A multi-perspective report on the status of the knowledge of and response to commercial sexual exploitation of children with a specific focus on child prostitution and child sex tourism : a social work perspective

Abstract

Increasing tourism numbers in third world countries affect their economies and certain aspects of their society positively; however, there are concomitant negative effects that expose the dark side of the tourism industry. One of these is the escalating commercial sexual exploitation of children (CSEC), particularly child prostitution (CP) in the context of tourism, a phenomenon known as child sex tourism (CST). Although tourism plays an important role in creating the perfect storm of poverty-stricken children colliding with wealthy tourists, it is not solely responsible for this phenomenon. Internationally and nationally, the lacuna of knowledge on CST in particular hampers an informed response by way of resource allocation and coordinated service delivery to both victims and perpetrators. Utilising a qualitative research approach, and the collective case study and phenomenological research designs complemented by an explorative, descriptive and contextual strategy of inquiry, the researcher explored the status of the knowledge of and response to the CSEC through the lens of closely associated role players, who were purposively selected for inclusion in the study. These were adult survivors who were as children engaged in sex work and victims of child sex tourism, social workers and non-social workers involved in rendering child welfare and protection services, members of the Family Violence Child Protection and Sexual Offences (FCS) Unit of the South African Police Service (SAPS) and representatives of the hospitality and tourism industry. Data was collected via individual in-depth semi-structured interviews, telephone interviews, and email-communication and thematically analysed. The researcher found that a range of microsystem level factors, such as poverty and family dysfunction, pushed children to the street, and as a means to survive engage in sex work, enabling tourists (i.e. local - out of towners) and foreigners, mainly men from varied sexual orientation) to commercially sexually exploit both boys and girls, from as young as nine years of age, and of different race groups, which leave them with physical and psychological scars. The following main findings surfaced: The social workers, in comparison to the non-social workers, who have a primary responsibility to provide child welfare and protection services were ill-informed in terms of identifying CST as phenomenon, untrained and/or slow to respond appropriately with interventions directed to the victims and perpetrators of CSEC. The service provider groups, as microsystems interfacing on a mesosystem, were fraught with perceptions that the social workers and the SAPS were being inadequate. Furthermore a lack of cooperation, collaboration and communication between the service provider groups to respond to CSEC existed. The hospitality and tourism industry service representatives were also ill-informed about the phenomena of CP and CST with a response that at best can be labelled as fluctuating between an indirect response to that of turning a blind-eye. From the findings, recommendations for social work practice, education and training and recommendations specific for the other closely associated role players in responding to the CSEC were forwarded.