CWA - Prostitution laws in San Francisco and Sweden: Who is right?
Brenda Zurita has this article at the Concerned Women for America website:
In 1999, Sweden passed a law prohibiting the purchase of sexual services but not the sale of them. The law also prohibits procuring, which means pimps and traffickers are arrested. Sweden believes that prostitution is a form of violence against women, and as such, they are going after the demand side of the equation and have been very successful. An absence of johns wanting to buy sex translates to no prostituted persons selling it.
In November 2008, the residents of San Francisco will vote on a different approach; they propose to decriminalize prostitution. The ballot measure states, “Law enforcement agencies shall not allocate any resources for the investigation and prosecution of prostitutes for prostitution.” It further says the funds should be reallocated to policies that reduce “institutional violence and discrimination against prostitutes.”