Introduction: Prostitution policy in europe–an overview

This chapter shows that public policy, as an object of analysis, gets short shrift in the voluminous literature on prostitution. It argues that collaborative governance might offer a fruitful break from the combination of adversarial, managerial, and coalition politics that has characterized prostitution policy in Europe for so long, and might inaugurate an effective and decent regulation of sex work. It shows, by the end of the nineteenth century in all European countries the state was deeply involved in regulating the sex trade. Most countries employed an intricate form of regulation that was known at the time as the French system. The United Kingdom (UK) and some other countries had laws and administrative arrangements that focused more exclusively on the prevention of the spread of contagious diseases. In most European countries, even countries such as the Netherlands that have officially legalized brothels, neo-abolitionism shapes the course of public policy.