Call for papers! Journal of Human Trafficking, Enslavement and Conflict-Related Sexual Violence (JHEC)! Submit now!

Multi- and interdisciplinary journal on the nexus between human trafficking, enslavement and conflict-related sexual violence

JHEC – 2024-5(3) welcomes contributions to a special issue, guest edited by Chris Dolan, articulating and evidencing the nexus between (conflict-related) sexual violence, asylum seeking/refugee status, and human trafficking.

A single individual may be simultaneously a survivor of (conflict-related) sexual violence, an asylum seeker/refugee, and a trafficked person. And yet, public discourses – and the institutional configurations of those purporting to support those with these experiences – repeatedly erase these possibilities. For example, the so-called ‘migrants’ in small boats on the Mediterranean and the English Channel, just like those crossing the Darien Gap in Central America, are likely to be described as having been trafficked. Their related experiences as asylum seekers – who may also be survivors of sexual violence before, during or after flight – is at best discounted and at worst actively erased.

Possible themes include but are not limited to consideration of:

When, where and why, these categories are synonymous and/or iterative rather than mutually exclusive
Institutional responses to each of these forms of victimisation
Impacts of lived experiences being discounted or erased
Uses and abuses of these erasures for political and policy purposes
Methodological challenges in documenting and researching complex experiences of vulnerability arising from/leading to conflict-related sexual violence (CRSV)/trafficking in persons (TiP)/Asylum Seeking
Theoretical progress that more nuanced understanding of the connections between these three areas of human experience could offer

Contributions can take the form of an academic article (word count: 6,000-8,000 words, references excluded) or a practitioner or experiential reflection (word count: 1500-2500). We request that those interested in contributing first submit an abstract of 100 words by Monday 3 June.

IMPORTANT DATES