Humanitarian experts call for dialogue and accountability on transactional sex for people navigating crisis

This first joint meeting generated important recommendations for all actors in crisis settings to better support and meet the needs of people who are or are considering engaging in sex for money or goods, or to access services or cross borders.

Transactional sex is driven by structural issues

A key starting point was evidence generated by both ListenH and the Liminality Research Consortium that transactional sex is a product of structural drivers. In a crisis, TS may be used to mitigate immediate financial hardship and losses or by limited or insufficient cash assistance, social support or emergency assistance. It is also used as a means to overcome limited livelihood options and secure protection from violence and abuse when institutional safeguards are absent or inaccessible, to navigate legal liminality resulting from migration and asylum-related hurdles or exclusion from formal systems that guarantee decent labour conditions, healthcare and housing as well as financial support. At the root of these problems are issues of constrained agency, exclusion and persistent insecurity.

Humanitarian actors can improve prospects for people engaging in transactional sex

While transactional sex is often conceived as a form of sexual violence or exploitation and abuse mainly affecting women, a more nuanced understanding of the phenomenon can help both address its drivers and support those engaged in it. 

Transactional sex includes a range of practices, from sex work to one-off transactional encounters, to intimate transactional relationships, to temporary or convenience marriages. It also involves a diversity of actors and relationships, queer people and unaccompanied young men, who may not always be prioritized by assistance or may face barriers to accessing it. 

Humanitarian actors, policy-makers and funders must develop and support holistic, multi-sectoral programming frameworks that consider protection, livelihoods and physical and mental health, rooted in a rights-based, gender-responsive approach that recognises the agency of those engaging in it. These should be developed in co-production with local communities and affected people, with user-centred design and accessible, confidential and effective feedback, complaint and remedy systems. Critically, they must acknowledge and confront socioeconomic precarity, constrained choices and heightened exposure to harm faced by individuals based on their particular characteristics.