In 2007, we published a study on trafficking of women into Ireland for sexual exploitation (Ward ... more In 2007, we published a study on trafficking of women into Ireland for sexual exploitation (Ward and Wylie, 2007), which, inter alia, identified the need for critical analysis of the sex industry in Ireland. That need still prevails, especially since the local sex industry continues to globalize and political attention turns to Irish prostitution law. Current debate in Ireland, as elsewhere in Europe, has been increasing around a campaign to adopt the ‘Swedish model,’ which criminalizes the demand for prostitution as a way of tackling both prostitution and, now, sex-trafficking. The campaign posits a causality between demand in a domestic sex-industry and the supply of prostitutes through sex trafficking. More generally, the campaign rests on a view of prostitution in which women are universally victims of sexual violence. An Irish NGO-based lobby does exist that shares this underlying philosophy and advocates the Swedish model, but although the Irish government has suggested that the domestic sex trade provides a ‘red light milieu,’ which makes sex-trafficking an attractive option (DJELR, 1998), the state has been slow to move towards a general criminalization of demand with the exception of criminalizing the use of the sexual services of a trafficked person in the Human Trafficking (Criminal Law) Act of 2008.
This article theorizes a research process in a highly politicized environment in which we, as fem... more This article theorizes a research process in a highly politicized environment in which we, as feminist researchers, found ourselves standing outside the feminist standpoint which dominated Irish public discourse, viz advocacy of a Swedish-style, neo-abolitionist, prostitution policy. We suggest that our increasing personal and intellectual discomfort as that policy position gained support contained valuable epistemic insight. We theorize this principally by drawing on Pillow’s concept of ‘reflexivities of discomfort’. This article offers an account of the messy dynamics of a research process in which we, in time, recognized our own psychosocial worlds as sites of social critique. We contribute to debates about reflexivity by exploring the insights which this approach brought when applied to the dynamics of power politics between us as researchers and the wider policy field within which we were immersed.
Journal of International Political Theory, Oct 1, 2013
This article argues that Buddhist social thought offers valuable insight into debates about cosmo... more This article argues that Buddhist social thought offers valuable insight into debates about cosmopolitan solidarity by raising cosmopolitanism's need to explore more deeply the relationship between the nature of self and the politics of solidarity. It suggests that a radical ‘socio-existential’ account of the individual, which rejects a conception of the self as autonomous and separate from others, mitigates categories of exclusion and offers a robust account of the possibility of solidarity with strangers. Buddhist thought theorises a movement from suffering to solidarity that does not recognise borders or boundaries as containing inherent ethical value.
Abstract: The purpose of this text is threefold; first it is to honour the contribution of an aca... more Abstract: The purpose of this text is threefold; first it is to honour the contribution of an academic who, more than any other, established the discipline of International Relations in Irish academia. Second, it is to make a substantive contribution to the ongoing debate about Ireland‟ s place in the world and the relationships that derive there from. Third and finally, it is to celebrate the study of international relations in Ireland and to make the case that the limited profile of international relations and Irish foreign policy in Irish universities ...
THESIS 5343This thesis sets out to explore cosmopolitanism as a position within International Rel... more THESIS 5343This thesis sets out to explore cosmopolitanism as a position within International Relations theory in the context of the activism of Irish Non-governmental Organisations (NGO) in Irish foreign policy. NGOs are posited as espousing a cosmopolitan activism in their attempts to influence Irish foreign policy makers. The methodology adopted was primarily a case study approach allowing an intensive analysis of three foreign policy issues: East Timor, the Enhanced Structural Adjustment policy of the International Monetary Fund and the Beijing Fourth World Conference on Women, 1995. In addition, the thesis also features the results of a survey of the NGO landscape in Ireland. In all, a total of 61 NGOs were surveyed on organisational, strategic and normative dimensions to their work
If the concept of social justice posits equality and fairness between subjects in the social orde... more If the concept of social justice posits equality and fairness between subjects in the social order, then the presence of those subjects within that order must first and foremost be acknowledged. In Ireland’s recent reform of prostitution law contained in the Criminal Law (Sexual Offences) Act 2017, the presence of the sex worker as a rights-bearing subject or citizen, with access to justice in that capacity, was denied. In this article I focus on the use of data by the neo-abolitionist ‘Turn off the Red Light’ campaign to ‘flatten out’ the complexity of sex workers lives and present the figure of the ‘vulnerable prostituted woman’ and the ‘trafficking victim’: tragic, abject, a necessarily violated person and in need of ‘protection’ from the state. I argue that this data, entering public and political discourse as uncontestable truth, constituted what I call, ‘framing figures’, framing an inevitable outcome and precluding certain subjects from the status of equality and fairness. The data allowed campaigners for the Sex Purchase Ban (SPB), and, in turn the state, to eclipse a social justice approach to sex work, such as proposed by the Sex Workers Alliance of Ireland and other actors.
In 2007, we published a study on trafficking of women into Ireland for sexual exploitation (Ward ... more In 2007, we published a study on trafficking of women into Ireland for sexual exploitation (Ward and Wylie, 2007), which, inter alia, identified the need for critical analysis of the sex industry in Ireland. That need still prevails, especially since the local sex industry continues to globalize and political attention turns to Irish prostitution law. Current debate in Ireland, as elsewhere in Europe, has been increasing around a campaign to adopt the ‘Swedish model,’ which criminalizes the demand for prostitution as a way of tackling both prostitution and, now, sex-trafficking. The campaign posits a causality between demand in a domestic sex-industry and the supply of prostitutes through sex trafficking. More generally, the campaign rests on a view of prostitution in which women are universally victims of sexual violence. An Irish NGO-based lobby does exist that shares this underlying philosophy and advocates the Swedish model, but although the Irish government has suggested that the domestic sex trade provides a ‘red light milieu,’ which makes sex-trafficking an attractive option (DJELR, 1998), the state has been slow to move towards a general criminalization of demand with the exception of criminalizing the use of the sexual services of a trafficked person in the Human Trafficking (Criminal Law) Act of 2008.
This article theorizes a research process in a highly politicized environment in which we, as fem... more This article theorizes a research process in a highly politicized environment in which we, as feminist researchers, found ourselves standing outside the feminist standpoint which dominated Irish public discourse, viz advocacy of a Swedish-style, neo-abolitionist, prostitution policy. We suggest that our increasing personal and intellectual discomfort as that policy position gained support contained valuable epistemic insight. We theorize this principally by drawing on Pillow’s concept of ‘reflexivities of discomfort’. This article offers an account of the messy dynamics of a research process in which we, in time, recognized our own psychosocial worlds as sites of social critique. We contribute to debates about reflexivity by exploring the insights which this approach brought when applied to the dynamics of power politics between us as researchers and the wider policy field within which we were immersed.
Journal of International Political Theory, Oct 1, 2013
This article argues that Buddhist social thought offers valuable insight into debates about cosmo... more This article argues that Buddhist social thought offers valuable insight into debates about cosmopolitan solidarity by raising cosmopolitanism's need to explore more deeply the relationship between the nature of self and the politics of solidarity. It suggests that a radical ‘socio-existential’ account of the individual, which rejects a conception of the self as autonomous and separate from others, mitigates categories of exclusion and offers a robust account of the possibility of solidarity with strangers. Buddhist thought theorises a movement from suffering to solidarity that does not recognise borders or boundaries as containing inherent ethical value.
Abstract: The purpose of this text is threefold; first it is to honour the contribution of an aca... more Abstract: The purpose of this text is threefold; first it is to honour the contribution of an academic who, more than any other, established the discipline of International Relations in Irish academia. Second, it is to make a substantive contribution to the ongoing debate about Ireland‟ s place in the world and the relationships that derive there from. Third and finally, it is to celebrate the study of international relations in Ireland and to make the case that the limited profile of international relations and Irish foreign policy in Irish universities ...
THESIS 5343This thesis sets out to explore cosmopolitanism as a position within International Rel... more THESIS 5343This thesis sets out to explore cosmopolitanism as a position within International Relations theory in the context of the activism of Irish Non-governmental Organisations (NGO) in Irish foreign policy. NGOs are posited as espousing a cosmopolitan activism in their attempts to influence Irish foreign policy makers. The methodology adopted was primarily a case study approach allowing an intensive analysis of three foreign policy issues: East Timor, the Enhanced Structural Adjustment policy of the International Monetary Fund and the Beijing Fourth World Conference on Women, 1995. In addition, the thesis also features the results of a survey of the NGO landscape in Ireland. In all, a total of 61 NGOs were surveyed on organisational, strategic and normative dimensions to their work
If the concept of social justice posits equality and fairness between subjects in the social orde... more If the concept of social justice posits equality and fairness between subjects in the social order, then the presence of those subjects within that order must first and foremost be acknowledged. In Ireland’s recent reform of prostitution law contained in the Criminal Law (Sexual Offences) Act 2017, the presence of the sex worker as a rights-bearing subject or citizen, with access to justice in that capacity, was denied. In this article I focus on the use of data by the neo-abolitionist ‘Turn off the Red Light’ campaign to ‘flatten out’ the complexity of sex workers lives and present the figure of the ‘vulnerable prostituted woman’ and the ‘trafficking victim’: tragic, abject, a necessarily violated person and in need of ‘protection’ from the state. I argue that this data, entering public and political discourse as uncontestable truth, constituted what I call, ‘framing figures’, framing an inevitable outcome and precluding certain subjects from the status of equality and fairness. The data allowed campaigners for the Sex Purchase Ban (SPB), and, in turn the state, to eclipse a social justice approach to sex work, such as proposed by the Sex Workers Alliance of Ireland and other actors.
This report is based upon findings that were obtained by an online survey with sex
workers in whi... more This report is based upon findings that were obtained by an online survey with sex workers in which there were 171 respondents and an online survey of clients that produced 446 respondents. We also undertook face-to-face interviews with 19 sex workers and 10 clients. Other methods included scraping data from websites that advertise prostitution, 18 interviews with experts and service providers, phone interviews with representatives of 9 councils across Northern Ireland, questionnaires for providers of support services for sex workers as well as a review of policies regarding prostitution in other societies. - All of the sex workers and clients interviewed for this study sold/paid for sexual services in Northern Ireland.
Co-authored with Eilis Ward, in M Holmes and D Holmes eds. Ireland and India: Connections, Compar... more Co-authored with Eilis Ward, in M Holmes and D Holmes eds. Ireland and India: Connections, Comparisons, Contrasts (Dublin: Folens Press, 1997).
The aim of the research is to provide the Department of Justice with a better understanding of th... more The aim of the research is to provide the Department of Justice with a better understanding of the extent and characteristics of prostitution and human trafficking for the purpose of sexual exploitation in Northern Ireland.
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workers in which there were 171 respondents and an online survey of clients that
produced 446 respondents. We also undertook face-to-face interviews with 19 sex
workers and 10 clients. Other methods included scraping data from websites that
advertise prostitution, 18 interviews with experts and service providers, phone
interviews with representatives of 9 councils across Northern Ireland, questionnaires
for providers of support services for sex workers as well as a review of policies
regarding prostitution in other societies.
- All of the sex workers and clients interviewed for this study sold/paid for sexual
services in Northern Ireland.