The New Gendered Plundering of Africa

This ethnographic study on Nigerian street prostitution in Italy transforms the understanding of the phenomenon of prostitution, questions the impact of European and Italian migration and prostitution laws on human rights, and investigates the legal, political and socio-economic conditions that create a permissive environment for trafficking.

Precious first-person accounts by Nigerian women give a privileged perspective on tortures and inhumane treatment prevalent in the migratory route from Africa to the European “promised land”, culminating in the daily experience of self-destruction in Italy. Neither the Palermo Protocol nor the current European, Italian and Nigerian prosecution and protection policies, still based on gender-imbalanced philosophies, are able to restore the requisite freedom and rights.

This book is the result of research mainly conducted in the migration landmarks of the Sicilian capital: namely, the port, nightlife streets, refugee camps, hospitals, African churches, Nigerian ghettos, and the prison. Sicily, the world capital of the mafia, is the main European docking area of the current African migration wave and represents the geopolitical middle-ground between the opulent and the plundered world.