Migrant Domestic Workers Re-framing Anti-trafficking

Abstract

The consequences of employing mainstream anti-trafficking approaches have been increasingly documented. These include restrictive migration policies, surveillance and the criminalization of migrant workers, including domestic workers (e.g. GAATW, 2007). Yet critiques levelled against mainstream anti-trafficking frameworks do not negate the fact that human trafficking does affect migrant domestic workers. Although the anti-trafficking framework has resulted in the criminalization of migrant workers in various countries, migrant worker-led organizations in Hong Kong are striving to use anti-trafficking and forced labour platforms to raise questions about domestic work. In Hong Kong, migrant domestic worker-led organizations have been vocal about the need for anti-trafficking and forced labour efforts that are capable of responding to the exploitation and abuse of migrant domestic workers. This paper discusses the risks and opportunities anti-trafficking frameworks pose for migrant worker organizations. This is followed by an examination of the human trafficking practices that affect migrant domestic workers in Hong Kong. We then analyse the efforts of migrant worker-led organizations in bridging anti-trafficking responses with efforts to end forced labour and contemporary forms of modern day slavery, in a way that has the potential to strengthen the rights of migrant workers, rather than undermining them.