By Jimmy Sand
The seminar was arranged in May at the Museum of World Culture in Göteborg by NIKK in co-operation with the Swedish Secretariat for Gender Research. Sven-Axel Månsson, who has been studying prostitution since the 1970s, spoke with a focus on the sex-buyers. In 1977 the Government initiated an investigation that resulted in the report Prostitution in Sweden: Background and Actions.
- With the report’s publication in 1981 a paradigm shift took place, and interest also shifted towards the sex-buyers. The focus was now on gender. In other countries the stigmatisation of prostitution is a great problem. The paradigm shift is about understanding prostitution in terms of demand.
Studies suggest that the amount of men who have ever paid for sex differs somewhat between various countries: Sweden 13 per cent (1996), England 7 per cent (1991), Spain 39 per cent (1992), Thailand 73 per cent (2003) and Holland 14 per cent (1989). Although there is large sex industry in Holland, the numbers for that country are roughly the same as for Sweden.
- When looking more closely at the study, it turns out to cover only Dutch citizens. The same is true of the study in Thailand. We must add a perspective based on the cultural patterns in the various countries being studied. In Sweden, with its strong equality ideology, there might be a tendency to cover things up. In the interviews with Thai men, it appeared that there is a social pressure on young men to claim to have been in contact with a prostitute.
Jenny Westerstrand also participated in the seminar. She is a doctoral student of law at the Department of Feminist Studies in Social Sciences at Uppsala University, and explores the legislation of prostitution and trafficking at global and regional levels in relation to human rights and perceptions of gender and sexuality.
Jenny Westerstrand spoke about the differences between two perspectives of prostitution and trafficking: one fragmented and the other coherent.
- One is a perspective that accepts and tolerates prostitution. Advocates of this perspective emphasize a woman’s right to decide about her body and they believe that there is paternalism which inhibits this by criminalizing the buyers. Prostitution is lifted out of its social context and it becomes very concrete. Although there maybe contextual violence, drugs, shame and stigma, these do not belong to prostitution as such.
In the formulation of the UN convention on preventing, suppressing and punishing trafficking in persons, the so-called Palermo Protocol, a conflict was discernible among the various advocates for this perspective. However, they managed to unite in order to obstruct those who called for a total ban of prostitution.
- One side talks about a chain of crimes, where each line is – or isn't – a separate offence. There is the recruitment, by inappropriate means and with the aim of exploiting, and there is the actual trade. All those involved in the criminal chain are punishable, as soon as the first step is taken, but the actual purchase of sex is not.
All women available
Jenny Westerstrand also spoke of a coherent perspective. The supporters of this do not want to accept a division between force and free will.
- The main point is that prostitution cannot be separated from society. The fact that it exists influences the low wages of women, male violence against women, and overall discrimination. If the other argumentation is very concrete, this is rather fuzzy and flighty. Describing society and all its dynamics is a very difficult thing to do.
Jenny Westerstrand pointed to the problems in thinking in terms of a criminal chain.
- What happens if the buyer is allowed to walk free, when one has said that each of the steps leading to the point of purchase is a terrible crime? Trading in women creates a legal space where all women become available.
During the last twenty years a number of studies have been conducted in Scandinavia on why men buy sex. Sven- Axel Månsson summarised the results in five main groups of motives. All pertain to men’s fantasies and images of prostitutes.
- The fantasy about the whore reflects contradictory feelings of enchantment and contempt. The image of the dirty whore strengthens the sexual excitement. It also provides the opportunity to deny all: one’s self is not part of that world.
- The perception of another kind of sexuality is based on sexual frustration coupled with the idea of a certain kind of sex that cannot be experienced with a non-prostitute. There is a suspicion of having been cheated, that other men get to experience things that one does not oneself.
All kinds of men
- The idea of the kind-hearted comforter is often rooted in a fear of intimacy on equal terms. The projection of potency on woman; the idea that she bestows potency, risks becoming a projection of impotency, too. If the act is unsuccessful it is her fault. This is also an explanation for much of the violence that occurs in relation to prostitution.
- The picture of sex as an item of consumption refers to a biologically determined, recurring need to “clear the pipes”. It is typical for this age to regard prostitution in the same way as any other market activity.
- The image of another kind of woman brings the gendered order of power to its extreme. Many men talk of the difficulties of being a man in an egalitarian society. A man who had been to Thailand talked at length about how wonderful it had been to be treated like a real man, by somebody who understood what it means to be a real woman. Sexual-racist and ethnic stereotypes play an important role in the marketing of sex tourism.
To the question as to what kind of men frequent prostitutes, Sven-Axel Månsson answered:
- Prostitutes and researches agree that all kinds of men buy sex. The market is very differentiated. There are different segments aimed at different buyers.
