Sexual development中国色情产业发展

　　摘要：近十年来，中国性产业在争议中对经济贡献显著。在我最近入住的北京一家五星级酒店，大堂里站着一排打扮惹火的女郎。我已经说不清多少次在酒店睡觉时被电话吵醒问要不要“按摩”。有一次我在人民大会堂和几个西方国家商务人员共餐，他们竞相比较中国各地“小姐”的不同。
 　　In 1992, my wife - then working for a Singaporean thinktank - accompanied a group of visiting mainland Chinese officials on a tour of state-sanctioned brothels in Singapore.
 　　They visited high-class brothels meant for the well-to-do as well as cheaper brothels for migrant workers. Accompanied by police officials, they interviewed managers and spoke with sex-workers, who explained that they get regular health checks and pay taxes to the state. The Chinese officials were somewhat surprised that Singapore - supposedly an arch-conservative nanny state - openly allows prostitution and they recognized the pragmatic benefits of legalizing the trade. But, they added, mainstream public morality would not tolerate similar arrangements in China.
 　　Since that time, the sex trade has grown at an exponential rate and China has become one of the world's leading centers for prostitution. According to the Public Security Bureau, there are between 3 and 4 million sex workers in China (Singapore's Lianhe Zaobao estimates up to 20 million). Most hotels openly tolerate (and benefit from) prostitution. In one Beijing five-star hotel that I recently visited, the lobby was lined with glamorous-looking ladies of the evening. I can't recall the number of times I have been waken up by late-night phone calls asking if I'm interested in "massage" services.
 　　The economic benefits of the trade are enormous - and arguably contributed to China's near-miraculous economic growth over the last decade or so. For obvious reasons, it is difficult to get reliable statistics. But there are some revealing anecdotes. Last year, I was having dinner with several Western businessmen at the Great Hall of the People and they were comparing notes on the cultural and physical particularities of "xiaojie" (ladies) from different parts of China. One of them - a leading entrepreneur in the clothing industry - said, half-jokingly, if he's given the choice to invest and do business in China or an Islamic country like Bangladesh, where do you think he'd want to go?
 　　In Beijing, there are karaoke parlors - the singing often followed by paid sex - specifically tailored for visiting businessmen of various nationalities. One club frequented by Koreans has Korean-speaking hostesses largely drawn from China's Korean minority. The same club has a floor with Japanese-speaking hostesses for Japanese businessmen.
 　　The government's periodic crackdowns on the trade only serve to confirm its economic importance. The economist Yang Fan estimates that with the implementation of the Regulations on the Management of Places of Entertainment, issued by the State Council in 1999, the Chinese GDP dropped by 1%.
 　　Taiyuan, the capital city of Shanxi province, was known as China's Karoake Capital, with about 7000 clubs in the city. In 1996, the government decided to crackdown. As a result, the restaurant and hotel business nosedived and the "xiaojie withdrew 400m RMB of remittances from the local banks. The government reversed course one month later.
 　　During important government meetings, karaoke parlors in Beijing are told to expect police inspections. But the dates are carefully specified in advance, with the implication that things will soon revert to normal.
 　　Public attitudes are also changing. In early December, the police officers in Shenzhen publicly paraded about 100 women and their johns in an attempt to humiliate them and discourage the trade - or perhaps to punish them for not paying their dues to the powers-that-be. The tactic led to a swift outcry in newspapers and on the internet, with the police coming under a hail of criticism for violating the right to privacy of those who were paraded in public.
 　　Elsewhere, public authorities are taking active measures to deal with the health consequences of the sex trade. In Harbin, sex workers are given courses in AIDS education and the use of condoms. To reduce the risk of sexually-transmitted diseases, every hotel room in Yunnan comes equipped with condoms. There have also been national voices calling for legalization. In the 2006 annual meeting of the National People's Congress, one deputy from Heilongjiang called for legalization of prostitution in order to secure the health of workers and reduce the risks of sexually-transmitted diseases. In private discussion, many intellectuals seem to endorse such views.
 　　In sum, the gap between public morality and the social reality may not be as wide as the government may fear. To the extent there is any resistance, the benefits of Singapore-style legalization will far outweigh the costs. Sex workers and their customers would be protected from sexually-transmitted diseases. The trade could be taxed and the revenue could be used for the disadvantaged (as it happens, "xiaojie" often send remittances to support family members in the impoverished countryside). The costs of prostitution would go down, to the benefit of the tens of millions of sexually-frustrated migrant workers. And the sex business would be taken out of the hands of criminal elements.