Regulating Sex: the Politics of Intimacy and Identity
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REGULATING SEX Some Recent Titles from the Perspectives on Gender Series Series Editor: Myra Marx Ferree, University of Wisconsin, Madison Black Feminist Thought: Knowledge, Consciousness, and the Politics of Empowerment Patricia Hill Collins Feminisms and the Women’s Movement: Dynamics of Change in Social Movement Ideology and Activism Barbara Ryan Black Women and White Women in the Professions: Analysis of Job Segregation by Race and Gender, 1960-1980 Natalie J. Sokoloff Gender Consciousness and Politics Sue Tolleson Rinehart Mothering: Ideology, Experience, and Agency Evelyn Nakano Glenn, Grace Chang, and Linda Rennie Forcey, Editors For Richer, For Poorer: Mothers Confront Divorce Demie Kurz Integrative Feminisms: Building Global Visions, 1960s-1990s Angela Miles Rock-a-by Baby: Feminism, Self-Help, and Postpartum Depression Verta Taylor School-Smart and Mother-Wise: Working-Class Women’s Identity and Schooling Wendy Luttrell Community Activism and Feminist Politics: Organizing Across Race, Class, and Gender Nancy A. Naples, Editor Grassroots Warriors: Activist Mothering, Community Work, and the War on Poverty Nancy A. Naples Complex Inequality: Gender, Class, and Race in the New Economy Leslie McCall Maid in the U.S.A.: 10th Anniversary Edition Mary Romero Home-Grown Hate: Gender and Organized Racism Abby L. Ferber, Editor Stepping Out of Line: Becoming and Being Feminist Cheryl Hercus REGULATING SEX The Politics of Intimacy and Identity Edited by Elizabeth Bernstein and Laurie Schaffner ROUTLEDGE NEW YORK AND LONDON Published in 2005 by Routledge 270 Madison Avenue New York, NY 10016 www.routledge-ny.com Published in Great Britain by Routledge 2 ParkSquare Milton Park, Abingdon Oxon OX 14 4RN U.K. www.routledge.co.uk Copyright © 2005 by Taylor and Francis Books, Inc. Routledge is an imprint ofthe Taylor and Francis Group. This edition published in the Taylor & Francis e-Library, 2005. “To purchase your own copy of this or any of Taylor & Francis or Routledge’s collection of thousands of eBooks please go to www.eBookstore.tandf.co.uk.” All rights reserved.No part ofthis book may be printed or utilized in any form or by any electronic,mechanical or other means,now known or hereafter in- vented, including photocopying and recording, or any other information stor- age or retrieval system,without permission in writing from the publisher. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Regulating sex : the politics of intimacy and identity / Elizabeth Bernstein and Laurie Schaffner, editors. p. cm. — (Perspectives on gender) Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 0-415-94868-1 (hardback) — ISBN 0-415-94869-X (pbk.) 1. Sex—Political aspects. 2. Sex and law. I. Bersnstein, Elizabeth, 1968– II. Schaffner, Laurie. III. Series: Perspectives on gender (New York, N.Y.) HQ23.R43 2004 306.7 — dc22 2004008237 ISBN 0-203-00607-0 Master e-book ISBN To the PBs, and community at the margins v Table of Contents Acknowledgments ix Regulating Sex: An Introduction xi Part I. The Regulation of Queer Identities and Intimacies 1. Liberalism and Social Movement Success: The Case of United States Sodomy Statutes 3 Mary Bernstein 2. Contract and the Legal Mooring of Same-Sex Intimacy 19 William Rountree 3. Unprincipled Exclusions: The Struggle to Achieve Judicial and Legislative Equality for Transgender People 35 Paisley Currah and Shannon Minter Part II. The Regulation of Sexual Commerce 4. Soft Glove, Punishing Fist: The Trafficking Victims Protection Act of 2000 51 Wendy Chapkis 5. At Home in the Street: Questioning the Desire to Help and Save 67 Laura Mª Agustín 6. Travel and Taboo: Heterosexual Sex Tourism to the Caribbean 83 Julia O’Connell Davidson and Jacqueline Sánchez Taylor 7. Desire, Demand, and the Commerce of Sex 101 Elizabeth Bernstein Part III. The Regulation of Childhood and Gendered “Innocence” 8. Child Welfare as Social Defense Against Sexuality: A Norwegian Example 129 Kjersti Ericsson vii viii • Regulating Sex: An Introduction 9. Sexual Abuse and the Wholesome Family: Feminist, Psychological, and State Discourses 143 Kerwin Kaye 10. Identity to Acronym: How “Child Prostitution” Became “CSEC” 167 Penelope Saunders 11. Capacity, Consent, and the Construction of Adulthood 189 Laurie Schaffner Part IV. Beyond Regulation: Towards Sexual Justice 12. How Libertine Is the Netherlands?: Exploring Contemporary Dutch Sexual Cultures 209 Gert Hekma 13. From Outsider to Citizen 225 Steven Seidman 14. Sex and Freedom 247 Janet R. Jakobsen and Elizabeth Lapovsky Kennedy References 271 About the Contributors 301 Index 305 Acknowledgments This volume emerged out of the proceedings of a workshop supported by the International Institute for the Sociology of Law in Oñati, Spain in the summer of 2000. We are tremendously grateful to the numerous friends and colleagues who so powerfully contributed to the cultivation and shap- ing of this text during the intervening years. We would first like to offer our thanks to Malen Gordoa and Pierre Guibentif for graciously tending the workshop, and to Will Rountree for taking on special duties at the confer- ence (including the overseeing of late-night impromptu hors d’oeuvres and assistance with the comings and goings of participants). Throughout the course of this project, Sea-Ling Cheng, Janet Jakobsen, Jason James, Mindie Lazarus-Black, Corinne Louw, Katalin Makkai, Greg Matoesian, Kelly Moore, Mark Padilla, Lucinda Ramberg, Gayatri Reddy, Beth Richie, Miryam Sas, Penelope Saunders, Steven Seidman, Robert Smith, Wendy Ward, and Paige West offered multiple forms of intellectual and emotional support, while Blaise Carter-Garber, Clare Corcoran, Lorena Diaz de Leon, Nirali Shah, Janna Thomure, Hsiu-Ann Tom, and Eddy U provided invalu- able editing, research, and bibliographic assistance. We are especially thankful to Logan MacLeod, whose acuity and stamina helped to bring this book to completion, and at Routledge, to Myra Marx Feree, whose spon- sorship and feedback were crucial in helping us to transform an unruly manuscript into a polished text. Elizabeth would like to offer special, heart- felt thanks to Kerwin Kaye, who contributed so much to this project at every stage—from intellectual input to pep talks to help with crude me- chanics. Laurie appreciates the support from David Perry and the Great Cities Institute at the University of Illinois at Chicago. We are grateful to all of you for helping us to realize some of the forms of collaboration and community that were the inspiration for this book. Elizabeth Bernstein and Laurie Schaffner New York and Chicago, December 2003 ix Regulating Sex: An Introduction ELIZABETH BERNSTEIN AND LAURIE SCHAFFNER Writing about sexuality is like writing about last evening’s news. By the time one’s thoughts are formulated, they may seem hopelessly out of date —vis-à-vis the world at large or vis-à-vis one’s own political convictions. In recent years, a vast array of social transformations falling under the broad banner of globalization have served to radically recraft not only economic activities, but also kin networks and paradigms of intimacy. While the spread of global capitalism has exacerbated social inequalities, fragmented families, and severed individuals from traditional social ties, it has also given rise to transnational feminist activism, a burgeoning lesbian-gay- bisexual-transgender-queer (LGBTQ) movement, a renewed commitment to international human rights, and myriad new forms of eroticism and community. Within this context of cultural upheaval, the best means by which to advocate for sexual freedoms—while at the same time protecting vulnerable parties from violation—can be difficult to assess.1 Bold and rapid transformations force a continual reevaluation of social and political questions, including those that have plagued us as scholars and activists working in the field of sexuality studies. Is the flourishing of sexual commerce one domain among others in an expanding global serv- ice economy, or the manifestation of gross inequalities of gender, class, race, and nation? Should the pursuit of marriage and other forms of legal domestic partnerships for same-sex couples be seen as a vital stepping stone toward civil rights and state recognition, or as assimilation to hetero- normative ideals? Are children more in need of protection from sexual ex- ploiters than of direction and encouragement in their quest for erotic forms of intimacy? The purpose of this volume is to address questions such xi xii • Regulating Sex: An Introduction as these via a series of spirited dialogues among scholars from diverse dis- ciplines, methodologies, and regions. Sexuality as Social Politics Over the last several decades, a large and important body of scholarship has developed within the growing interdisciplinary field of sexuality studies, a primary aim of which has been to problematize naturalistic understand- ings of sexuality and to highlight the influence of cultural diversity and his- torical change upon sexual identities and behaviors. Recent scholarly work has served as a corrective to the tendency in Western social thought to rel- egate questions of sexuality to the domain of the personal and the presocial —a trend that has prevailed over the last century. In contrast to the avowed moralism of Christian theological discourse, which situated questions of sexuality within the domain of ethics and the political, the fields of sexol- ogy and psychoanalysis emerged in the late nineteenth century to articulate the natural and instinctual underpinnings