Africa is home to the newest and most vibrant face of the global sex workers’ rights struggle—a fight to end criminalization of sex 
work and gain recognition of human rights, safe working conditions, and lives free from violence and discrimination. Professor Chi Adanna Mgbako drew upon her original fieldwork from seven African countries, including interviews with 160 sex worker activists, to write To Live Freely in This World: Sex Worker Activism in Africa (NYU Press), a never-before-told story of the brave men and women at the heart of the sex workers’ rights movement across the continent. Mgbako’s revelations challenge disempowering and one-dimensional depictions of “degraded Third World prostitutes” and help fill a gaping hole in feminist scholarship regarding sex work in the African context. “To say this is a groundbreaking book is an understatement. Well written and elegant … This book will change the conversation about sex work in Africa,” Northeastern University Professor Aziza Ahmed said.
Chi Adanna Mgbako is Clinical Professor of Law and Director of the Walter Leitner International Human Rights Clinic in the Leitner Center for International Law and Justice at Fordham Law School.