7 – The Fourth “P” in the Trafficking in Persons Report

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Learn the meaning behind the fourth “P” in the just-released Trafficking in Persons Report from the U.S. State Department. Sandra Morgan Dave Stachowiak discuss the importance of partnerships in ending human trafficking and cite a number of examples and opportunities for partnership.

Key Points

  • Background for the other three P’s: Prevention, Protection, and Prosecution.
  • Prevention: The most effective means that includes education within the community and law enforcement.
  • Protection: How to provide resources and aftercare for victims.
  • Prosecution: As a government with the people to deter those who would illegally traffic.
  • The Trafficking in Person’s Report is centered around the 4 P’s.

Resources

[Note from the Ending Human Trafficking podcast team: This episode was recorded in 2011 so the contact information provided is no longer accurate. Please refer endinghumantrafficking.org/contact for the correct contact information to get in touch with the EHT podcast.]

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Transcript

Dave Stachowiak 0:00
You’re listening to the Ending Human Trafficking podcast. This is episode number 7 recorded in July 2011. Welcome to the Ending Human Trafficking podcast. My name is Dave Stachowiak.

Sandra Morgan 0:27
And I’m Sandra Morgan from the Global Center for Women and Justice at Vanguard University of Southern California.

Dave Stachowiak 0:33
And this is the show where we empower you to study the issues, be a voice, and make a difference in ending human trafficking. And Sandie, we’re back for another episode to help all of us learn more about this issue, if I can speak today, so we can really help empower others with knowledge that will help them study the issues and be a voice and end human trafficking.

Sandra Morgan 0:56
Absolutely, it’s summer. I understand everybody’s on vacation. But the thing is, human trafficking doesn’t take a hiatus. So we have to keep pushing forward on our efforts to understand what we can do and say to be strong advocates to fight this. I was very excited last week because the brand new 2011 TIP report, Trafficking in Persons report, from the U.S. State Department was released. And the exciting addition and enhancement that they made to that report was to introduce a fourth P.

Dave Stachowiak 1:31
And so we talked about the Trafficking in Persons report back on episode 5 last month. And hopefully, folks have had a chance to listen to it already. If you haven’t, you may want to go back before we talk about the report today and listen to episode number 5. And for those of you who aren’t, or are just looking at finding this episode the first time you can hop onto iTunes and just search for Ending Human Trafficking, you’ll be able to find episode 5 that way. Or you can go directly to our website at gcwj.vanguard.edu and you’ll see a category there for the Ending Human Trafficking podcast, and you can look at episode 5 that way too. And that’ll provide a great introduction to what we’re going to be talking about today, which is what is now in the 2011 report that has been released since that episode was published. And before we even go further though, you may have questions or comments for us on this episode as you’re listening to it or past episodes, or you may have a suggestion for something you’d like to hear in the future. And so before we jump in, if you have a question or comment for us, be sure to email that to us. And you can email us at gcwj@vanguard.edu or you can call and leave a message for us or even talk to Sandie directly. And the number for folks to reach you at Sandie?

Sandra Morgan 2:50
Area code 714-556-3610, extension 2242.

Dave Stachowiak 2:57
And that’s the number for the Global Center for Women and Justice at Vanguard University, which of course, Sandie is the Director of and we’re based out of. So I think with that Sandie, we should jump right in and talk about the report and specifically talk about this, this fourth P, and we were talking about this earlier before we even started recording today. And I wasn’t familiar with the first three Ps; so I was wondering if you could give us a little background on first of all, what the first three Ps were and then talk about the addition that’s happened in this year’s report.

Sandra Morgan 3:30
Well, in the past, the three Ps have been the structure for building our policy globally, nationally and locally. So that we would address prevention, protection, and prosecution. Prevention is always going to be the most effective means of reducing an illness or a blight, whatever. So what what kind of steps can we do for better prevention? And that will include things like education, for in the community, as well as for law enforcement and in areas of business, et cetera. And we can spend a whole podcast talking about prevention strategies, which is one of my favorite things.

Dave Stachowiak 4:12
And we probably will in an upcoming show.

Sandra Morgan 4:14
Absolutely, you’ve got it. And then the second P, protection, has been about how we provide resources and aftercare for victims of trafficking, of modern-day slavery. And then the third P has been prosecution. Because in our criminal justice system, that’s how we use our weight as a government as, as a people to deter those who would illegally traffic anything. And in this instance, it’s trafficking of human beings. But sometimes people ask me, so why is this called trafficking? And that’s because we understand when something is trafficked, whether it’s weapons or drugs, it’s an illegal sale, something that’s not supposed to be part of the open market. And we’re not supposed to sell drugs. We’re not supposed to sell atomic weapons. And we’re not supposed to sell people.

Dave Stachowiak 5:14
And so those three P’s have been a centerpiece of the report for, you know– Has it been since the report started or have the, were those introduced at some point later?

Sandra Morgan 5:24
And that’s been since the beginning. And the evaluation for all the countries have been on that structure. What is this country doing for prevention? What is this country doing for protection of victims who become survivors? What is this country doing to prosecute those who are profiting by selling people? So those three things. So now, we’ve added the fourth P and that is partnership. And partnership has an entirely new world of things we can look at to evaluate to begin to understand how we’re going to move forward in much stronger and more effective ways.

Dave Stachowiak 6:06
And what– From your perspective, Sandie, what is the, what does that partnership mean? What’s the reasoning now for having that as part of the framework for looking at human trafficking?

Sandra Morgan 6:17
Well, I think in today’s world, we understand that the globalization factor that is part of the internet, and part of our world business. If one country has a problem, it’s not going to be self-contained, it’s going to affect everybody around them. Well, it’s the same thing in the area of human trafficking. We can’t have silos where we’re just training people in law enforcement, or this particular governmental organization or this agency is in charge of this. We have to communicate, we have to create new patterns of partnership and collaboration so that we are all doing the same things with the resources that we have to bring to the table, but with the same goal, end goal in mind.

Dave Stachowiak 7:08
So using that definition, this podcast that we’re doing, the show would be part of that partnership process of reaching out to other folks around the country and around the world who are involved in advocating against human trafficking, to raise awareness, but to really create relationships that are going to help all of us to fight this challenge.

Sandra Morgan 7:27
I agree. That’s exactly right. We’re probably mostly in the column for prevention because we’re providing education that will empower those who are listening to take steps so that they’ll know what to say and what to do. But the partnership, P, for the report is a lot broader than just general education and awareness.

Dave Stachowiak 8:17
How so?

Sandra Morgan 7:51
Well, there is a component that is very structurally clear in the new TIP report that makes this inter-agency collaboration a part of the partnership. So that what we’re seeing here in our own national government, we have the State Department Trafficking in Persons report, which is global, and that is going to impact our understanding of how this is happening outside of the United States. But it also has a component within the United States that because we are a destination country, and so we have victims that come from those other countries. So anything that the State Department learns about vulnerability and risk for victims from another country–from Southeast Asia, from Latin America, from Africa, from the Middle East, from Eastern Europe–those things are going to impact local communities that have high populations of refugees or immigrants from those areas, and so sharing that information is important. From a national perspective, our Department of Justice and the Office for Victims of Crime, both have extensive programs to address human trafficking. The Department of Justice began funding 42 regional task forces that are responsible for training local law enforcement, for building collaborations between victim services and law enforcement. So that a task force that gets, receives Department of Justice funding has to, it’s built into the grant process, has to have an OVC partner, an Office of Victims of Crime partner, that will provide resources so they’re all at the table. And that monetary stream helps make sure that that kind of partnership is happening because you can’t have one without the other. If you have law enforcement that are well trained in identifying victims, and they go and rescue lots of victims, but you don’t have a place to provide aftercare, you don’t have the resources for their advocacy in court, legal advocates, then rescuing them will be almost meaningless because a victim that doesn’t receive services is not going to be a good witness in a prosecution. So you begin to see how interrelated those resources are. Other agencies that from a national perspective that are really involved in a National Partnership movement, the Health and Human Services has launched several years ago, the Look Beneath the Surface campaign. That’s a wonderful campaign that your tax dollars support. And many times I receive phone calls because people want to know how they can do community awareness, which is an important part of partnership. Well, we don’t have to create our own material and find an expert to write those materials for us. Instead, we go online to Look Beneath the Surface and we can order posters and brochures and postcards and stickers that all have the 888-3737-888 hotline number from our National Human Trafficking Resource Center.

Dave Stachowiak 11:08
And people can just go online and request those resources, or is there a fee for that? How does that work, Sandie?

Sandra Morgan 11:14
Well, sometimes I use the term that it’s free, but it’s not really free. Because your tax dollars already paid for it.

Dave Stachowiak 11:20
Sure.

Sandra Morgan 11:21
So it’s actually really good thinking to use resources that you’ve already paid for. And you go online, at Look Beneath the Surface campaign, and you can order posters in the languages that are spoken in your community. Your group can be the hands and feet that deliver resources that the government has determined are really important to get out there. And the brochures are designed for law enforcement, they have special brochures for healthcare professionals, and for social workers. So each of those audiences, their material specifically prepared for them. There’s also stickers so that you can promote the 888-3737-888 number. This is another way of partnering between agencies and with the community.

Dave Stachowiak 11:21
And it’s it really goes back to what I think of the center is always trying to do Sandie, which is studying the issues and making people aware of that, because I think probably most people aren’t aware. Even folks who, you know, are involved in some of the advocacy efforts of that those resources are available. So it’s great to know that that’s there and that, you know, we’ve already invested it in as a country and as citizens that we can go and then pull that information and utilize it to get the word out.

Sandra Morgan 12:40
And it’s amazing what one poster can do. I did an event a few years ago out in a rural area and the event organizer asked me to make sure I brought something people could do today. So I packed my bag with packages of posters from the Look Beneath the Surface campaign. I had them in two languages in that particular area, I took English and Spanish. Two weeks later, I got a phone call from someone who worked at the Greyhound bus depot. And they had, the person who had attended that event had gone back to work, put that poster up in the Greyhound bus station. And now then people from others bus stations wanted those posters as well. Well, I didn’t want to be shipping them from my office. So I didn’t have to take on the responsibility of being a distributor for Look Beneath the Surface materials. I just sent them the online information so that they could order them themselves. And now then that bus station keeps fresh posters up all the time.

Dave Stachowiak 13:46
That’s a great, that’s a great message and a great place for that message.

Sandra Morgan 13:49
And it’s a good example of how the community can partner in best practices with government agencies.

Dave Stachowiak 13:55
Yeah.

Sandra Morgan 13:56
Some of the other agencies that have developed campaigns, our Department of Homeland Security, which houses the Immigration and Customs Enforcement department, they have a campaign called The Blue Campaign. You can go online there and also receive resources, they have a brand new PSA DVD 45 seconds. And it shows pictures that help you begin to understand that vast population of people who are at risk for being victims of human trafficking. We sometimes have just one image of what a slave looks like. But this helps in 45 seconds for you to see the diversity of the trafficking issue. And the wonderful thing about their video is there is no sound just a little bit of background music, and instead there are subtitles. And those subtitles are available in 14 languages. That’s an incredible opportunity to partner with the very multi-cultural community that we live in here in Southern California, and in other regions.

Dave Stachowiak 15:06
Well, and I would think that in many cases, the victim of human trafficking who may be here, and or someone who runs into a victim may not be an English speaker.

Sandra Morgan 15:19
Absolutely. So it’s really important to have resources so that they know what to do. And over the last couple of years, because we’ve done better at targeting those communities where there is a lot of risk. The number of calls to the National Human Trafficking Resource Center, by actual potential victims, has increased so much that it’s almost 25% of the calls that they get. People who enter the country receive through our customs offices, a little card that tells them that if their employment opportunity changes, and it’s connected to debt, or any other kind of fraud, call this number. And they’re able to receive that in their own language. Another national office that’s partnering in the approach to defeat human trafficking is our FBI. They’re particularly, they’re particularly strong Innocence Lost campaign that addresses commercially sexually exploited children, and we’ve mentioned that in the past. But probably one agency that people don’t often think of as being a great warrior in the battle against human trafficking is Department of Labor. And on our Orange County Human Trafficking Task Force. See it is July.

Dave Stachowiak 16:40
I know, our brains are asleep.

Sandra Morgan 16:42
Orange County Human Trafficking Task Force, one of the key people at the table is the District Director for the Department of Labor. And they have the capacity to investigate labor exploitation which is a huge part of human trafficking.

Dave Stachowiak 17:00
Well, that brings us to talking about some of the local partnerships as well, too. Because of course there we’ve spoken about in many of the national partnerships and international partnerships. I know one of the things you also have a great passion for is locally, how do we make strong connections with local organizations. And so in our area, Southern California here, the Orange County Human Trafficking Task Force is certainly one of those. I was wondering if you could speak to how effective partnerships work on the local level, Sandie?

Sandra Morgan 17:27
Well, I think finding a common ground. We all agree that this is a horrendous crime. And then beginning to build partnerships that are based on best practice. We can bring the community NGOs, nonprofits, faith-based community to the table and provide resources and training for them. One of the, at the Orange County Human Trafficking Task Force is a great example. They have a regular monthly volunteer meeting. People come to that. They go through the process of being trained as a volunteer either for outreach and awareness or even for life skill mentors, for victims out in the aftercare process working with our OVC partner, which in Orange County happens to be the Salvation Army. And they provide the resources for aftercare. The exciting thing coming up in the next week that’s a great example of how significantly that kind of partnership can progress is for the last three years, the Orange County Human Trafficking Task Force has had a strong presence at the Orange County Fair. Every year volunteers from the task force staff that every single day of the of the fair, which is a month-long event here, attended by millions.

Dave Stachowiak 18:49
It is, yeah.

Sandra Morgan 18:51
And in the past, that we originally designed that because we thought ‘Oh, everybody in Orange County is going to learn about human trafficking.’ But what we didn’t understand is people come to Orange County from all over during the summer because we’ve got beaches and Disneyland and everything else. It’s a great entertainment destination. So, we had the opportunity to educate visitors to our community who go to the fair, and we began to get phone calls from Iowa and Pennsylvania, and Kansas City because they had picked up an Orange County Fair postcard from our task force.

Dave Stachowiak 19:31
Such a great example of how a local partnership can really do a lot to drive the awareness and help people to study the issues and be a voice and make a difference nationally and internationally.

Sandra Morgan 19:45
And I think the other key thing to consider about local partnerships with the community is everybody needs to understand what their roles are, what they have to offer that is best practice. And we sometimes, we watch a documentary and our heartstrings are pulled and we decide that, wow, we’re going to open a shelter. And I was recently talking to a juvenile probation officer who was a little frustrated because people are talking about opening a safe house for teens who have been lured into commercial sexual exploitation. And he said, ‘How are we going to communicate to people that it’s not that easy. You don’t just rent a house, and put up a sign and say, okay, bring us your victims.’ And in fact, some of the requirements are pretty stringent when it comes to providing a safe, secure environment. And the average community organization is not equipped with the expertise, with knowledge, with the resources. The building is really the easiest thing to obtain. But do you have the people to staff it? So I said, so what, what would I need if I wanted to open a safe house for teenagers? And he said, Oh, well, you need to, first of all, make sure it has a 12-foot wall with razor wire, and 24/7 arm security. Wow. So does your organization have that? I asked somebody I saw in the next week, and it was like, wow, no. And would you like before you start any new venture, you want to do a business plan and figure out how much it’s gonna cost? Do you want to figure out what the budget is going to be just for the security? And I’ve been talking about this for a long time, but now I’m starting to see this in evidence-based practices here in the states. But my own personal experience when I lived in Athens, Greece when the shelter was opened, and it was a partnership between the government and the European Union, and Doctors of the World, the shelter was running with a negative cash flow by the second month, and in 14 months, ran out of money. And they started with a 600,000 euro grant. And they ran out of money. They had to pay for 24/7 security, they had to pay for medical supplies, the medications. All of our health care services were volunteer. But many of the other things were not volunteer. We had to have 24/7 psych on-site for crisis intervention when victims were rescued and brought to the shelter. So the business plan for a community that starts a shelter has to be really well thought out.

Dave Stachowiak 22:49
And the partnerships have to be well thought out too. And I think about just the organizations that are here locally. So the Global Center for Women and Justice, our organization, the Orange County Human Trafficking Task Force, Salvation Army, those are organizations that are well established and certainly better funded than someone going off on their own and doing something and even those organizations struggle with the right, having the right funding and resources and partnerships. And so it’s a big undertaking, and I think it’s been a blessing and a curse that human trafficking is getting a lot more attention in the media right now, Sandie. It’s a blessing because the there are more people who are aware of this issue. And it also is a little bit of a curse in that sometimes very well-meaning people want to go out and help and to do something, but unfortunately, they don’t have a lot of the knowledge in the background, and they haven’t taken the time to study it and end up making choices that don’t really help the situation, and in some cases can hurt.

Sandra Morgan 23:46
Well, and the other issue too is, we all understand that we have a lot less resources than we did a few years ago. The economy does not allow us to be extravagant. And so we have to be really wise stewards of what is placed at our disposal. So it’s important to assess your organization, your nonprofit, your community for what they are good at. So Vanguard, we’re good at education. So this is what we bring to the table, we offer the venue and the opportunity for training. Salvation Army, they have a long history of providing aftercare for victims of all kinds of trauma, and so extending that now to human trafficking is logical, and they’re very well prepared for that. And of course, leaving all of the criminal justice aspects of human trafficking to our local law enforcement and judicial system, that’s a really wise move, too.

Dave Stachowiak 24:48
And we’ve been talking a lot about partnership today and so I think one thing that we should look at is what other types of partnerships are there too. And one of the partnerships we talked about was partnerships with the business community several episodes ago, I think was back in episode number 2. And we received a question from Bruce in Pennsylvania actually a couple weeks ago. And so we wanted to make sure to respond to that today. And Bruce actually emailed us at the Global Center for Women and Justice email address. That’s gcwj@vanguard.edu. And he had a question in regards to our conversation from a few episodes ago, Sandie, on fair trade chocolate. And so I’m going to read his question that he sent to us and I’ll give you a chance to respond to it. I know you’ve been talking to Bruce already. But here’s this question: “Sandie, thank you for your podcast on human trafficking. You have a wonderful way of breaking down a lot of information and making it very easy to understand. It’s very helpful.” Thank you, Bruce. “We,” he says, “looking forward to the next podcast, and at our church we have been selling for the last few years fair trade chocolate, coffee, and tea through the equal exchange. We do not make a profit on it. We are hoping that our church members will see the benefit of having something pleasant to eat or drink, not at the expense of another person slavery. In addition, our church makes a great deal of chocolate candy each year as a fundraiser. At this point, I’ve not been able to find a wholesale supplier for fair trade chocolate. Do you know of one and thanks for considering my request.” Sandie, do you know of a wholesale supplier or other resources that Bruce might tap into?

Sandra Morgan 26:20
Well, what Bruce is asking really drives a new direction. One of the aspects of, of using the concept of fair trade as a strategy against human trafficking is that a number of nonprofits have popped up, and they are doing fair trade products as a means of fighting human trafficking. But in the day to day living, we need to figure out how to make this a part of our regular shopping without having to go to a nonprofit, which actually in involves another layer of expense because you have to support the nonprofit.

Dave Stachowiak 26:59
Sure.

Sandra Morgan 27:00
So I personally go to Trader Joe’s and purchase fair-trade chocolate. Fair-trade tea and fair trade coffee. There are other products, more and more, that are becoming available. I said that at a conference though, and someone said, “Well, we don’t have a fair Trader Joe’s.” It’s like, well, what you do is what my Vanguard students did a couple years ago. They canvassed the businesses in their community, and ask them, do you sell fair trade chocolate? Do you sell Fairtrade coffee? And eventually, after two or three months of going back to those same businesses, those products showed up on those shelves without the additional cost factor of supporting a nonprofit. So I believe that I am, what I passed on to Bruce was, check out your local Trader Joe’s for everyday prices on fair trade products. But more and more for those who are listening because I anticipate your question, if you don’t have that kind of store in your town, you’re going to want to find out who is receptive to beginning to supply that on your shelves so that just becomes a practice.

Dave Stachowiak 28:11
And businesses really can become great partners in the efforts to end human trafficking in that businesses bring a lot of resources and a lot of visibility. So if we’re able to create effective partnerships with businesses, that helps all of us to really end human trafficking in a more proactive and effective way. And that’s just working smart with all of our resources.

Sandra Morgan 28:31
Absolutely, absolutely.

Dave Stachowiak 28:32
And business people are people too, of course. And so they, they care about these issues and care deeply about these issues. In many cases, and many organizations, advocate for them strongly. So it’s an important thing for us to remember when we’re talking to businesses and talking to organizations.

Sandra Morgan 28:47
And there’s a new legislation that was passed in California that will require transparency for the supply chain. And we’ll talk about that on another podcast. But it’s a very exciting movement forward because it’s going to create more and more motivation for big businesses to identify fair trade practices and promote and celebrate those and make them affordable for the everyday consumer.

Dave Stachowiak 29:21
And continuing our conversation on partnerships, we’re actually going to jump even further into that in the next episode, Sandie, because we’re going to talk about how we can partner effectively with students. So could you give us a little preview on who we’re going to be speaking with?

Sandra Morgan 29:35
We’re going to call an interview, the former president of Live2free at Vanguard University, Tiffany Wong. She received congressional recognition for her outstanding efforts and community awareness and outreach, and is a great example of students who become passionate when they understand what’s happening in the world of modern-day slavery and want to do something that really makes a difference.

Dave Stachowiak 30:01
And speaking of things that folks can do to make a difference in furthering their education and studying the issues, I know one of the ways that the center supports that Sandie is through the annual conference. That’s coming up in March. We’ve talked about it on some future, on some past episodes. I was wondering if you could, for those who may not have heard an episode previously if you could tell a little bit about what will be coming up at the conference here in Southern California in March.

Sandra Morgan 30:25
March 2-3, the Women Education and Justice Conference will be held here in Costa Mesa, California. And our, it will really focus on the importance of studying the issues of the research, so that we can find answers that will be sustainable and effective here and abroad. Thank you, Dave.

Dave Stachowiak 30:47
My pleasure. And if you’re looking for more information on that you can visit us at gcwj.vanguard.edu or you can email us a question again, question or comment, at gcwj@vanguard.edu. Or you can call us at

Sandra Morgan 31:02
714-556-3610, extension 2242.

Dave Stachowiak 31:08
And we will see you on the next episode. Thanks, Sandie.

Sandra Morgan 31:11
Okay, bye-bye.

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