Ontario Superior Court’s recent ruling that struck down key parts of Canada’s prostitution law has again sparked the heated debate on the decriminalization of prostitution. While sex-work advocates praised that the ruling would set up legal grounds to protect the safety and security of sex workers, the opponents of decriminalization assailed the ruling as potentially stabilizing the sex industry and encouraging the sexual exploitation of women as well as children. Although Justice Susan Himel, the judge of this ruling, stressed that other provisions on prostitution can still be used to restrain child prostitution, the impacts of the possible legalization of adult prostitution on underage prostitutes have not been discussed extensively.
Both sides advocating the criminalization and decriminalization of prostitution often build their arguments on the basis of human rights. While the former claims that the criminalization of prostitution would encourage the physical and psychological exploitation of women, the latter argues that the decriminalization would provide the legal ground that can better protect sex workers.
Are domestic policy options constrained/facilitated by international law and politics?
The debate over prostitution is heady and passionate. The scope of the debate varies from those who argue that prostitution is a human rights violation/ a violation of women’s bodies, to those who argue that it should be decriminalised to protect sex workers and reconstructed as a human right under existing labour laws.
