Understanding the Adoption, Prioritization, and Biases Within Anti-Human Trafficking Policy Restricted; Files Only
Harmon, Rachel (Summer 2023)
Abstract
The primary purpose of this dissertation project is to explore government policies designed to respond to human trafficking from several angles. This is done through a three-paper format that examines both the United States and countries around the globe. The first paper looks at what potential political biases exist in how the United States government ranks other states’ responses to human trafficking. The second paper explores whether more gender-equal states are more likely to have more robust anti-trafficking policies. Finally, the third paper asks whether racial and gender stereotypes shape the policy preferences and prioritization of the United States public through a survey experiment. This dissertation utilizes a mixture of observational and experimental data, and a notable theme running throughout the project is how important it is that better data be collected on human trafficking and policy responses to move this research agenda forward. Each of the three papers are summarized below.
Paper 1: One of the main sources of data on global trafficking, the annual Trafficking in Persons (TIP) Reports, is susceptible to biases because report rankings are tied to political outcomes. In contrast to other country-level human rights indicators, the State Department issues both narratives and rankings, which incentivizes attempts to influence the rankings based on political interests. The study uses a supervised machine-learning algorithm to examine how narratives are translated into rankings, to determine whether rankings are biased, and to disentangle whether bias stems from changing standards or political interests. The authors find that the TIP Report rankings are more influenced by political biases than changing standards.
Paper 2: Human trafficking is a gendered issue that disproportionately harms women and girls, and women often take on leadership roles in developing and implementing anti-trafficking policy solutions. Research has shown that increasing women’s representation in government can, but is not guaranteed to, lead to more robust government responses to a variety of issues, whether than is due to the power of descriptive or substantive representation. I theorize that the inclusion of women in political spaces will lead to more comprehensive government responses to human trafficking, as well as lower trafficking rates overall. Specifically, I expect that higher proportions of women in legislative bodies will be associated with better government responses to human trafficking and lower rates of trafficking perpetration. These hypotheses are tested using data from the Trafficking in Persons Report, which provides panel data on state responses to human trafficking. No meaningful support for the expectations is found, indicating that the inclusion of women in legislative office alone is not sufficient to change anti-trafficking policy in a substantial way.
Paper 3: Human trafficking has a long history of being raced and gendered in public discourse. This project tests whether public policy preferences about how anti-trafficking policy is prioritized is sensitive to numerous identity frames that vary in terms of race and gender. While the data do not provide strong support for the expectations, this is likely due to flaws in the research design. This learning experience will be used as a stepping stone for upcoming projects.
Table of Contents
Table of Contents
Paper 1: TIP for Tat: Political Bias in Human Trafficking Reporting ……….….…..……………1
Figure 1.1: Fixed rolling window model …….….………………………………………..8
Figure 1.2: Changes in Coverage and Median Word Count of TIP Reports …………….8
Figure 1.3: Accuracy and bias across windows – Global Sample ……………………...12
Figure 1.4: Accuracy and bias across windows - Asia Only ……………………………16
References …………………………………………………………………………….…20
Paper 2: Examining How Gender Equality in Political Spaces Influences Global Human Trafficking Outcomes …………………………………………………………………………...23
Table 2.1: Summary Statistics for the Percentage of Women in Parliament ……...…… 37
Figure 2.1:TIP Report Rankings Summary ……………………………………………..41
References ………………………………………………………….……………………53
Appendix A: Robustness Check ………………………………………………………...57
Paper 3: Experimental Evidence of the Sources of Public Support for the Prioritization of Anti-Trafficking Policy ………………………………………………………………………….58
Figure 3.1: Histogram of dependent variable 1…………………………………………74
Figure 3.2: Histogram of dependent variable 2 …………………………………..……..75
Table 3.1: Balance Table ………………………………………………………………...76
Table 3.2: Results from H1 for DV1 …………………………………………………….77
Table 3.3: Results from H1 for DV2 …………………………………………………….78
Table 3.4: Results from H2 for DV1 …………………………………………………….79
Table 3.5: Results from H2 for DV2 …………………………………………………….80
References ……………………………………………………………………………….85
Appendix B: Survey Vignettes …………………………………………………………..87
Appendix C: Survey Post-Treatment Questions ………………………………………...91
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File download under embargo until 16 August 2025 | 2023-07-07 12:08:31 -0400 | File download under embargo until 16 August 2025 |
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