Rättsliga åtgärder mot människohandel : Att skydda offer eller möta hot

Sammanfattning: This thesis focuses on legal protection of victims of human trafficking in Sweden. Human trafficking involves the exploitation of often already vulnerable individuals and is a violation of their human rights. Human trafficking is also a threat to state security as a component of transnational organized crime and illegal migration, and has therefore long been a subject of international cooperation.     In this thesis international responses to human trafficking are categorized as being focused on two distinct and separately protected parties, namely the individual and the state. The implementation of these international responses have, in the case of Sweden, mainly led to new criminal regulation relating to human trafficking, and in this thesis international as well as Swedish legal measures against human trafficking are analyzed from a victimological perspective. The overall aim is to investigate and analyze whether victims of trafficking have received an enhanced legal protection through Swedish criminal law.     The thesis shows that human trafficking is not considered a problem in the Swedish legislative context, and that the international measures to protect victims of trafficking have not been regarded to any great extent. Few victims of trafficking in Sweden are even identified as victims, and measures against human trafficking have largely been associated with measures against prostitution. To legally connect human trafficking with prostitution is, however, problematic because these crimes have different primary protective interests and the victims have different roles in the investigation and litigation process. From a victim's perspective, the categorization of the crime is crucial because the status of plaintiff, as is required for the possibility for financial redress and other legal rights, is assessed in Sweden by how the offense is classified. It is therefore important for the victims of human trafficking to be identified and categorized correctly in order to be defined as plaintiffs and obtain protection under criminal law. As a result of all these factors, the intended enhanced legal protection for victims of trafficking in Sweden is lost.