Gendered Motivations, Sociocultural Constraints, and Psychobehavioral Consequences of Transnational Partnerships in Cambodia

Abstract

Global flows of people, information, and capital have created transnational spaces in Cambodia. Within those spaces exists the formation of complex and multilayered interpersonal relationships between people attempting to capitalize on the opportunities created by these flows. The purpose of this article is to describe these transnational relationships, namely, between young women employed in the entertainment sectors in Phnom Penh and their western male partners, while highlighting the racialized and gendered motivations of the global actors, the inevitable sociocultural conflicts/constraints/misunderstandings that arise within the partnerships, and the resulting challenges and psychobehavioral consequences experienced by the mobile and differentiated individuals involved in these postcolonial relational formations.

FUNDING

The author was supported as a post-doctoral fellow in the Behavioral Sciences Training Program in Drug Abuse Research program sponsored by Public Health Solutions and National Development and Research Institutes with funding from the National Institute on Drug Abuse [grant number T32 DA007233]. Points of view, opinions, and conclusions in this article do not necessarily represent the official position of the U.S. Government, Public Health Solutions, or National Development and Research Institutes.

Notes

1. A “hostess bar” is an establishment where paid female employees act as “hostesses” by sitting and interacting with foreign male customers in order to supplement their USD$60 per month salaries with tips and “ladies drinks” (which are drinks purchased for the women by customers whereby the women earn the $1 surcharge added to the price of the drink). The “hostess bar scene” is made up of all the hostess bars (totaling between 100 and 200 in Phnom Penh) and the employees and customers who patronize them.

2. “Professional girlfriends” are women who do not typically identify as sex workers but who engage in materially motivated transactional relationships with more than one partner via a performance of intimacy in order to improve their socioeconomic status and sustain their livelihoods (Hoefinger, 2011, 2013). The term “transactional” refers to the gift-based nature of the relationships, whereby the exchange of sex for gifts is tied to a larger set of nonconjugal obligations (Hunter, 2002), and it should not be confused with “commercial” exchanges, which denote the sex-for-cash exchanges that take place in the sexual marketplace.

3. Throughout this article, “western” (and its derivatives) is used interchangeably with “global north” to connote socioeconomically advantaged persons or places as well as the hegemonic cultures, values, and beliefs embodying those persons or places (Hoefinger, 2011, 2013).

4. “Bar girl” is a term the young women employed in bars self-reference with.

5. These typologies are further outlined in Hoefinger (2013).

6. This larger sample size of 102 “western” males includes 46 diasporic or overseas Cambodian-American, Cambodian-Australian, and Cambodian-French men who had spent most or all of their lives living outside of Cambodia in either the United States, Australia, or France. When compared with “white” westerners, this group tended to have differing experiences with Cambodian women who were specifically seeking out “western” men because on first sight, the men appeared to be ethnically Khmer, yet their behaviors, attitudes, and comportment were more American, French, or Australian due to their extended exposure abroad. Their insights and experiences have been particularly useful in highlighting the complex racialized desirabilities of the female bar workers, who tended to initially reject these men until the women were able to read them as more “western.”

7. Ethics approval was granted by both the Institutional Review Board at Hunter College, City University of New York, and the Department of Media & Communications Research Ethics Committee at Goldsmiths College, University of London.

8. “Sexpat” is the colloquial term used to describe expatriates who settle in Cambodia for the sole purpose of consuming paid sex.

9. The legal age of consent in Cambodia changed from 15 to 18 in the 2008 Law on the Suppression of Human Trafficking and Sexual Exploitation, which can be found at http://www.no-trafficking.org/content/Laws_Agreement/cambodia_tip_2008.pdf.

10. A contemporary example of “temporary wives” could be the mia chao in Thailand. See Cohen (1982) and Murray (2001).

11. For more on these social codes for women, known as the Cbpab Srei, see Ledgerwood (1990), Chandler (1996), Tarr (1996), Derks (2008), Jacobsen (2008), and Brickell (2011). The Cbpab Srei are the best-known literary sources describing specific ideal behavior for women, which were written by elite men between the 14th and 19th centuries. They stress that regardless of what happens inside the house, only blinding obligation toward one’s husband and family will ensure the good reputation of the whole family. Breaking these social codes—particularly being a nonvirgin at marriage—could mean, conversely, ruining not only one’s own reputation but also that of the entire family.

12. For more on men’s negative feelings toward western feminism, see Faludi (1999), Robinson (1996, 2001), Constable (2003), and McRobbie (2009).

13. For a longer discussion on the sexist, ageist, and discriminatory effects of the current marriage ban, see Hoefinger (2013). For more information on the ban itself, see http://www.economist.com/blogs/ban-yan/2011/04/legislating_morality_cambodia and http://www.asiaone.com/News/Latest+News/Asia/Story/A1Story20110316-268488.html.

14. “Beer promotion women” are women who work in the “beer garden” sector of the entertainment industry in Cambodia. They are employed by both local and western beer distributors (such as Heineken, Carlsberg, Tiger, Asahi, and Anchor) to wear the company’s branded uniforms and push their particular brand of beer to customers in exchange for monthly salaries or commission only. “Beer gardens” are often large combined indoor/outdoor venues that provide beer, food, and entertainment to mostly Cambodian or other Asian customers—as opposed to white westerners, who instead frequent the hostess bar sector (racialized differences in clientele are what make beer gardens and karaoke bars, which tend to attract locals, distinct from western-oriented hostess bars). For more on “beer promotion women” or the beer garden sector, see CARE Cambodia (2005), Lubek (2005), or visit http://www.beergirls.org.

15. Apparently, two other western male acquaintances of his in Cambodia had also ended their lives due to strained relationships. For a longer discussion on the sociocultural and historical links to self-harming and suicide in Cambodia, see Hoefinger (2013).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Heidi Hoefinger

Heidi Hoefinger, Ph.D., is Postdoctoral Fellow at the National Development and Research Institutes in New York; Adjunct Lecturer in Gender and Sexuality Studies at the Institute of South East Asian Affairs, Chiang Mai University, Thailand; and author of Sex, Love and Money in Cambodia: Professional Girlfriends and Transactional Relationships (Routledge, 2013).