Transitioning Thailand: Techno-professionalism and nation-building in the transgender entertainment industry

Abstract

The workplace is a key site through which sex and gender are organizationally produced and unequal gender relations take place. Technologies, which are embedded with and impacting gendered power relations, are also integral to work and workplaces worldwide. As nation-states promote technologies and rebrand themselves, how do technologies catalyze new forms of gendered embodiment and work—and how might this contribute to a nation-state's development plans and rebranding efforts? How do the intersections between states, labor, and technologies also reify inequalities, both in and beyond workplace settings? Based on 14 months of fieldwork and interviews with 62 participants, this article analyzes how Thai transgender women's work in the entertainment industry simultaneously advances technological growth and national rebranding efforts. In 2016, the Thai state launched “Thailand 4.0,” an economic plan centered on technological growth, alongside efforts to restore its reputation from a sex tourism destination. In this context, Thai transgender entertainers promote what I call “techno-professionalism,” or professionalism that is not only enhanced by technologies, but that also supports state development plans and rebranding efforts. The concept of techno-professionalism underscores how technologies figure centrally into new iterations of state development and nation-branding promoted in global workplaces, adding to our understanding of the linkages between gender, labor, and national development. By highlighting how state development plans intersect with technologies and norms of professionalism, this article reveals how the economy and professions are made up of intimate social relations, including gendered technologies and gendered social roles.