Abstract
Human trafficking and people smuggling are sometimes, erroneously, treated as interchangeable. The chapter outlines the apparently clear-cut distinction between human trafficking and people smuggling in international law, stressing that the distinction is less conspicuous in real-life cases. Human trafficking is a complex crime, and practitioners need specialist training to differentiate between those being trafficked who should be managed as victims and those being smuggled who are, in law, engaged in a crime. Identification rests on interpreting the way in which the ambiguous notions of consent and agency have been exercised by the trafficked/smuggled individual. Accurate identification is further hindered by the imprecision of the concept of exploitation in the UN Trafficking Protocol leading to divergent interpretations in different jurisdictions.
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Massey, S., Rankin, G. (2020). Agency, Consent and Exploitation. In: Exploiting People for Profit. Palgrave Pivot, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-43413-5_2
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-43413-5_2
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