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COVID-19 in Japan: A Nighttime Disease

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  14 March 2025

Valentina Giammaria
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Abstract

When the state of emergency was declared in Tokyo, it was less a mandatory order than a request for cooperation and for jishuku (self-restraint). Along with the ambiguous status of such a request in a time of pandemic, this confusion was further compounded by uneven enforcement. While wealthier, middle class areas were left relatively unpatrolled, the areas around the redlight district of Kabuki-chō in Shinjuku, Tokyo, were very strictly monitored despite the lack of any conclusive data at that time regarding the infection patterns or rates. In targeting workers in the “night business,” the Tokyo Metropolitan Government reenacted centuries old prejudices against those working the sex trades. This paper focuses on how the advent of COVID-19 affected the lives of people working in the settai (business entertainment) industry, in particular hostesses in hostess bars, kyabajō (hostesses in clubs), and male hosts. Their voices tell us how, through the government's actions as well as mass media and social media discourse surrounding their work, these laborers were stigmatized, resulting in a worsening of their already precarious positions as they have been expected to do difficult and increasingly dangerous work, almost always without any contract or insurance protection, in a time of pandemic.

Keywords

COVID-19vulnerable populationssex workKabuki-cho
Type
Research Article
Information
Asia-Pacific Journal , Volume 18 , Issue 18 , September 2020 , e8
Copyright
Copyright © The Authors 2020

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