Today is the International Day to End Violence Against Sex Workers. We stand in solidarity with sex workers. We mourn the lives lost to anti-sex work bias. We demand systemic change to create a world where sex workers are respected, supported, and safe. Read our statement here: bit.ly/4p4WPWr

words no longer mean anything.... 'terrorist' (now used to justify attacks on boats in the Caribbean) 'refugee' (now used to justify sending privileged white South Africans to the US) 'weapon of mass destruction' (this one is so stupid it isn't clear what is going on here)

Late sharing cos was unwell, but here’s our farewell from openDemocracy’s Beyond Trafficking & Slavery. What a privilege to have been part of the editorial team. I learnt so much from our incredible contributors & the amazing Cam Thibos, Melissa Pawson & @joelquirk.bsky.social . Thank you all ❤️

Gentle reminder that the European Union was established because the first four decades of our 20th century were mostly internecine war and genocide.

Our final editorial: THANK YOU to everyone who helped us make BTS a success over the past 11 years. We will forever be in your debt, and we will miss you! Take care. www.opendemocracy.net/en/beyond-tr...

The post-colonial settlement has left Africa vulnerable to conflict, external pressure, and intellectual dependency. What comes next? africasacountry.com/2025/12/beyo...

Beyond slavery and trafficking was supposed to be a one-year project. Our plan: public education Eleven years later we are finally signing off www.opendemocracy.net/en/beyond-tr...

New #CallforPapers! This issue will aim to highlight cases of intersectional, intermovement alliance and solidarity building between different marginalised and oppressed groups. See call 👉🏼 www.antitraffickingreview.org/index.php/at... Guest editors @drellac.bsky.social & @joelquirk.bsky.social

Will American anti-trafficking ever recover from Trump 2.0?

This is something we've raised since "day one" rights were first mentioned. Farm workers here on temporary visas remain without unfair dismissal protections-even when returning every year. Last yr we had 145 dismissal cases: used as a threat, used when people complain, used to maintain power.

Have you been wondering what the hell is going on with US human trafficking policy under Trump 2.0? In the link below you will find a deep dive interview I did with Ambassador Luis C.deBaca, who used to run the TIP office back in the day. www.opendemocracy.net/en/beyond-tr...

Delighted to co-author this piece urging the de-silo-ing of anti-trafficking work, & genuine solidarity with grassroots movements.

Our Human Trafficking Lead @mayal-n.bsky.social has written about the growing attack on sexual freedoms, the (mis)use of anti-trafficking frameworks to do so, + the opportunity it has given us to join an incredible alliance of feminist LGBTI rights activists: www.opendemocracy.net/en/beyond-tr...

Latest in our solidarities series: fascinating reflections on striking workers in South Africa finding common ground with Palestine solidarity activists. I like that this series doesn’t shy away from tensions & challenges, as well as benefits. By Maya Bhardwaj for @beyondslavery.bsky.social .

When dairy workers made common cause with Palestine solidarity activists, the result was radical love in the public square www.opendemocracy.net/en/beyond-tr...

Our final feature is rolling out! We wanted to end on a positive note, so asked a bunch of amazing people to write about their experiences with cross-movement solidarity and organising. We're very excited to share it with you. Enjoy! www.opendemocracy.net/en/beyond-tr...

Radical feminists and religious groups got into bed together once. Now they're broadening the affair, says @gaatw.bsky.social www.opendemocracy.net/en/beyond-tr...

‘An indictment of the trade union movement’: Why no one is organising seasonal workers

Why can't anti-trafficking be more radical?

🚨Publication Alert🚨 Just out, the final argument in my decades plus long research on humanitarian borders. "Humanitarian Borders, Safe Passage Campaigns, and the (Re)Production of Unequal Mobility" doi.org/10.1093/9780...

Despite huge sums spent on anti-trafficking, there are staggeringly few evaluations of interventions & growing evidence of harms caused. This new edited book with @uclpress.bsky.social is our attempt to help change that. 1/ Open access with free digital downloads: uclpress.co.uk/book/evaluat...

Kicking us off is a fantastic piece about solidarities in action by Elene Lam & @chanellegallant.bsky.social . Lots to learn here from Butterfly about how Asian migrant sex workers have organised across silos in Canada and the US. www.opendemocracy.net/en/beyond-tr...

Next out in our final @beyondslavery.bsky.social feature is this brilliant piece by Jake Hall about Wages for Housework. An important historical lens on solidarities beyond silos on the global stage, and the legacies of this trailblazing movement. www.opendemocracy.net/en/beyond-tr...

Next up in our solidarities series is this brilliant piece on an unlikely tactical alliance. Unsettling and important look at the tensions involved and lessons from it. By Alex Andrews of @swopbehindbars.bsky.social for @beyondslavery.bsky.social www.opendemocracy.net/en/beyond-tr...

Solidarity beyond silos is our best bet for fighting exploitation

Farm workers go on unofficial strikes as their temporary visas create barriers to union membership Read our investigation with @tbij.bsky.social here ⤵️ www.opendemocracy.net/en/beyond-tr...

How one case made unlikely allies of police and sex workers

Supporting the Epstein survivors is important, but please don’t support World Without Exploitation. They advocate for policies that are really harmful to sex workers, like the Nordic Model, which puts sex workers at greater risk of violence and poverty by criminalizing their clients.

Anti-trafficking killjoys struggle to get beyond trafficking and slavery. The only way to truly get beyond anti-trafficking is to stop making it the main character. Our final @beyondslavery.bsky.social feature on solidarities beyond silos www.opendemocracy.net/en/beyond-tr...

Two data points: 1) Trump killing 11 people via drone strike off the Venezuelan coast 2) Isreal violating international law to strike Hamas in Doha These are cut from the same cloth. Once you create a state of exception you keep using it over and over Really baaaaaad shit is coming down the pipe

Applications are now open for the 2025 Colin Murray Award. Deadline: 30 September 2025. The award supports post-doctoral researchers to carry out original ‘engaged field research’ in Southern Africa. Please see the link below for more details jsas.blog

BREAKING: ICE is sending Russian dissidents back to Russia. When the dissidents arrived in Russia, the Russian authorities were given documents relating to their asylum applications in the US which under US law are confidential. This seems to be part of a secret agreement between Trump and Putin.

I’m just a girl, who did a spinal tap on a preschooler last week, asking you to fire RFK Jr.

Imagine picking a “businessman” to be your leader, but instead of a great businessman, or even a good one, you pick the absolute worst one…I mean, the laughing stock of his sector (land dev’t), known for many bankruptcies, cheating people, crooked deals, etc. Now imagine letting him be a dictator.

Call from a producer this morning: Zoe please help - we thought the panel on our show was balanced, but it turns out they’re both pro-mass detention camps for asylum seekers. Would you come on to be the anti-detention camp voice? We are in a really bad place, friends, I am telling you.

Laura Bates' book The New Age of Sexism takes a sobering look at how tech accelerates misogyny. But the book makes a pretty glaring failure, in that it overlooks the very real and harmful impact that AI has on sex workers. Which should be the real story.

This is all becoming very dangerous and the Government's failure to show any kind of resistance to it is a disgrace www.theguardian.com/world/2025/a...

My latest with the Global Observatory, on the need for urgent action in #Tigray: theglobalobservatory.org/2025/08/urge...

Apartheid South Africa banned television until 1977, partly due to a belief that TV was satanic. www.researchgate.net/publication/...

At the beginning of September, South Africa’s Western Cape High Court will hear a case that could finally end the criminalization of sex work in the country. It’s a moment decades in the making, which could bring real gains for the safety, dignity, and equality of sex workers.

I understand why Democrats are citing things like a "human trafficking investigation" as evidence of beneficial local/federal enforcement cooperation, but the one cited here appears to have not resulted in any arrests for human trafficking, but for sex-for-a-fee: police.boston.gov/2025/08/12/t...

I am genuinely impressed at the government's capacity to undermine the normative power of invoking terrorism and national security. They have done more in 30 days to problematise the concepts than 30 years of leftist scholarship.

The return to the Gilded Age continues as ICE detention centers have become a spawning ground for consumption, AKA tuberculosis. It goes without saying that ICE isn't doing what it takes to prevent this. @whitneycwimbish.bsky.social has the disturbing story: prospect.org/health/2025-...

@theguardian.com doesn't reflect the reality of what happened yesterday. The fascist group held signs saying "Kill them all" (no arrests), made obscene gestures, did nazi salutes, used abusive & obscene language (vocabulary not usually a strong skill for them). www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2025...

There are no magic fixes, but Section 307 of the US Tariff Act delivers results. Import bans blocking forced-labor tainted goods from the US market have led to more than $62 million in back wages & fees returned to workers. Read our @opendemocracy.net oped: www.opendemocracy.net/en/beyond-tr...

Seminar (online only): Female Politicians Running for Office Thursday 10am SAST Meeting link: lnkd.in/d3gxgGUm Causes of Women's Descriptive Under-representation in Zambia, Janet Mundando Between Rhetoric and Reform: The Failure of Gender Quotas in Liberia, Lisa Kindervater

Facebook reminds me that a year ago I started a project of scanning the journals of the Central African Historical Association, based at the University of Rhodesia/Zimbabwe, which ran from 1970 to the early 1980s. I have uploaded my scans to Dropbox here: www.dropbox.com/scl/fo/ruzbp...

Happening now: protesters in Chicago are interrupting a hiring fair at the Congress Hotel, where U.S. Customs and Border protection is recruiting today. Banner reads, "stop kidnapping our neighbors!" It's quite the scene in here, and the DHS table has been blocked for several minutes already.

This is nuts. 474 people have been arrested and are now facing being charged with terrorism for showing up in a public place to peacefully protest against the most well documented genocide in human history… www.theguardian.com/world/2025/a...

UK still sharing intelligence with Israel as surveillance flights over Gaza continue - https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/uk-still-sharing-intelligence-israel-surveillance-flights-over-gaza-continue