Page 108 - Chinese Woman Living and Working

FEMINIST PROSTITUTION DEBATES 95
The very diversity of venues and people that were targeted by the late 2000 ‘strike-
hard’ campaign undermines recent claims by foreign newspaper correspondents to the
effect that it was strictly a moral campaign against prostitution, one that inadvertently
exposed the entrenched size and economic significance of ‘the sex industry’ in China,
hence the political futility of attempting to ban it. According to one business report, for
instance, bank deposits in Guangdong Province alone dropped by 36 million yuan as a
result of the decision to launch this campaign, with prostitutes withdrawing their savings
and returning to their native places of origin until the campaign was over, after which it
would soon be ‘back to business as usual’ (‘Banking, the Oldest Profession’ 2000:11). In a
similar vein, another report maintains that China’s ‘new left’ economist, Yang Fan,
estimated that, following the implementation of the 1999 Entertainment Regulations, the
Chinese Gross Domestic Product (GDP) slumped by 1 per cent, due to the lack of
consumption on the part of female prostitutes (Zhong Wei 2000). As this latter report
concludes, it is thus not ‘moonshine to talk about the economic importance of the “sex
industry”’, since it may well move the Chinese economy along ‘with an annual level of
consumption of 1 trillion’ yuan (Zhong Wei 2000).
What these economistic arguments elide, even as they offer implicit support for liberal
arguments concerning the need to legally recognise ‘the sex sector’, is that their estimated
figures with regard to bank deposits and the Chinese GDP are not indicative of the
supposedly high earnings of female prostitutes. These estimated figures refer to the
‘untaxable’ profit derived from a whole host of ‘ungoverned’ business operations and to a
related rate of consumption that is fuelled in no small part by bribery and corruption.
Given that the monies derived from unlicensed and illicit business operations are subject
to fines and even confiscation by the Chinese government, the aforementioned 36 million
yuan does not demonstrate the lucrative nature of prostitution for female sellers of sex. It
points to the profits to be gained by those who run illicit or unlicensed business enterprises
with low capital overheads for a delimited period of time; namely, in the less risky ‘non-
campaign’ period.
At first glance, this latter consideration would appear to support the popular
construction of Chinese policing campaigns as punitive crackdowns that, once concluded,
are promptly followed by the restoration of ‘business as usual’. Such a conclusion is flatly
countered by recent reports to the effect that prostitution activities have been severely
curtailed in site-specific business operations such as karaoke/dance venues and
hairdressing salons, even as new and non-site-specific forms of commercial sex, such as
‘telephone sex’, have begun to emerge in China (Kwang 2000). In short, campaigns
against prostitution businesses and practices may have failed to eradicate prostitution in
toto, but the conclusion of each and every campaign has not exactly been accompanied by a
return to the status quo. On the contrary, the productive nature of regulatory measures to
turn China’s recreational venues into ‘open and healthy’ public spaces is demonstrated by
the fact that, even though campaign-related investigations have resulted in expanded legal
definitions of what counts as a prostitution-related offence, they have simultaneously
helped to create a legitimate female service worker with the right to refuse to engage in
practices that do not conform with the ‘valid labour contract’, as well as the right to be
free from sexual harassment in the work-place. At the same time, such measures have not