Kendra Miller/flickr. (CC BY-ND 2.0)
The UN Protocol to Prevent, Suppress and Punish Trafficking in Persons, Especially Women and Children (UN Trafficking Protocol), adopted in 2000, is often credited with the first international definition of human trafficking and with marking the beginning of the regulation of trafficking in persons, both in the domestic and international spheres. History shows us otherwise. The foundation of modern anti-trafficking legislation in England was created during the years of 1885 and 1912 through a series of legal interventions in both the domestic and international spheres. The legacies of those laws are still present.
The dominant white slavery discourse at the turn of nineteenth century was largely constructed around the crude juxtaposition of dangerous, foreign men and innocent, white women. The similarities with modern-day anti-trafficking rhetoric are striking. Both narratives, particularly in popular culture and the media, toy with details of innocence and ruin of the victim, coupled with the demonisation of foreign men. Anxieties about race, nationality, and immigration underpinned much of the debate on trafficking. Indeed, the racially neutral term 'traffic' only replaced 'white slavery' in international law in 1921, with the League of Nations International Convention to Combat the Traffic in Women and Children.
