A Legal Analysis of the Contributing Factors to Trafficking in Women: Points of Strength and Weakness of the Recent Developments in Europe

Abstract

The purpose of this contribution is first to build the legal connections between anti-trafficking law, gender and international refugee law. The paper will then move to “contributing factors” to trafficking with the objectives of: a) distinguishing the root cause analysis from the contributing factors analysis; b) explaining why the contributing factors analysis can be used as framework to investigate the proposal of the European Commission for amendments to the EU Anti-Trafficking Directive, presented in December 2022, with the purpose of highlighting its points of strength and weakness. The paper will identify four of these factors: forced marriages, illegal adoptions, ICT, and an “unsafe” migration framework. It eventually suggests that working on a safer migration framework in the EU is a key aspect for the prevention of this transnational crime.