GEOGRAPHIC AND SOCIAL MAPPING: A TOOL TO ADDRESS TRAFFICKING IN PERSONS IN CENTRAL AMERICA

BACKGROUND

Background (I) Since 2002, Save the Children United Kingdom has implemented an innovative criminal and social investigation practice, using the method of geographic and social mapping to investigate the commercial sexual exploitation of boys, girls, and adolescents in Honduras. In 2004, Save the Children Sweden learned about this experience and decided that this method could be used to investigate cases of trafficking in boys, girls, and adolescents in other countries as well. To this end, Save the Children Sweden entered into an alliance with Save the Children United Kingdom to obtain technical assistance in implementing the five-year project (2004-2008) “Geographic and Social Mapping of the Routes for Trafficking and Smuggling Boys, Girls, and Adolescents for the Purpose of Sexual Exploitation in Central America”. The project was implemented in all Central American countries and also in Ecuador, Argentina, and Chile.

Background (II) The project promoted social investigation efforts in each participating country and enabled collecting strategic information to address the crime of trafficking in persons. Furthermore, the project facilitated binational and regional coordination to integrate multiple results from national geographic and social mapping efforts into a regional map.  In 2005-2007 three multi-sectoral meetings were held in Antigua, Guatemala; Roatán, Honduras; and San Andrés, Colombia, with participation of representatives from police and immigration institutions of Central American countries as well as national counterparts of the project. In addition, representatives from NGOs involved in preventing and addressing the crime in participating countries as well as representatives from regional institutions and international organizations attended the meetings as observers.

Background (III) In 2007 Save the Children Spain obtained approval from AECID to implement Cooperation Agreement 07- CO1-060 “Capacity building of government and civil society institutions for the comprehensive protection of boys, girls, and adolescents, with a special focus on trafficking and smuggling of boys, girls, and adolescents”. The four-year Agreement (2008-2012) included four Central American countries: El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, and Nicaragua, and enabled continuing the process initiated by Save the Children Sweden.

Background (IV) Each State Party to the Agreement implemented different geographic and social mapping efforts since the beginning of the project in 2004 until the date when the systematization was completed (September 2010). All countries accumulated a wide array of lessons learned and best practices from the experience and from the various strategies that were implemented in adjusting geographic and social mapping as much as possible to specific realities and needs. This stimulated the systematization of the Central American experience as a method for the criminal and social investigation of trafficking in persons, with a focus on boys, girls, and adolescents.

METHODOLOGY

Methodology (I) Geographic and social mapping as a tool for criminal and social investigation is a method used to develop a geo-referenced representation of the occurrence of the crime of interest in a given territory, analysing geographic-social determining factors as well as gender-based factors and particular conditions that help generate and perpetuate the occurrence of the crime.

Methodology (II) From this perspective, the use of geographic and social mapping to investigate the crime of trafficking enables developing a visual tool (map), transforming dispersed information from key institutional and social actors into knowledge. This enables the implementation of mechanisms to control and suppress the crime, protect victims, and prevent the occurrence of the crime through relevant institutions and organized society.

Methodology (III) From a methodology perspective, this is a qualitative and exploratory study including the following phases: 1) Design and Organization: This phase involves identifying the mode of the crime to be characterized and investigated and establishing agreements with the relevant public institution that should give its political approval and take the lead of the effort. In addition, the process, the territory to be included in the study, and the profile and list of key informants to be convened should be established together with the leading institution. Furthermore, the context should be analysed, relevant bibliographic references should be reviewed to guide the effort, and adjustments should be made to the methodology as required.

Methodology (VI) 2) Collecting Information: This phase includes various implementation options, expressed through the following steps of the methodology: Step 1: Collectively developing departmental or national physical maps with participation of officers from various police force, immigration, and legal investigation institutions in each territory. Includes interviews with key national actors and recording information from key informants through use of the workshop methodology. Step 2 (optional): Integrating departmental maps into a national map or national maps into a binational or regional map with representatives from the groups that participated in Step 1.

Methodology (V) Step 3: Digitizing the maps developed under Step 1 (or Step 2) and submitting them to relevant authorities in the country or region as a graphic component of an integrated report, together with an analysis of the collected information. This can be used as input in developing or implementing policy on prevention and prosecution of trafficking in persons with a focus on boys, girls, and adolescents, and protection of victims. The analysis based on the mapping process should follow the guiding approaches described below: Rights Approach: The analysis is oriented toward verifying findings in regard to the current legal and institutional framework in order to position the State and its institutions as guarantors of the rights of victims. In addition, the age perspective is introduced in assessing the identified risk factors, establishing the required protection actions, and developing proposals for action in accordance with the focus of the intervention (prevention, protection, and prosecution).

Methodology (VI) Geographic-social Approach: The vulnerability is analysed considering the area of residence and particular situation of affected populations (ethnic group, nationality, migration status, etc.) and the type or mode of crime. Gender Approach: A gender- based analysis of the exploiter and the victim and the influence, according to specific vulnerabilities under specific modes of the crime of trafficking.

Methodology (VII) Geographic and social mapping is a criminal and social investigation method that enables, in investigating the crime of trafficking in persons, to transform dispersed information into systematic knowledge based on the experience, knowledge, and perceptions of key informants. Enables integrating relevant information that is not available from other formal information sources in order to guide the development of policies on prevention, protection, and prosecution through public institutions and other key actors. Carried out regularly with the objective of deepening, updating, and expanding findings.

Methodology (VIII) Geographic and social mapping enables documenting two dimensions of the crime that is being analysed. Under the geographic dimension it records, visualizes, and analyses the space-time trends of the crime, using maps to depict existing national and international routes, the most vulnerable areas, locations used as rest areas (“cooling points”), and unauthorized border crossings (“blind spots”), and to link trafficking in persons to other modes of organized internal and transnational crime. Under its social dimension, geographic and social mapping enables documenting and characterizing specific situations of trafficking in persons, including information about intermediaries, victims, and exploiters as well as the dynamics of operations and prevalent risk factors based on gender, socio-economic situation, or other particular situations.  

Methodology (IX) 3) Follow-up and Strategic Use of Results: The Central American experience shows that good performance during this phase depends largely on the political position and the contact network of the institution or organization leading the geographic and social mapping effort. The use of findings to prosecute the crime, protect the victims, and as input for public policy is still in its initial phase and has yet to be fully implemented in the region.

BINATIONAL PROCESSES

Binational Processes To date, two binational geographic and social mapping efforts have been recorded in land border regions in Central America: Costa Rica-Nicaragua in 2009 and Costa Rica-Panama in 2008. The processes were financed by Save the Children and coordinated by Paniamor Foundation in Costa Rica, with support from public institutions of Costa Rica, Nicaragua, and Panama.

Regional Process The work objectives established by Save the Children in Central America are as follows: To promote knowledge about the crime in the region and cooperation between governments, NGOs, and civil society. To share data at a Central American, binational, and tri-national level and to develop a regional map (June 2005) (visualization of the regional map). To provide updated information about the crime and its dynamics to governments, with the aim of stimulating the development and implementation of policies and practices on prevention and prosecution of the crime and protection of victims. To validate a proposal for designing a unified methodology to implement geographic and social mapping efforts in each country and in the region (agreements from the regional meeting held in Roatán, Honduras in 2005). To follow up on and promote information exchange between national processes relating to the development, validation, and strategic use of geographic and social mapping to address trafficking in boys, girls, and adolescents at an institutional level.

CHALLENGES

Challenges (I) The potential of geographic and social mapping has yet to be fully taken advantage of, as a tool to strengthen national actions to combat trafficking. Rather than using the tool only for police actions, it should be used to prevent the crime and protect victims and, in general, for public policy- making to combat the crime. Geographic and social mapping has not been institutionalized in any country. The implementation of this tool continues to be dependent upon financing from external cooperation agencies even in those countries that are more advanced in this regard (Nicaragua and Costa Rica).

Challenges (II) Public authorities highlight the convenience of reviving the regional dimension of geographic and social mapping as a basic mechanism for binational and regional actions, given the transnational nature of the crime. Institutional agendas have other priorities, and this has a negative impact on the capacity of the allies of geographic and social mapping to allocate resources to relevant actions with the same urgency as to actions aimed at addressing drug trafficking, trafficking in arms, and other modes of organized crime.

Challenges (III) For geographic and social mapping to be effective, the crime needs to be recognized by relevant institutions and society in the region in its full dimension, as a human rights violation and an expression of organized crime. The strategy to advance toward institutionalizing geographic and social mapping could require parallel capacity building efforts aimed at enabling coalitions, committees, and secretariats against trafficking in persons to fulfil their mandate.

Challenges (IV) An aspect that should be addressed and managed as much as possible in developing strategies to implement geographic and social mapping is the existing concern in regard to the degree to which organized crime has penetrated the State structure. To approve and implement the Protocol to carry out geographic and social mapping efforts on trafficking in persons in Central America.

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