Decrim now world news digest for August 2026

Study will investigate impacts of Oregon laws that criminalize consensual sex work 

USA, Oregon St.

August 5, 2026

The grassroots effort kicks off a pathway to decriminalization, which sex workers and trafficking survivors have long advocated. A first-of-its-kind largescale study is now underway looking at how Oregon laws that criminalize consensual sex work are impacting sex workers and survivors of sex trafficking. 

Project Impact is a partnership between Oregon health research powerhouse, Influents Innovations, and advocacy groups led by sex workers and survivors of trafficking around the state. 

“This will be unique for any state to have this level, almost any research at all,” said Kate Marquez, the project’s director for Influents and a former sex worker herself. “Having incontrovertible data is both armor to protect us, but also it’s going to be just fascinating what we find through this research.”

The hour-long, paid and anonymous survey looks at criminalization’s impacts on wide-ranging factors like access to healthcare, childcare, housing, banking, other employment and many other parts of life. It also stands to show the role sex workers and survivors of trafficking play in their communities. 

The project comes after efforts to decriminalize sex work in Oregon had been stalled at the political level by Governor Tina Kotek, and as Portland area police continue a sting-heavy response to sex work that research and many workers say makes their lives harder and more dangerous. 

It also follows a detailed 2025 report laying out exactly how Oregon can fully decriminalize sex work produced by the Oregon Safer Workers Coalition. 

“Everybody wants to do the same thing, which is to reduce sex trafficking and abuse and exploitation,” said Elle Stanger, president of OSWC and a longtime sex worker. “But people have misunderstandings of how we could achieve that. And again, that’s based on media and laws written by outsiders.”

The results of Project Impact, alongside the OSWC report, stand to correct those false narratives — giving sex workers and survivors of trafficking two crucial tools in their fight to make Oregon the first state to fully decriminalize sex work. 

The paid survey is open to any Oregonian 18-years-old or older who has participated in criminalized sex work or been sex trafficked in the last two years, said Jessie Marquez. She’s Kate’s daughter and also a senior program designer and developer at Influents.

People who complete the survey get $100.

Anyone interested in taking the survey can contact one of the project’s partners which include: Haymarket Pole Collective, New Avenues for Youth, Oregon Safer Workers Coalition and Rahab’s Sisters. 

In addition to being shaped by people with real life experience with its subject matter, the survey was also approved by an Institutional Review Board ethics committee.

Influents is aiming to give the survey to about 400 people from all around Oregon and is making sure the sample is indeed representative. 

Source portal streetroots.org

Decriminalising Sex Work in Thailand in 2026. Latest news

Thailand

August 11, 2026

HRRC calls on the tie government and prime minister to immediately endorse and pass the sex work protection bill which fully discriminalises sex work and recognizes sex workers under the national labour laws. HRRC emphasizes that every individual has the right to live, safety and legal protection regardless of their status. We denounce laws that enable foreign tourists or anyone to exploit sex workers with impunity.

Prostitution in Thailand was criminalised under the 1960 Prostitution and 1966 Entertainment Places Acts and it remains illegal today under the 1996 Prevention and Suppression of Prostitution Act. Because of these anti-prostitution laws, voluntary consensual transactions are turned into crimes. This law puts workers at extreme risk of exploitation and discrimination. As the law does not regulate them as legal workers, sex workers are denied basic human rights and have zero protection under the Thai labour laws. 

Criminalising sex work effectively disarms victims and gives leverage to abusers. The Director of Service Workers in Group Foundation (SWING), Surang Chanyam, highlighted a recent violent case in Pattaya where an Australian man was arrested and charged with the death of a 17-year-old sex worker. Foreign tourists feel they can do anything to sex workers without facing consequences. Under the current law, sex workers endure severe abuse and violence because they fear the legal system and are unlikely to seek justice. 

In response to this reality, sex worker groups are demanding systemic change. On August 11th, approximately twenty members of the Empower Foundation, a sex worker rights group, organized a demonstration opposite Government House (Office of the Prime Minister)  to petition the Prime Minister Anutin Charnvirakul to endorse the proposed Sex Work Protection Bill. 

The protesters seek labour protections, the repeal of the 1996 Act, and a shift of sex workers from "offenders" to legal workers who deserve employment protections, social security benefits, and safe working conditions. This demonstration also served to expose their reality to the world and show that sex workers have always been a part of Thai society, in brothels, karaoke bars, cafes, etc. 

While the draft bill was submitted to the Parliament on July 10, it was classified as a financial bill which requires the Prime Minister’s approval before it can be forwarded through the lawmaking process. On August 5, the government released a summary acknowledging recommendations from the UN Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW), which urged Thailand to decriminalise prostitution in order to end social stigmatization and denial of labour rights.

Source portal humanrightsresearch.org

Sex work bill back in South African Parliament years later

South Africa, Johannesburg

August 17, 2026

The long-awaited draft sex work decriminalisation bill will return to Parliament for consideration, three years after it was sent back to be redrafted.

Department of Justice spokesperson Samuel Modipane revealed to GroundUp that the draft bill will be sent to Cabinet for a decision “on policy issues” and to “request approval” to put the bill out for public comment.

After years of consultations, the draft Criminal Law (Sexual Offences and Related Matters) Amendment Bill of 2022, which includes decriminalising sex work, was withdrawn to be redrafted in 2023.

In June 2025, the (Sex Worker Education and Advocacy Taskforce) SWEAT called on the Department of Justice and Constitutional Development to prioritise the “long-delayed” bill.

Then in September last year, a directive issued by the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) stated that sex workers would no longer be prosecuted, pending the outcome of a court case launched in May 2024 by sex workers challenging the criminalisation of sex work.

Now the justice department appears to have resolved some of the issues initially raised by state law advisers about the bill’s lack of regulation.

The bill will be published in the Gazette for consultation this year and then submitted to Cabinet for approval to introduce it into Parliament, said Modipane.

The bill will likely be introduced to Parliament in 2027, he added.

SWEAT and Asijiki Coalition welcome this progress by government.

Source portal groundup.org.za

Inquiry to inform sex worker reforms in South Australia and Thailand

Australia, Melbourne

August 26, 2026

An inquiry into violence against sex workers in Australia and Thailand held this July will contribute to law reform efforts in both countries, with its findings set to inform Victoria’s upcoming review of sex work decriminalisation.

Held over two days on 21 and 22 July, the Feminist Inquiry into Violence Against Sex Workers in Australia and Thailand brought sex worker organisations, advocates and legal experts together to examine how violence is experienced by sex workers, how different areas of law intersect with their lives, and what legal strategies can better protect their rights and safety.

The inquiry was led by Melbourne Law School Research Fellow Dr Debolina Dutta through the ARC Centre of Excellence for the Elimination of Violence Against Women (CEVAW), in consultation and collaboration with Scarlet Alliance, Empower Foundation and the Asia Pacific Network of Sex Workers, with support from Thammasat University.

At the heart of the inquiry were testimonies from sex worker organisations and people with lived experience. Across two days, they shared perspectives on what constitutes violence in their communities, the impact of criminalisation and other legal frameworks, barriers to accessing justice, and priorities for legal and policy reform.

The testimonies were heard by a panel chaired by former Supreme Court of Victoria judge and law reformer Marcia Neave AO, alongside former Victorian MP, sex worker and sex worker rights advocate Fiona Patten; Thai feminist lawyer and human rights defender Pranom ‘Bee’ Somwong; Christine Robinson, CEO of the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander women’s community legal centre Wirringa Baiya; and Melbourne Law School Professor and CEVAW Chief Investigator Heather Douglas AM.

The inquiry grew partly from the response to a 2024 call for submissions by the UN Special Rapporteur on Violence Against Women on the relationship between prostitution and violence against women. More than 3,600 sex workers and allies signed a petition challenging the framing of that process, including its use of the term ‘prostitution’ and approaches they argued failed to adequately recognise sex workers’ rights and experiences.

In response, the CEVAW inquiry adopted a sex worker-centred approach, seeking to understand violence through the experiences and expertise of sex workers themselves and to explore how law can contribute both to vulnerability and to greater safety and justice.

The inquiry also has a practical law reform focus. Its findings are expected to contribute the upcoming review of Victoria’s sex work decriminalisation reforms, while supporting sex worker-led advocacy for decriminalisation in South Australia and Thailand, including advocacy concerning Thai migrant sex workers across the Asia Pacific.

Following the hearings, the inquiry panel will develop a report containing recommendations for legal and policy reform and advocacy, drawing on the testimonies and evidence presented during the two-day event.

Source portal law.unimelb.edu.au