Affects and international migration: the case of exotic dancers in Switzerland

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Affects and international migration the case of
exotic dancers in Switzerland

• Romaric Thiévent
• Department of geography
• University of Neuchâtel
• Switzerland

The 4th International Conference on Population
Geographies 12 July 2007
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Introduction

• PhD project in geography called  Ciculatory
  migration the case of cabaret dancers 
• Aims
• To explain the economic, sociological and/or
  demographic evolutions that underlie the
  importation of such labour force in Switzerland
• To analyze the evolutions of the volume and
  structure of this migratory flow
• To get an understanding of the geographical
  trajectories of theses migrants at a national and
  international scale

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Aim of the presentation

• Discuss the relations between affects, the
  international division of labour and
  international migration with particular reference
  to the case of exotic dancers in Switzerland
• Special emphasis on  emotional consumption  in
  Swiss cabarets

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Plan of the presentation

• The context of exotic dance in Switzerland
• Research question
• Theorical framework
• Hypothesis
• Methodology
• Some results
• Conclusion

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The context of exotic dance in Switzerland

• The L permit
• Stay of maximum 8 months
• Exception in Swiss immigration policy
• Number of dancer
• About 1500 per month
• Activites of dancer
• Strip
• Discuss with clients and insite them to drink
  alcohol
• Provide sexual services
• Origin
• 98 form non UE countries, mainly Ukraine,
  Russia, Rumania, Morocco, Brazil, Dominican
  Republic and Thailand.

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Research question

• Why do exotic dancers come from these particular
  countries?

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Theorical framework 1

• The international division labor (IDL)
• Delocalization at the core of the process of IDL
• Services are nowadays more and more delocalized
• Certain kind of services cannot be delocalized
  because they have to be performed in a particular
  place and context
• Among these activities which are
  traditionally, although not exclusively,
  feminine like nursing, child care, domestics
  work, sex work
• Activities of a particular kind emotional labor.
  
• Emotional labor requires services providers to
  offer emotion as part of the service itself
  (Hochschild, 1984)

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Theorical framework 2

• Cabaret dancer perform emotional labor
• Particular kind of consumption in Swiss cabarets
  ? emotional consumption

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Theorical framework 3

• The need in western countries for such
  emotional services causes important migratory
  movement of women at a global scale
• Trend named
• International division of reproductive labor
  (Parreñas, 2000), Cross border transfer of
  reproductive labor (Truong, 1996), Global
  redivision of women traditional work (Ehrenreich
  Hochschild, 2000)
• Litterature on IDRL give
• Convincing explanations about the process that
  underly the  importation  of women reproductive
  workers in First World countries
• Few or only general explanations about why
  women from particular countries perform
  particular reproductive work

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Hypothesis

• The pattern of emotional consumption that occur
  in Swiss cabarets explain (partly) the origin of
  dancers
• To test the hypothesis
• Focus on transactions between customers and
  dancers
• Focus on criteria of recruitment of agencies

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Methodology

• Semi structured interviews with
• Cabaret dancers
• Cabaret owners
• Agents
• Clients
• Observation in cabarets

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What do the customers ask for in their
interaction whith dancers?

• Great diversitiy and complexity of motivations,
  experiences, fantasies, etc.
• General pattern
• Search for emotions (to feel powerful, to be
  understood, etc.) that emerges from the relation
  (watch, talk, touch, etc.) with women labelled as
  exotic

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Exotism

• Exotism
• Not inherent to certain people, objects or places
  
• Product of a gaze and discourse
• Behind the attraction for exotic women lie a
  subtle mechanism of racism, which as a system of
  meaning and power often foregrounds the body of
  the Other as object of ridicule or admiration,
  as object for domination or commodification
  (Jordan and weedon, 1995, 253)

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Tensions between what clients expect and get

• Pattern of search of exotism appears even more
  clearly when you analyse this tensions
• Not only do the clients search relationships
  (talk, touch and have sex) with women labelled as
  exotic, but in these relationships they also want
  to find the confirmation of their own
  representations.

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Example of tension

• You are not a real Moroccan! The real Moroccans
  are more expansive and aggressive with clients.
  If you want to earn money and continue to work
  for me, you have to behave as a real Moroccan.
  The clients dont want false Moroccans! Some
  clients complain about you! (Leila, Dancer,
  Moroccan)

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Example of tension

• Most of the clients tell me
• Oh you are Brazilian! It seems that in Brazil
  there are only soccer players, whores and
  transvestites. You dont play soccer, and are not
  a transvestite, so you like sex a lot, dont you?
  So why dont you want to have sex with me?
• They dont understand that I dont want to have
  sex with everyone. Im not what they believe I
  am. (Carol, Dancer, Brazilian)

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• These two example show that
• Cabaret dancers are paid to be archetypal exotic
  object
• In the process of emotional consumption, the
  consumer project fantasies onto the commodity
  which have little to do with the person providing
  the service being consumed (Egan, 2005)
• When a dancer does not fit into these exotic
  stereotypes, she may encounter problems
• In order to continue earning money, dancers have
  to fit into exotic representation of clients
• What the clients find in cabaret is a
  construction and not an importation of the
   natural  characteristics of a given culture

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Recruitment criteria 1

• The general pattern of search for exotism is
  necessary, but not sufficient to explain why
  these women are coming from these particular
  countries
• Almost all dancers come to work in Switzerland
  through recruitment agencies.
• So the role of these middle level unit that
  facilitate and organize migration have to be
  taken into account
• criteria of recruitment of agencies

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Recruitment criteria 2

• Origin of dancers is the expression of clients
  desire
• Recruitment is made to follow/fulfill clients
  desire for women labelled as exotic

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Conclusion 1

• In Swiss cabaret emotional consumption is
  strongly dependant of a process of exotisation of
  the Other performing emotional labor
• The exoticization of the Thirld World Other is
  equally important as economics factors in
  positioning women in sex work (Kempadoo, 1998,
  p.10)

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Conclusion 2

• Recruitment agencies try to fulfill, respond
  clients desire for women labelled as exotic
• To understand the involvement of women in the sex
  industry, it is important to focus on the
  behaviour and the preference of consumers and non
  uniquely on the women who provide these services

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Conclusion 3

• Importance of non economic factors emotions
  buyed and sold - in the process of international
  division of reproductive labor