Seeking Support Under the State: Sex Worker's Experiences Navigating Gender-Based Violence Services

In the United States, the selling of sexual services for tangible goods (e.g. money, housing, shelter, food, substances, etc.), also called sex work, is criminalized. Because of this, people who engage in the selling of sexual services experience criminalization, stigma, and increased surveillance by the state. Additionally, sex workers are at a heightened risk of violence, including physical assault, sexual violence, and state-sanctioned violence due to the precarity they experience that exists because of the stigma and criminalization of their labor (Mac & Smith, 2018; Vance, 2011). Research shows that due to criminalization, sex workers have increased barriers to accessing necessary social services such as housing, health care, gender-based violence services, legal services, substance use services, and more (Mac & Smith, 2018). Many of the services that are available to sex workers exist only through carceral avenues, requiring that sex workers be arrested in order to access programming including so-called “diversion programs” (Shadaimah & Bailey-Kloch, 2014). Additionally, some services may be inaccessible to sex workers because of their collaboration with and reliance on policing, surveillance, and the state (e.g. gender-based violence services), creating unique barriers to sex workers generally, and sex workers of color, trans sex workers, and undocumented workers specifically (Anasti, 2019; Dewey & St. Germain, 2016; Kim, 2020; Musto, 2016). Although sex work stigma, criminalization, and violence is well-documented in the literature, there exists a gap in the literature regarding the experiences of sex workers accessing and navigating social services, specifically gender-based violence (GBV) services, as there is no study to date that has documented these experiences. This study seeks to address this gap in the literature by examining the experiences of sex workers accessing and navigating gender-based violence services with a particular focus on the ways that carceral expansion and the shadow state uniquely impact sex workers. The study also seeks to understand other factors that may impact sex worker’s decision to seek out gender-based violence services including the role of the anti-trafficking movement, the decision to seek out other formal sources of support, and the role of informal support.