Prostitution, Essential and Incidental Aspects: A Libertarian Argument for Legalization

Abstract

Prostitution is often depicted as an aggressive and coercive activity. We have convincing empirical evidence that sometimes this is indeed the case. However, this is not sufficient to make it illegal. We argue that an activity should be outlawed if and only if it is essentially aggressive and/or coercive. But prostitution is not inherently violent, only incidentally. Indeed, prostitution could be defined as “the act of rendering, from the client’s point of view, non-reproductive sex against payment” (Edlund and Korn, 2002). No aggression and/or coercion necessarily enters this all-inclusive definition. This is why prostitution should be legalized laws to the contrary repealed.

Keywords

• prostitution
• freedom
• libertarianism
• feminism
• j46
• k14