On the Association between Prostitutionregulation and Rape

Abstract

A recent branch of the literature documented causal empirical evidence in favor ofa substitutive relationship between rape and prostitution. This paper proposes a theoreticalmodel that connects the two taking into account this substitutive relationship.The contribution of this article is twofold. First, it provides a theoretical underpinningof the close connection between rape and the prostitution market (i.e. supply and demand).Second, it studies how the most popular prostitution regulations might affectrape. Using legalized prostitution as a benchmark, the findings of this paper supportthat both the Nordic and Dutch model increase rape, being the effect of the formerlarger than that of the latter. Estimated correlations using a panel dataset of Europeancountries offer suggestive evidence in favor of these findings. This paper also positstwo theoretical results (i) criminalization of clients brings about a larger increment inrape than criminalization of prostitutes (ii) there exists an optimal expected fine minimizingthe weighted sum of the demand of prostitution and rape.

Keywords: Rape, sex crimes, prostitution, prostitution law, prostitution regulation