ABSTRACT
A recurring theme in the construction of tourism is how it can re-invigorate economies, regenerate cities and even ensure sustainable lifestyles. In this sense tourism is given an exalted status, where it is perceived as a noble cause in which all should participate. The invoking of religious fervour is even explicit at times. Witness the Acapulco Document in 1982 and its statement that ‘domestic tourism enables the individual to take spiritual possession of his own country, just as it prepares him for a universal perspective’.1 The same document also connected tourism with the achievement of world peace as it ‘enables peoples to gain first-hand knowledge of each other, thus bringing them closer together’.2 It also reaffirmed that ‘world tourism can be a vital force for world peace’ and that as stated in the Manila Declaration on World Tourism in 1980, tourism can lead to a ‘new international economic order that will help to eliminate the … economic gap between developed and developing countries’.3 Thus tourism is also constructed as integral to the reduction of global poverty. That tourism, in bringing people together, may actually create increased
suspicion of others escapes consideration in many of these statements related to the role of world tourism. Likewise, the assumed connection between tourism and the creation of a new world economic order which in turn leads to a reduction in inequality and poverty makes some fatal mistakes in reasoning – that increased economic activity benefits everyone and that all people are motivated solely by economic well being. While the view that tourism is
about creating economic benefits is not a necessary aspect of how tourism may be conceptualised, it appears to have become central in the tourism strategies of many so-called advanced nations. In part this makes for good local politics – for example, in selling the Olympics to potential host communities governments rush to proclaim how many jobs they will create for the local economy, including in tourism.4 But there is no necessary connection here. A thriving tourist industry will not reduce poverty through the provision of employment in itself. As Bolwell and Weinz’s paper produced for the International Labour Organization has observed:
Economic growth is an essential but not a sufficient condition for poverty reduction. Poverty reduction involves growth with a substantial reorientation in favour of the poor. It includes changes in institutions, laws, regulations and practices that help create and perpetuate poverty. It includes targeted interventions to enable poor people to better integrate into economic processes and take advantage of opportunities to improve their economic and social well-being. It means ending harassment of the poor, and eliminating restrictions on how they make their livelihoods. This especially applies to the tourism sector. Interventions must be made to help poor people become part of the processes that drive the industry.5
