Gender ARC is pleased to invite you to a research seminar May-Len Skilbrei, University of Oslo, Norway“The Sex Purchase Ban in Sweden and Norway: evaluating law-in-action”

This seminar launches the first all-Ireland network for researchers critically engaged in the area of commercial sex and its attendant politics. A further one-day series of workshops will be held in University of Limerick on November 27th 2015. All are welcome to attend. For further details and to reserve a place, contact annmarie.joyce@ul.ie

Abstract: Much is said about the unilateral sex purchase ban in Sweden and Norway – called the Swedish or Nordic model – in debates on prostitution policies elsewhere. Claims about the laws made in these debates make it necessary to critically assess the evidence of their effects, and to understand how they operate in a larger context where social welfare provisions and other sets of legal and administrative instruments also apply.

In her talk, Skilbrei goes beyond the ideological arguments and pragmatic reasoning behind the Sex Purchase Act in both countries, to explore how the Acts are argued for and put to work today. She argues that the explicit intentions behind the acts are counteracted by how their implementation works in practice and that they have been repurposed to meet new goals. Both of these aspects of prostitution law-in-action need to be considered in debates over whether or not to ‘export’ similar Acts to new contexts.

Professor May-Len Skilbrei is based in theDepartment of Criminology and Sociology of Law, University of Oslo. She researches prostitution and prostitution policies, and labour and migration. In the last decade, her research has dealt mainly with human trafficking and prostitution policies in the Nordic countries. She published a book on prostitution policies in the Nordic countries with Charlotta Holmstr̦m (Ashgate 2013). Prof. Skilbrei is Vice Chair of the European network of prostitution scholars, COST Action “Comparing European Prostitution Policies: Understanding Scales and Cultures of Governance (ProsPol)”, and is as co-editor of the Routledge book series Interdisciplinary Studies in Sex for Sale.

Followed by Gender ARC reception and network members meeting (1.00-3.00pm)