ABSTRACT

In the previous chapter we examined sex tourism as an aspect of tourism as transgression. What is discovered is a form of tourism which appears to be driven by the same dynamic as tourism in general and which has become interwoven as a consequence with what might be said to be the ‘mainstream’. This also reinforces the point that a significant part of tourism exists in the margins, or in those liminal spaces as Ryan and Hall would describe them. The dilemma this creates for state regulation is manifold. To the extent that such forms of tourism constitute the ‘negation’ of tourism and offend certain values they cannot be allowed to flourish unchecked. On the other hand, as they are driven by the same forces that have allowed global capital to thrive, over-regulation may create other forms of discomfort for those with economic power. The solution has been in reconstructing the problem of sex tourism around child protection, a less contested concern. The consequence has thus also been to leave a considerable amount of sex tourism in the darkness of quasi-regulation. In this chapter we pursue this theme of how tourism deals with transgres-

sion around two areas that may not immediately seem related: work and death. While those that work in the tourism industry occupy a central role (perhaps leaving aside the role of the sex worker) in terms of supporting

tourism, it is often in their working conditions, wages and status that one can find issues of liminality. It is also as a consequence of some other marginal status that people come to work in tourism, such as being a migrant worker or a refugee. Thus issues of regulation and justice are often to the fore for those that work in tourism. In the case of death tourism (and we include for present purposes illness in this category) the liminal space is one suggested by either travel for medical intervention or suicide, or a fascination with the macabre, as sites where death has occurred. To some extent the death or medical tourist exists in a darkness for the notion of what tourism might be for such pursuits conflicts with the idea that tourism is about leisure and relaxation. For those who travel to see ‘sites of death’, it is in this form of voyeurism that one finds a darkness that also potentially negates what tourism might be in a more exalted state. For the state and the law, the issue of how to regulate these areas presents many dilemmas and challenges.