Fantasies and Realities of Child Exploitation in Western Europe
By Peyroux Olivier, 19 Nov 2014
Trafficking in children has long been associated only with sexual exploitation. The “ideal victim” was a naive young girl tricked by her boyfriend in her Moldovan village and taken by force to the West in order to be sexually exploited. This image of the “real victim” tends to overshadow other forms of trafficking that have recently developed in Western Europe. These include forced stealing, forced begging, exploitation in domestic work, labor exploitation and male prostitution.
The trafficking of minors has its own specificities. First of all, the forms of exploitation can often be conditioned by the age of the minor. In this context, we are increasingly referring to ‘poly-exploitation’ (i.e. multiple forms of exploitation) happening successively or simultaneously. Concretely, this can mean that children are begging from 6 to 10 years old, forced to steal from 11 to 14 or involved in prostitution from the age of 15 although there are no strictly established boundaries between age groups and the different forms of exploitation. The objective is to minimise the risk of judicial proceedings and defeat the juvenile justice system by playing with the age, the lack of any identified legal guardian, etc. The forms of coercion over the minors also differ from those of adults; it is often a combination of physical and psychological violence, a sense of family loyalty, or the desire to reach social recognition. For all these reasons, the trafficking of minors is a complex issue requiring a multidisciplinary approach which is difficult to implement in practice. The issue of information sharing, for example, raises much reluctance between administrations (police, justice, child welfare) and associations.
Generally speaking, when we look at the responsiveness of European States to implement their obligations and to adapt their child protection systems to these realities, we see that this is far from being a priority. The EU Directive/2011/36 which deals with an improved protection of victims of trafficking in human beings was to be transposed into the national laws of the Member States no later than April 6, 2013. On that date, 21 Member States, including most of Western European countries, had not fulfilled this obligation. To better understand this low motivation which clearly goes against the sacrosanct principle of “best interests of the child”, one must inquire about the profile of the most visible victims in the media. In France, Italy, the United Kingdom and in Germany, the vast majority of articles and reports focus exclusively on Roma children forced to beg or to steal, and they essentially depict these children as criminals rather than victims requiring special protection. According to the work of Milena Jaksic, to be considered by the public as a true victim, the child must express the signs of submission, resignation and suffering inflicted by his persecutors. In contrast to this imaginary figure, the “false” victim is the one who steals, deceives institutions, who, in short, by his behavior, harms society. When one adds to these forms of exploitation the negative preconceptions linked to nationality or belonging to certain ethnic minorities, such as the Roma, one can better understand the difficulty political leaders face in defending the rights of the victims. These are largely considered suspicious, due to their origin, and responsible for the exploitation they endure.
Generally speaking, when we look at the responsiveness of European States to implement their obligations and to adapt their child protection systems to these realities, we see that this is far from being a priority. The EU Directive/2011/36 which deals with an improved protection of victims of trafficking in human beings was to be transposed into the national laws of the Member States no later than April 6, 2013. On that date, 21 Member States, including most of Western European countries, had not fulfilled this obligation. To better understand this low motivation which clearly goes against the sacrosanct principle of “best interests of the child”, one must inquire about the profile of the most visible victims in the media. In France, Italy, the United Kingdom and in Germany, the vast majority of articles and reports focus exclusively on Roma children forced to beg or to steal, and they essentially depict these children as criminals rather than victims requiring special protection. According to the work of Milena Jaksic, to be considered by the public as a true victim, the child must express the signs of submission, resignation and suffering inflicted by his persecutors. In contrast to this imaginary figure, the “false” victim is the one who steals, deceives institutions, who, in short, by his behavior, harms society. When one adds to these forms of exploitation the negative preconceptions linked to nationality or belonging to certain ethnic minorities, such as the Roma, one can better understand the difficulty political leaders face in defending the rights of the victims. These are largely considered suspicious, due to their origin, and responsible for the exploitation they endure.
Visibility and media coverage of the phenomenon obscures the reality of child exploitation. In the UK, for the year 2013, the National Crime Agency report provided figures of 2,744 victims and people at risk, including 602 minors. Although progress remains to be made, forms of exploitation of children identified are not limited to, unlike in most European countries, the sexual exploitation of teenage girls. The forms of child exploitation that are covered range from forced labor in illegal cannabis plantations to the use of children for cheating on family benefits, the recruitment of teenagers as street peddlers up to the most common forms of exploitation including child sexual exploitation, the exploitation of children as domestic workers through forced marriages, child begging, and the forced involvement of children in petty crimes, etc. In terms of nationalities, English children rank on top of the list of exploited children (with 128 victims), Romanian minors are the fourth on the list (with 42 victims). This plurality of forms of exploitation and nationalities jostle the usual representations. Contrary to the common image conveyed, most victims of trafficking in human beings, including both children and adults, are not of foreign origin. In the Netherlands and in Germany, according to official statistics, adult victims most affected by trafficking are nationals. If these figures are to qualify for the guarantees available to these victims in case they file a complaint, this implies that trafficking is not limited to poor migrants.
When considering criminal groups exploiting a large number of Romanian children (mostly from Roma origin), we find that they are far from being representative. If we take the case of France, in the Paris region, the numbers provided by the police and justice sector indicate a range of children potentially exploited (forced to steal or forced to beg) from 3 to 10% compared to all children recorded in the slums areas. This means that between 90 % and 97 % of these children are not used by their families.
When considering criminal groups exploiting a large number of Romanian children (mostly from Roma origin), we find that they are far from being representative. If we take the case of France, in the Paris region, the numbers provided by the police and justice sector indicate a range of children potentially exploited (forced to steal or forced to beg) from 3 to 10% compared to all children recorded in the slums areas. This means that between 90 % and 97 % of these children are not used by their families.
Among these exploited minors, the majority are under the control of some criminal organisations known to the British, German, Spanish and French police. After studying the cracks in the system of various countries in Western Europe, these networks have understood the potential benefits of using minors forced to beg or to steal to quickly make money. Through a debt bondage system, they bring families to exploit their children. Even in case of debt repayment, this operation has a lasting impact as some parents continue thereafter to use their children for income generation.
These forms of exploitation require adjustments on the part of States who hitherto considered the fight against trafficking primarily in terms of the arrest of key leaders with little regard to the protection of victims. However, the current situation shows that the arrest of the perpetrators is not enough to force these criminal groups to stop exploiting children and adolescents. If the protection of victims is a moral duty, it should also be emphasised that it is also one of the best ways to fight against this trade. Protecting victims would dry up the source of income of these organisations, that is to say, their raison d’être. Recently, at the instigation of the European Union and the Council of Europe, European States have adopted action plans against trafficking more focused on the protection of victims. Although it is still too early to make an assessment, these initiatives are a prerequisite for the implementation of the necessary measures. However these will remain limited as long as trafficking in human beings continues to be perceived as a marginal phenomenon affecting only the poor migrants and stigmatised minorities.
