Shifting markets, shifting risks: HIV/AIDS prevention and the geographies of male and transgender tourist-orientated sex work in Phuket, Thailand

Abstract

"Sex tourism has received minimal attention in academic arenas and consequently remains under-theorized and restrictively conceptualized as brief sex-for-money exchanges between heterosexual men and brothel-based female sex workers. However, these images are becoming increasingly divorced from the realities of Thailand’s sex tourism industry in the twenty first century. Rather than taking mono-dimensional approaches to the phenomenon, new conceptual frameworks must be developed that can accommodate the growing heterogeneity of sex tourists and workers, and the complex interplay between gendered, raced and economic powers involved in these encounters. They must also recognize the increasing variety of sexual-economic exchanges; with the shift towards more protracted and less commercialised liaisons in a more diverse set of locations. This trend has created acute problems for HIV/AIDS prevention policy-makers, who are under growing pressure to provide targeted cost-effective prevention strategies due to the current climate of international HIV policy, which many perceive as increasingly treatment-orientated."