Recording: Gender, Human Trafficking and Exploitation

Women and girls represent 65% of trafficking victims globally, but research is increasingly recognising that a significant proportion of human trafficking perpetrators are women. Between these profiles there are also several roles that women and girls may play that blur the line between victim and perpetrator, complicating efforts to protect victims and prosecute offenders.

At the same time, men and boys – often generalised as offenders – make up the majority of victims trafficked for forced labour, and are also vulnerable to other forms of trafficking, including for sexual exploitation. Heteronormative perceptions of victims serve to disguise male victimhood, limiting the resources and support available to men and boys.

This webinar brings together a panel of experts to explore gendered understandings of human trafficking and the impacts these have on efforts to tackle crime, protect victims and provide gender-specific responses to prevent offending.

This is the final webinar in a five-part series exploring organised crime and gender, held by RUSI in collaboration with the Thames Valley Violence Reduction Unit and the Department of Politics, Languages and International Studies at the University of Bath.

Dr Rosemary Broad, Senior Lecturer at the University of Manchester. She has been conducting research in the area of human trafficking and modern slavery for over a decade, with a focus on perpetrators of these offences, policymaking and practice.

Dr Noemi Magugliani, Lecturer in Law at Kent Law School, University of Kent and Research Fellow at the British Institute of International and Comparative Law. Their research focuses on migration and border violence, trafficking in human beings and critical gender studies. Since 2020, they have also acted as Senior Legal Advisor to the United Nations Special Rapporteur on Trafficking in Persons, Especially Women and Children, and in 2022 they co-founded de:border//migration justice collective, a collective of scholars and activists mobilising the law to challenge border violence.

Mark Hadley, National Crime Agency. Mark has worked in law enforcement for 15 years and leads a team of analysts within the National Assessments Centre, who are responsible for delivering the UK’s national strategic assessment of the serious and organised crime threat posed to the UK. His team specifically focuses on the threat from Modern Slavery and Human Trafficking, both within the UK and globally.

The webinar is be chaired by Dr Keith Ditcham, Senior Research Fellow, Organised Crime and Policing, RUSI.