ABSTRACT
While ideology is a complex term, one profound trait stands out: namely, its concern with the ‘bases and validity of our most fundamental ideas’ (McCellan, 1986: 1; quoted in Dobson, 1995). In using the term ideology, we will be referring not only to the sustaining of relationships of domination in the interest of a dominant political power (the USA as the only global superpower, for example) or social thought (the supposed significance of religion to ‘civilisation’, for example), but also to interests that are opposed to dominant power (the anti-nuclear movement, environmentalists, feminists and so on) that are themselves capable of forming ideologies in the pursuit of power. Although, as Eagleton (1991) notes, this may signal a degree of contradiction in the meaning of ideology, it is nevertheless fundamental to the notion that ideology is about the way relationships of power are inexorably interwoven in the production and representation of meaning which serves the interests of a particular social group. As Dobson concludes, ideologies ‘map the world in different ways’ (1995: 7), and it is the intention of this book to map the way in which different interests are implicated in the uneven and unequal development of tourism.
