Graduation Year

2026

Date of Submission

4-2027

Document Type

Campus Only Senior Thesis

Degree Name

Bachelor of Arts

Department

International Relations

Reader 1

Aseema Sinha

Abstract

Thailand's prostitution industry involves an estimated two million individuals and generates approximately US$6.4 billion in annual revenue — equivalent to 1.6 percent of GDP — yet remains formally illegal under the Prevention and Suppression of Prostitution Act of 1996. This legal paradox, in which the state simultaneously prohibits and economically depends upon the sex industry, has left sex workers without legal status, labor protections, or recourse against exploitation, while repeated legislative reforms have failed to reduce the industry's scale or address the trafficking of an estimated 610,000 victims. This thesis examines whether Thailand should legalize prostitution, and whether doing so would more effectively address exploitation, public health risks, and labor inequality than its current prohibition-based framework.

Using a qualitative comparative case study approach, this thesis analyzes Thailand as the primary case alongside two international regulatory models: the Netherlands, which legalized and regulated prostitution in 2000, and Sweden, which introduced partial criminalization in 1999. Drawing on legal texts, policy reports from academic literature on prostitution regulation, feminist political theory, and Thai political economy, the analysis evaluates each model before assessing their applicability to Thailand's specific institutional and economic context.

The findings show that legalization in the Netherlands expanded the overall sex market, increased trafficking inflows, and provided organized crime with legal cover, with post-legalization evaluations finding that abuse and forced prostitution persisted throughout the licensed sector. Partial criminalization in Sweden, by contrast, reduced street prostitution by 30 to 50 percent within three years of implementation and significantly reduced trafficking inflows compared to neighboring countries that maintained legal or tolerated markets.

This thesis argues that Thailand should adopt partial criminalization — decriminalizing the sale of sex while criminalizing its purchase — accompanied by substantial investment in exit programs, rural education, vocational training, and healthcare for sex workers. It further argues that reform requires confronting the institutional corruption that has allowed the industry to operate with impunity, and that Thailand's status as a high-capacity state means the missing ingredient is political will rather than institutional capacity. The case illustrates a broader principle with implications for international relations: that prostitution policy is not a purely domestic matter but a question of transnational governance and gendered political power whose resolution demands the tools of political science.

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This thesis is restricted to the Claremont Colleges current faculty, students, and staff.

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