ABSTRACT
It has been remarked that an outside observer would believe that the issue of child sexual abuse and exploitation is a modern concept (Phoenix and Oerton, 2005: 52), yet we know this is not true. The sexual abuse and exploitation of children has occurred for hundreds of years. However, it was not until the later years of the twentieth century that the issue of child sexual exploitation began to be taken seriously at a policy level in many countries, and certainly not until the 1990s that it began to feature notably at an international level. This chapter analyses how international law seeks to prevent the sexual exploitation and abuse of children.
