Evidence‐Based Prevention of Organized Crime: Assessing a New Collaborative Approach

• Author: Martijn Groenleer,Maurits Waardenburg,Herman Bolhaar,Jorrit de Jong
• Published date: 01 March 2018
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/puar.12889
• Date: 01 March 2018

Evidence-Based Prevention of Organized Crime: Assessing a New Collaborative Approach 315

Public Administration Review,

Vol. 78, Iss. 2, pp. 315–317. © 2017 by

The American Society for Public Administration.

DOI: 10.1111/puar.12889.

Martijn Groenleer is professor of law

and governance in the Tilburg School of

Governance and director of the Tilburg

Center for Regional Law and Governance,

both at Tilburg University in the Netherlands.

His research focuses on the analysis and

design of regulation and governance in

multiactor and multilevel settings.

E-mail: m.l.p.groenleer@uvt.nl

Jorrit de Jong is lecturer in public policy

and management at Harvard University ’ s

Kennedy School of Government. He is

faculty director of the Bloomberg Harvard

City Leadership Initiative and academic

director of the Innovations in Government

Program at the Kennedy School. His

research and teaching focus on leading

innovation in the public sector.

E-mail: jorrit_dejong@hks.harvard.edu

Herman Bolhaar is senior fellow in

the Ash Center for Democratic Governance

and Innovation at Harvard University ’ s

Kennedy School of Government. He was

chair of the Board of Prosecutors-General,

the executive board of the Dutch Public

Prosecution Service, from 2011 to 2017.

As a practitioner, he initiated several

innovations in the fight against organized

crime. As a senior fellow, he focuses on

strengthening cross-sector collaboration in

crime prevention and repression.

E-mail: herman_bolhaar@hks.harvard.edu

This manuscript was originally submitted

and accepted as an

Evidence in Public

Administration

article. The feature editors,

Kimberley R. Isett, Brian W. Head, and Gary

VanLandingham, are gratefully acknowledged

for their work in soliciting and developing

this content. Effective with Volume 78, the

Evidence in Public Administration feature has

been discontinued.

Maurits Waardenburg is a PhD

candidate in the Tilburg Center for Regional

Law and Governance, Tilburg University. He

is also a research fellow in the Ash Center

for Democratic Governance and Innovation

at Harvard University ’ s Kennedy School

of Government. His research focuses on

performance management in collaborative

governance settings.

E-mail: m.j.s.waardenburg@uvt.nl

A fter the publication of the U.S. Department

of State ’ s 2005 Trafficking in Persons report,

the Dutch Public Prosecution Service decided

to increase its efforts to fight human trafficking.

The report identified the Netherlands as complying

with “the minimum standards for the elimination

of trafficking” but made it clear that the country

could do more, especially for the 25,000 commercial

sex workers in the country, of whom an estimated

50 percent to 80 percent were trafficking victims.

The results of the report prompted a question at the

Prosecutor ’ s Office: why had its efforts to tackle the

human trafficking problem been so ineffective?

In response to this question, in 2006, the Dutch

Public Prosecution Service embarked on a journey

to find better ways to fight human trafficking. It

developed and implemented an unorthodox approach

focused on erecting barriers for all “facilitators” of

sexual exploitation and forced labor, such as hotels,

landlords, tax attorneys, and physicians, that might

knowingly or unknowingly provide services to

traffickers. Through cumulative learning from a series

of high-profile cases—from Eastern European women

coerced into illegal hotel prostitution to Philippine

sailors exploited in inland shipping—a fundamental

challenge gradually revealed itself: how to measure the

effects of the new approach to fight human trafficking.

Challenges to Gauge Progress

Seven years after taking the first steps toward

implementing the new approach, the results were

ambiguous. Key stakeholders seemed to be more

aware of the human trafficking problem than before

the Public Prosecution Service stepped up its efforts,

with prosecutors often taking on responsibilities far

beyond their traditional prosecutorial role. Politicians,

policy makers, and the public at large had come to

realize that, although legalized prostitution and sexual

exploitation are different, they are usually connected,

and that other forms of modern slavery, such as

maltreatment of Philippine sailors, still occur in the

Netherlands.

Besides clear improvements in public awareness,

the Public Prosecution Service struggled to gauge

its progress in the fight against human trafficking

overall. Recent data showed that human trafficking

in the Netherlands was better recognized and

reported with each passing year: the number of

reported victims increased from 716 to 1,222 per

year between 2007 and 2011 (Nationaal Rapporteur

2012 ). It remained unclear, however, whether the

increase was a result of more cases being reported

thanks to the awareness-raising efforts or whether

there had actually been a surge in human trafficking

activity.

In a similar vein, the number of prosecutions

remained constant: about 220 per year on average.

Did that mean that prosecutors had maintained the

same level of performance, despite the allocation

of considerable resources to prevention? Or was

this number disappointing in light of the higher

volume of reported victims? Of the reported cases,

perpetrators were indicted for trafficking about 70

percent of the time, and around 50 percent of the

cases brought before the court led to convictions.

Even if this was a satisfactory number, had this

been accomplished as a result of or despite the new

investigatory and prosecutorial practices focused on

prevention?

Overall, thanks to the new approach, much had been

learned about the victims, perpetrators, and enablers

of human trafficking. Even more had been learned

about engaging public and private partners and about

the role of the news media. Prosecutors had acquired

new skills and developed a different mind-set in

dealing with a highly elusive problem. However, it had

become less clear how the performance of prosecutors,

increasingly engaged in preventive, collaborative

efforts, could be measured. And while public

perceptions of the problem of human trafficking

seemed to have changed, performance indicators for

police and prosecutors had not; they were typically

evaluated in terms of number of investigations

Evidence-Based Prevention of Organized Crime:

Assessing a New Collaborative Approach

Viewpoint

Stephen E. Condrey,

Associate Editor

Maurits Waardenburg

Martijn Groenleer

Tilburg University

Jorrit de Jong

Herman Bolhaar

Harvard University