“Prostitution Can Be Eliminated,” “It Should Just Go Underground”… The Modern Anti-Prostitution Movement, Where Even Among Those Who “Opposed” It, Opinions and Stances Vary

The Modern State-Sanctioned Prostitution System

“The Anti-Prostitution Law was enacted with the aim of abolishing the previous modern licensed prostitution system and transitioning to an entirely different framework,”

Professor Yoko Hayashi of the Faculty of Letters at Gakushuin University, who specializes in the intellectual and gender history of modern and contemporary Japan, explains it this way.

A “review of the Anti-Prostitution Law” is currently under discussion. Following the COVID-19 crisis, there has been an increase in streetwalkers at Okubo Park, and an incident uncovered in 2025—in which a 12-year-old Thai girl was forced to provide sexual services at a massage parlor in Tokyo—sparked a wave of calls for stricter regulations.

Critics have raised questions about the fact that “while sellers are subject to enforcement, there are no penalties for buyers,” prompting the Ministry of Justice to convene an expert panel in March of this year. On September 17, the panel compiled a report that included proposals to regulate solicitation by “buyers.” An amendment is expected during the extraordinary session of the Diet this fall.

The Anti-Prostitution Law was enacted in 1956. While it prohibits the buying and selling of sexual services, it does not criminalize the act of prostitution itself. Punishable offenses include solicitation by sellers in public, brokering prostitution, and providing venues for prostitution.

Japan’s system of regulating the sex trade (including sexual services other than prostitution) through the Anti-Prostitution Law and the Entertainment Business Regulation Law is unique even by global standards. How did the Anti-Prostitution Law come into being, and what issues did it present? We spoke with two experts about the pros and cons of criminalizing the purchase of sexual services.

In this first part of the series, Professor Hayashi explains the background leading up to the enactment of the Anti-Prostitution Law and the issues with the law itself.

From the Meiji era until the enactment of the Anti-Prostitution Law, the government maintained a modern state-sanctioned prostitution system and the “red-light” and “blue-light” districts (a system of tacitly permitted private prostitution) as a matter of national policy. The government sought to regulate the sexuality of its citizens for the sake of the nation’s progress and development.

“While a system of licensed prostitution existed during the Edo period, the Meiji Restoration ushered in an era of ‘enriching the nation and strengthening the military,’ and efforts to prevent sexually transmitted diseases were promoted to protect the military. This was not intended to safeguard public health, but rather to maximize national interests.

The modern state-sanctioned prostitution system was one in which ‘the state permitted the buying and selling of sex in specific areas, provided certain conditions were met.’ The anti-prostitution movement, which began in the Meiji period, arose in response to this issue” (Professor Hayashi; same source applies below).

“Prostitution is like sewage.”

According to Professor Hayashi, there were various viewpoints within the anti-prostitution movement. While some argued that “regulations should be strengthened, ” others opposed this stance.

“Under the pre-war adultery law, only women were punished for extramarital affairs, while men were let off the hook. Ochi Kubushiro, General Secretary of the Japan Christian Women’s Association for the Reform of Morals—which spearheaded the anti-prostitution movement—argued that ‘men should also be punished.’

“This has parallels with the current debate over criminalizing the purchase of sexual services. She argued that since the Japanese are susceptible to the authority of the government, an approach that emphasizes punishment would be effective. The idea was to ‘achieve gender equality through stricter regulations.’”

Even within the anti-prostitution movement, there were differences of opinion, with some believing that “prostitution can be eliminated” and others believing that “it cannot be completely eliminated.”

“Women’s rights advocates such as Raitei Hiratsuka and Kikue Yamakawa belonged to the former group, which differed from the Kyofukai. They raised the question of whether there was really a significant difference between marrying for economic reasons and prostitution, and from a standpoint that emphasized ‘freedom of love,’ they opposed regulation. However, this did not mean they endorsed prostitution itself.

On the other hand, there were women’s rights advocates like Noe Ito, who criticized the Kyofukai, arguing that ‘prostitution is based on male instinct and therefore cannot be abolished.’

Furthermore, the Kaku-sei-kai, led by Isao Abe and others, supported regulation based on the idea that “it should simply be kept out of the public eye and driven underground.”A metaphor was also used: “Prostitution is like sewage (it is dirty and cannot be eliminated, but it can be excluded from the public sphere and diverted underground)” (the “sewage theory”).

Then, in the postwar period, marking the 10th anniversary of the realization of women’s suffrage, female lawmakers considered it their mission to end the system of licensed prostitution.They worked across party lines to enact the Anti-Prostitution Law, and momentum toward its enactment accelerated. After several attempts at passage were rejected, the law was finally enacted in 1956 and fully implemented on April 1, 1958.

The Perspective of Protecting Women, Which Was Criticized as “Discriminatory”

It is said that, compared to before the law was enacted, women’s awareness of human rights and the social climate have changed significantly. A major shift occurred when the practice of selling daughters for the sake of the family—which had once been viewed as an act of filial piety—came to be recognized as abuse and a human rights violation.

However, Professor Hayashi points out that there were also shortcomings.

“The previous Anti-Prostitution Law faced criticism that ‘it was discriminatory because it viewed only women as the problem and positioned them solely as subjects of rehabilitation.’ As a result of welfare professionals lobbying politicians to change the law, a new law supporting women was enacted in ’22. Consequently, women’s protection facilities were transformed into women’s self-reliance support facilities.

The shift from protection to self-reliance support is highly significant. Until then, there had been an aspect of managing women in a paternalistic (patriarchal benevolence) manner, but the approach has now evolved to one that respects women’s human rights.”

Furthermore, Professor Hayashi expresses concern about criminalizing the purchase of sexual services.

“I oppose criminalizing the purchase of sexual services. This is because there is a risk of once again turning women into objects of protection and control. However, the question of whether to criminalize the purchase of sexual services should be considered separately from the moral merits of prostitution itself. A situation where a person’s body or sexuality is traded for money is undesirable.

Relationships between men and women must, by their very nature, be equal. Relationships involving money create a master-servant dynamic. This applies not only to prostitution but also to marriage. There are marriages where the wife views her husband as little more than an ATM. You might think I’m being romantic, but the ultimate goal we should strive for is an equal relationship free from the influence of money as much as possible.”

He says there is a gray area between romance and prostitution, and he feels stifled by the government and police intervening in that space.

“I think there are many people in society who don’t think too deeply about it and simply hold a conservative view that ‘I don’t want my life disrupted by prostitution.’ I want to tell these people, ‘Prostitution should be eliminated, but criminalizing the act of buying sex is not the way to do it.’

Operators who engage in sexual exploitation should be punished, but the parties involved in the buying and selling of sex should be decriminalized, and the issue should be addressed through education and social welfare rather than punishment. The state should not intervene based on prostitution itself; rather, instances of violence or sexual violence should be dealt with as ordinary crimes.

Rape committed against sex workers is, of course, rape and is absolutely unacceptable. Sexual violence must never occur, even between spouses or romantic partners. I believe a more appropriate approach would be to enact a law prohibiting sexual violence—rather than a law criminalizing the purchase of sex—to ban sexual violence itself in all forms of sexual relationships.”

Professor Hayashi states , “State power tends to want to control people’s sexuality.” This is a concept known as “biopower” (biopolitics), which involves managing people’s lives to serve the interests of society; the population issue, which is currently being widely discussed, is one such theme.Wouldn’t entrusting the police with the authority to judge the “correctness” of sexual behavior amount to a step backward to a time before the Anti-Prostitution Law?