Empowerment of Sex Service Providers through alternative participatory methods Erasmus Project

Project Title

Empowerment of Sex Service Providers through alternative participatory methods

Project Key Action

This project related with these key action: Cooperation for innovation and the exchange of good practices

Project Action Type

This project related with this action type : Strategic Partnerships for adult education

Project Call Year

This project’s Call Year is 2020

Project Topics

This project is related with these Project Topics: Migrants’ issues; Inclusion – equity; Access for disadvantaged

Project Summary

Sex service providers (SDL – abbreviation comes from the German word SexdienstleisterInnne) are the target group of this project proposal. Sex work/prostitution is a difficult phenomenon to quantify, as it is not regulated or banned in most EU Member States, and there are no or very few reliable statistical surveys. According to the 2016 report by the Fondation Scelles around 103,000 people were involved in sex work between 2012 and 2016. This number represents countries with official statistical surveys. If we include the countries without surveys, the number of estimated numbers multiplies by five.
SDL often come from socially underprivileged backgrounds and from families at risk of poverty, they experience little support and encouragement in the course of their lives, they migrate through Europe as unsettled self-employed people in search of new “markets”, they experience stigmatisation unlike any other group of people – due to their work, and have very little formal access to vocational training and the traditional labour market.
According to statistics from Austria and Germany, most SDL come from Romania and Hungary and migrate between Germany and Austria, where sex work is regulated very differently.
Because of migration, SDL often don’t know the structures of the “foreign” system and usually do not have enough language skills to deal with the complexity of the bureaucratic process and the legal bases that regulate sex work. The resulting lack of information favours the exploitation of sex service providers and might drive them into dependence of brothel operators. Stigmatisation, language barrier, lack of training, or the lack of recognition of professional qualifications and diplomas are obstacles SDL face when they want to access the labour market and further training or participate in social life. This leads to further social isolation and marginalisation, a reality that will likely be passed on to future generations.
The aim of this project partnership is, to provide this marginalised target group with access to information, education and further development, thereby improving their social situation and integration. The approach of professionalisation to prevent exploitation, violence and marginalisation is an innovative approach, because it acknowledges that bans only push SDL more into the isolation of unattended private spaces, where there is bound to be less protection and control. The threshold to exploitation, coercion and trafficking in human beings thus becomes more permeable.
In this sense, professionalisation means information, knowledge, competences, being able to move within the European area as responsible citizens and to be able to actively enlist in social participation opportunities. It also means to take an active role in the development of one’s own employment opportunities, as well as being able to consciously and actively care for one’s own health and the health of clients.
The aim of the partnership comprising institutions from Austria, Hungary, Romania and Germany is, to exchange views on the professionalisation of sex service providers (SDL) and the necessary acquisition of knowledge and key competences, to collect methods and practices of knowledge transfer and to evaluate them on the basis of established quality criteria, as well as to collect and publish best practices in a catalogue. Through on-site visits, it is possible to get to know the country-specific parameters and the respective working methods of the project partners directly and personally, and to also identify and compare differences as well as similarities regarding the social and legal situation of SDL.
Subsequently a transnational concept that includes the basic contents and the appropriate methods and formats for the professionalisation of this target group will be drafted with the participation of sex service providers.

Project Website

https://www.frauenservice.at/forschung-und-projekte/empowerment-sexdienstleister_innen

EU Grant (Eur)

Funding of the project from EU: 49975 Eur

Project Coordinator

Verein Frauenservice Graz & Country: AT

Project Partners

• Madonna e.V. Treffpunkt und Beratung für Sexarbeiterinnen
• Association of Hungarian Sexworkers
• ASOCIATIA SWC