Is There a Social Justice for Sex Workers in Eastern Europe?

This study explores the potential for social justice for sex workers in post-1989 Europe, focusing on the Czech Republic and Slovakia through in-depth interviews with the sex workers themselves. Despite the end of state-socialist hegemony and the transformative impact of the Velvet Revolution on political, economic, and gender dynamics, sex workers remain deeply marginalized and stigmatized in today’s neoliberal capitalist systems. I am interested in how these external political, legislative, and social changes have affected sex workers' lives and their ability to negotiate within the system. Have globalization and liberal internationalism (Engle, 2005) improved the conditions for sex work, or do sex workers feel that social justice is unattainable in this system?

The research also considers the 'grey zone' of Czech law—who benefits from it, and what are the implications for the less privileged? Is there anything that sex workers lack in order to fully understand themselves as equal citizens with bodily citizenship (Dudová 2015)? Do they identify as active agents making free choices in neoliberal capitalism, as part of a new working class, or as victims of a patriarchal system that commodifies sexuality? The slogan 'sex work is work' has long been a rallying cry for sex workers' rights - but is it the goal of our imagination? Do we want to liberate ourselves through work or rather from it?

By critically engaging with these questions, the aim is to examine social justice from the perspective of some of the least privileged voices in contemporary society, while consciously avoiding the pitfalls of white savior feminism and acknowledging the ongoing hierarchies between Eastern and Western Europe. The interviews are analyzed through the theory of bodily citizenship and anti-work theories (e.g. Weeks, 2011; Berg, 2021; Hester & Srnicek, 2023).