ABSTRACT
Prostitutes’ campaigns are a fragile but critical element in contemporary prostitution. This chapter analyses their identity, their progress and its determinants and the significance of their achievements in terms of social change. The aim of the campaigns in Britain, on the Continent and in the USA has been to press for decriminalisation - concentrating on the abolition of laws and sentences which discriminate against women who work as prostitutes. In agitating for law reform, prostitutes’ campaigns bear a feminist stamp. In common with such campaigns as those against domestic violence and for women’s legal and financial independence their aim has been to challenge certain adverse social conditions as women’s lot and the idea that their causes lie in individuals’ shortcomings.
