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Introduction: Sex work decriminalisation is widely supported by public health research and sex worker advocates as the best model to protect the health and rights of sex workers. In order to understand the actual implications of sex work decriminalisation on sex workers' health, this article reviews and summarises existing research from two sites where sex work has been decriminalised for several years: the Australian state of New South Wales and New Zealand. Methods: In July 2021, the authors conducted database and directed searches for academic and grey literature reporting on research with diverse sex workers in NSW and New Zealand since, respectively, 1995 and 2003. The searches were updated in July 2022. Fifty-two different papers, including 33 peer-reviewed articles, were identified and reviewed using a scoping methodology. Results: The review describes improvements in the health and well-being, as well as in access to and engagement with health services among diverse sex workers in terms of gender, migration history, cultural backgrounds and type of sex work, in the two jurisdictions. These improvements are linked to the development of peer-based outreach and service provision by and to diverse sex workers in both sites. The review also highlights a number of existing regulatory concerns, including the persisting illegalisation of locational aspects of street-based sex work (NSW) and of non-resident, migrant sex work (New Zealand). Conclusions: The authors conclude that evidence from the two countries supports full sex work decriminalisation as a necessary first step in order to start addressing health and social inequalities among this highly diverse and stigmatised population. Policy Implications: The evidence reviewed presents overwhelming support for the full decriminalisation of all forms of sex work, including street-based and migrant sex work. Peer-based service provision by and to diverse sex workers should be promoted and funded. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In 2003 and 2004, Aotearoa New Zealand enacted two key laws that regulate two very different ways in which the female body may be commodified. The Prostitution Reform Act 2003 (PRA) decriminalized prostitution, removing legal barriers to the buying and selling of commercial sexual services. The Human Assisted Reproductive Technology Act 2004 (HART Act), on the other hand, put a prohibition on commercial surrogacy agreements. This paper undertakes a comparative analysis of the ethical arguments underlying New Zealand's legislative solutions to prostitution and commercial surrogacy. While the regulation of prostitution is approached with a Marxist feminist lens with the aim to ensure the health and safety of sex workers, commercial surrogacy is prohibited outright for concerns of negative impacts on present and future persons. I ground the principles of each Act in their ethical foundations and compare these two against one another. I conclude that New Zealand's legislative approach to regulating the commodification of the female body is ethically inconsistent. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

At present, there is limited research on the intersection of sex work, takatāpui/ LGBTIQ+ communities, and experiences of homelessness in Aotearoa New Zealand. This paper helps to bridge this gap, exploring how takatāpui/LGBTIQ+ people who had been failed by the welfare state engaged in sex work during periods of homelessness, and expressed agency in difficult circumstances. Specifically, we look at sex and sex work as a means to secure basic needs, and in the context of exploitative relationships; the emotional effects of sex work; and safety and policing. A stronger welfare state is needed to provide sufficient support for people to realise an adequate standard of living and treat them with dignity and respect. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Sex work has undergone a change, with the rise of the internet economy with more 'middle class' sex workers coming into the industry. In this paper, I explore the social status hierarchy within online direct-contact commercial sex work in New Zealand. I draw on findings from an in-depth qualitative investigation of online sex work, undertaken between 2017 and 2018. I took a participatory approach, working closely with NZPC – Aotearoa New Zealand Sex Workers' Collective to provide an understanding of two interrelated issues: the role web platforms play in shaping the social status of sex workers who advertise for clients online; and how sex workers brand and market themselves online. The findings suggest that sex workers strive to represent themselves as authentic in their marketing to enhance social status. Furthermore, the web platform on which over 90% of indoor sex workers in New Zealand advertise has embedded a status system among sex workers through the advertising packages they offer. Social status has thus become the most powerful marketing tool indoor direct-contact sex workers have to stand out from their competitors and attract sufficient clients to make a liveable income. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

New Zealand decriminalized sex work in 2004 with the passage of the Prostitution Reform Act (2003), which sets an explicit intention to prevent exploitation of sex workers and improve their welfare. This has demonstrably improved conditions for sex workers and provides a necessary context for addressing exploitation. However, little research has looked at how this works for brothel‐based sex workers in New Zealand. This paper responds to that gap by examining how brothel operators in New Zealand exercise power and control and how sex workers experience that. The study draws on in‐depth interviews conducted across New Zealand with 33 participants. These include staff from the New Zealand Sex Workers' Collective (2), brothel‐based sex workers (18), operators (8), and sex worker/operators (5). We use a Foucauldian framework and Foucauldian Discourse Analysis to examine how disciplinary power informs brothel management, prompting the production of normative discourses of work that destabilize sex workers' safety at work. We conclude that decriminalization nevertheless provides an essential framework by which sex workers are able to resist disciplinary control (W/C 171). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Sex work is commonly understood to be a risky occupation. Sex work law debates coalesce around the issue of harm, with differing perspectives regarding what constitutes harm, how harm is produced and what needs to change to mitigate it. While sex work is often portrayed as inherently harmful, sex workers and researchers have challenged this assumption, calling attention to the relationship between harm and policies in place. Criminalisation, in its many and varied forms, is thought to exacerbate harms that can occur in sex work, while decriminalisation is understood as creating conditions conducive to minimising harm. However, the decriminalisation of sex work remains rare, and more research which examines how decriminalisation works in relation to harms is critical. This paper uses the concept of social harm to unpack the implications of sex work policies and examine the experiences of sex workers in New Zealand, where sex work is decriminalised. Methods: Semi-structured in-depth interviews were conducted with 46 sex workers in New Zealand in 2018 and 2020 across two studies focused on examining experiences and perceptions of stigma and discrimination in this context. The interviews were thematically analysed using NVivo data analysis software. Results: The experiences of participants demonstrate how involvement in sex work had improved their lives in multiple ways. Participants described the importance of sex work in improving their quality of life by ensuring that they could better meet their everyday needs, the autonomy this afforded them and how decriminalisation helped to enable this. The validating impact of decriminalisation in acknowledging sex workers as people with rights is also evident in participant's experiences. Conclusions: Social harm is a framework that can help illuminate socio-economic harms which influence pathways into sex work for some people and the compounding harms of criminalising regimes. The benefits of engaging in sex work are often overlooked in policy debates. Although sex work is not easy work, engaging in sex work can have positive impacts on the lives of people who pursue it. Full decriminalisation of sex work is the only responsible option for societies seeking to reduce harm. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The passing of the Prostitution Reform Act (PRA) in 2003 has resulted in Aotearoa/New Zealand being in a unique position internationally in terms of the regulation of sex work. In this paper, I provide an overview of the history of sex work in Aotearoa/New Zealand leading up to and subsequent to the passing of the PRA. Underlying this overview are theoretically informed discussions considering how discourses of heteronormative sexuality result in sex work being gendered in particular ways, and how different models of regulating prostitution reflect different ideological and political concerns, and have different outcomes. The specifics of the gendering of sex work means that these understandings and outcomes have particular effects on women. While the interests of women are thus prioritised in recent theorising and, in some instances, in the regulation of prostitution, it is apparent that what is considered to be in 'women's interests' varies. I conclude by suggesting that while the PRA may not challenge the gendered nature of the industry, it protects the immediate interests of the women who work within it. This paper is intended to serve the dual purpose of providing the reader of this special issue of the Women's Studies Journal with some relevant background, and giving students interested in the area -- especially those in Aotearoa/New Zealand - a starting point for their research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article engages with the voices of women sex workers during the peak of the HIV and AIDS epidemic in New Zealand. The late-1980s saw the formation of the New Zealand Prostitutes' Collective, a sex worker led organisation that contracted with the government to provide a community-based national response to HIV and AIDS. The article explores the challenges sex workers faced to sustain and implement the use of condoms in their daily professional and personal lives. These included pressure from clients to forego the use of condoms, the risk of carrying condoms amidst the threat of arrest, and the struggle to manage the use of condoms in their personal sex lives. The paper traces both the widespread support for safe sex and the fractures and tensions that emerged as many sex workers mobilised to establish a community-based response to one of the most devastating health crises of the late-twentieth century. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In 2003, New Zealand passed the Prostitution Reform Act (PRA), becoming the first country in the world to decriminalise sex work. Aotearoa/New Zealand's model of decriminalisation is internationally regarded as an ideal model for prioritising sex workers' rights and safety, and is understood to have had several positive impacts in these areas. The decriminalised model is often described as 'full decriminalisation', to distinguish it from legal frameworks which decriminalise sex workers while still criminalising clients and/or third parties. However, an infrequently discussed aspect of the Aotearoa/New Zealand model of 'full' decriminalisation is that it prohibits migrant sex work as an anti-trafficking measure. In this paper I discuss the contradictory nature of Aotearoa/New Zealand's sex work law in relation to the precarious legal status of migrant sex workers. I explore the disconnect between the intention and consequences of this policy, outlining the challenges this poses for sex workers, and those committed to the full realisation of sex worker rights. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Young people in statutory care and protection interact with social workers, who hold potential to provide a supportive adult role in their lives. Many however, run away at an early age and end up on the street trading sex for money or other favours. There is potential to improve outcomes for young people in care if the relationship between young people and their social workers is better addressed. This paper uses data from a qualitative study of 14 young people who traded sex and who had experienced interactions with social workers. A thematic analysis identified three themes: the rigidity of social work practice; contesting the family situation; and resisting the at-risk label. We argue that to have any impact on outcomes for young people in care, social workers need to prioritise relationship-building above the need to conform to organizational protocols and guidelines. Such guidelines assist the social worker in assessing whether family situations pose high risk for a young person, but the 'at-risk' label is contested by young people, which results in a lack of trust and a barrier to relationship building. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

On 27 June 2003 the New Zealand Parliament passed a unique piece of legislation, the Prostitution Reform Act (PRA), effectively decriminalising prostitution. The momentum for the Act came from the desire to minimise harm and risk for sex workers through the promotion of human rights, and the welfare and occupational health and safety of workers in the sex industry. The passage of the PRA in 2003 required a redefinition of the governance of prostitution that would fit within a work and rights framework. When prostitution was illegal, the police were the key social control agent. However, when prostitution was decriminalised, the governance of sex work was distributed among central and local government departments, NGOs, grassroots, and community groups. This reconfiguration of governance highlights the inherent controversies and tensions involved in a mix of top-down/bottom-up governance of sex markets. This paper will present findings from an empirical study undertaken in Christchurch in 2010/2011. The study set out to map the understandings, practices, and processes of NGO human services as they negotiated decriminalisation and their new roles as regulators of the sex work industry, promoting a sanctioned harm minimisation approach to governance that aimed to ensure the rights, health, and safety of sex workers and balance public concerns of social control. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Sex workers' humor has received comparatively little attention in the literature to date, and work that does consider this phenomenon focuses on humor in face-to-face contexts. Increasingly, elements of sex workers' labor and community building take place online. This article examines the emergence of sex work humor in online spaces, considering how this humor provides evidence of resilience within this community. The article uses a critical discourse analysis approach blended with a cultural studies lens to examine 171 discrete texts drawn from sex work communities in Australia and New Zealand. These include social media postings from peer-led organizations and correspondence between sex workers and their clients, which was profiled in news media during the COVID-19 lockdowns. The humor evident within these texts falls into three major categories: humor about clients; humor as a mechanism of discussing stigma and discrimination; and humor as an agent of activism and social change. The findings indicate that humor can be evidence of resilience among sex-working communities, that it is politically productive and effective from a communications perspective, and present the possibility that it may also contribute to resilience. The presence of humor in online sex work spaces of sociality further highlights the importance of these spaces for community building, and draws attention to additional harms created by deplatforming. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Sex work in New Zealand was decriminalized by the Prostitution Reform Act 2003. News media is one of the key sites where stigma against sex workers is reproduced, negotiated and can be resisted. Depictions of sex workers in New Zealand vary significantly according to where and how they work. News media texts which discuss modes of sex work constructed as less acceptable sometimes call for sex workers to change how and where they work, typically to modes of work which would make them less visible, in the sense of removing them from public space or of making them invisible as sex workers. The 'solutions' for these sex workers are typically proposed by outsiders to the industry, who generally do not acknowledge the benefits, drawbacks and barriers which sex workers perceive to be attached to different ways of working. The demands placed upon sex workers to make the correct 'choice' about how and where to work recall neoliberal discourses of entrepreneurialism and further marginalize women who fail to engage in sex work in the 'correct' manner. This article examines these media discourses with reference to theories of neoliberal postfeminism, to establish how these discourses function to establish a mode of sex work most accessible to white, middle class, cisgender women as more 'acceptable'. The concomitant effect of these discourses is to blame sex workers who disproportionately suffer the effects of stigma and harassment for their own ill-treatment, invoking ideas of 'personal responsibility'. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Sex work is decriminalised in Aotearoa New Zealand and so brothels are deemed a 'businesses like any other' in the eyes of the law. We interviewed 14 brothel operators in this study to understand whether they were able to run their 'business like any other'. Similar to any other business owners, local authorities require brothel operators to run their businesses in accordance with the local district plan. Institutions such as banks and insurance companies, however, have policies which discriminate against brothel owners, and this presents a barrier to running their business like any other. Brothels continue to be seen as discreditable businesses in a decriminalised context and brothel operators internalise this stigma. More effort is needed to reduce stigma and discriminatory practices. The inclusion of the prevention of discrimination on the basis of occupation in New Zealand's Human Rights Act should be the first step. This could better allow brothel operators to run their business like any other in the 'mainstream' economy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction: This article provides insight into a rare instance of a collaborative governance approach to sex work that led to the decriminalisation, design and implementation of the sex work policy governance framework in New Zealand with the Prostitution Reform Act 2003. Methods: Drawing on a sample of 17 interviews conducted between the years 2012 and 2019 in addition to associated archival material originating from government and non-government sectors including sex worker representative organisations. Results: It finds that non-sex workers' endorsement for the decriminalisation of sex work was motivated by the New Zealand Prostitutes Collective (NZPC) and occurred primarily within a human rights and harm minimisation framework. But that during the lobbying and parliamentary process, amendments to the Bill emerged that contradicted the NZPC's main goal which was for sex work to be recognised as a legitimate labour activity and for all sex workers to benefit from decriminalisation and policy reform. Conclusions: As such, this article broadens the scope of analysis related to the sex worker rights movement by examining how and why sex workers and their allies came to communicate and act on the impetus for sex work law reform and how it affected policy outcomes. Policy Implications: Those involved in collaborative governance sex work law reform projects could consider adopting Östegren's typology of repressive, restrictive or integrative approaches to sex work law reform in negotiations that concern regulation and policies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While New Zealand's Prostitution Reform Act has decriminalized sex work for citizens and permanent residents, migrants on temporary visas are still not permitted to work in the sex industry. In 2018, a series of news media texts documented complaints about migrant sex workers put forward by Lisa Lewis, a prominent sex worker. This article considers how the figure of the migrant sex worker was produced through comparison to contingently acceptable 'New Zealand working girls'. This was partly achieved through a discursive link between sex work and the alleged economic impact of Asian migrants to New Zealand, with the argument that migrant sex workers were impacting the earnings of domestic sex workers. Lewis' claims were subsequently publicly rejected by other domestic sex workers, who resisted attempts to position them within this discourse. This media event offers evidence of changes to the figure of the sex worker in public discourse post-decriminalization: first in the way that some sex workers may be offered conditional acceptance and recognition of their jobs, and secondly in that it displays active resistance to the stigmatization of prostitution by a group of sex workers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the context of on-going debates regarding sex work laws, in most jurisdictions forms of criminalisation continue to dominate. Despite decades of sex workers calling for the decriminalisation of sex work and collectively organising against repressive laws, decriminalisation remains uncommon. New Zealand was the first full country to decriminalise sex work with the passing of the Prostitution Reform Act in 2003, which aimed to improve occupational health and safety. Several empirical studies have documented positive impacts of this framework. However, despite this, neo-abolitionists persistently describe the New Zealand model as a failed approach. This article examines neo-abolitionist knowledge claims regarding the New Zealand model and in doing so unpacks the strategic stories told about this approach, considering the implications for sex work policy making. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The author comments on an article by C. Benoit and colleagues which argued that policy responses to sex work are motivated by two different perspectives on social inequalities. She discusses the policies on sex work in New Zealand, the typology of prostitution policies used by Benoit and colleagues, and the best possible way to develop policy which is both acceptable and effective.

Victims of sex trafficking are known to be at risk for a wide range of adverse outcomes globally, but sex trafficking is commonly believed not to happen in Aotearoa/New Zealand. New Zealand has a robust legislative framework to safeguard people doing sex work; the work itself is decriminalised, and trafficking legislation disallows exploitative behaviour. However, this trafficking legislation is under-utilised, and domestic sex trafficking has attracted no prevention efforts from the government. While initiatives to assist identification and intervention are common practice internationally, they do not exist in Aotearoa/New Zealand. Using online qualitative surveys, I sought to examine frontline medical and social service practitioners' perspectives of and experiences with domestic sex trafficking. The results indicated varied experiences of contact with victims, and numerous problematic interpretations of victims' presentations and of the concept of trafficking. Specifically, definitions of trafficking appeared ambiguous and outdated, and respondents commonly conflated 'trafficking' with other phenomena such as sex work, sexual violence, or family violence. I conclude that trafficking and victimhood discourses arguably texture people's conceptualisations of what constitutes sex trafficking, illustrating the need for a clear shared definition of sex trafficking as it manifests in a domestic context. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The New Zealand Prostitutes' Collective played a lead role in the development of sex work policy and law in Aotearoa/New Zealand. This commentary examines the Collective's experience and observations in working with the law at a practical and theoretical level. It addresses successes as well as areas that need improvement to uphold the aims of the Prostitution Reform Act 2003. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Social work practice with sex workers in New Zealand occurs within a context of decriminalization since the passing of the Prostitution Reform Act (PRA) in 2003. This article presents the findings of a qualitative study focused on social workers’ perceptions of sex work/ers, the PRA, and its influence on practice with individuals in the sex industry. The findings suggest that social workers hold nuanced perspectives on sex work. While decriminalization creates opportunities that support social work practice with sex workers, challenges to antioppressive, critical social work remain, even within the context of decriminalization. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In 2003, Aotearoa New Zealand (NZ) passed the Prostitution Reform Act 2003 (PRA), which decriminalized sex work for NZ citizens and holders of permanent residency (PR) while excluding migrant sex workers (MSWs) from its protection. This is due to Section 19 (s19) of the PRA, added at the last minute against advice by the Aotearoa New Zealand Sex Workers' Collective (NZPC) as an anti-trafficking clause. Because of s19, migrants on temporary visas found to be working as sex workers are liable to deportation by Immigration New Zealand (INZ). Drawing on original ethnographic and interview data gathered over 24 months of fieldwork, our study finds that migrant sex workers in New Zealand are vulnerable to violence and exploitation, and are too afraid to report these to the police for fear of deportation, corroborating earlier studies and studies completed while we were collecting data. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]