Another Kind of R & R: An Historical Analysis of the Camptown Clean-Up Campaign and the Reinforcement & Regulation of Camptown Prostitution in South Korea, 1971-1976

Abstract

This paper analyzes the Camptown Clean-Up Campaign (1971-1976), a joint governmental initiative between the United States and South Korea to regulate the lives of prostituted South Korean women working in camptowns surrounding U.S. military bases in South Korea. Implemented in large part due to increasing racial tensions between military personnel and Korean nationals, and rising rates of venereal diseases among American soldiers, the Camptown Clean-Up Campaign held prostituted women that worked in the camptowns responsible for failing base-community relations. At the same time, national and international laws existed outlawing prostitution and prostitution-related activities. These laws also maintained that parties engaging in prostitution or related activities could be criminally punished. Using the theoretical concept of wartime [1], I argue that the world’s understanding of the Cold War as wartime justified this gross breech of national and international law by governments who utilized women and women’s bodies to fulfill their own self-interests.