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This working paper sets out key findings and recommendations based on the survey of organisations of people with disabilities in Ukraine. The survey was conducted in May - July 2021 and explored organisational perspectives on the impact of COVID-19 on people with disabilities in Ukraine (including internally displaced people with disabilities), and on the organisational activities and development. This survey was co-designed with the National Assembly of People with Disabilities of Ukraine as the first phase of a larger GCRF/AHRC funded research project to explore the impact of the pandemic on people with disabilities in Ukraine.DOI: https://doi.org/10.17869/enu.2022.2849863

У цьому робочому документі викладено основні висновки та рекомендації на основі опитування організацій людей з інвалідністю в Україні. Опитування проводилося у травні – липні 2021 року та досліджувало організаційні перспективи впливу COVID-19 на людей з інвалідністю в Україні (включаючи внутрішньо переміщених осіб з інвалідністю), а також на організаційну діяльність та розвиток. Це опитування було розроблено спільно з Національною асамблеєю людей з інвалідністю України як перший етап більшого дослідницького проекту, який фінансується GCRF/AHRC для вивчення впливу пандемії на людей з інвалідністю в Україні.DOI: https://doi.org/10.17869/enu.2022.2849877

This paper relies upon the ‘what’s the problem represented to be?’ approach to policy analysis to interrogate key representations of human trafficking implicit in the UK government’s anti-trafficking policy. It identifies six policy vectors, or representations, of human trafficking embedded within the policy, including organized crime, ‘illegal’ immigration, and victim assistance as three primary vectors; sexual exploitation/prostitution, poverty in countries of victims’ origin, and isolated instances of labour law infringements as three secondary vectors. In addition, a series of assumptions, which underlie the current interpretation of trafficking, are also identified. By exploring what the problem of human trafficking is represented to be, the paper also provides an insight into what remains obscured within the context of the dominant policy frameworks. In doing so, it highlights the role of state-capital entanglements in normalizing exploitation of trafficked, smuggled and ‘offshored’ labour, and critiques the UK’s anti-trafficking policy for manufacturing doubt as to the structural causes of human trafficking within the context of neoliberalism.

Dominant anti-trafficking policy discourses represent trafficking as an issue of crime, “illegal” migration, victimhood and humanitarianism. Such a narrow focus is not an adequate response to the interplay between technology, trafficking and anti-trafficking. This article explores different levels of analysis and the interplay between human trafficking and technology. We argue for a shift from policy discourses with a very limited focus on crime and victimisation to more systemic understandings of trafficking and more robust micro-analyses of trafficking and everyday life. The article calls for an agnotological understanding of policy responses to trafficking and technology: these depend upon the production of ignorance. We critique limitations in policy understandings of trafficking-related aspects of online spaces, and argue for better engagement with online networks. We conclude that there is a need to move beyond a focus on “new” technology and exceptionalist claims about “modern slavery” towards greater attention to everyday exploitation within neoliberalism.

This paper presents a synthesis of the available literature on the topics of disability, displacement and COVID-19 in Ukraine. The discussion contained here represents a scoping review, rather than a systematic narrative literature review; however a brief overview is provided of the sources used to search for literature. As this paper has a social science/sociological focus, literature was selected primarily from the social sciences, with some limited inclusion of medical literature where relevant for discussion of COVID-19 and disability-related medical issues.DOI: https://doi.org/10.17869/enu.2022.2854864