victim is not innocent, and, hence, not a “victim” at all), one would have to conclude that trafficking has not occurred.
Comparatively, in the “Witness Protection Law” (“Official Gazette of the Republic of Macedonia,” no. 38/5), we find the following definition of the concept of the victim: “A victim in a capacity of a protected witness is any person whose personal right or ownership right has been violated or threatened.” According to this definition, innocence is not implied as the condition for being recognized as a victim; thus, a supposed “consensual” act of becoming of a trafficked person has no bearing on the fact that “someone’s personal right or ownership right has been violated or threatened.”
It is interesting to note that the article mentions “slavery” as its aspect; and indeed, in its essence, it is about slavery, since it involves utter objectivisation of the human subject into property. If the phenomenon of trafficking is to be addressed, one will be addressing slavery as one of the – obviously perennial – forms of socio-cultural violence. And we would stress that, in this matter, it is utterly irrelevant whether the “victim” is truly a victim (i.e., “innocent”), or whether she or he has willingly entered into slavery. In other words, it is not just the brutal force (deception, kidnapping), the obvious and physical acts of violence that define the phenomenon of trafficking as violent, but it is also the social phenomenon of trafficking itself (that specific type of contemporary slavery) that is structurally (and historically) perpetuation of cultural (also social, economic, and gendered) violence.
What is particular about this form of slavery, and makes it different from the previous ones (which were ethnically and racially conditioned) we find in history, is the fact that they are essentially gendered and sexualized. If we add to this the trafficking for the purposes of transplantation of bodily organs, we can see that these are not identity groups (culturally or in any other sense), these are neither “citizens” nor official “slaves” (they are deprived from the latter socio-cultural visibility), the contemporary slaves are mere bodies (“bare life”) that are subject to the violence of trafficking.
The National Programme for the Fight Against Human Trafficking and Illegal immigration (2002) is a document that conceptualises the phenomenon of trafficking in human beings by determining the priorities in a wide range of areas such as legislation, social policy, outlining various preventive measures in the fight against human trafficking. This consideration of the multi-dimensionality, however, obfuscates the fact that these women have been subject to violence by the very state of (illegal) enslavement, and it is against the instances of such violence that one has to act and protect the women from. The programs in place at the shelter for trafficked women and girls work according to a policy which allows that only victims who are ready to go back to their country of origin are accepted, while trafficked women who do not want to take part in the International Organization for Migration program have no other option but to be deported. One cannot identify the internally trafficked women and children. Here we see the intertwining of national and international legal and policy provisions which determine the status of a victim, and which introduce a discriminatory choice of protecting against violence according to which those who violate the immigration law cannot be provided shelter from the violence they are daily exposed to. We would argue that protection against violence and gendered violence must not be rendered lesser in significance than the immigration laws and control over illegal immigration. Violence should be addressed independently, or in a parallel manner, with the issue of migration itself.
The above claim is additionally confirmed by the fact that, according to the Agreement, signed by the International Organization for Migration (IOM) and the Government, the police identify women and girls who might be trafficked and transfer them to the Transit centre - a shelter for victims of trafficking in Skopje. The findings of the OSCE (Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe) field missions suggest that not all women are brought to the shelter (Transit Center). Moreover, as the shelter takes only those victims who are willing to return in their country of origin, trafficked women who do not want to take part in the IOM program have no choice but to be deported. Internally trafficked women and children are not identified at all.”10. UNICEF, UNHCR, and OSCE/ODIHR (with the administrative support of UNDP for Bosnia and Herzegovina), Report: Trafficking in Human Beings in South-eastern Europe, 2003.
Since 2005, the NRM Office (National Referral Mechanism for the victims of trafficking in human beings) has functioned successfully within MLSP (Ministry of Labour and Social Policy). It was established as a part of the project realized by the Ministry of Labour and Social Policy and National Commission to Combat Trafficking in Human Beings and illegal migration, in cooperation with OSCE mission in the Republic of Macedonia. The Centres for social work, the local institutions, NGO's, the Association of the social workers' organizations as well as the municipal commissions for gender equality were included in this project. The NRM Office for the victims of trafficking in human beings promotes a good practice of democratic establishment of institutions by means of enhancing and coordinating the relations between the state institutions and civil society. Moreover, it informs the public and the state bodies that the concept of the human trafficking should be changed, so that it should be considered as a flagrant harassment of human rights. The Centres for social work are directly involved in all activities in the social protection for prevention and reducing the human trafficking on a local basis.11. For the purpose of a more successful functioning of the National Referral Mechanism for victims of trafficking in human beings, an analysis has been conducted, containing recommendations for amendments and modifications to the following laws:
CRIMINAL CODE OF THE RM (Official Gazette of the RM numbers 37/96 80/99, 4/02, 43/03 and 19/04);
CRIMINAL PROCEDURE LAW OF THE RM (Official Gazette of the RM numbers 4/90 74/04 and revised text 15/2005);
LAW ON FAMILY (Official Gazette of the RM number 80/92, 9/96 and 83/04; revised text - Official Gazette of the RM number 83/04) and AMENDMENTS AND MODIFICATIONS TO THE LAW ON FAMILY (Official Gazette of the RM number 33/06);
LAW ON SOCIAL PROTECTION (Official Gazette of the RM number 50/97, 6/2000, 17/03, 62/05 and 111/05) REVISED TEXT (Official Gazette of the RM no. 21/06);
LAW ON CHILD PROTECTION (Official Gazette of the RM no. 98/2000, 17/2003, 65/2004 and 113/2005); and,
LAW ON FREE ACCESS TO INFORMATION OF PUBLIC CHARACTER (Official Gazette of the RM no. 13 as of 01.09.2006). Nonetheless, this multidimensional sensitivity of the approach does not tackle the fact that the illegal migrants who do not wish to leave this country are deprived from the right to be protected against gender based violence. This deprivation on the other hand works as institutional violence exercised in the name of a culture that strives to protect itself from the flows of migration.
Analysis of the Personal Narratives
Out of the 7 analyzed interviews in which the issues of gender, interculturality and migration crosscut, two represent oral history personal accounts of young women, victims of trafficking related to prostitution; the other are interviews with refugee from Kosovo, who have remained in the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia since the Kosovo crisis, still holding the status of “refugees”. Two accounts are of transgender persons belonging to ethnic minority. The latter, as well as those of the refugees, are analyzed to serve as the background for comparative analysis that will enable to put the central subject to investigation here (that of gendered trafficking) in the wider context of intersection of culture, gender, sexuality and violence against minority. We have also conducted a mini-focus group of in depth discussion with the activists and professionals working at shelters while being very active at the NGO-scene in the defense of women’s and human rights of trafficked women (“La Strada”). In addition to this we have analyzed the personal narrative (conducted according to oral history method) with one of the NGO activists who participated in the mini focus-group.
Analysis of the personal accounts and narratives of the NGO activists and professionalsThe mini-focus group with La Strada (conducted in May 2009)
Present: Viktorija Borovska (researcher), Veselinka (La Strada, working at the Shelter), Marija (La Strada, working at the Shelter)
How they describe their work at the Shelter: Veselinka, has been working at the shelter for three years, and she explains that she is a social worker and that together with Marija, who is a psychologist they work on a special program (together with a third person, also a social worker). The program is one of socializing and they include in it the women/girls who will remain longer than 3 months in the Shelter. There are two forms of counseling: individual sessions and groups sessions, but Veselinka explains that individual sessions are preferred by the sheltered women. The aim of these sessions is to “offer emotional support” and “overcome the post-traumatic stress.” She points out that this emotional support is even more necessary if the “victim” will appear in a court trial. The psychologist, Marija, works as a councilor not as a therapist; but a therapist visits twice a month, for individual or group sessions. It is interesting to note that the therapy comes down to some tests that the sheltered women have to take. The fact that the therapist’s work consists in this “testing” that happens twice a month is repeated several times throughout the focus-group discussion. It is also important to note that both Veselinka and Marija work 12 hours a day at the shelter, in two shifts.
The usual day at the shelter, from the aspect of the program that V. and M. run, consists in normalizing the sleeping pattern of the victims (apart from the habit of sleeping during day time, they also very often suffer from insomnia). They learn how to prepare their meals with care, cook for themselves, the go out (except for those from whom any leaving of the Shelter is dangerous). During these outings they talk about their experiences; Marija stresses that most of the women open up easily, they like to talk about their experiences, also during individual sessions. The sheltered girls/women also go to school, and V. and M. task is to help them in the learning process. Most of the girls are 16-17 years old, so they are enrolled in special programs to finish their primary education (most of them haven’t).
How they experience their work emotionally: It is emotionally very hard, Maria (M.), says – one identifies with the victims experiences. She mentions that the hard part of it is “grasping it”: “you keep repeating to yourself, this is not normal, this does not happen to everyone.” M. concludes that it becomes bearable as soon as one turns “numb,” and just “reminds herself it is their work to help those young women.” Still, there are often dramatic events, she mentions, and in these cases you cannot remain indifferent. One has to mark here that M. does not see her work as possible through identification with the victims and empathy, but rather through “numbness” and an achieved level of indifference. Both Veselinka (V.) and M. agree that they do not see their job as identifying with these women, but as indifferent helping. A certain professional distance, detachment is necessary, they insist; however, what M. stresses is the reverse problem: the impossibility to identify.
V. and M. point out to the fact that the sheltered girls seek for protection in them and emotional attachment – both of them, as professionals cannot offer it, “they have to keep their professional distance.” The sheltered girls’ expectation of emotional protection on the part of the professionals at the Center is clearly stressed. This expectation remains unmet.
We would like to comment here that a feminist approach would consist in precisely the opposite to the distant professionalism, but rather in identifying and empathy; control over emotion, refraining from excessive attachment, according to the norms of professionalism, comes only a posteriori.
M. and V. demonstrate difficulty in establishing a sense of empathy/identification; hence, they talk about a level of closeness established as a result of “getting used to some of the women, those who remain longer” (M.) V. remarks immediately that the girls are capable of manipulation, faking closeness, and she concludes “in any case, they are interesting, hard to bear but interesting”
Describing the emotional state of most of the sheltered women: Victims accounts of their experiences are confused, they usually display lack of focus, inability to account of the real problem (my remark [KK]: the traumatic spot), their accounts “move in circles around irrelevant fact.” They all also display some sort of a loss of memory, inability to remember what has happened in duration of, e.g., two days. During sessions they usually manage to recover those memories, fill up the gaps of missing parts of their personal stories. Both V. and M. note that all of the girls come from “dysfunctional families.” Immediately, they add that what is characteristic for all of these girls, in terms of psychological problems, is that they all display psychosomatic problems. The traumatic core is displayed in this psychosomatic manifestation, i.e., in a form of a failing – or rather failed – discourse; whereas discursively the girls tend to focus on marginal accounts, that both V. and M. see as a mark of “lack of psychic orientation.”The Personal Account of Maja, a La Strada-Open Gate Activist
Talks with Viktorija Borovska
Describing her work: Maja considers the mission of her organization to be the promotion and the protection of women’s and human rights in the context of trafficking. They focus on the support provided for the victims and on prevention. Related to the latter they have launched several anti-trafficking campaigns in high schools and primary schools, one of them, claims Maja, being particularly successful: theater workshops, whereby through role-playing the young girls are introduced with the problem of trafficking and the ways in which one becomes potentially trafficked. Maja, in her capacity of the general manager of the organization, professes commitment to also educate and raise awareness from the perspective of women’s rights among professionals, in particular social workers and psychologists, including those working at La Strada Shelter. Apart from psychological, they also provide legal support, through their two lawyers who represent the victims in court trials. She insists that the lawyers have to be women, i.e., that it is their ability to communicate on the basis of trust with the victims which emerges as the determining factor for insisting on working with female lawyers. Maja praises the good communication and collaboration with the Department for the prevention of trafficking at the Ministry of the Interior, stressing that they are highly professional. However she disagrees with some part of the legal framework within which they work. Namely, she is critical of the fact that only the personal testimony of being a victim to trafficking grants the trafficked woman the status of a “victim.” Maja insists there are other ways of proving this fact, whereas the testimony is something the women are not easily ready to give. She sees her primary task as the manager of La Strada that the sheltered women are satisfied, that they feel better about themselves, in the shelter and in the outside world of re-socialization. Maja told us of dealing with mostly internally trafficked women or young girls from the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia trafficked abroad.
Describing the victims and her emotional relationship to them
In Maja’s narrative there is presence of a high sense of solidarity and ability to identify with the victims. She seems to identify (manifested in her highly emotional speech style accompanied with expressive gesticulation, throughout the conversation) with the suffering, the trauma they undergo, without searching to identify the victim’s personal responsibility for becoming a victim to trafficking. Maja is not explicit in reference to the latter. However, she states she believes that it is the entire context (of dysfunctional families, poverty and culture) that is to blame, and not the individual women. All of the examples of women trafficked abroad (to France and to Italy) she gave us are young girls literally sold by their families or forced to pre-arranged marriages. The girls were Romani and Albanian. When talking about the fake marriages, Maja becomes emotional, emphasizing: “Can you imagine? They organized them a wedding here, a real wedding! And then, over there….” She also stresses the fact that it is evident that these girls try to find mothers in the professionals at the Center, making a remark that “certainly M. and V. are very professional, and they do a great job” but they cannot give them emotionally what these girls are seeking for. The girls a mostly filled with a sense of guilt, and those among them who see themselves as solely responsible for the state they are in do not open up easily, do not wish to talk, and it takes them a long time until they start verbalizing what they have been through.
My remark (KK): A feminist approach of the professionals, according to Chodorowian methodology and in line with Gilligan’s ethics of care, through the empathy it necessarily entails could help the sheltered girls achieve more effectively the goal of overcoming their sense of guilt and personal responsibility, and toward reaching the necessary level of self-esteem in order to be truly re-socialized.
Personal Narratives of Trafficked Women4.2.1 The Story of “Nasmie”
“Nasmie” is a pseudonym of the young girl (of Romani ethnicity) who is the protagonist of this oral history narrative. She got married when she was 13.5 years old to a 15 years old boy. She never finished her primary education. Her parents were apple pickers in Resen, and she barely saw them as a child. She grew up with her grandmother, and she insists on her grandmother playing the role of a mother (“I could not fall asleep if my grandmother was not next to me.”) She qualifies her early life in a way full of contradictions, indicating a certain aporia in the effort of making sense out of it and attempting to assign it meaning and value: “We had a good life […] I did not finish school […] my parents were never present.” She attempts to resolve the contradiction through embellishing her narrative. For not finishing school and for all the bad things that followed she blames an “external factor,” her aunt’s daughter. “She was the source of all of her misfortunes.” She qualifies her childhood as a good one. She lived with her two brothers and two sisters and her mother was the 8th wife of her father. “They all went along very well, agreed about buying stuff, and everyone got what they needed.” However she regrets for having to drop out from school. Her father’s sister “took her from her home and forced her to marry.” Her parents insisted on her return home, and on her going back to school. Her father’s sister was not letting her back. In her short forced marriage, “Nasmie” lost her virginity – “after that, after loosing your virginity there is no return to the life you used to have,” explains “Nasmie.” Her aunt did what she did out of jealousy: for “Nasmie’s” beauty and for the fact that her mother “took such good care of her” (“There was no other young girl who was taken such good care of as me.”) The account continues in negative terms: “My father didn’t drink”; “There was no fighting or beating in our house”; finishing with a lengthy account on how much healthy food, habits and hygiene were present in the house. “Nasmie” was a good pupil, and she didn’t drink any alcohol, except for a couple of time, perhaps, says she.
She repeats that was forced into marriage, and after loosing her virginity her parents could not take her back home. She became pregnant, and tried to commit suicide. She was saved eventually: the description of the moments of physical suffering (foam coming out of her mouth), and the process of saving her by a doctor who seems to have also been her mother’s obstetrician, is very vivid. After that depression followed, self isolation, and psychosomatic pain in the throat.
She did not see any future for herself in the normal life, considering she had lost her virginity. It is then that her mother’s niece introduced her into the “business in bars.” She ended up in Gevgelia. She decided to run away, and she did so. She ended up in the La Strada Shelter Center, and decided to testify against the owner of the bar (and her owner) in Gevgelija. She is very grateful to La Strada who supported her decision not to show up in the court room. She “could not face him”; she was “terrified of him” (“he wanted to sell me in Kosovo; I ran a way the night before he was supposed to sell me”). He was also Romani.
She was all bruised up and in blood when running away, since she had to jump of a window of the house (there were “metal fences, and grids”). She returned to her mother; the owner used to come to the house to look for her. Her mother was provided protection by the police in case the owner tries to trespass. She believes that her “immorality” (the desire to go out, drink, have boyfriends) is a result of some spell that somebody cast upon her. A psychic established some evil spirit (a “giant”) present in her body drove her into immorality, not herself. She would run away from home, and it was the demon who incited her into such actions. The demon was exorcised by the psychic woman “Nasmie” went to see, so life is now normal again. “Nasmie” intends to continue with her secondary education, and study to become a beautician. She doesn’t have a boyfriend now: she has lost the love of her life because of his “evil mother” who ended their relationship.
Our comments on “Nasmie’s” story: She ends up working as a prostitute and trafficked for reasons that are radically gender-conditioned; escaping forced marriage, and having lost her virginity – there is no place for “Nasmie” in the “normal world.” The possibilities of a position in a society she can imagine for herself are yet again conditioned by a fundamental gender asymmetry: she can either be married and respectful or an outcast from the world of normality, i.e., patriarchy – a “fallen woman.” An independent position of a professional woman who would be single (accepting the premise marriage is impossible because of the loss of virginity) is unimaginable in her cultural context and, hence, never imagined by either herself or her mother. The reasons for “Nasmie’s” course of life that brought her to prostitution and ending up trafficked are multiple and intersecting: cultural (prearranged marriages in early teens are habitual in Romani culture), social (level of poverty and social exclusion) render the idea of her living in an other cultural/ethnic community impossible (which would have given her the chance to re-marry, amongst other things). She can neither imagine herself as an autonomous subject in the positive sense (imagining an emancipated future for herself), nor in the negative sense (of self-culpabilization, a sense of guilt and personal responsibility). Namely, the reasons, according to “Nasmie,” are always external: evil female relatives and demons; however, in the imaginary about the demon – who led her do things which are not proper (to “wander astray”) – we see a sense of guilt and therefore individual responsibility which is yet again externalized (through the phantasm of the demon).
Considering the fact that Nasmie’s story is to such an extent conditioned by the socio-cultural context, which is profoundly gender asymmetric, and considering the fact that she is unable to assume the position of an autonomous subject, we argue that indeed she cannot be called upon “individual responsibility.” Quite simply, such an interpellation of the subject is inadequate for her socio-cultural context – in one word, it would be context insensitive. The Story of “Svetlana”
“Svetlana” is 18 years old, from Prilep (ethnicity: Macedonian). She describes herself as very sociable in her childhood, yet shy and basically a quiet child, respectful of her parents and the authorities. She opposes this “Svetlana” from the period of childhood to what she is now – “a direct person,” she claims, “somebody who tells you the truth right at your face.” Her relationship with her parents if fine, says “Svetlana”; however, she is not close with her mother (“cannot talk about intimate stuff”); she used to have disagreements with her father when she was younger because of her “frequent going out.” She used to go to a primary school where most of the pupils were Romani. “Svetlana’s” best friend at school was a Romani girl. The other Macedonians did not want contact with the Romani, “Svetlana” quite liked some of them. In particular, the girl she sat together with at school. Presently she attends the medical high school in Prilep. She wishes to study the law and hopefully become a politician. She sees herself as somebody working at the Ministry of the Interior. By the end of the narrative she claims she wants to study archeology. “Svetlana” thinks she will continue living in Prilep, though she dreams about an opportunity to travel to or move out to Dubai, Las Vegas, Monaco. She likes to listen to techno music and loves the literature (“reads quite a great deal”). She traces the change in her attitude toward life – which led her to the situation of being trafficked for sexual exploitation – in the period when she began to drink heavily and “hang out with the junkies.” From the description of this period of her life, one concludes she used to be an alcoholic. Her first contact with the phenomenon of trafficking was when a friend of hers, a Romani from Skopje tried to sell her in marriage to a much older Romani from Bitola (“If I was to merry a much older person, at least he had to be a Macedonian”; she does not comment about the selling itself, just the ethnicity of the buyer). Through this friend of hers, who was “linked to the Mafia,” “Svetlana” started working in bars. An owner of one of these bars decided to sell “Svetlana” either to marriage or to another owner in Kosovo, for 5000 euro. She was terrified by this and could not sleep at nights, in fear that somebody would brake into her room and take her away by force. She has also experienced rape “by a group of Albanians.” Still, she prefers the Albanians as clients due to their style: “when they like a woman, they say you will be my wife.” She did not try to escape the bar where she was expecting to be sold. “Svetlana” was saved in a police raid on this bar, and then taken back to her family in Prilep. With the consent of her parents she was placed in the Shelter so that she “gets back to normal, calm down a bit.” She suffers from eating disorder and takes regular therapy for her sleeping disorder. “Svetlana” claims to have suffered from depression and psychosomatic problems since her age of 16. While trafficked, she never tried to return to her family since she was afraid she may cause them harm by this: there was a constant threat by “her boyfriend” in this period (unclear whether a client or a boyfriend) that he would kill her family. In particular she was afraid that her younger brother may suffer or be killed.
She did not feel relieved when the police found her. On the contrary: she was and is still afraid that her Romani friend of the mafia may find and harm her or her family for testifying.
Our comments on “Svetlana’s” narrative:
In “Svetlana’s” story we detect the radical cultural divisions in our society. By stepping into the “culture of the Other,” she has transgressed the border of “normality.” She never returns to her cultural community: throughout the entire period of prostitution and being trafficked she is linked exclusively to the “other” ethnic communities (Romani, and Albanian). Again. her situation is conditioned by the context and it is impossible to locate her individual responsibility: lack of communication with the family (the sense of being alone), psychological complexity (referring to her severe depressions which started in her age of 16) and addiction to alcohol and drugs. It is interesting to note how she has “culturalized” her psychological problem: it would seem that in her early teens she decided she would accept her “abnormality,” and attempted to belong to the community of the “other culture,” that of her Romani classmate. As if the normality is embodied by the culturally dominant Macedonian community, she stepped into a world, which, from her cultural (Macedonian) view-point, is anomalous in itself. She has been in search of belonging somewhere, and to someone: the Romani culture, the possibility of marriage (with an Albanian); but the sense of comfortable belonging had to be somewhere where abnormality is permitted (which would render her psychological problems, and the sense of being an outcast bearable and moreover acceptable). She “accepts her guilt”, it would seem; she claims individual responsibility through acting out of the attitude: “I am a bad girl and there is nothing you can do about it.” Here too we see a deeply contextually conditioned case, and we would say it is impossible to call upon individual responsibility. This is yet another case where standing up for oneself, in the sense of “taking one’s own destiny in one’s own hands and shaping it,” is impossible. The pressure of normality – as a form of culture – is such that “Svetlana” cannot take it, and so she chooses to be “abnormal.”
We would like to note that in spite of the fact that Svetlana assumes responsibility for her life-choice, being trafficked and sold is not something she sought for, nor, it seems, she accepts responsibility for.Comparative reading of these two narratives against the background of the analysis of the other interviews (with transgender persons and refugees)
In the case of the stateless refugees we see radical gender imbalance. Similarly to the above two stories, their state is one of “bare life” (Agamben) of individuals whose course of life is determined by socio-cultural exclusion, by the context. Again, there is absence of any awareness of the “autonomous subject” that shapes his/her own future. Transgender interviewees confirm the inherent intersecting of culture and gender related normality: it is again on the margins of the culturally dominant community that one can permit oneself to be “anomalous.” Unlike the other cases both transgender interviewees seem to act as “autonomous subjects,” display awareness of autonomy and act accordingly. Their position toward the dominant culture – the topos of “naturalized” – heteronormality is critical and informed. Their stories of oppression and emancipatory life choices witness the fact that unless one subjects the ideology of patriarchy to radical critique, exercised through transgressive individual actions, it remains impossible to assume the position of an “autonomous” subject in a context conditioned as bare life.
Conclusions and Policy Recommendations
The issue of individual responsibility and moral judgment as an aspect determining policy and the quality of help and re-socialization offered by shelters and the State
In the Criminal code, by the very definition of the concept of trafficking (article 418), the issue of individual choice seems to be directly tackled; moreover, it seems to be at the heart of the perception/the understanding of trafficking itself by our Criminal Code. The personal narratives we have examined support the thesis according to which individual choice (and “consent”) in terms of trafficking is impossible: even those who claim it, in their personal narratives, display a deeply socio-culturally conditioned life “choices.”
Those who have claimed their choice to work at bars (as prostitutes and dancers) do not claim, at any point of their narratives, they wanted or expected to be sold.
The narratives of NGO-activists and professionals witness of the fact that most of the women trafficked abroad have been sold mostly by means of forced prearranged marriages.
It seems utterly inadequate to assume the possibility of individual choice and include it in the definition of trafficking. This is also something that complicates the legal process through the institute of “individual testimony” (since it touches upon the sense of responsibility, guilt, shame of the person giving the testimony, which is not only a form of institutional violence against the victim but also an obstacle for the process, since it is precisely the giving an account of herself that precludes the victim from giving testimony).
Offering a different definition of the notion of trafficking which would exclude the assumption of individual responsibility as relevant – and focus only on the fact of the violence of the trafficking itself (the slavery and the physical brutality it entails) will shift the perspective of not only the institutions of the State, but also of the social workers and psychologists working at the Shelters who find it difficult not to judge the victims and identify with them in empathy. A definition which deals away with the myth of the “autonomous subject” (and the possibility of acting by purely individual choice) as victim of trafficking, a definition which insists on the society’s responsibility instead of that of the individual, would help improve the level of effectiveness of combating trafficking and the quality of help and re-socializing that the shelters provide.
Feminist/Gender Sensitive Approach to the Issue as a Necessary Tool for Combating the Phenomenon of Trafficking of WomenThe policies for prevention
The roots of the problem are radically gendered. Patriarchal cultures which allow the possibility of selling girls into prearranged marriages is one source of the problem of trafficking of women and children (most of the trafficked women are minors). The other, purely gendered aspect is the life-choice possibilities (identity-roles) for a woman within a profoundly patriarchal culture: if the choice is either a respectful housewife and mother or a “slut,” the “individual choices” of prostitution in the context of trafficking will remain significant cause of the problem.
We urge the institutions of the State, the EU and the international organizations to invest more in raising the awareness of gender equality and in particular women’s emancipation in the Romani and the other cultural minority groups as the most effective means of prevention. Prearranged marriages and girls’ dropping out of school should be targeted most directly. Policies/Methods of Support by Women’s Group
Psychologists should receive training in feminist psychology and psychoanalytic theory in order to overcome the positivist, allegedly neutral and “indifferent” approach deemed to be professional. Indifference, in its definition, is something in utter opposition with the goal of emotional support, rendering the latter always already failed.
Training in the basics of feminism would help the social workers overcome the issue of moral judgment/inability to identify, by way of being able to understand the underlying pattern of patriarchy behind what seems to be an individual choice.The Centrality of the Issue of Violence
Both policies of combating trafficking and the programs of help/support and resocialization should focus on the instances of systemic violence itself, rather than on individual responsibility. We identify the instances of sheer violence precisely at the points of the victims’ accounts where meaningful discourse fails. The blind-spots of being unable to explain the source of her problem, and to distinguish her own responsibility from that of another person or a community – is the traumatic spot revealing underlying systematic cultural violence. Since it is the entire socio-cultural context that has shaped her “choice,” the victim is unable to account for it. It is there the kernel of systemic violence lies. Instead of individualizing the issue, policies should address it as structural, systemic and profoundly gender-conditioned cultural phenomenon rather than merely criminal one.
What should be acted against are the instances of violence rather than individuals in their roles of either perpetrators or “victims”: prearranged marriages, slavery (being owned and object of trade), selling into marriage, teen marriages, physical violence, forced dropping out of school, both preventively and as an actual offence. In order to achieve all this, the phenomenon of trafficking must be redefined as a problem of socio-cultural and gendered exclusion rather than as crime and a purely criminological issue.
Notes