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Biography

Corinne Isler possesses Master’s Degree in Sociology and EU Studies from the University of Helsinki, Finland. Her main research interests are women’s rights, in particular violence against women and sexual exploitation, children’s rights, and migration issues. She has previously worked as a trainee at the Finnish Immigration Service and the Council of Europe.

Marjut Jyrkinen is an associate professor in working life equality and gender studies at the University of Helsinki and research director of the social and economic sustainability of future working life (WeAll) research consortium (weallfinland.fi). The consortium (No. 292883) is funded by the Strategic Research Council at the Academy of Finland (2015-20). Jyrkinen’s current research addresses emotional abuse at work, sustainability of working life, intersectionalities of gender, age and ethnicity, and gendered age and care in management and organizations.

Abstract

In this article, we examine how socio-political actors frame prostitution and problems attached to the phenomenon and what types of policies they suggest. The sex trade in Switzerland has been tolerated since 1942, and prostitution is protected under the economic freedom guaranteed by the Swiss constitution. Any critique of prostitution is viewed as counterproductive, claimed to be rooted in old-fashioned ideas about sexuality and thought to worsen the situation for women who sell sex. The role of sex buyers is largely obscured, and the presumed right to buy sex remains unquestioned.

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Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 License.

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