Transnational Sisterhood? <scp>B</scp>razilian Feminisms Facing Prostitution

Abstract

During the 1980s, the sex wars concerning feminism and prostitution had little effect on B razilian feminisms. Although prostitution was far from central in this “second wave” of feminism in B razil, which was organized around fighting the military regime, struggling for democracy and amnesty, and confronting specific struggles against male domination, it provoked curiosity, and a certain proximity grew between feminists and prostitutes. During the decades of 2000 and 2010, networks and coalitions of B razilian feminists with transnational articulations have increasingly adopted an abolitionist position, denying the differences between prostitution and sex trafficking and refusing to listen to the voices of organized prostitutes. In this article I analyze this complex process, based on research conducted between 2004 and 2011 with an anthropological approach on transnational sex markets and sex trafficking, in which I interviewed B razilian prostitutes in this country and abroad, feminists, and agents in different positions of the B razilian state.