Regulating Prostitution in China : Gender and Local Statebuilding, 1900-1937

Elizabeth J Remick

ISBN 10: 0804788367 / ISBN 13: 9780804788366

Published by Stanford University Press Mär 2014, 2014

About this Item

Neuware - Elizabeth J. Remick is Associate Professor of Political Science at Tufts University. She is the author of Building Local States: China During the Republican and Post-Mao Eras (2004).

Seller Inventory # 9780804788366

Bibliographic Details

• Title: Regulating Prostitution in China : Gender and Local Statebuilding, 1900-1937
• Publisher: Stanford University Press Mär 2014
• Publication Date: 2014
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0804788367
• ISBN 13: 9780804788366
• Binding: Buch
• Condition: Neu
• Dimensions: 236W x 155H x 21D millimeters 236 millimeters width by 155 millimeters height by 21 millimeters depth
• Weight: 508 grams

About this title

Synopsis

In the early decades of the twentieth century, prostitution was one of only a few fates available to women and girls besides wife, servant, or factory worker. At the turn of the century, cities across China began to register, tax, and monitor prostitutes, taking different forms in different cities. Intervention by way of prostitution regulation connected the local state, politics, and gender relations in important new ways. The decisions that local governments made about how to deal with gender, and specifically the thorny issue of prostitution, had concrete and measurable effects on the structures and capacities of the state.

This book examines how the ways in which local government chose to shape the institution of prostitution ended up transforming local states themselves. It begins by looking at the origins of prostitution regulation in Europe and how it spread from there to China via Tokyo. Elizabeth Remick then drills down into the different regulatory approaches of Guangzhou (revenue-intensive), Kunming (coercion-intensive), and Hangzhou (light regulation). In all three cases, there were distinct consequences and implications for statebuilding, some of which made governments bigger and wealthier, some of which weakened and undermined development. This study makes a strong case for why gender needs to be written into the story of statebuilding in China, even though women, generally barred from political life at that time in China, were not visible political actors.

About the Author

Elizabeth J. Remick is Associate Professor of Political Science at Tufts University. She is the author of Building Local States: China During the Republican and Post-Mao Eras (2004).