1The globalisation of tourism in formerly colonised countries such as Vietnam has long been studied using two fundamentally similar, academic approaches. The first constructs international tourism – defined most often from the perspective of former colonial metropoles – as a lever for economic development. (Krapf, 1961) The second critiques the marginal profits earned by these countries for a profoundly neo-colonial activity. (Turner, Ash, 1975) In both cases, only a minor role is given to local populations (Peyvel, 2017), which overlooks the complexity of power dynamics between local actors and their disparate capacities to negotiate, defy, or on the contrary accompany this sector’s development. (Scheyvens, 2002) This article extends the reach of both approaches by studying the globalisation of tourism using tools borrowed from both tourism geography and urban studies. We look at how urban space given over to tourism is both a vector and an indicator of power struggles (Backouche et al., 2011; Clerval et al., 2015) in order to understand the inequalities structuring this activity in one of global tourism’s most emblematic spaces: the backpacker district.

2Since the pioneering works of Erik Cohen (1973), the scientific community has yet to establish a commonly accepted definition for backpackers; however, it has become possible to identify recurring themes concerning the type of tourists that frequent backpacking areas. They are generally young tourists (often under 40), justifying the expression “youth travel hub” to designate the neighbourhoods to which they are drawn. (Richards, Wilson-Bareau, 2004) They also generally travel without a precise itinerary and off the beaten path, in keeping with their values of liberty and authenticity. (Howard, 2005; Pearce et al., 2009; Hannam, Diekmann, 2010; Hampton, 2013) Scholarship has shown that these modes of travel, more fantasized than real, are undergoing a profound normalisation that distances them from the original model of the drifter, a figure born with the 1960s hippie movement. (Ateljevic, Doorne, 2004; O’Reilly, 2006; Demers, 2012; Le Bigot, 2016) This evolution greatly affects the production of backpacking districts throughout the world. Such areas can be defined by a very specific public (a high number of backpackers though it remains difficult to count them precisely) and the characteristic services offered (guest houses, cyber cafés, small grocery stores). Both factors flag such areas in the local landscape and in the major international guidebooks that reference them.

3Long seen from the point of view of tourists, scholars have historically constructed these districts as enclaves (Edensor, 2001; Hottola, 2005; Howard, 2005; Lloyd, 2006; Wilson, Richards, 2008) or bubbles (Judd, 1999), reinforcing their specificity in cities where they develop. In order to nuance this de-territorialisation, we have focused on the local actors involved in this economy, which to the best of our knowledge is a position that has yet to be explored. Our analysis focuses on how professionals, neighbourhood residents, and authorities invest this global backpacking economy in order to understand both their ability to profit from the situation and the severe inequalities amongst the various stakeholders. Social class, nationality, skin colour, gender, and age are all discriminating factors in the spatial and economic access to the resources provided by tourism.

4Together with India and Nepal, Southeast Asia is home to some of the oldest backpacker trails and remains the most popular backpacker destination. (Hampton, Hamzah, 2010) This historical development explains the many specialized districts of the region dedicated to backpackers: Khao San Road in Bangkok, Jalan Jaksa in Jakarta, or Boeng Kak in Phnom Penh. (Howard, 2007; Hampton, 2013; Le Bigot, 2016) In Vietnam, the Pham Ngu Lao neighbourhood of the southern metropolis of Ho Chi Minh city is closely associated with the presence of backpackers since the beginning of the 1990s (Lloyd, 2003), thanks to the reopening of the country in 1986 and especially the end of the American embargo in 1994. As can be seen on the maps of figure 1, Pham Ngu Lao has historically been an exceptional transportation hub, with both the Central Train Station and the harbour nearby during the colonial period. Today, it is located next to the Ben Thanh bus station and central market. The neighbourhood’s unique location partially explains how it became associated with Vietnam’s window to the rest of the world. During the colonial period, the area was a destination for soldiers in search of prostitutes. In the 1960s, US soldiers on leave appreciated its budget accommodations. These were the premises for the area’s current specialisation in budget tourism. As seen in the third map of figure 1, Pham Ngu Lao’s toponym currently designates a busy thoroughfare in District 1, the sub-district (phuòng) serviced by the thoroughfare with a total of 17,000 inhabitants in 2015 (Health Department of Ho Chi Minh City, 2015), and the portion of this subdistrict dedicated to activities for tây ba lô, Westerners with back-packs.

Fig. 1

Locating and integrating Pham Ngu Lao in Ho Chi Minh City

Locating and integrating Pham Ngu Lao in Ho Chi Minh City

5Our bottom-up approach to globalisation using the little studied case of Pham Ngu Lao participates in our desire to critically understand tourist economies and how they interact with the construction of contemporary urbanism. As a consumer practice in the framework of globalised leisure societies, tourism allows us to challenge the economic, social, and cultural mechanisms behind the reproduction of spaces and the distribution of the power that regulates said spaces, illustrated by the struggle to appropriate its material and immaterial resources. (Boukhris, Chapuis, 2016) The resulting spatial transformations, girded by profoundly unequal social relationships, underline the effects of domination, exploitation, and oppression between local actors.

6Our results were obtained by combining the research focus of both authors: tourism for the first (Peyvel, 2009) and urban studies for the second (Gibert, 2014a). They were made possible thanks to a prolonged stay in the country. Our research methodology is based on two main tools. The first is a spatial analysis of trade activities tied to tourism through typo-morphological surveys at the scale of each plot, resulting in a precise understanding of the spatial logics that regulate their deployment, beyond the apparent homogeneity of the area. These periods of observations were formalised thanks to cadastres obtained beforehand. In order to round out our understanding of these observations, we undertook a comprehensive survey of roughly thirty semi-directive interviews mainly in Vietnamese – more rarely in French or English – with neighbourhood actors such as managers and employees of small hotels, restaurants, bars, spas, and boutiques dedicated to serving tourists. These surveys were combined with observations that were occasionally participative at different moments of the day and night and built around two series: an explorative one in April-May 2006 and the main series carried out in August and October 2014 [1].

7To better present our research, we have organised the current article into three parts. We begin with an overview of the globalised nature of the neighbourhood, the result of the different degrees of implication of the various actors in this economy of mobility. Then, we focus on the area’s economic specialisation with a study of the different services provided and the intertwined relationships of domination and submission that regulate its organisation. Finally, we lay out the spatial and social inequalities that result from a globalised economic activity that is inherently competitive, one that elicits avidity and justifies an increase in social control.

A globalised tourist district

8To different degrees, the economic actors who earn their living through tourism in Pham Ngu Lao have managed to take advantage of various network opportunities to transform this portion of the city into a globalised neighbourhood. They used both the various means of transportation available in the area and the Internet’s capacities to expand their offers to a wider range of tourists. This is how Pham Ngu Lao participates in a network that includes other tourist locations at both the global and city scale.

At the global scale, a recognizable and recognised backpacking district

9The perimeter of backpacking activities in Pham Ngu Lao is more or less the same in all of the major international guides, whether it is the French Guide du Routard, the Australian Lonely Planet, the English Rough Guide, the German Baedeker, the Japanese Arukikata, or the guide written by the Chinese National Administration. The backpacking zone occupies only a portion of the sub-district of the same name. This trapezoid measures roughly 5 hectares (12 acres) and is bounded to the north by the Pham Ngu Lao Boulevard, to the south by Trân Hung Dao Boulevard, to the east by Nguyên Thi Minh Khai Street, and to the west by Công Quynh Street (fig. 1). The homogeneity of its borders shows the extent to which its global identification is stable.

10This reputation has been crafted by both word of mouth among tourists and most especially by shopkeepers working to develop activities tied to the area’s tourist potential. When their establishment has been mentioned in the various guide books and referencing sites (especially Tripadvisor), owners tend to plaster their doors and counters with the different logos. These stickers help tourists orient themselves while also feeding an economy of reputation. They are also used to legitimise the owner’s activity on the global stage. Such recommendations participate in the staging of a joyful cosmopolitanism. Affixed next to the logos of the accepted credit cards and the establishment’s Wi-Fi codes, these labels demonstrate that shopkeepers master globalised means of communications. Such a communication strategy also encourages tourists to leave comments, drawings, business cards, and flags (photos 1 and 2). The Guest Book, which no one ever reads, is no longer the destination for such memorabilia; rather, they are displayed directly on the walls and across social media platforms.

Photos 1 and 2

Staging of cosmopolitanism in Pham Ngu Lao

Staging of cosmopolitanism in Pham Ngu Lao

11Tourist activity has created a landscape that is typical of backpacking districts. The signs are almost all in English, though Japanese, Chinese, and Korean are increasingly present on menus and agency brochures in response to a growing clientele (Teo, Leong, 2006). A handful of French references remind visitors of colonial Indochina. The landscape is particularly recognisable at night. Neon lights, string lights, and flashing advertisements echo the nocturnal landscapes of other Asian metropolises known for their urban nightlife, such as Bangkok, Hong Kong, or Tokyo.

12At the domestic level, this internationalised landscape is reflected in the brands of food and hygiene products. Small shops offer French biscuits alongside Chinese instant noodles, with American sodas and Japanese beauty products not far down the aisle. Such shops have carefully replicated globalised consumption codes (prices are indicated, the uniformed staff is multilingual, the shop itself is well lit and clean). Though these products can be found elsewhere, they are never so easily located and in such large quantities. To help their clientele deal with the sentiment of otherness, hosts and hotel managers offer their idea of a Western breakfast: eggs served alongside pancakes and accompanied by Lipton tea. They also try, however modestly, to provide standard norms of comfort such as seated toilets, foreign television stations, and of course a Wi-Fi connection.

The district’s national and regional influence

13Pham Ngu Lao is also very well connected at the national level to all of the country’s major tourist sites and those of neighbouring Cambodia (fig. 2). The neighbourhood is the starting point for a route that runs 1,300 kilometres to Sa Pa, a Northern resort town in the mountains at the border with China. The trip is generally made by buses that are filled in the evening by backpackers; but also by domestic tourists, students and workers taking advantage of a solid performance-price ratio. For several dozens of dollars at most, all passengers can enjoy air-conditioned beds, free water, and on-board toilets, along with recent vehicles that have been inspected for safety. Parking lots near the departure of these buses offer weekly rates, allowing travellers to leave their motorbikes, the most common means of transportation in Vietnam. Thus, the neighbourhood’s tourist economy participates greatly in constructing the city’s mobility.

Fig. 2

Pham Ngu Lao, a tourist hub

Pham Ngu Lao, a tourist hub

14These routes also strengthen the area’s impact at the regional level by offering multiple excursions within a hundred kilometre radius, especially in the Mekong Delta. In all, it is possible to travel directly to no fewer than 20 destinations from Pham Ngu Lao.

15For backpackers, this formula is the key selling point of the open ticket that allows them to travel the country, making as many stops as they wish. The Sinh Café was the first establishment in Vietnam to offer such a ticket. The Sinh Café travel agency was created in 1992 by a Vietnamese couple living in Pham Ngu Lao. It has since opened branches in the centre in 1994 and in Hanoi in 1995. [2] Their ability to offer activities and transportation services in several languages has since been copied many times over. Kim Café is one such example; it was founded by a former employee of Sinh Café. Pham Ngu Lao has thus become a model for professionals of Vietnamese tourism, strengthening its position as a connected and innovative hub at the national level.

Between anchors and mobility: Backpacking’s glocalised economy

A neighbourhood specialised in travelling…

19Certain local actors have turned this function into a resource, offering their clients the possibility to go from here (the backpacker’s district) to there (the halts at the other tourist sites along the way) and further still (the family and friends to whom the traveller gives news). The typo-morphological survey confirms the extent to which tourism activities are important (fig. 3): the dark grey shows that these activities have taken over all others along the main thoroughfare. The survey also shows the importance of small agencies, like the Sinh Café. On only the Bùi Viên section (fig. 4), there are no fewer than eleven. Their strategic role is to offer different types of services tied to mobility: transportation tickets (open bus tickets, train and plane tickets), visa extensions, tourist activities with or without guides, and even motorbike rentals. They take advantage of an economy of alterity by helping organize a trip logistically, legally, and linguistically. The “passers of alterity” (Équipe MIT, 2002) who work for these agencies can obtain advantageous work conditions, accumulating both formal and informal revenue:

20

“Respondent: I have been a guide for a dozen years. Before, I was an English teacher. I decided to quit. Today, at 52, I earn much more and can organise my day as I see fit. I always do the same tour [Cú Chi], I can go home in the evening and work only three or four days a week. The agency gives me a fixed salary and the tourists give me tips.
Surveyor: Along the way, we stopped in bar-restaurants where you can buy souvenirs. Do you get anything from these stops?
R: Yes, I always stop in the same ones and they pay me a little because I guarantee them regular clients.”

Fig. 3

The typo-morphological survey of the touristic economic sector of Pham Ngu Lao

The typo-morphological survey of the touristic economic sector of Pham Ngu Lao

… and the temporary anchor they produce

21Organising a long trip coupled with a visit of the city and nearby sites justifies staying several days in the tourist area. This temporary base is economically exploited by the many actors offering services that can be divided into two categories. The first handles basic needs: sleeping, eating, hygiene, communicating… These services are provided by rest houses, bars and restaurants, small grocery stores, launderettes, internet cafes, and the post office. The second category deals with entertainment, especially nocturnal leisure: bars and nightclubs, boutiques of souvenirs, tailors, spas, massages, nail bars. We can also include the illegal trade of sex and drugs. These services are provided in a wide variety of forms and organisations on a continuum from legality to illegality, from stable to mobile, from large surfaces to micro-shops, etc. As for hawkers, figure 4 differentiates between two localisation logics: street vendors who occupy the same portion of the sidewalk daily to offer their services and those who walk endlessly [3], a much more precarious situation.

Fig. 4

Between anchors and mobility, the diversity of touristic services in Pham Ngu Lao

Between anchors and mobility, the diversity of touristic services in Pham Ngu Lao

22The majority of services offered can be read as form of glocalisation, a hybridisation of modes of global consumption of leisure and local practices, a fundamental dynamic of globalisation. (Bhabha, 1994; Appadurai, 1996) For example, the guesthouse model is here represented by its local equivalent: the nhà nghí (literally a house to sleep in, which translates into Spartan hotels). Cheap street food stalls (com bình dân), which are highly popular in Vietnam, have hybridised with take-away services to offer inexpensive drinks, soups, and sandwiches. The ubiquitous beer bars (bia hòi), where clients are often seated outside, are also highly popular among tourists.

23There is a visible interpenetration between the family and the trade spheres, depending on the varying degrees of formalisation. One example is laundry service. Certain establishments, such as travel agencies, offer the use of washing machines for a fixed sum. Tourists can also leave their laundry at their guest house, where it will be washed on-site according to established rates or be entrusted informally to an outside person, often female. She can thus make a profit off the recent purchase of a washing machine or earn a living from home by washing the clothes by hand and ironing them. Finally, there are also signs in English, or sometimes only in Vietnamese, indicating that the inhabitants of a home are willing to do laundry. These different options allow the tourist economy to reach into the heart of each block, where nothing is officially identified on the typo-morphological survey. This said, the degree to which an activity is carried out informally directly correlates with the extent to which the family sphere is implicated, the percentage of women handling such activities, and the modesty of earned revenue. All of these adaptations testify to the capacity of local actors to understand tourists’ expectations in order to lessen the alterity and make them feel at home. An actor’s capacity to do so is dependent on their experience with foreigners, a discriminating factor in the tourist economy. The Vietnamese who have always lived in their home country are penalised compared to those who have lived or travelled abroad, to shopkeepers with family networks in other countries, to mixed race couples, and to expatriates who have lived for many years in Vietnam. The example of Mimi, who has two spas in the neighbourhood where she has lived for the past ten years, is eloquent:

24

Interviewer: Where do you come from?
Mimi: From Vung Tàu [a seaside resort town located a hundred kilometres away], but I have been living in Saigon for the past twenty years.
I: Why are the signs in your spa written in Korean?
M: I want to attract this clientele. I lived in Korea for six years. I still have family over there.
E: Oh, and your husband?
M: No, my husband is Dutch.
E: So you speak Korean?
M: Yes, my clients are Korean and Japanese. They like the calm, the cleanliness, and the quality of our services. It reminds them of home.

Towards a relational approach of the neighbourhood

25Though the specialisation of an area into a backpacking zone renders it visible at the urban and the global levels, it does not necessarily transform it into an exceptional enclave. There are three main reasons for this, all of which allow us to re-contextualise it within its urban environment.

26First, from an economic point of view, the specialisation of activities within an urban zone is common in Vietnam. Historically, this has been done jointly with a trade village situated on the periphery of the city that thus manages to perpetuate its social hierarchy and rituals within the city. (Fanchette, 2012; Papin, 2013) A legacy of the Chinese trade corporations (Clément, 1995; Quynh Trân, Nguyên Trong, 2007; Chow, 2015), this system presents clear advantages: increased recognition, ease in the circulation of sales and fabrication techniques within the trade community, price regulations…. In Ho Chi Minh City, there exists a jam-making neighbourhood (district 3) and another for lanterns (Tân Bình district). (Gibert, 2014a) This is why the specialisation of Pham Ngu Lao into a backpacking neighbourhood belongs to economic logics that are common in Vietnam; even though tourism is an exceptional activity due to the necessarily large presence of foreigners.

27Next, from a morphological standpoint, the zone does not present itself as an exceptional enclave. The surveys, based on land registers (fig. 3), show that the neighbourhood is densely populated and is thus controlled by the same architectural and real estate dynamics as the rest of the city. The splintering of real estate has resulted in the construction of tube homes that are 3 to 4 metres wide and 15 to 25 metres long. The densification of construction takes place at the heart of blocks, whose contours are defined by a jumble of alleys. In turn, these alleys are contained within several major thoroughfares which, in our case study, were already present during the colonial period. Backpacking activities flourish in these long, dim buildings, whose facades are reduced to a minimum due to their exorbitant prices. The term nhà mặt tiền designates a house found on a frontage street; mặt tiền means “facade” in Vietnamese and interestingly enough, tiền also means “money”. Houses on larger arteries are more expensive thanks to their trade potential. Backpacking activities did not provoke major changes in the urban fabric or in the local architecture because its production is part of the adaptive processes carried out by a multitude of local stakeholders, in line with the glocalisation model.

28Finally, from a social standpoint, the area is visited not only by foreign tourists but also by relatively affluent, recent Vietnamese graduates of both sexes, who are looking to spend an evening in establishments that encourage access to globalised modes of leisure consumption. Speaking in English, meeting Westerners, spending an evening at an “it” bar, listening to music, dancing… These are some of the many reasons given for going to the backpacking neighbourhood during our interviews. During these same interviews, the neighbourhood’s shady reputation (drugs, sex, and its relative insecurity) is either accepted or handled thoughtfully (“I’m never alone here, I come with my girlfriends, we meet up with other guy friends or foreign colleagues from work”, Hà, 23 years old) or constructed positively. The festive, tolerant, and cosmopolitan nature of the zone renders it particularly attractive to a young, urban population looking to transform their nightlife into a distinctive, urban lifestyle (Drummond, Thomas, 2003), by coming to celebrate Christmas, Halloween, or Saint Valentine’s Day for example. Thus, Pham Ngu Lao appears completely integrated into the city, with a range of visitors that extends far beyond only foreign tourists.

A neighbourhood living off of a competitive, globalised economy that generates inequalities and cupidity

Spatial inequalities and social hierarchies

29The spatial functioning of the neighbourhood leads to inequalities because it is structured on the one hand by visible, central spaces and on the other by marginalised, invisible areas. In order to analyse them, the typo-morphological survey (fig. 3) was combined with a survey on the degree of a building’s investment in tourism (fig. 5). Buildings were graded from 3 (total investment) to 0 (no investment), depending on the number of occupied floors, the publicity, and the equipment available. Both these studies show that dominating relationships are based on the both the horizontal and vertical division of space.

Fig. 5

Tourist investment gradient

Tourist investment gradient

30Prominent activities strategically occupy the main arteries and intersections, the ground floors, and the shop windows. The services offered are clearly indicated by touts and multi-lingual advertisements. They can also be outrageously decorated, as is the case for the Crazy Buffalo, an emblematic bar at the corner of Bui Vien and De Tham, with its red facade and giant buffalo head above the entrance. In contrast, activities relegated to alleys, the back rooms of family homes, or upstairs are generally less profitable. They tend to provide services for partners situated on the main thoroughfare: dishwashers and cooks for bars and restaurants, seamstresses for custom clothing boutiques, laundry services for guest houses. For the vast majority of cases, these subordinate activities are handled by women, both young and retired, and recent arrivals to Ho Chi Minh City. Age, gender, and place of origin are all criteria that can of course be cumulated. Alleys are also home to entrepreneurs with insufficient capital to invest in a central location, a sizeable office space, and competitive advertising and equipment. The asymmetrical relationship between main streets and alleys is even more visible at night. Along the main thoroughfares, boutiques close at 9 p.m. whereas bars, karaoke bars, and night clubs close well after midnight. Meanwhile, the alleys live according to domestic rhythms: they are darkened, the gates are closed, and quiet reigns. Tourism revenue is unequally shared by the area’s stakeholders, depending on their localisation and the temporality they can consecrate to tourists’ consumption.

31Thus, localisation is both a vector and a producer of inequality. If an activity is confined to an alley, a courtyard, or upstairs, it will be less profitable (typical examples being bars and restaurants). Furthermore, should an activity be de-qualified, it is spatially marginalized, a prevalent mechanism for all back offices.

32However, the inequality between small and large entrepreneurs should not overshadow even more modest stakeholders, whose subordinate positions are revealed by their mobility. Street vendors and xê om bitterly negotiate temporary spots on the busiest sidewalks amongst themselves, with boutique owners for permission to set up in front of the shops, and with the police. In this social and spatial hierarchy, the most vulnerable are condemned to roam, at best with a bicycle or a carrying pole to sell cigarettes, candy, handkerchiefs, key rings, SIM cards and at worst, to beg. Most have received only a modest education and often belong to formerly rural families who have yet to obtain a legal existence in the city. [4] Young girls and old women are the most fragile. A vendor in her sixties at the entrance of an alley explained that she began her activity after her retirement and the death of her husband.

33These inequalities are both social and spatial. An activity as globalised as backpacking produces a fundamentally competitive economy that demands stakeholders be reactive in order to closely follow the demand. However, the demand is normalising globally as it is increasingly integrated within tourism economy, functioning along entrepreneurial codes. (Welk, 2010) International chains, such as Burger King and Starbucks, have recently opened in Vietnam and brought with them products and norms of comfort, service, and hygiene that are not attainable by all. For the smallest and those with the least experience, adapting is difficult, as explained by Phú, 23 years old. He lost his father and today, lives in a house with rooms for rent at the end of a badly indicated alley:

34

Phú: My mother is a retired primary school teacher. To increase income, she decided to take advantage of the tourist activity in the neighbourhood. She rents motorbikes and has converted several rooms of the house into bedrooms. But it’s not working so well.
Interviewer: Why? Would you have done things differently?
Phú: My mother has her way of seeing things and I have mine. She doesn’t speak English; I speak a little. I learned at school. I don’t speak very well but I try to communicate with the tourists and they explain things to me. The furniture is too basic, there’s just a bed. I’ve seen the websites of the other places. I know how they do it. We don’t have a website. She’s not very welcoming either. I would offer motorbike rides and maybe even include the price of breakfast with the room; but she doesn’t agree.

35This excerpt from an interview sharply contrasts with others held with stakeholders who can and know how to use more capital and means, such as the owner of the Blue River Hotel, 30 years old, who explained in fluent English:

36

Interviewer: “What did you know about tourism when you started? When did you start your business?
Owner: I studied at the Saigon Economic Business School, where I quickly majored in Hotel Management. My father worked for a Japanese company. During my first year at university, we demolished our house to build our first hotel in 2009. Today, I am the owner. Business is good; we can identify clients’ wishes fairly well. We are referenced, notably by Trip Advisor. Today we have 14 employees in 4 hotels [built in 2011, 2013, and 2014 in the area].
I: Were the hotels built using your savings?
O: For the first, yes. But the others were financed with bank loans. The previous hotel finances the next.
I: And today, where do you live?
O: We don’t live in the neighbourhood anymore, but in district 4. I come here every day; it’s vital for the quality of our service. I talk with the tourists and oversee the work.
E: Do you travel often?
O: I’ve travelled around Vietnam, in Thailand, Singapore, Korea, Malaysia.
It’s given me ideas for my own business."

37A comparative analysis of the interviews shows that even though the initial location and financial means are discriminatory, the resulting capital can eventually fructify depending on criteria linked to professional training, mastery of foreign languages, and experience with entrepreneurial travelling. Good relationships with local authorities contribute to a business’s success (Bennett, 2009); social capital is also eminently discriminatory.

Attraction and repulsion, informal and illegal activities

38The social and spatial inequalities structuring the area can also be explained by the complexity of the gradients between formal and informal, legal and illegal. The previous example of laundry services shows how a legal activity can be carried out both formally and informally. The majority of the zone’s activities are legal; but certain boutiques combine both legal and illegal trade such as souvenir shops selling pirated DVDs. Others are completely illegal such as sex and drug trade, which are nevertheless tolerated in the area. This results in an ambivalent game played by stakeholders trying to balance the need to remain visible for tourists and thus earn their income and remaining sufficiently discreet so as to avoid provoking authorities and damaging the zone’s safety, which would harm all forms of consumption. This ambivalence undeniably participates in the zone’s attraction. It drives current urban transformations, in keeping with those identified in other globalised landscapes of immorality such as Patpong in Bangkok (Roux, 2011) or the red light district in Amsterdam. (Chapuis, 2016) Paradoxically, the discretion of such activities at the local level goes hand in hand with a strong integration into tourist globalisation. The backpacking district has become an interface that is both reassuring and accessible, including financially, to experiment these activities in different ways.

39The invisibility of those involved in such activities is based on a variety of spatial tactics. Sex workers (SW) can be found in places that are not specifically dedicated to their trade: karaoke bars, bars, hair salons, massage parlours. They meet their clients there before going back to hotels that rent by the hour. All workers know how to advertise both verbally and visually (coy slogans such as Ugly but good or No money no honey, red lanterns, shaded storefronts, sexy outfits).

40As for the drug trade, by comparing interviews, we have determined that its spatial invisibility results from mobility. Sales (most often of marijuana, but also of cocaine or ecstasy) take place on the back of a motorbike during a fake taxi ride.

41Both drugs and prostitution are considered social evils (tê nan xã hôi) by the socialist government. The absence of legal recognition provokes social power struggles. Since they are not officially recognized and therefore protected, sex workers and drug dealers are vulnerable in terms of their clients and authorities. This justifies not only the presence of middlemen from the mafia who guarantee clients and safety in exchange for what resembles racketeering, but also the corruption of local authorities. (Koh, 2001; Hoang, 2015) Such violence, particularly in prostitution, is also symbolic of the tradition of white men from the former colonial metropoles dominating the exoticised female of the former colonies. Indeed, eroticism and exoticism have been symbiotic since the colonial period (Saïd, 1978; Staszak, 2011), both feeding the racialisation of economic and sexual exchanges. (Tabet, 2004; Hoang, 2015) Ultimately, these activities testify to the obvious violence of domination based on criteria such as gender (sex workers, women, and trans-gender people are subjected to the violence of their clients as well as at the hands of mafia goons and police officers), race (the majority of exchanges concern white men who are the clients of services offered by racialised populations), and between legal and illegal stakeholders fighting for control of territory and profits.

Speculation, normalisation and social control

42Despite the fact that the Pham Ngu Lao neighbourhood earns its living from what is considered a modest tourist activity that generates an ambivalent reputation, real estate is expensive. The high prices are due to its strategic location. It is situated in the centre of the country’s economic capital, where property speculation has been the strongest over the past several decades due to the concentration of foreign projects and investments. The neighbourhood encompasses several “golden parcels” (dât vàng), which are reserved for mega projects such as luxury hotels, office buildings, and shopping malls. The latter are decided within urban programs, whose call for tenders and contracting authorities are internationalised. In 2007, the Japanese consulting firm, Nikken Seikkei, won the project to renovate the historic centre. In 2011, the area was also at the perimeter of the Landscaping and aerial arrangement of the walking area within the city centre of Ho Chi Minh City, conducted in tandem by the city, the Spanish Ministry of Tourism, and the consultancy group Idom.

43Whether these projects ever see the light of day does not change the fact that they feed a speculation frenzy. A mere announcement is enough to raise real estate prices. This profits a long chain of stakeholders due to the complexity of Vietnamese land rights. Building owners profit in two ways: either by moving to maximize the surface area for business at the expense of domestic space or by raising the rent instead of selling off highly profitable holdings. Sub-leasing is common and a raise in rent can easily impact several intermediaries, each of whom tries to skim a profit along the way. Finally, local authorities also profit. At the helm of projects, they are the first to know the perimeters and the timeline for new constructions. Such information can be converted into capital in two ways. Either the authorities personally invest in the real estate before the project becomes official in order to make the most profit once the project is announced or they sell the information and facilitate acquisitions by others. (Labbe, 2014; Segard, 2014) Speculation, insider dealing, and corruption go hand in hand, leading to an increasingly rapid turnover in real estate:

44

“- I’m one of the oldest in the neighbourhood. I’ve been working here for 19 years and the longer I work here, the more shops I see being replaced. For example, on the other side of the street, they opened 5 months ago but in less than a year, they won’t be here anymore. I’m sure of it. They’re just taking advantage of a boon by opening up a healthy juice stand with fancy furnishings.”

45In such a context, access to information has become highly discriminatory, favouring collusion between political and economic powers:

46

- Respondent: “Do you see the Crazy Buffalo? That location is impossible to get because it’s the best. Lots of people have tried to set up there, even Starbucks, but they’ve all failed.
- Interviewer: I heard that the owner of the Crazy Buffalo also owns the Allez Boo and Go 2 Eat [two bars at the intersections of the area’s main thoroughfares]. The managers said that she’s a Vietnamese born abroad.
- R: It’s true that it’s the same owner but the rest is nonsense. She’s Vietnamese. I know her, I say hello to her but I don’t want any kind of trouble with her. She’s powerful. She works at Saigon Tourism [an organ of the city’s popular committee]. That’s how she got those locations.”

47The zone has been taken in hand from the top down, resulting in more widespread social control by authorities as they work to normalise its image. The most subordinate participants in tourist related activities are the first targets. Beggars and street vendors have been evicted, officially in order to free up the sidewalk for security reasons. In 2014, media widely covered the installation of video surveillance cameras to fight against pickpockets. Numerous signs promoting a civilized, modern, urban way of life hang from brand new street lamps around the neighbourhood. Though they echo the handmade signs spontaneously hung up by locals who have had enough with the noise or drunken foreigners urinating everywhere, the official signs carry a clear ideological weight. The propaganda reminds readers how deeply the area is rooted in a socialist country where the interest of major private and public stakeholders are intrinsically linked (Gainsborough, 2010), a situation that favours collusion and insider influence.

48Backpacking brings together perpetually renewed flows of tourists. However, our results show that a local economy, with deep territorial influences, with remarkable resiliency, and requiring diverse skills, has managed to develop in Pham Ngu Lao. Glocalisation, or the hybridisation of local and global practices, constitutes the base of the economic, social, and morphological production of the neighbourhood. Thus, as soon as we examine the situation from the viewpoint of local actors, invested to various degrees in this economy, it is possible to observe the extent to which the area is finally less exceptional than the analytical figure of the backpacking enclave would have us believe. Activities tied to tourism remain socially and spatially unequal at many levels. Such inequalities are representative of the relationships of domination that are present in any production of urbanity.

49These power struggles are all the more flagrant as the zone evolves in a metropolitan context, accentuating the competitive nature of economic resources originally constituted by neighbourhood stakeholders, but which currently attract the avid interest of both major foreign firms and urban authorities. This has resulted in land speculation, which has enriched certain individuals, including those who began modestly in the area. However, it has also weakened the most vulnerable segments of the population, those living opportunistically, without any real capitalisation, from tourist-related activities.

50As such, this zone is a unique observatory from which we can get a better understanding of the progressive insertion of the country into globalisation, thanks to the socialism of a complex market. The current normalisation and valorisation of Pham Ngu Lao’s real estate is both representative of a dynamic found in all backpacking districts around the world and specific to post-socialist economies. The zone’s windfall economy has been well identified, which explains its hegemonic position at the microlocal level. Such an economy produces accumulation effects that have resulted in the convergence of private and public interests, with local authorities becoming active actors of this valorisation.