 |
| Photo: iStockphoto |
by Anette Dina Sørensen
In the Nordic countries, prostitution is defined as a social problem, which is first and foremost to be tackled through social measures, write May-Len Skilbrei and Charlotte Holmström in the final report of the project Prostitution in the Nordic countries, which they headed. However, the ways in which the measures are structured and administered vary between the countries, not least because of differences in their prostitution legislation.
In Denmark and Norway, where procuring is forbidden, but the buying and selling of sexual services are not punishable, social measures are mainly characterised by damage limitation. In Sweden, where the buying of sexual services has been forbidden since 1999, social measures are primarily aimed at reducing prostitution and at getting women and men to leave the occupation.
In Norway, social measures are provided by both public and private establishments. Most of them primarily work with street prostitution, but in recent years, contacts have also been established with prostitutes working indoors.
The Norwegian Pro Senter focuses on damage limitation and on the rights of the prostitutes. Their working methods consist of short meetings, including distribution of condoms and lubricants, and the provision of relevant information.
The private organisation Kirkens Bymission (Church City Mission), on the other hand, offers more extensive discussions and home calls. Even if they, too, work from a damage limitation perspective, their main emphasis is on helping women out of prostitution.
Looking at Sweden, a major part of the social measures are organised by the so-called prostitution units subordinate to municipal authorities in Stockholm, Gothenburg and Malmö. They do visiting work at street level, but also offer individual, therapeutic and long-term treatment in combination with web-based counselling and social support. Information dissemination is also included in the work of the prostitutions units. They cooperate with the police, who focus on the customers, while the workers at the prostitution units take care of the social measures in relation to the women.
Transnational prostitution
Seen from a historical perspective, social measures in the Nordic countries have mainly been aimed at national prostitution, but the considerable changes in the global prostitution market over the last ten years, which have led to increased transnational prostitution, have challenged their scope and forced the Nordic countries to refocus. May-Len Skilbrei describes some of the consequences:
“Norwegian prostitutes are under pressure by the presence of foreign prostitutes in the country. They must, for example, be more mobile in order to get customers. At the same time, they have become less visible in terms of the application social measures over the last few years, since these to a large extent now turn their attention to visible street prostitution and foreign prostitutes,” she points out.
The fact that the Nordic countries focus almost exclusively on adult women, including women in transnational prostitution, affects other groups of prostitutes. Thus, male prostitutes are on the periphery of social measures; they form what May-Len Skilbrei calls ‘the blind spot’.
Difficult to trace
Since they seldom advertise, they are difficult to trace. The measures aimed specifically at them are scarce, as is knowledge of their particular needs for counselling and support.
In Finland, the social measures are arranged by the NGO Pro-Tukipiste in Helsinki. The organisation also has a special programme for men in prostitution, which is based on damage limitation.
In Denmark, men in prostitution can, similarly to female prostitutes, use the letterbox on the website of Kompetencecenter for prostitution, their anonymous phone counselling and therapeutic discussion groups.
The activities of the Swedish prostitution units are also aimed at men in prostitution, but, contrary to the situation in Finland, existing measures are basically designed with women in mind.
There are signs that support for male prostitutes has decreased because of the growth in transnational prostitution. The Norwegian Pro Senter had to make changes in their activities in 2007 and give lower priority to the work aimed at men in prostitution as a consequence of the increasing number of foreign prostitutes in Norway.
According to Inger Björne-Fagerli, who has written her Master’s thesis at the University of Oslo on male prostitution, there is no reason to believe that the number of male prostitutes is small. Even if the blind number is large, several studies conducted among very young people in Iceland, Norway and Sweden indicate that the number of boys who have experiences of selling sex is larger than the number of girls with this experience.
Criminalisation of customers
In 2009, the buying of sexual services will become punishable in Norway. May-Len Skilbrei thinks, however, that the possible criminalisation will be successful only if the legislation does not lead to the cancelling of social measures.
”Much of what has already been done in that area has a positive impact,” she thinks.
“The number of prostitutes is not increasing, so something is at work here. Therefore it’s crucial that the legislation must
not overrule the social measures, and that the Norwegian State follows up the legislation with social action plans, so that
the constant attention that the area has attracted over the last 15 years will continue.”
Anette Dina Sørensen is freelance journalist specialising in gender research.
This article has been published in NIKK magasin 1 2009 © NIKK
