Reducing the number of men and women involved in Southeast Asia's pay-for-play sex tourism industry requires an understanding of its participants as well as finding ways to develop and enforce anti-prostitution laws.
The Sex Tourists (Clients).
Sex tourism is defined as "an activity that entails individuals engaging in both national and international travel in order to participate in sexual activity considered to be both illegal and unethical in those individuals' respective nations or countries of residence" (4 Facts, n.d.). Every day, thousands of men visit Southeast Asia to take advantage of the ignored, or lenient, or non-existent prostitution laws. In fact, in Thailand, close to 60 percent of tourists are there to participate in some form of anonymous sexual encounter. Sex tourists in Southeast Asia are typically men who live in both developed European countries and the United States, and enjoy middle to upper-class lifestyles. Throughout Southeast Asia, mobile populations of men such as “Transport workers, seafarers, businessmen and men who are separated from their families and communities either by migration or by joining the armed forces are regular clients” (World Health Organization, 2001), are contributors to the ever-increasing demand for prostitutes.
The Prostitutes.
Many sex workers in Southeast Asia are migrant women who arrive from other countries seeking ways to support their families. They often settle in rural jurisdictions just outside urban areas where there may be lucky enough to find employment. But jobs in Southeast Asia are hard to come by, and many women, with little or no education under their belt, see prostitution as the only viable option. Although it's true that some women, especially those from younger generations, are involved in prostitution to find a foreign man to marry for financial security, the majority of those who participate in the “pay-to-play” lifestyle live in poverty and serve sex tourists only out of economic desperation.