The Allure of Transactional Intimacy in Sugar Dating

Datos Bibliográficos

ID2363775
AutoresLena Gunnarsson (0000-0002-7766-8696, Örebro University, Örebro, Sweden, autor de correspondencia)
Año2024
Volumen67
Número1-3
Páginas25-41
Fecha de publicación2024-06-01
Peer ReviewedSí
Open AccessSí
TipoARTICLE
RevistaSociological Perspectives (JOURNAL)
Identificadores de la revistaISSN: 0731-1214 • E-ISSN: 1533-8673
EditorialSAGE Publications Inc (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1177/07311214231191771
OpenAlexW4386029050
IdiomaEN
Citas recibidas7
Referencias citadas33

The proliferation of 'sugar dating' websites, facilitating transactional relationships between a 'sugar baby' and a 'sugar daddy,' raises new questions about the reconfigured relationship between intimacy and economy in the contemporary Global North. By encouraging people to approach sex and intimacy through a logic of exchange, sugar dating has been claimed to represent the culmination of a broader trend towards a 'marketization' of intimacy. Based on semi-structured interviews, this article analyzes Swedish 'sugar babies'' investment in a transactional approach to intimate interactions with men, focusing on the emotional rewards that they associate with the transactional setup of sugar dating. While the participants' transactional approach to intimacy is bolstered by the cultural dispersal of a neoliberal rationality into ever more domains of life, I argue that its deeper roots need to be sought in the precarious conditions of contemporary intimacy. Drawing in particular on the work of Eva Illouz, I claim that the women's embracement of a transactional approach to heterosexual sex and intimacy may be read as a defensive tactic of seeking to gain control over the flows of intimate interaction in light of the (gendered) insecurities and vulnerabilities of the contemporary market of intimacy

Marketization · Political science · Sociology · Transactional analysis · Transactional leadership · Transactional sex · Gender, Feminism, and Media · Law · Marriage and Sexual Relationships · Psychology · Sexuality, Behavior, and Technology · Social Psychology