HUMAN TRAFFICKING IN EASTERN EUROPE:

Understanding Variation in the Czech Republic and Slovakia

By Natalie Koch

Dartmouth College

 

In the early 1990s, after the collapse of communism in the East Europe, human trafficking in the region was thrust into the international spotlight. The dissolution of these regimes left many people facing serious economic hardship without the government assistance to which they were accustomed. Although the most severe problems associated with the post-communist transition have since diminished, vulnerable populations in Eastern Europe continue to be threatened by traffickers to this day.

 

The precise definition of “human trafficking” has been hotly debated in the international community. Only in 2000 was “human trafficking” concretely defined by the United Nations Protocol to Prevent, Suppress and Punish Trafficking in Persons, Especially Women and Children.  The UN describes trafficking as the recruitment, transportation, transfer, harboring, or receipt of people for the purposes of exploitation—including not only sexual exploitation, but also forced labor, other forms of servitude, or even the removal of organs. Although this definition has clarified the debate in a technical sense, human trafficking is still frequently confounded with other issues (like terrorism and organized crime) and sensationalized by the media and politicians alike.

 

The current era of globalization not only presents many opportunities but also new challenges in the effort to combat human trafficking. Some countries in Europe have responded positively to these challenges, but others have not. The case of the Czech and Slovak Republics is particularly interesting because of the surprising contrast in the trafficking trends and responses of these once-unified countries. At the time of this research, the Czech Republic was classified as Tier 1 by the United States Trafficking in Persons (TiP) Report, while, Slovakia was on the Tier 2 Watch List (it was removed from the Watch List in the 2006 Report).

 

 Livia Vedrasco, of the International Organization for Migration (IOM) in Vienna, explains that the variation between the Eastern European countries “depends a lot on the confluence of all sorts of political circumstances, and their subsequent political will.” The numerous aspects of this variation for the Czech Republic and Slovakia are detailed below.

 

History and Economics

 

One of the most common explanations for this significant difference is the historical difference in wealth distribution between the two countries. Since independence in 1918 and after the Velvet Divorce in 1993, the Czech Republic has become more economically advanced than Slovakia. Slovakia’s slow economic development is important because, as Petra Burcikova, the Director of La Strada Prague, explains, economic inequality is “the primary driving factor behind any trafficking case—it’s the lack of economic opportunities in the country of origin and, therefore, the people are trying to find some other opportunities in other countries.” Trafficking patterns in the Czech Republic are beginning to reflect this economic progress; Tereza Hulikova of IOM Prague explains that it is “becoming more and more the destination country.” Not only is economics an important factor in trafficking routes, it also determines a nation’s ability to effectively implement counter-trafficking measures, which can be very expensive.

 

Minority Populations

 

The sizes of minority populations differs considerably between the Czech and Slovak Republics, with Slovakia having a much larger Roma population.  This group has historically been marginalized in both countries, and more Roma women are trafficked, often at younger ages. According to Soňa Šaradínová of IOM Bratislava, the Roma population in Slovakia “lives in very poor conditions [and] compared to Czech Roma, there’s a huge difference in level of development.  Some of the areas where the Roma population lives in [Slovakia are] really very, very, very below any—not even standards—much less than standards.” The fact that there is a larger population of Roma in Slovakia living in deplorable conditions means that a larger population is vulnerable to trafficking.  Hulikova says, “It’s interlinked with marginalization of minorities. When you look at the streets in street prostitution, you have lots of Roma girls, even from the Czech Republic, Slovak Roma, Bulgarian Roma. […] It’s interlinked with the fact that they […] don’t find work in their countries.”

 

Political Will vs. External Pressure

 

The enormous difference in counter-trafficking measures between the Czech Republic and Slovakia can be partially attributed to the greater political will that is found in the Czech Republic, as compared to Slovakia. Dealing with the issue of human trafficking is not a serious priority for most countries in Europe and is particularly overlooked Slovakia. There, Alex Micudova of the UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), says, “you always need to feel a bit of political pressure to get things done.” She explains that the United States TiP Report, with its threats of sanctions for countries dropping to a Tier 3 classification, “has had a very positive effect on raising the awareness and somehow initiating the motivation of [the Slovak government] to do something.” Political pressure may be effective at bringing the issue to the government’s attention, but it cannot solve a host of other state-level obstacles. In Slovakia, the lack of sincere political will to address the issue has rendered the rapidly implemented counter-trafficking measures that were adopted in response to the Report ineffective. For example, the competence of the new Slovak National Coordinator for Counter-trafficking is unclear.  Micudova explains that he has been asked by the government only to set up a “system” for the protection of trafficking victims as quickly as possible. In fact, he has actually proposed a victim protection model, which Slovakia has subsequently ratified, that fails to comply with international laws and conventions. It seems that government officials “do not know that the laws have changed”, Micudova adds.

 

Slovakia’s haste to respond to international pressure has thus far failed to effect a deeper commitment to combating trafficking. The Czech government, on the other hand, has demonstrated a serious commitment to working on the issue. Thanks to strong economic resources, the Czech government’s commitment to funding counter-trafficking projects is much more effective than Slovakia’s, where the National Coordinator has even suggested that victims pay for their own services—or essentially the provision of their internationally guaranteed human rights. Both countries undertook UNODC projects to help with the implementation of the Palermo Protocol in 2003, but this project did not materialize in Slovakia until 2006.

 

Governmental Institutions

 

Institutional instability has been a major obstacle to the effective implementation of counter-trafficking measures in Slovakia and in the Czech Republic as well, though to a lesser degree, .  Ministerial institutions in Slovakia have been subject to great volatility and historically, there have been problems with government coalitions’ ability to function. Micudova explains that the UNODC projects have been slowed because their partners keep changing, as “new departments are being created and disappear, and they shift different types of responsibility.” Even though the Czech Republic’s governmental institutions are more stable, each election threatens a devolution in counter-trafficking measures, since most of of these measures are simply government resolutions that can be easily repealed. La Strada’s Burcikova said that even in the Czech Republic, the successful treatment of human trafficking is “not that stable, and we can very well go back.”

 

NGO Sector

 

Another major differentiating factor between the two case countries is the strength of the non-governmental organization (NGO) sector. NGOs are essential because they are often on the front line in the fight against trafficking persons. In Slovakia, there are no NGOs that specialize exclusively in assisting trafficked persons, though a few NGOS that serve victims of domestic violence are sometimes willing to assist victims of trafficking. “But the problem so far,” explains Šaradínová, “has been that they basically had no funds for that.” Micudova adds that the NGO sector is weak and fragmented, and, furthermore, international organizations do not cooperate well in Slovakia.

 

Burcikova says that the beneficial measures to counter trafficking in “the Czech Republic are not just thanks to La Strada, but I think the presence of NGOs and of organs or institutions that are, to a large extent, devoted to protect, promote human rights, including migrants.” It is also important to consider the individual when attempting to gauge the discrepancies between the strength of the NGO sectors. “Sometimes it may be an individual woman who was good in her studies, who got opportunity abroad, who got expertise in the subject, who founded an NGO, and that’s it,” Micudova says, citing Burcikova as one woman who did exactly this.

 

Media & Public Awareness

 

Public awareness of the complexities and causes of trafficking is highly influential in suppressing the phenomenon. There is a tendency in both countries to perceive trafficking solely as prostitution. In the Czech Republic, organizations like La Strada actively work to prevent journalists from sensationalizing news concerning trafficking. Despite the efforts of some NGOs to keep newspapers from referring to it as “‘trafficking in white meat,” this sort of sensationalism still continues. Micudova argues that because of this, people still have a distorted conception of trafficking and are more likely to assume that it would never happen to them. It is exactly this attitude that increases an individual’s risk. Insofar as the media propogates this idea, the discrepancies in public awareness are also partly responsible for the variation in who is victimized and how they are treated in the two countries.

 

The case of the Czech and Slovak Republics illustrates the numerous factors that differentiate the effectiveness of the individual countries’ efforts to counter human trafficking—factors ranging from historical economic inequalities to domestic internal will to civic activity and understanding. Beacause this variation hinges on a confluence of various political, economic, and social factors, it demands a smaller-scale analysis focusing not only on individual nations, but also on local populations and marginalized populations.

 

Works Cited

Corrin, C. (2005). Transitional road for traffic: Analysing trafficking in women from and through central and eastern Europe. Europe-Asia Studies, 57(4), 543-560.

United States Department of State.  (2005).  Trafficking in persons report. (No. 11252).  Washington, D.C.: Bureau of Public Affairs.

UNODC. (2006).  Toolkit to combat trafficking in persons.  Vienna, Austria: United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime.