Synopses & Reviews
This new collection of empirical investigations shows how patterns of prostitution in today's world are radically changing. Western affluence, deepening poverty in many Third World villages, the cheapness of international travel, cultural shifts in attitudes to extra-marital sex, and the Internet are all making an impact. The volume includes personal testimony alongside its empirical information and sociological investigation. It stresses the importance of looking at all three sets of actors involved -- the prostitutes themselves, clients, and the pimps and international traffickers -- to provide an up-to-date portrait of prostitution today.
Synopsis
Patterns of prostitution, like so much else in our increasingly inter-connected world, are changing radically, as the investigations in this volume dramatically show. The question of migrant prostitutes in the West may be much debated, but it is little researched. This collection makes a radical break with the current media focus on human trafficking and the old habit of simply blaming the victim. What emerges is a nuanced and empirically grounded portrait of the complexities of prostitution across national boundaries today.
As befits a subject with such huge consequences for the lives of people, this volume includes personal testimony alongside sociological investigation. Testimony comes from both prostitutes and clients. Men are dealt with as customers; as creators of dominant European notions of sexuality, race and prostitution; and as prostitutes themselves selling services to women tourists.
The experiences of women who migrate to the West and work there as prostitutes are sensitively described. It becomes clear that their lives and aspirations are much more complicated than is usually assumed, and that easy generalizations about trafficking and forced labour do not always hold up.
Of particular interest are the volume's explorations of innovative new policies being pioneered in the Netherlands and Sweden as well as the impact of rising anti-immigrant feeling.
The authors include both scholars and activists. It is their hope that this book will raise the level of debate and contribute to a more humane approach.
Synopsis
This is an up-to-date global portrait of transnational prostitution and sex tourism today.
About the Author
Susanne Thorbek is a senior lecturer at Aalborg University, Denmark.
Bandana Pattanaik is Research and Training Program Coordinator at the Global Alliance Against Traffic in Women, Bangkok.
Table of Contents
Introduction to Prostitution in a Global Context--Susanne Thorbek *
Part I: Men in Prostitution * Travellers' Tales: Sex Diaries of Tourists Returning from Thailand--Ryan Bishop and Lillian S. Robinson * Prostitution in a Global Context: The European Inheritance: Male Perspectives--Susanne Thorbek * The Beach Boy of Barbados: The Post-Colonial Entrepreneur--Joan L. Phillips *
Part II: Migrant Women in Prostitution * A Social Response to Transnational Prostitution in Queensland, Australia--Linda Meaker * Transnational Prostitution of Thai Women to Germany: A Variety of Transnational Labour Migration?--Pataya Ruenkaew * Four Cases from Hamburg--Prapairat R. Mix * Bodies Across Borders: Prostitution-Related Migration from Thailand to Denmark--Anders Lisborg * Black Prostitutes in Denmark--Marlene Spanger *
Part III: Critical Reflections * A Portrait of the Lady: The Portrayal of Thailand and its Prostitutes in the International Media--Chitraporn Vanaspong * Il y a 50,000 Prostituees Marocaines de Luxe dans la Cote Espagnole: A Necessary Myth--Ana Lopez Lindstrom *
Part IV: New Policies on Prostitution * Migrant Sex Workers in Canada--Noulmook Sutdhibhasilp * Business Like Any Other? Managing the Sex Industry in the Netherlands--Marieke van Doorninck * The Criminalization of Buying Sex: The Politics of Prostitution in Sweden--Author Gould
Introduction to Prostitution in a Global Context--Susanne Thorbek * Part I: Men in Prostitution * Travellers' Tales: Sex Diaries of Tourists Returning from Thailand--Ryan Bishop and Lillian S. Robinson * Prostitution in a Global Context: The European Inheritance: Male Perspectives--Susanne Thorbek * The Beach Boy of Barbados: The Post-Colonial Entrepreneur--Joan L. Phillips * Part II: Migrant Women in Prostitution * A Social Response to Transnational Prostitution in Queensland, Australia--Linda Meaker * Transnational Prostitution of Thai Women to Germany: A Variety of Transnational Labour Migration?--Pataya Ruenkaew * Four Cases from Hamburg--Prapairat R. Mix * Bodies Across Borders: Prostitution-Related Migration from Thailand to Denmark--Anders Lisborg * Black Prostitutes in Denmark--Marlene Spanger * Part III: Critical Reflections * A Portrait of the Lady: The Portrayal of Thailand and its Prostitutes in the International Media--Chitraporn Vanaspong * Il y a 50,000 Prostituees Marocaines de Luxe dans la Cote Espagnole: A Necessary Myth--Ana Lopez Lindstrom * Part IV: New Policies on Prostitution * Migrant Sex Workers in Canada--Noulmook Sutdhibhasilp * Business Like Any Other? Managing the Sex Industry in the Netherlands--Marieke van Doorninck * The Criminalization of Buying Sex: The Politics of Prostitution in Sweden--Author Gould