Selling sex under socialism: prostitution in the post-war USSR

The existence of prostitution was embarrassing for the Soviet government. This was especially true after the end of the Second World War and the death of Josef Stalin, when the Cold War and global processes of decolonization were in full swing and the USSR competed for the supremacy of its version of state socialism on the world stage. Soviet officials claimed that social ills that plagued capitalist countries, like prostitution, did not exist in the USSR. Despite these confident declarations, Party officials at the central and regional level, law enforcement and medical workers, as well as ordinary Soviet citizens, were well aware that these statements were false, as prostitution was a permanent feature in Soviet cities in the long post-war period. This article examines Soviet state policies towards women engaged in sex work from the mid-1950s until the disintegration of the Soviet Union in 1991. The article also explores how policing actually functioned in practice in major cities, paying particular attention to the Baltic capitals of Riga and Tallinn. This 'top down' and 'bottom up' approach reveals how prostitution was entangled with the spatial politics of the long post-war era, and examines how Soviet citizens aided and resisted policing, motivated by ideological commitment, indifference or concern for their own financial gain.