Tourism logically attracts a large number of researchers because of its scale and the diversity of the sectors it affects.
Economists, anthropologists, sociologists, doctors, urban planners, geographers, etc. they all study tourism with their own scientific approach. Therefore, in this article, we will consider tourism and geopolitical locations.
This is a topic that has been discussed and debated many times before. Taking into account the conflicting representations that the actors of the situation under study have, the power or influence on the regions and therefore the populations located there is studied.
Although tourism is a global phenomenon, this activity can be the subject of specific and contradictory development projects.
The fact that it concerns certain places remains unchanged, the interests of some may not necessarily meet those of others.
Additionally, many of us are tourists at different times for a few days or weeks, usually for a limited time, and most of us have some experience in the field.
Everyone has a way of traveling and being a tourist. For this reason, everyone represents the touristic development of the places they discover according to their age, social level, cultural and economic environment. Representations of tourism experts are also added to this.
Geography is a necessary knowledge for the analysis of tourism. These have been and continue to be motivation, one of the main sources of travel. It is geographers who best explain and explain them.
It is at the center of the approach, combining the knowledge and geopolitical approach of geographers.
Finally, if tourism is a global phenomenon, although tourism is developing in developing countries, it is a sector that primarily affects developed countries. Let’s remember that tourists overwhelmingly travel within their own country.
For example, out of 80% of French travelers in France, only 11% go abroad, and the vast majority of them go to Spain and Italy.
Geopolitical Impact
Let’s look at the importance of representations in perceiving the effects of tourism on a region. Tourism has two completely opposite representations.
Some see tourism as an effective development tool, regardless of the places involved, with the positive effects far outweighing the negative aspects.
800 million tourists, the first sector of economic activity, provides hundreds of thousands of jobs.
Others, on the other hand, insist on the effects that they consider, above all, negative from this activity.
It is a development that benefits only a few, at the expense of the majority of the population in which the lifestyle and environment can live.
It will be destabilized by this brutal intervention represented by tourists.
Next, we condemn the acculturation of the local population as its victims, and the price increase that tourist purchases inevitably bring.
These two representations are particularly prominent in the analysis of the effects of tourism on Southern countries.
However, this very negative representation may be responsible for destroying the authenticity of their lifestyle or, worse, forcing populations to commit a fraud.
Intellectual circles exposing the evils of capitalist globalization in Southern societies are essentially current.
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Or, on the contrary, we condemn the ban on developing such sites to preserve the natural environment, to preserve the flora and fauna that tourists admire and photograph.
In both cases, it arrives at the same thing, namely the profit interest that precedes respect for the local population, and is also reprimanded for tourists for supposed authenticity. Undoubtedly, this mass phenomenon has negative effects like any other process.
However, this criticism reveals a certain regret for the time that only those who know how to travel to these distant lands, that is, well-off and cultured people, even those who have worked in the field and do some research from time to time, go.
The exclusivity of long-distance travel is a thing of the past. Moreover, the question of originality is not so simple. Does it decide what is original and by what criteria?
And the question of preserving authenticity necessarily raises the question of identity. However, identity is not a static, abstract situation.
On the other hand, the massive influx of tourists leads to sometimes drastic changes in the way of being and behavior of local peoples.
However, the critical look at this evolution is the view of those who regret the disappearance of a previous situation.
