Beyond Tourismphobia

Abstract

This chapter discusses the factors that have led to the emergence of expressions of criticism toward tourism. This review serves to frame the original contribution of this text: a theoretical model that clarifies the defining features of the main attitudes towards tourism. Merton's model is here adjusted for the analysis of a new relationship between social ends and economic means. In this case, the end is economic progress. The way is the tourism, conceived as a massive social phenomenon. The relation between goals and means generates tensions. Its management derives in strategies of adaptation that include different ways of identification or discussion. The five types of adaptation of the new model are useful for addressing subject positions, political discourses, or attitudinal dispositions towards tourism. To illustrate this typology a purposive sampling of news on the tourismphobia has been selected, with no statistical generalization reflecting the constituent elements of each of the types: legitimization, innovative criticism, resignation, radical criticism, and subversive utopia.

Tourismification narratives and the ‘Transformative turn’ in tourism. An analysis derived from the Spanish press debate on the Barcelona tourism model

“…The press discourse is a strategic element in the formation and maintenance of power relations. This is consistent with the fact that the third axis of the discourse on tourismification has a markedly ideological character, highlighting the current trend towards the politicisation of tourism (Mantecon and Velasco, 2020; Milano et al, 2019). The main feature of this narrative is the use of tourism-phobia to legitimise or delegitimise social actors according to their preferences in relation to a specific tourism model.…”

“…Taking as a reference the framework of analysis of attitudes to tourism proposed by Mantecon and Velasco (2020), different press narratives are distinguished, suggesting the existence of differences among newspapers. Narratives of legitimisation and innovative criticism were found to carry equal weight.…”

“…Finally, the most critical narratives are much less present in the Spanish press. These narratives propose a social transformation and the substitution of the political-economic order that regulates cities affected by overtourism (Mantecon and Velasco, 2020).…”

“…The Spanish press places Barcelona at the centre of the debate on tourism and takes advantage of its privileged position to propose discursive strategies that favour specific political and economic interests. The use of narratives and counter-narratives with opposing objectives generates tensions that are managed from adaptive strategies useful for addressing subject positions, political discourses or attitudinal dispositions towards tourism (Huete and Mantecón, 2018; Mantecon and Velasco, 2020).…”