Notes
Given only two of the participants were male, caution should be taken regarding any conclusions related to gender and sex work here. Nevertheless, both of these participants provided invaluable knowledge and, since their interviews were audio-recorded, their interviews provide a level of rich detail complementing the other hand-written notes for the female participants.
‘One-woman brothels’ refer to the private apartments of sex workers, about 100 square feet or below, which can be partitioned flats from a larger flat. It is important to stress that all of our participants reported an independent ‘sole proprietorship’ mode of running sex work. None of the participants worked collectively in any vice establishments organized by local triads (i.e. organized crime). No participants expressed that they were coerced to work in the industry. This is not to imply that triad-organized type of brothels do not exist in Hong Kong (they certainly do), nor to imply that most sex workers in Hong Kong work in a ‘one-woman brothel’ mode of business. The ‘sole proprietorship’ mode of work among our sample is likely related to the focus of the NGOs participants were recruited from, which focus on reaching out to ‘independent’ sex workers in Hong Kong. Our participants thus kept all of the revenues or profits from their work.
Potential harm posed from clients was a frequent concern expressed by our female participants. Two participants said they had been robbed by clients once or more at their work place (i.e., one-woman brothel). Police were rarely called upon for investigation, as participants expressed doubt about their ability to help. Clients were reported to sometimes be intoxicated on drugs or alcohol, which sometimes resulted in physical abuse. Clients sometimes insisted on not using condoms, or verbally abused sex workers. Unanimously, participants pointed to support from non-governmental organizations which help to address these risks.
References
Aas, K. (2011). Visions of global control: cosmopolitan aspirations in a world of friction. In M. Bosworth & C. Hoyle (Eds.), What is criminology (pp. 406–419). Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Aas, K. (2012). ‘The earth is one but the world is not’: criminological theory and its geopolitical divisions. Theoretical Criminology, 16(1), 5–20.
Adorjan, M., & Lee, M. (2017). Public assessments of the police and policing in Hong Kong. Australian & New Zealand Journal of Criminology, 50(4), 510–528.
Amesty International. (2016). Harmfully Isolated: criminalizing sex work in Hong Kong. Retrieved from London: Amnesty International.
Armenta, A. (2017). Racializing crimmigration: structural racism, colorblindness, and the institutional production of immigrant criminality. Sociology of Race and Ethnicity, 3(1), 82–95.
Armstrong, L. (2014). Screening clients in a decriminalised street-based sex industry: insights into the experiences of New Zealand sex workers. Australian & New Zealand Journal of Criminology, 47(2), 207–222.
Bauman, Z. (1998). On glocalization: or globalization for some, localization for others, Thesis Eleven, 54(1), 37–49.
Beckett, K., & Evans, H. (2015). Crimmigration at the local level: criminal justice processes in the shadow of deportation. Law and Society Review, 49(1), 241–277.
Broadhurst, R., Bacon-Shone, J., Bouhours, B., Wa, L. K., & Zhong, L. (2010). Hong Kong United Nations International Crime Victim Survey: final report of the 2006 Hong Kong UNICVS. Retrieved from Hong Kong and Canberra.
Calavita, K. (1998). Immigration, law, and marginalization in a global economy: notes from Spain. Law and Society Review, 32, 529–566.
Chu, D. C., & Huey-Long Song, J. (2008). Chinese immigrants’ perceptions of the police in Toronto, Canada. Policing: An International Journal of Police Strategies & Management, 31(4), 610–630.
Chu, D., Song, J. H.-L., & Dombrink, J. (2005). Chinese immigrants’ perceptions of the police in New York City. International Criminal Justice Review, 15(2), 101–114.
Coconuts Hong Kong. (2015) Over 4000 mainlanders arrested for unlawful prostitution. available at http://hongkong.coconuts.co/2015/2002/2006/over-4000-mainlanders-arrested-unlawful-prostitution-2014
Dingeman, K., Arzhayev, Y., Ayala, C., Bermudez, E., Padama, L., & Tena-Chávez, L. (2017). Neglected, protected, ejected: Latin American women caught by crimmigration. Feminist Criminology, 12(3), 293–314.
Fraser, A. (2013). Ethnography at the periphery: redrawing the borders of criminology’s world-map. Theoretical Criminology, 17(2), 251–260.
Hiah, J., & Staring, R. (2016). ‘But the Dutch would call it exploitation’. Crimmigration and the moral economy of the Chinese catering industry in the Netherlands. Crime, Law and Social Change, 66(1), 83–100.
Holroyd, E. A., Wong, W. C., Gray, S. A., & Ling, D. C. (2008). Environmental health and safety of Chinese sex workers: a cross-sectional study. International Journal of Nursing Studies, 45(6), 932–941.
Kong, T. (2006). What it feels like for a whore: the body politics of women performing erotic labour in Hong Kong. Gender, Work and Organization, 13(5), 409–434.
Kong, T. (2008). Risk factors affecting condom use among male sex workers who serve men in China: a qualitative study. Sexually Transmitted Infections, 84, 444–448.
Laidler, K. J., Petersen, C., & Emerton, R. (2007). Bureaucratic justice: the incarceration of mainland Chinese women working in Hong Kong’s sex industry. International Journal of Offender Therapy and Comparative Criminology, 51(1), 68–83.
Lau, J., Tang, A., & Tsui, H. Y. (2003). The relationship between condom use, sexually transmitted diseases, and location of commercial sex transaction among male Hong Kong clients. AIDS, 17(1), 105–112.
Lau, J. T., Tsui, H., Ho, S. P., Wong, E., & Yang, X. (2010). Prevalence of psychological problems and relationships with condom use and HIV prevention behaviors among Chinese female sex workers in Hong Kong. AIDS Care, 22(6), 659–668.
Lee, M. (2007). Women’s imprisonment as a mechanism of migration control in Hong Kong. British Journal of Criminology, 47(6), 847–860.
Lee, M. (2008). Policing Chinese migrant sex workers in Hong Kong. International Migration, 46(3), 95–121.
Lee, M., & Laidler, K. J. (2013). Doing criminology from the periphery: crime and punishment in Asia. Theoretical Criminology, 17(2), 141–157.
Li, J. C. (2013). Violence against Chinese female sex workers in Hong Kong: from understanding to prevention. International Journal of Offender Therapy and Comparative Criminology, 57(5), 613–631.
Ling, D. C., Wong, W. C., Holroyd, E. A., & Gray, S. A. (2007). Silent killers of the night: an exploration of psychological health and suicidality among female street sex workers. Journal of Sex & Marital Therapy, 33(4), 281–299.
Menjívar, C., & Bejarano, C. (2004). Latino immigrants’ perceptions of crime and police authorities in the United States: a case study from the Phoenix metropolitan area. Ethnic and Racial Studies, 27(1), 120–148.
Stumpf, J. (2006). The crimmigration crisis: immigrants, crime, & sovereign power. bepress Legal Series, Working Paper 1635, 1–44.
Tsing, A. (2005). Friction: an ethnography of global connection. Princeton: Princeton University Press.
Wong, K. H., Lee, S. S., Lo, Y. C., & Lo, K. K. (1994). Condom use among female commercial sex workers and male clients in Hong Kong. International Journal of STD & AIDS, 5(4), 287–289.
Wong, W., Holroyd, E., Chan, E., Griffiths, S., & Bingham, A. (2008). “One country, two systems”: sociopolitical implications for female migrant sex workers in Hong Kong. BMC International Health and Human Rights, 8(1), 1–7.
Woude, M. A., Leun, J. P., & Nijland, J. A. A. (2014). Crimmigration in the Netherlands. Law & Social Inquiry, 39(3), 560–579.
Yuen, W. W.-Y., Wong, W. C.-W., Holroyd, E., & Tang, C. S.-K. (2014). Resilience in work-related stress among female sex workers in Hong Kong. Qualitative Health Research, 24(9), 1232–1241.
Ziteng. (2009). Ziteng newsletter, 31. Retrieved from Hong Kong SAR, China.
Funding
Funding for this project was provided by a University of Calgary internal ‘seed’ grant (no award number was provided).
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Ethics declarations
Conflict of Interest
Dr. Michael Adorjan declares that he has no conflicts of interest regarding this study.
Ethical Approval/Ethics Statement
All procedures performed in studies involving human participants were in accordance with the ethical standards of the institutional and/or national research committee and with the 1964 Helsinki declaration and its later amendments or comparable ethical standards.
Statement of Informed Consent
In the case of this study, ethical approvals were obtained from both (author’s current institution) and the University of Hong Kong.
Additional information
Publisher’s Note
Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Adorjan, M. Perceptions of Policing and Security Among Hong Kong Migrant Sex Workers—a Research Note. Asian J Criminol 14, 103–111 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11417-018-9281-1
Received:
Accepted:
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11417-018-9281-1