06/18/2026
Survivor participation in anti-trafficking work has grown in visibility over the past decade. What has grown more slowly is the practical understanding of what makes that participation genuinely meaningful.
In Guatemala, survivors with lived experience in child labor spent months preparing before they presented eight strategic recommendations to the national interinstitutional committee. It was the first time in the country's history that persons with lived experience had presented at that level. The Ministry of Labor formalized a collaboration with Free the Slaves the following week.
The preparation mattered as much as the presentation. Survivors did not walk into that room to share their stories. They walked in as prepared advocates with a specific policy agenda. That distinction shapes what comes next.
On June 1, Free the Slaves joined the UNODC and the Organization of American States for a landmark side event on the margins of the 35th Session of the Commission on Crime Prevention and Criminal Justice (CCPCJ) in Vienna. The event, Inclusion in Practice: Examining Survivor Participation in Anti-Trafficking Efforts Across the Americas featured key perspectives on survivor participation in anti-trafficking efforts across the Americas. We came with field evidence from Guatemala, Bolivia, Latin America and the Caribbean, and a shared conviction that this work requires deliberate investment in people, institutions, and time.
We are sharing what we have learned.
https://freetheslaves.net/survivor-participation-in-anti-trafficking-policy-evidence-from-latin-america/
