The Politics of Sexual Labour in Greece

Beschreibung

This book offers an original, critical analysis of the governance of sexual labour in Greece, tracing how state regulationism and feminist interventions have systematically separated sex work from other forms of women’s labour, constructing it as an exceptional field requiring heightened surveillance, discipline, and control. By analysing how feminist currents in Greece have at times aligned with state agendas—embracing punitive approaches under the banner of gender justice—it challenges dominant narratives that obscure class dynamics, migration realities, and the broader political economy of reproductive and intimate labour. At the same time, the book foregrounds sex workers’ strategies of resistance, community-building, and collective action.

Athena Michalakea is a scholar in socio-legal studies and radical criminology. She holds a PhD in Law from Birkbeck, University of London, and studied law and social and political theory at the University of Athens. Her research explores the intersections of state power, philanthrocapitalism, and dominant feminisms in the governance of sexual labour. With a background that spans academic research, institutional work, and activist engagement, she brings a multidimensional perspective to questions of law, gender, and labour. She is a member of the European Group for the Study of Deviance and Social Control and the European Sex Work Research Network. Athena is currently Law and Criminology Tutor at Teesside University International Study Centre, UK.

This book offers an original, critical analysis of the governance of sexual labour in Greece, tracing how state regulationism and feminist interventions have systematically separated sex work from other forms of women’s labour, constructing it as an exceptional field requiring heightened surveillance, discipline, and control. By analysing how feminist currents in Greece have at times aligned with state agendas—embracing punitive approaches under the banner of gender justice—it challenges dominant narratives that obscure class dynamics, migration realities, and the broader political economy of reproductive and intimate labour. At the same time, the book foregrounds sex workers’ strategies of resistance, community-building, and collective action.

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Athena Michalakea

Themen in »The Politics of Sexual Labour in Greece«

Feminist theory Legal theory Lived experience Anti-carceral feminist scholarship Critical labour law Trafficking Transnational crime Sex work regulation

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“This is an exceptional book that offers an original and detailed genealogy of the regulation of sex work in Greece and the contemporary politics of sexual labour. The author combines empirical insights with a real mastery of the complex and competing theories of commercial sex to make a clear and valuable contribution to broader discussions around spatial regulation, public health, penal welfarism, governance feminism, trafficking and labour studies. As such, the book is a must for sex work scholars and activists as well as for those working across socio-legal studies, political economy and adjacent fields.” (Professor Jane Scoular, University of Strathclyde, UK)

“This book is a bold and necessary intervention in a field where the state, the law, and strands of feminism have too often spoken over the very workers they claim to represent. It incisively exposes how sexual labour is constructed as an “exception” in order to justify surveillance, criminalisation, and the control of marginalised bodies. Rather than reproducing rescue narratives, this work firmly situates sex work within relations of class, labour, and capitalist exploitation. It demonstrates how the supposed humanitarianism of law and policy often masks punitive practices that intensify, rather than alleviate, harm. By centring the voices and lived experiences of sex workers, it challenges the reductive victim/offender binary and opens space for a politics grounded in dignity and autonomy. This is not simply a call for recognition, but a demand for justice. At a time when repressive policies are increasingly framed as “protection,” this analysis is both urgent and indispensable. A vital resource for activists, scholars, and all those resisting the criminalisation of survival. Above all, it is an act of political solidarity.” (Rafailia Varonou, sex workers’ rights activist)

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