Profile
Evelyn Probst
Birth:
1970
Training Location(s):
Mag., University of Vienna (1998)
Cert., Group trainer
Cert., ÖAGG
Primary Affiliation(s):
LEFÖ - IBF Intervention Center for Trafficked Women (since 1998; head since 2000)
European NGO network "La Strada International" (board member)
International network "GAATW - Global Alliance against Traffic in Women" (former board member)
University of Klagenfurt – Lecturer (2004-2021)
Career Focus:
Psychologist and group trainer, head of the IBF Center for Trafficked Women, national and international advocacy work for victims of trafficking in women, lecturer, expert author
Biography
Evelyn Probst is a feminist psychologist and group trainer, she heads the Intervention Center for Trafficked Women (IBF), is the author of numerous publications on the rights of trafficked persons and co-author of the brochure "Together against Human Trafficking - Compact Knowledge for Practice: Criminal Proceedings, Compensation and Victim Protection". Probst taught on human trafficking at universities in Austria and Mexico and is a board member of the international networks La Strada International and GAATW - Global Alliance against Traffic in Women.
Probst grew up in a small town in Upper Austria, where, as in other towns in the province, there was a left-wing alternative association which was run by people with a keen interest in culture. Within this framework, women founded a women's group in the mid-1980s to address socio-politically relevant issues from a women's and feminist perspective. Probst, although only 16 years old, was the youngest invited to join the group. "Let's unite as women", was an empowering and important experience she took away from that time.
Probst, who did not want to live in the countryside after graduating from high school, moved to Vienna and began to study Psychology - a subject she was so enthusiastic about already in school that she gave presentations on Freud, Jung and Adler. She became politically involved at the university and, together with other female students, set up the “women's tutorials” where, among other things, violence against women, participation and equal treatment were discussed. In addition, the young feminists tried to bring women-specific and feminist courses to the university. In 1980s Vienna, however, Psychology studies tended to still be rather conservative, with a focus on behavioral science, neuroscience, and statistics, and feminist topics were difficult to establish.
At the beginning of her studies, Probst had little concrete idea about the profession of "a psychologist"; she wanted to "think, understand, and analyze"- first about female socialization and the construction of sex and gender, and then during two extended stays in Latin America (including a Latin American-Caribbean feminist meeting in the early 1990s), she learned Spanish and became very interested in the region.
Consequently, Probst completed her mandatory internship, which students had to do as part of their Psychology studies, at the autonomous women's project LEFÖ, an organization founded in 1985 by exiled migrant women from Latin America, whose feminist and anti-racist stance she wanted to support: "I wanted to make my unpaid work available to an organization whose idea I found good." Probst completed her studies with her thesis: "On the Construction of the Self and the Stranger in the Course of Female Socialization." Since she could not find a suitable thesis supervisor in Vienna who dealt with the topic of racism, she chose the German psychologist Birgit Rommelspacher, who taught in Berlin in the 1990s, as her supervisor and wrote her thesis with her.
After graduating, Probst first worked as an organizational/administrative assistant at LEFÖ for a year before becoming a psychosocial counselor. The focus of the work of the self-governing politically autonomous organization changes and expands constantly. In the 1980s, the focus was mainly on refugee women, later on labor migration and today trafficking in women is an important area of work.
Probst has been working at LEFÖ for more than 22 years; together with several feminist activists, she first established the Intervention Center for Victims of Trafficking (IBF) in Women under the leadership of M. Cristina Boidi. After a two-year preparatory phase (including an interministerial working group), the IBF began to operate in 1998 and Probst has headed it since 2000. The IBF is the first and still the only victim protection institution for trafficked women in Austria.
In addition to her consulting and management function, Probst taught on the topic of human trafficking at the Alpen-Adria University in Klagenfurt from 2004 to 2021 and she is the author of numerous publications on the rights of trafficked persons and co-author of the brochure "Together against Human Trafficking - Compact Knowledge for Practice: Criminal Proceedings, Compensation and Victim Protection". She is also a board member of the European NGO network La Strada International and the international network GAATW - Global Alliance against Traffic in Women.
Important political actions for Probst were to participate as a women's organization in the Sea of Lights against Racism and Xenophobia (one of the largest demonstrations to date of the Second Republic of Austria at Heldenplatz in Vienna in 1993), as well as to co-organize a women's demonstration at the UN International Conference on Human Rights (Vienna, 1992), where participants took their issues and concerns out of the UN building and into the streets.
The debate between a "Women-specific or feminist approach” has been consistent for Probst since her student days. On the topic of sex work, these positions manifest themselves in the question: can sex work be a job or is it per se violence against women? Probst is proud that a position on this debate has been clearly articulated at LEFÖ: "We know what we are arguing about sex work. It can be work, for which we need to create the legal framework so that women have better choices." Indeed, even after 20 years, Probst finds the work at LEFÖ exciting and meaningful - self-organization, insightful and empowering debates in the group, and creating networks are essential parts of it. Controversial discussions about human trafficking and trafficking in women, conceptualizing work with non-binary people in a women's organization, and confronting racism in a migrant women's organization are issues that can be grueling and tedious, but are both timely and important. Probst pleads, "[...] Always asking yourself what is the feminist idea [...] and not losing sight of the idea of fighting."
By Emelie Rack & Susanne Hahnl (2023)
To cite this article, see Credits
Selected Works
Selected Works
By Evelyn Probst
By and about Evelyn Probst
Probst, B. (2023, January 3. Interview with S. Hahnl [Video recording].
Evelyn Probst
Birth:
1970
Training Location(s):
Mag., University of Vienna (1998)
Cert., Group trainer
Cert., ÖAGG
Primary Affiliation(s):
LEFÖ - IBF Intervention Center for Trafficked Women (since 1998; head since 2000)
European NGO network "La Strada International" (board member)
International network "GAATW - Global Alliance against Traffic in Women" (former board member)
University of Klagenfurt – Lecturer (2004-2021)
Career Focus:
Psychologist and group trainer, head of the IBF Center for Trafficked Women, national and international advocacy work for victims of trafficking in women, lecturer, expert author
Biography
Evelyn Probst is a feminist psychologist and group trainer, she heads the Intervention Center for Trafficked Women (IBF), is the author of numerous publications on the rights of trafficked persons and co-author of the brochure "Together against Human Trafficking - Compact Knowledge for Practice: Criminal Proceedings, Compensation and Victim Protection". Probst taught on human trafficking at universities in Austria and Mexico and is a board member of the international networks La Strada International and GAATW - Global Alliance against Traffic in Women.
Probst grew up in a small town in Upper Austria, where, as in other towns in the province, there was a left-wing alternative association which was run by people with a keen interest in culture. Within this framework, women founded a women's group in the mid-1980s to address socio-politically relevant issues from a women's and feminist perspective. Probst, although only 16 years old, was the youngest invited to join the group. "Let's unite as women", was an empowering and important experience she took away from that time.
Probst, who did not want to live in the countryside after graduating from high school, moved to Vienna and began to study Psychology - a subject she was so enthusiastic about already in school that she gave presentations on Freud, Jung and Adler. She became politically involved at the university and, together with other female students, set up the “women's tutorials” where, among other things, violence against women, participation and equal treatment were discussed. In addition, the young feminists tried to bring women-specific and feminist courses to the university. In 1980s Vienna, however, Psychology studies tended to still be rather conservative, with a focus on behavioral science, neuroscience, and statistics, and feminist topics were difficult to establish.
At the beginning of her studies, Probst had little concrete idea about the profession of "a psychologist"; she wanted to "think, understand, and analyze"- first about female socialization and the construction of sex and gender, and then during two extended stays in Latin America (including a Latin American-Caribbean feminist meeting in the early 1990s), she learned Spanish and became very interested in the region.
Consequently, Probst completed her mandatory internship, which students had to do as part of their Psychology studies, at the autonomous women's project LEFÖ, an organization founded in 1985 by exiled migrant women from Latin America, whose feminist and anti-racist stance she wanted to support: "I wanted to make my unpaid work available to an organization whose idea I found good." Probst completed her studies with her thesis: "On the Construction of the Self and the Stranger in the Course of Female Socialization." Since she could not find a suitable thesis supervisor in Vienna who dealt with the topic of racism, she chose the German psychologist Birgit Rommelspacher, who taught in Berlin in the 1990s, as her supervisor and wrote her thesis with her.
After graduating, Probst first worked as an organizational/administrative assistant at LEFÖ for a year before becoming a psychosocial counselor. The focus of the work of the self-governing politically autonomous organization changes and expands constantly. In the 1980s, the focus was mainly on refugee women, later on labor migration and today trafficking in women is an important area of work.
Probst has been working at LEFÖ for more than 22 years; together with several feminist activists, she first established the Intervention Center for Victims of Trafficking (IBF) in Women under the leadership of M. Cristina Boidi. After a two-year preparatory phase (including an interministerial working group), the IBF began to operate in 1998 and Probst has headed it since 2000. The IBF is the first and still the only victim protection institution for trafficked women in Austria.
In addition to her consulting and management function, Probst taught on the topic of human trafficking at the Alpen-Adria University in Klagenfurt from 2004 to 2021 and she is the author of numerous publications on the rights of trafficked persons and co-author of the brochure "Together against Human Trafficking - Compact Knowledge for Practice: Criminal Proceedings, Compensation and Victim Protection". She is also a board member of the European NGO network La Strada International and the international network GAATW - Global Alliance against Traffic in Women.
Important political actions for Probst were to participate as a women's organization in the Sea of Lights against Racism and Xenophobia (one of the largest demonstrations to date of the Second Republic of Austria at Heldenplatz in Vienna in 1993), as well as to co-organize a women's demonstration at the UN International Conference on Human Rights (Vienna, 1992), where participants took their issues and concerns out of the UN building and into the streets.
The debate between a "Women-specific or feminist approach” has been consistent for Probst since her student days. On the topic of sex work, these positions manifest themselves in the question: can sex work be a job or is it per se violence against women? Probst is proud that a position on this debate has been clearly articulated at LEFÖ: "We know what we are arguing about sex work. It can be work, for which we need to create the legal framework so that women have better choices." Indeed, even after 20 years, Probst finds the work at LEFÖ exciting and meaningful - self-organization, insightful and empowering debates in the group, and creating networks are essential parts of it. Controversial discussions about human trafficking and trafficking in women, conceptualizing work with non-binary people in a women's organization, and confronting racism in a migrant women's organization are issues that can be grueling and tedious, but are both timely and important. Probst pleads, "[...] Always asking yourself what is the feminist idea [...] and not losing sight of the idea of fighting."
By Emelie Rack & Susanne Hahnl (2023)
To cite this article, see Credits
Selected Works
Selected Works
By Evelyn Probst
By and about Evelyn Probst
Probst, B. (2023, January 3. Interview with S. Hahnl [Video recording].