The Increasing Mobility of Chinese Repeat Visitors to France

Abstract

This paper examines the characteristics of Chinese tourist repeat visits to France. The focus is on the different ways these Chinese tourists acquire mobility skills, pointing out the social profiles and trajectories of such individuals. This approach brings both an empirical and theoretical contribution—as modest as it is—to the definition of the concepts of social capital and mobility skills applied to Chinese tourists. The analysis of social trajectories is based upon a corpus of ten tourists interviewed biographically, which corresponds to three ideal types determined from interviews with influential operators in the field, the really active fringe of accredited agencies to welcome Chinese tourists in France. As in other countries, we can observe that Chinese international tourists individualize their tourist practices when progressively expanding their mobility skills. While all of them were visiting the French territory in groups until very recently, some Chinese tourists are now discovering France on a more individual mode and are venturing outside traditional tourist haunts.

Notes

The policy of “reform and opening” was introduced by Deng Xiaoping in 1978 when he came to power two years after the death of Mao Zedong. Note that this policy was outlined at least since 1975 by Zhou Enlai, the historical Premier of Mao.

The concept of “way of living” according Lazzarotti Olivier (2010) “remains present but specialized and somewhat marginal in these sciences (and humanities) in the twentieth century, whether in philosophy (Heidegger, Merleau-Ponty or Bachelard), sociology (Bourdieu and habitus, etc.), history (Chesneaux), geography (Lévy, Lussault, Lazzarotti, Stock, etc.), urban planning (Lefebvre, Paquot, etc.) or architecture (Norberg-Schulz, etc.).” Here, we take the meaning given by Mathis Stock (2004), that is to say, “the relation to space expressed by the practices of individuals.”

In French we use for this expression the preposition “dans” [in] which actually localizes the time dimension (note from the translator).

These are 500 accredited agencies to accommodate groups of Chinese tourists. In these, however, only a handful are active.

A double-digit economic growth materialized by joining the World Trade Organization (WTO) in 2001.

Chinese tourists cannot travel to a country before China has signed first a bilateral agreement with the host country. This agreement, entitled “approved tourist destination” (ADS), involves easier procedures for visa application.

“The Schengen Visa has made traveling between its 25 member countries (22 European Union states and three non-EU members) much easier and less bureaucratic. Travelling on a Schengen Visa means that the visa holder can travel to any (or all) member countries using one single visa, thus avoiding the hassle and expense of obtaining individual visas for each country.” (http://www.schengenvisa.cc/)

The most popular countries are: France, Germany, Switzerland, Italy, the Netherlands, Belgium, Austria, the Vatican, Monaco, Luxembourg and Liechtenstein. The most frequented cities are: Paris, Brussels, Amsterdam, Milan, Frankfurt, Vienna, Geneva, Lucerne, Innsbruck and Rome.

Interview conducted on 7 December 2011 in Ningbo with a Chinese tourist who travelled for the first time to France in July 2011.

As shown, the study of the tour offer in the catalogues of tour operators helps to understand better the actual practices of tourists (Violier, 2011).

.

The Baccalaureate examination in China, called “gaokao” allows the best candidates in each province to choose the universities in which they want to study. Universities are ranked according to a top 10, a top 100 and top 211. There are about 2,000 universities in China.

Interview conducted on 20 October 2011 in Guangzhou with a 26-year-old woman, currently in charge of the administrative processes of collaboration between Sun Yat-sen (Zhongshan) University and the French institution partners.

This tourist comes from the province of Henan and was returning to France to stay with a friend (visiting her country for the first time). The opportunity to stay in France with another person (while French law prohibits groups of less than five Chinese tourists) was through having “a contact person at the French Embassy of France in Beijing.”

This tourist also studied, obtained a Bachelor's degree in 1992, where he was born in the countryside of Henan, one of the three poorest provinces of China.”

This woman holds a Master of Management degree from the University of Montpellier. After two years under contract at the Consulate of the Netherlands in Guangzhou and her pregnancy in 2009, she stayed at home until the end of 2011. She now works part-time for a major translation company.

She lives in the centre of Shanghai, in a comfortable area. A Master's graduate, with significant economic income, she is not married and confesses her dream to go back to live for a year in France.

The official newspaper of China, the organ of the Communist Party and subject to censorship.

(2001), «  (la France) », (Pékin) [Jie Piezhu, Huang Jinshan, (2001) “France” China tourism Press, Beijing], China National Tourist Board Editions, 570 pp.

Even California State statistics indicated and accounted before the signing of the ADS in 2008, a Chinese tourist flow to the state.

Synthesis of seven exploratory interviews conducted in San Francisco and Los Angeles, 14 to 28 February 2011.

Interview conducted on 25 February 2011 in Los Angeles. The man, a native of Beijing, was accompanied by his wife and their 28-year-old son. They travelled to the USA for a period of “at least two months,” in a trip that mixed business and tourism.

The historical Premier Mao Zedong.

Known in mainland China to have said in 1963, when he was Minister of International Relations, “I'd rather be a citizen of Guilin than an immortal.”

See the city website http://www.montargis.fr/

This man has studied (BA) at the University of Nanjing (6th best university in national rankings in 2011) in the 1990s. Native of Ningbo, he is married and the father of a 1-year-old child.

This man is married and father of a 3-year-old daughter; he said he travels abroad many times a year.

200 intellectuals were arrested that year, because of “subversion against state power.” The best known of these is the artist Ai Weiwei, imprisoned for two and a half months from the beginning of April 2011.