戰爭的親密經濟：越南戰爭黑市與性經濟書籍導讀

 戰爭的親密經濟：越南戰爭黑市與性經濟書籍導讀

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越南戰爭長期被視為軍事與政治衝突，但近年學術研究轉向其地下經濟：黑市、軍事相關貿易與美軍基地周邊的性經濟。這些作品顯示戰爭不僅在叢林與村莊中進行，也在市場、妓院與暗巷交易中展開，性、金錢與生存交織。對熟悉金貞敏《黑市親密》的讀者，越南戰爭提供平行但獨特的案例，展現軍事主義如何重塑性別勞動、非正式貿易與日常生活。

越南戰爭經濟書籍

多部研究直接連結越南戰爭與非法與性別經濟：

• Amanda Boczar，《美國妓院：越南戰爭期間的性與外交》（Cornell University Press, 2022）
  Boczar 探討美軍與越南及亞洲女性的性接觸，聚焦妓院與「娛樂」空間如何成為外交、監視與種族化欲望的場所。她揭示性經濟嵌入美軍與外交策略，越南女性在剝削與能動性間周旋。

• 《帝國禮物：肥皂、人道主義與南越黑市》（Radical History Review, 2023）
  這篇論文將美軍分發的肥皂視為「禮物」轉黑市商品，追蹤南越黑市如何將軍需肥皂轉為非法貿易，截斷美帝流動，創造戰時資本主義下的替代社會關係。

• 《越南黑市經濟》（University of Hawai‘i Institutional Repository, 2023）
  這篇社會史重建南越跨國黑市，展現平民、士兵與商人如何在佔領區移動貨物。它強調戰時參與者透過走私、生存與非正式交易記憶戰爭。

• 《劍橋越南戰爭史》第29章：「越南戰爭經濟」（Cambridge University Press, 2024）
  這章將戰爭經濟置於全球脈絡，涵蓋美援、通脹與軍事支出的 destabilizing 效果，為正式與非正式經濟共存提供背景。

• Anthony P. Campagna，《越南戰爭的經濟後果》（Praeger, 1991）
  這本經典研究聚焦戰爭對美國經濟的影響，但暗示戰爭支出如何在海外催生非正式與軍事相關市場。

這些作品顯示，越南戰爭像韓戰一樣，圍繞美軍存在產生複雜性與黑市經濟，與《黑市親密》共享對親密、性別與非正式貿易如何成為戰爭物質基礎的興趣。

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Intimate Economies of War: Introducing Books on the Vietnam War’s Black Markets and Sexual Economies

 Intimate Economies of War: Introducing Books on the Vietnam War’s Black Markets and Sexual Economies

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The Vietnam War has long been studied as a military and political conflict, but a growing body of scholarship now turns to its intimate, underground economies: black markets, military‑linked trade, and sexual economies around U.S. bases and occupied zones. These works show that the war was not only fought in jungles and villages, but also in markets, brothels, and back‑alley exchanges where sex, money, and survival intertwined. For readers familiar with Jeongmin Kim’s Black Market Intimacies, the Vietnam War offers a parallel yet distinct case of how militarism reshapes gendered labor, informal trade, and everyday life.

Key Books on Vietnam’s War Economies

Several recent studies explicitly connect the Vietnam War with illicit and gendered economies:

• Amanda Boczar, An American Brothel: Sex and Diplomacy during the Vietnam War(Cornell University Press, 2022)
  Boczar examines sexual encounters between American servicemen and Vietnamese and other Asian women, focusing on how brothels and “entertainment” spaces functioned as sites of diplomacy, surveillance, and racialized desire. Her work reveals how sexual economies were embedded in U.S. military and diplomatic strategies, and how Vietnamese women navigated both exploitation and agency within these structures.

• “Imperial Gift: Soap, Humanitarianism, and Black Marketeering in South Vietnam” (Radical History Review, 2023)
  This article by an emerging scholar theorizes U.S.‑distributed soap as a “gift” turned black‑market commodity. It traces how South Vietnamese black‑marketeers repurposed military‑supplied soap into an illegal trade good, intercepting U.S. imperial flows and creating alternative social relations under wartime capitalism.

• “Vietnam’s Black Market Economy” (University of Hawai‘i Institutional Repository, 2023)
  This social‑history paper reconstructs South Vietnam’s transnational black market, showing how civilians, soldiers, and traders moved goods across borders and through occupied zones. It highlights how wartime participants later remembered the war through stories of smuggling, survival, and informal exchange.

• The Cambridge History of the Vietnam War, Chapter 29: “The Economics of the Vietnam War” (Cambridge University Press, 2024)
  While broader in scope, this chapter situates the war’s economic history in global context, including U.S. aid flows, inflation, and the destabilizing effects of military spending. It provides essential background for understanding how formal and informal economies co‑existed during the conflict.

• Anthony P. Campagna, The Economic Consequences of the Vietnam War (Praeger, 1991)
  Campagna’s classic study focuses on the war’s impact on the U.S. economy—spending, inflation, employment, and long‑term structural change—but it also hints at the ways war spending fueled informal and military‑linked markets overseas.

Together, these works suggest that the Vietnam War, like the Korean War, produced a complex sexual and black‑market economy around U.S. military presence. They share with Black Market Intimacies an interest in how intimacy, gender, and informal trade become central to the material foundations of war and occupation.

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