Queering accounts of “MSM” practitioner agency: recognising collateral benefits

Abstract

This article demonstrates how donor resources can enable MSM/TG practitioners to exercise agency in diverse ways, which produce collateral benefits for sexuality/gender-diverse communities. By focusing on what Thai MSM/TG practitioners actually do, we illustrate how their practices respond to their own aspirations, not only the demands of donor funding regimes. We position our project as queer in the sense that it interrupts the normative absence of practitioner agency within current “MSM” development literature. We argue that our reading might enable greater recognition and donor support for MSM/TG practitioners who produce collateral benefits through their work.

Cet article montre comment les ressources des bailleurs de fonds peuvent permettre aux praticiens du secteur des MSM/TG (hommes ayant des rapports sexuels avec des hommes/transgenres) d'exercer leur libre-arbitre de diverses manières, qui donnent lieu à des avantages collatéraux pour les communautés de sexualité/genre divers. En nous concentrant sur ce que font réellement les praticiens MSM/TG thaïlandais, nous illustrons la manière dont leurs pratiques répondent à leurs propres aspirations, et pas seulement aux exigences qui accompagnent les régimes de financement des bailleurs de fonds. Nous positionnons notre projet comme « différent » dans le sens où il interrompt l'absence normative de libre-arbitre parmi les praticiens dans le cadre des documents actuels sur le développement dans le secteur des MSM. Nous soutenons que notre interprétation peut permettre une reconnaissance et un soutien accrus de la part des bailleurs en faveur des praticiens MSM/TG qui donnent lieu à des avantages collatéraux grâce à leur travail.

El presente artículo examina cómo los recursos de los donantes pueden facilitar el agenciar de los operadores del ámbito de los HSH/TG (hombres que tienen sexo con hombres/transgéneros) de variadas maneras, lo cual produce beneficios colaterales en las comunidades de sexualidad/género diversas. Centrándose en lo que los HSH/TG tailandeses hacen de verdad, los autores muestran hasta qué punto las prácticas de este grupo responden a sus propias aspiraciones y no solo a las exigencias establecidas por los apoyos financieros. Asimismo, los autores conciben su proyecto como queer, en el sentido de que el mismo rompe con la ausencia de normatividad en aquellos aspectos relacionados con el agenciar de los operadores que son abordados por las investigaciones actuales cuyo objetivo es analizar el desenvolvimiento de los HSH. En este sentido, sostienen que su interpretación puede dar lugar a que exista mayor reconocimiento y más apoyo de los donantes hacia los operadores del ámbito de los HSH/TG, que producen beneficios colaterales a través de su trabajo.

Keywords:

• Civil society – NGOs
• Gender and diversity
• Social sector – HIV/AIDS and sexual health
• Methods
• East Asia

Acknowledgements

We would like to acknowledge the generosity and innovative work of the Thai activists and development practitioners who participated in the 2009 research, and the ongoing support of Adisorn Juntrasook. We would also like to thank a reviewer from Development in Practice who made helpful suggestions which have improved this paper.

Funding

This research was funded by a Victoria University Masters (by thesis) Scholarship and an Education NZ Travel Grant. The writing of this article was made possible through a Faculty of Science Strategic Research Grant from Victoria University of Wellington.

Notes on contributors

James Burford is a lecturer at the Faculty of Learning Sciences and Education at Thammasat University, Thailand. His current work examines the politics of emotion in the context of doctoral education, in Aotearoa-New Zealand. James has previously worked as a queer community development practitioner and youth worker in Otago, New Zealand.

Sara Kindon is an associate professor in Human Geography and Development Studies at Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand. Her current work focuses on tracing researcher complicity within the colonial continuities of community development research involving participatory video. She also works with refugee-background communities in New Zealand to support their more effective resettlement.

Notes

1 We use the term ‘MSM’ in this paper with a degree of discomfort, aware of critical commentaries that that have been offered about it (e.g. Gosine 2006, 2009). However, it remains a key organising concept for the populations, and communities at the centre of this paper. We do recognise that the conflation of ‘MSM’ development challenges with those of transgender communities can serve to subsume the latter, re-centring cis-gender men (men whose gender identity is congruent with their assigned sex at birth) as the primary sexual actors (Campuzzano 2008). Future research in the Thai context would benefit from building on studies such as Berry, Escobar, and Pitoraks’ (2012) work, which attends to the specific needs of transgender women/transfeminine people. We also call for future research to identify the development needs of transgender men/transmasculine people, including those who have sex with men, who are routinely erased in the way ‘MSM’ is operationalised. In recognition of the mis-gendering effects of applying the term ‘MSM’ as a composite to discuss transgender women, when discussing our own research context we combine it with the term ‘TG', which should be understood as ‘transgender women who have sex with men’. When referring to broader debates in the field, for the sake of clarity we have stuck with the term ‘MSM’, yet use it in quotation marks to alert the reader to its contestedness.

2 Khanna et al.’ describe the pronouns ‘heris’, ‘herim’ and ‘s/he’ as enabling a “multiplicity of gender into the imagination of the political subject. Rather than ‘her/his’ etc., which maintain a male-female binary, and create space for gender diversity only insofar as ‘transgender’ implies a movement between the two, these terms allow for other genders that the development industry, for the large part resists recognizing” (2013, 13).