From Millennial Sleaze to Old World Charm: The Politics of Place Branding in Creative City Singapore

Abstract

Night entertainment districts are an important attraction in many cities, often promoted and even cultivated by urban authorities as part of city branding efforts. Yet, adult oriented entertainment is prone to generating moral controversy, especially when sex work is visibly involved. How are the tensions between global- and creative city ambitions on one hand and the potential moral contentiousness of adult oriented entertainment on the other navigated by stakeholders such as the state, local businesses, residents, and civic groups? How and why are some night entertainment establishments accepted as legitimate contributors to global- and creative city visions, while others are stigmatized as unsavory or shameful?

This dissertation examines the politics of boundary work and place branding within the context of neoliberal authoritarian urban governance. I use the case study of Joo Chiat, a neighborhood in the city-state of Singapore, tracing its development from a relatively obscure neighborhood to a trendy tourist attraction known for its pre-war architecture and heritage. The turning point in this trajectory occurred in the early 2000s when Joo Chiat Road experienced an explosion of red-light businesses staffed mainly by migrant Asian women. This led a group of middle-class residents to form the Save Joo Chiat Work Group which then successfully lobbied the state to “clean up” Joo Chiat while promoting the neighborhood’s local heritage in a bid to “rehabilitate” its image.

In explaining the origins, resolution, and impact of the controversy along Joo Chiat Road in the early 2000s, I first introduce the concept of permeable industries to describe those economic sectors—most notably tourism, hospitality, and entertainment—whose establishments inherently facilitate considerable slippage between their officially sanctioned purposes and illicit or stigmatized activity. Drawing on interviews, three years of participant observation, and archival data spanning 1910—2022, I demonstrate that the Joo Chiat neighborhood has been a historically conducive environment for the flourishing of permeable industries, a tendency that was amplified by the neoliberal authoritarian state’s attempts at the turn of the millennium to develop Joo Chiat as a decentralized tourist hub in line with creative city ambitions for Singapore. However, in the absence of close regulations and state sensitivity to local history, the proliferation of permeable tourist and entertainment establishments along Joo Chiat Road instead facilitated the development of a vibrant low-end red-light district, much to the dismay of middle-class residents. Finally, I show that in its effort to “clean up” the neighborhood, the Save Joo Chiat Work Group did not categorically oppose night entertainment businesses or the state’s creative city ambitions more broadly, but rather mobilized the discourses of “sleaze” on one hand and “old world charm” on the other to distinguish between night time establishments that were acceptable or unacceptable to middle-class sensibilities. These boundary drawing efforts ultimately led to the reassertion of existing hierarchies of class, nationality, and ethnicity in urban space. Although the authoritarian state appeared to adopt an uncharacteristically reactive stance towards Joo Chiat residents’ initiatives, the precipitation and resolution of the Joo Chiat Road controversy ultimately unfolded within the parameters of the state’s neoliberal urban governance.