Time, space, and the authorisation of sex premises in London and Sydney

Prior, J; Hubbard, P

Time, space, and the authorisation of sex premises in London and Sydney

Prior, J

Hubbard, P

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Publication Type:: Journal Article
Citation:: Urban Studies, 2017, 54 (3), pp. 633 - 648
Issue Date:: 2017-02-01

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Field	Value	Language
dc.contributor.author	Prior, J https://orcid.org/0000-0002-6145-5207	en_US
dc.contributor.author	Hubbard, P	en_US
dc.date.issued	2017-02-01	en_US
dc.identifier.citation	Urban Studies, 2017, 54 (3), pp. 633 - 648	en_US
dc.identifier.issn	0042-0980	en_US
dc.identifier.uri	http://hdl.handle.net/10453/41036
dc.description.abstract	© 2015, © Urban Studies Journal Limited 2015. While the regulation of commercial sex in the city has traditionally involved formal policing, recent shifts in many jurisdictions have seen sex premises of various kinds granted formal recognition via planning, licensing and environmental control. This means that ‘sexual entertainment venues’, ‘brothels’ and ‘sex shops’ are now not just labels applied to particular types of premises, but formal categories of legal land use. However, these categories are not clear-cut, and it is not simply the case that changes in the law instantiate a change whereby these premises are brought into being at a particular point in time. Countering the privileging of space over time that is apparent within much contemporary research on sex and the city, this paper foregrounds the varied temporalities in play here, and describes how the actions of those policy-makers, municipal bureaucrats and officers allow sex premises to variously ‘fade in’, accelerate, linger, or disappear as legal land uses within the city. We examine the implications of these different temporalities of the law by exploring how sex premises have been subject to regulation in London and Sydney, showing that the volatile, contradictory and fractured nature of legal space-making does not necessarily provide the certainty sought by the law but produces overlapping and contested understandings of what types of premises should be subject to regulation. More broadly the paper highlights how attention to the contingency and complexity of municipal law can help us better understand the ways that commercial sex is differently manifest in different cities.	en_US
dc.relation.ispartof	Urban Studies	en_US
dc.relation.isbasedon	10.1177/0042098015612057	en_US
dc.subject.classification	Urban & Regional Planning	en_US
dc.title	Time, space, and the authorisation of sex premises in London and Sydney	en_US
dc.type	Journal Article
utslib.citation.volume	3	en_US
utslib.citation.volume	54	en_US
utslib.for	1205 Urban and Regional Planning	en_US
utslib.for	1402 Applied Economics	en_US
utslib.for	1604 Human Geography	en_US
pubs.embargo.period	Not known	en_US
pubs.organisational-group	/University of Technology Sydney
pubs.organisational-group	/University of Technology Sydney/DVC (Research)
pubs.organisational-group	/University of Technology Sydney/DVC (Research)/Institute For Sustainable Futures
pubs.organisational-group	/University of Technology Sydney/e-Press
pubs.organisational-group	/University of Technology Sydney/Strength - ISF - Institute for Sustainable Futures
utslib.copyright.status	open_access
pubs.issue	3	en_US
pubs.publication-status	Published	en_US
pubs.volume	54	en_US

Abstract:

© 2015, © Urban Studies Journal Limited 2015. While the regulation of commercial sex in the city has traditionally involved formal policing, recent shifts in many jurisdictions have seen sex premises of various kinds granted formal recognition via planning, licensing and environmental control. This means that ‘sexual entertainment venues’, ‘brothels’ and ‘sex shops’ are now not just labels applied to particular types of premises, but formal categories of legal land use. However, these categories are not clear-cut, and it is not simply the case that changes in the law instantiate a change whereby these premises are brought into being at a particular point in time. Countering the privileging of space over time that is apparent within much contemporary research on sex and the city, this paper foregrounds the varied temporalities in play here, and describes how the actions of those policy-makers, municipal bureaucrats and officers allow sex premises to variously ‘fade in’, accelerate, linger, or disappear as legal land uses within the city. We examine the implications of these different temporalities of the law by exploring how sex premises have been subject to regulation in London and Sydney, showing that the volatile, contradictory and fractured nature of legal space-making does not necessarily provide the certainty sought by the law but produces overlapping and contested understandings of what types of premises should be subject to regulation. More broadly the paper highlights how attention to the contingency and complexity of municipal law can help us better understand the ways that commercial sex is differently manifest in different cities.

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http://hdl.handle.net/10453/41036