In February 2025, the Coalition Against Trafficking In Women (CATW) released a report, Failed Promises: The History of Legal Prostitution and Sex Trafficking in the Kingdom of the Netherlands. From the emergence of Amsterdam’s red-light districts in the 13th century to the enslavement of human beings and the sexual exploitation of Indigenous, African, and Asian women and girls in the Dutch Empire’s colonies, Failed Promises traces the socio-cultural and historical roots of the Dutch prostitution system.

The report focuses on the failures of the stated goals of the Prostitution Act of October 1, 2000, an amendment to the Dutch Penal Code, and the first law of its kind in Europe, which legalized prostitution and lifted the bans on brothels and pimping.

Read the full report here.

Video produced by Lakshmi Anantnarayan.