A Chronological Study of Discourse on Prostitution Policy, Anti-prostitution Feminist Movements, and Sex Workers' Rights Movements in South Korea

This research examines the history of sex workers' agency and resistance to prostitution policies and anti-prostitution feminist movements in defense of their rights in South Korea based on a transnational feminist approach. I first analyze the violent impacts of government prostitution policies and anti-prostitution feminisms on sex workers' human rights, showing how they reinforce social stigma and discriminate against sex workers. The nature and content of prostitution policies throughout history share the characteristics of regulating and managing sex workers. In the name of national interests, public health, and sexual ethics, these regulatory and control policies have exploited sex workers' labor and violated their rights. In response to government prostitution policies, mainstream anti-prostitution feminists have criticized and/or collaborated with government prostitution policies that violate the human rights of sex workers by strongly advocating for the prohibition of prostitution. Since the early 20th century, anti-prostitution women’s movements have claimed universal women's rights. By ignoring and denying the long history of sex workers identifying themselves as laborers, mainstream feminists reinforce anti-trafficking and anti-prostitution logics.

I argue that sex workers are professionals with unique perspectives and experiences in the prostitution sector. This research demonstrates how they have resisted stigma and discrimination, government policies to control and prohibit sex work, and campaigns by mainstream feminists and their allies in government policy. Sex workers understand not only their work and the nature of labor in a patriarchal and capitalist society, but also how state systems and mainstream feminist initiatives violate their rights. The way to defend the human rights of sex workers must come from sex workers themselves.