Then you could add this discussion to the paper.

Duxide,

Thanks for the suggestion! I've added the discussion to page 21 and rewritten most of page 20.

Very good!! But if I were you, I'd try harder to find examples of non-White women slave trade. Once could even consider modern trade of Nigerian prostitutes into Europe as a sort of slave trade? Just playing devil's advocate here but you need to consider all possibilities when dealing with such a thorny issue.


EDIT 1: You probably should dedicate a separate numbered section to this issue. For example, I found this: "While in the 19th century the British in India began to adopt the policy of social segregation, they still kept their brothels full of Indian women.[48] In the 19th and early 20th centuries, there was a network of Chinese and Japanese prostitutes being trafficked across Asia, in countries such as China, Japan, Korea, Singapore and British India, in what was then known as the "Yellow Slave Traffic". There was also a network of European prostitutes being trafficked to India, Ceylon, Singapore, China and Japan at around the same time, in what was then known as the "White Slave Traffic".[49] The most common destination for European prostitutes in Asia were the British colonies of India and Ceylon, where hundreds of women and girls from continental Europe as well as Japan serviced British soldiers".

In the 16th and 17th centuries, Portuguese visitors and their South Asian (and sometimes African) crewmembers often engaged in slavery in Japan, where they brought or captured young Japanese women and girls, who were either used as sexual slaves on their ships or taken to Macau and other Portuguese colonies in Southeast Asia, the Americas,[38] and India.[40] For example, in Goa, a Portuguese colony in India, there was a community of Japanese slaves and traders during the late 16th and 17th centuries.[41] Later European East India companies, including those of the Dutch and British, also engaged in prostitution in Japan.[42]

This is a good starting point for a less biased view: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_prostitution

You're pushing this discussion into a grey area. I understand that international prostitution is often perceived as being a form of 'slavery' but this perception is influenced by self-interest. Feminists try to shift the blame from the prostitute to the client. Immigrant rights groups likewise try to portray foreign prostitutes as victims, rather than as victimizers. Finally, the prostitutes themselves want to regularize their situation and encourage portrayals of themselves as 'slaves.'

The reality is that most foreign prostitutes have chosen their line of work and are strongly motivated to pursue it.

Let's take your example of Nigerian prostitutes in Europe. Is this prostitution demand-driven or supply-driven? Are Europeans sending agents to Nigeria to abduct and bring Nigerian women to Europe? Is there a strong pent-up demand for African prostitutes in Europe? Or do they try to create demand for their services?

Everything suggests that this prostitution is supply-driven. They come to Europe because the market is already saturated in their home country.

For nearly 20 years, the women of Benin City, a town in the state of Edo in the south-central part of Nigeria, have traveled to Italy to work in the sex trade. Every year, successful ones recruit younger girls to follow in their steps. Most migrant women, including those who end up in the sex industry, have made a clear decision to leave home and take their chances overseas. They are headstrong and ambitious women who migrate in order to escape conflict, persecution, environmental degradation, natural disasters, and other situations that affect their habitat and livelihood.

http://vk.com/photo-26953_300743343

They are repeatedly described as selling their services aggressively, hardly the portrait of a woman who is acting against her will:

Copenhagen Police rounded up 31 suspected illegal immigrants working as prostitues during a sweep of Istedgage in the Vesterbro district early Thursday morning. The women, all from Nigeria, are charged with holding false residency permits. A man indentified as a French citizen was also detained, but later released.

Kjeld Farcinsen of the Copenhagen Police said the number of African women arriving in Copenhagen to work as prostitutes was on the rise, and they are becoming increasingly aggressive.

“When our undercover officers approach them, the women make no attempt to hide the fact that they are offering sex for money,” Farcinsen told Politiken newspaper.

http://cphpost.dk/news14/local/nigerian-prostitutes-nabbed-in-red-light-raid.html

This point is important because a supply-driven service tells us little about the demand for the service. More people are selling the service because more of them are entering the market. It's not because demand for the service has increased.

You're pushing this discussion into a grey area. I understand that international prostitution is often perceived as being a form of 'slavery' but this perception is influenced by self-interest. Feminists try to shift the blame from the prostitute to the client. Immigrant rights groups likewise try to portray foreign prostitutes as victims, rather than as victimizers. Finally, the prostitutes themselves want to regularize their situation and encourage portrayals of themselves as 'slaves.'

The reality is that most foreign prostitutes have chosen their line of work and are strongly motivated to pursue it.

Let's take your example of Nigerian prostitutes in Europe. Is this prostitution demand-driven or supply-driven? Are Europeans sending agents to Nigeria to abduct and bring Nigerian women to Europe? Is there a strong pent-up demand for African prostitutes in Europe? Or do they try to create demand for their services?

Everything suggests that this prostitution is supply-driven. They come to Europe because the market is already saturated in their home country.

For nearly 20 years, the women of Benin City, a town in the state of Edo in the south-central part of Nigeria, have traveled to Italy to work in the sex trade. Every year, successful ones recruit younger girls to follow in their steps. Most migrant women, including those who end up in the sex industry, have made a clear decision to leave home and take their chances overseas. They are headstrong and ambitious women who migrate in order to escape conflict, persecution, environmental degradation, natural disasters, and other situations that affect their habitat and livelihood.

http://vk.com/photo-26953_300743343

They are repeatedly described as selling their services aggressively, hardly the portrait of a woman who is acting against her will:

Copenhagen Police rounded up 31 suspected illegal immigrants working as prostitues during a sweep of Istedgage in the Vesterbro district early Thursday morning. The women, all from Nigeria, are charged with holding false residency permits. A man indentified as a French citizen was also detained, but later released.

Kjeld Farcinsen of the Copenhagen Police said the number of African women arriving in Copenhagen to work as prostitutes was on the rise, and they are becoming increasingly aggressive.

“When our undercover officers approach them, the women make no attempt to hide the fact that they are offering sex for money,” Farcinsen told Politiken newspaper.

http://cphpost.dk/news14/local/nigerian-prostitutes-nabbed-in-red-light-raid.html

This point is important because a supply-driven service tells us little about the demand for the service. More people are selling the service because more of them are entering the market. It's not because demand for the service has increased.

Perhaps you could compare the price asked by a Nigerian prostitute with that requested by Eastern European women. I've heard the latter are much more expensive but I am not aware of any official sources.

Unregulated prostitution like workers that don't work in safe brothels are indeed at risk for abuse and exploitation. So there is some truth in that.

Perhaps you could compare the price asked by a Nigerian prostitute with that requested by Eastern European women.

The price of a prostitute's services is a function of both supply and demand. A Nigerian prostitute is lower priced than a Ukrainian not only because the demand is lower but also because the supply is higher.

It would be difficult to disentangle the two factors, even if we could find good statistics on the relative pricing of Nigerian and Ukrainian prostitutes.

Unregulated prostitution like workers that don't work in safe brothels are indeed at risk for abuse and exploitation. So there is some truth in that.

You're losing sight of the argument. Those constraints tell us nothing about what the client wants. It's not as if Europeans are abducting Nigerian women and bringing them to Europe. The constraints are imposed largely by the people who smuggle the women into Europe. And those people are largely fellow Nigerians.

Perhaps you could compare the price asked by a Nigerian prostitute with that requested by Eastern European women.

The price of a prostitute's services is a function of both supply and demand. A Nigerian prostitute is lower priced than a Ukrainian not only because the demand is lower but also because the supply is higher.

It would be difficult to disentangle the two factors, even if we could find good statistics on the relative pricing of Nigerian and Ukrainian prostitutes.

You raised an important point. This is not a quantitative paper, but a qualitative one or an "opinion" article as it does not include a rigorous statistical analysis. If it gets accepted, I will have to assign it to that category.

This is not a quantitative paper, but a qualitative one or an "opinion" article as it does not include a rigorous statistical analysis.

Quantitative information has its advantages and its limitations, as does qualitative information. One is not better than the other. In general, statistical analysis is best suited for phenomena that can be replicated and/or repeatedly studied under controlled conditions.

Unfortunately, most phenomena in this universe do not meet those requirements. Yet they are no less real and we don't have the luxury of simply ignoring them because they are not conducive to statistical analysis. The so-called "soft sciences," notably history and anthropology, have developed their own methodologies for analysis of such phenomena.

I've had to deal with both quantitative data and qualitative data. Frankly, I am just as wary of the former as of the latter.

Peter,

Could you make a list of 5 to 10 qualified researchers whom we can contact to see if they would be willing to review? Thanks.

Chuck,

"5 to 10" is setting the bar a bit high (most journals ask for 3 or 4 names). I can recommend the following people:

Robert C. Davis - History, Ohio State University

Dariusz Kołodziejczyk - History, University of Warsaw

Alexandre Skirda - French historian - I don't have his contact info

Pierre van den Berghe - Sociology, Washington State

Peter,

Could you make a list of 5 to 10 qualified researchers whom we can contact to see if they would be willing to review? Thanks.

Who is "We"? The reviewers can be contacted only by the editor or by the author himself. Are you perhaps a co-author?Or are you the editor of this journal?
And Peter, 5 to 10 is probably not enough. You'll probably need to contact 20 to get a couple of reviews. Response rate is notoriously low.
Moreover, all external reviewers in excess of 1, if they accept to review, will have to be approved by the other reviewers, since the author can only appoint 1 reviewer.

Duxide,

How many more reviewers are needed? There have already been two.

I agree that the editors should authorize any new reviewers. If the current four prove to be insufficient, I'll provide more names. But, first, let's work with what we have.

Duxide,

How many more reviewers are needed? There have already been two.

I agree that the editors should authorize any new reviewers. If the current four prove to be insufficient, I'll provide more names. But, first, let's work with what we have.

Peter,

I perused the thread and found only Emil's approval. Are there other approvals that I do not know of? Publication in this journal requires 3 approvals. I will give my approval if you make the changes you requested but if you do not want to, you can always find another reviewer who is fine with the paper how it is.

Edit 1: I am aware one external reviewer (Razib) has been seeked out yet, and this means that any other reviewers will have to be approved by the review team. Moreover, I cannot see Razib's approval in the thread.

Duxide,

I'm currently out of the country and don't have access to my home computer, but the email that Razib sent to me indicated approval. In any case, the editors should ask him directly whether or not he approves the manuscript, as it now exists.

I'm not sure what you mean when you refer to the changes you requested. I cannot discuss Nigerian prostitutes as being comparable to the case of the white slave trade because their case is not comparable. They come to Europe of their own free will to live a better life. Yes, their lives in Europe seem terrible, and they complain about "exploitation" and "slavery" but these are simply tactics to regularize their status so that they may stay in Europe and eventually sponsor their children and next-of-kin.

When you state that Nigerian prostitutes are "exploited" and thus "enslaved" you are implying that they should be earning much higher wages for their services. If their wages don't reflect their true market value, demand for their services should exceed their supply, and they will not have to market themselves aggressively. Yet everything in the literature indicates the opposite: Nigerian prostitutes have to market themselves aggressively because demand for their services is weak.

Duxide,

I'm currently out of the country and don't have access to my home computer, but the email that Razib sent to me indicated approval. In any case, the editors should ask him directly whether or not he approves the manuscript, as it now exists.

I'm not sure what you mean when you refer to the changes you requested.

By the changes I requested I meant adding a specific (separate) section to the paper dealing with the issue of non-white women slave trade.It's just an editorial quibble. I will email Razib.

To whom it may concern, I approved publication of his paper in the OBG journal,.

We now have 2 approvals. If the author makes the requested changes, I will give my approval too and that will guarantee publication.

Duxide,

I have no problem with adding a separate section on international trafficking in prostitutes, as it developed in the 19th and 20th centuries. This is what you requested in your review (comment #21).

Such a discussion would end with the conclusion that such trafficking is not comparable with the trade in enslaved women of previous periods. A prostitute is an agent in her own right. Her physical and cultural characteristics are therefore a function not only of what the client desires but also of her willingness to engage in prostitution, particularly in places far from her place of origin. This willingness, in turn, is a function of her cultural background.

For instance, historically there have been much fewer Muslim prostitutes engaged in this trafficking than Japanese prostitutes. Is this because Muslim prostitutes are less desirable? A more salient reason is that it is much easier to recruit prostitutes in Japanese society than in Muslim society. In the latter case, recruitment of prostitutes is much more circumscribed, prostitutes being recruited in the past much more among non-Muslims (Christians, Jews, pagans) who were already stigmatized and/or less bound by Islamic morality.

Again, I have no problems with adding this chapter and perhaps it would be worthwhile for me to anticipate the criticisms of those who consider prostitution to be comparable to slavery.

Duxide,

I have no problem with adding a separate section on international trafficking in prostitutes, as it developed in the 19th and 20th centuries. This is what you requested in your review (comment #21).

Such a discussion would end with the conclusion that such trafficking is not comparable with the trade in enslaved women of previous periods. A prostitute is an agent in her own right. Her physical and cultural characteristics are therefore a function not only of what the client desires but also of her willingness to engage in prostitution, particularly in places far from her place of origin. This willingness, in turn, is a function of her cultural background.

For instance, historically there have been much fewer Muslim prostitutes engaged in this trafficking than Japanese prostitutes. Is this because Muslim prostitutes are less desirable? A more salient reason is that it is much easier to recruit prostitutes in Japanese society than in Muslim society. In the latter case, recruitment of prostitutes is much more circumscribed, prostitutes being recruited in the past much more among non-Muslims (Christians, Jews, pagans) who were already stigmatized and/or less bound by Islamic morality.

Again, I have no problems with adding this chapter and perhaps it would be worthwhile for me to anticipate the criticisms of those who consider prostitution to be comparable to slavery.

Yes please add this chapter and anticipate the criticisms as you have done in this thread.

I have just realized that Emil gave his approval when this paper was submitted to ODP. However, this is now a OBG submission. Emil is not a reviewer for OBG so his approval cannot count unless he makes an application as one-time or permanent reviewer for OBG. I can vouch for Emil's ability to review this paper but 2 more review members will have to approve Emil as one-time reviewer too.