‘Poor children on Tinder’ and their Barbie Saviours: towards a feminist political economy of volunteer tourism

ABSTRACT

Barbie Saviours is a satirical Instagram account and linked Facebook page that depict white western Barbies volunteering in Africa with the bio, ‘Jesus. Adventures. Africa. Two worlds. One love. Babies. Beauty. Not qualified. Called. 20 years old. It’s not about me… but it kind of is’. Drawing on emerging theories of feminist political economy, we address the growing backlash against volunteer tourism in the popular media and argue that critiques against these images reflect an anti-hegemonic project that highlights the role of sentimental colonialism in contemporary forms of international popular humanitarianism. Widely described as a critique against the ‘White Saviour Complex’, Barbie Saviour is used to popularise a negative image of western female volunteer tourists which currently comprise more than 75% of the industry. These critiques question the morality and legitimacy of female volunteer tourists as well as related spaces of western forms of development in the global south. These satires shine a spotlight on the neocolonial aura of the practice. However, we argue that while this critique is a productive reminder of the symbolic violence of racialised inequality, the critique itself also, albeit inadvertently, perpetuates the ahistorical and apolitical racial, ethnic, gender and class-based binary thinking that it seeks to condemn.

KEYWORDS:

• Barbie Saviours
• feminist political economy
• neocolonialism
• neoliberalism
• volunteer tourism

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1. The informal economy, or grey economy is that part of an economy that is neither taxed, nor monitored by any form of government. Women make up a disproportionate percentage of the informal economy. It can encourage the sustainable use of goods, while offering an alternative to the regulated market economy by supporting the informal sectors such as farmers markets, street vendors and non-market activities (see, for example, Ruzek, 2015).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Stephen Wearing

Stephen Wearing is a honorary associate at the University of Technology Sydney. He has made seminal contributions in many areas including ecotourism, volunteer tourism and community development, the importance of community-based approaches in the leisure, recreation and tourism sector has formed the focus of his research.

Mary Mostafanezhad

Mary Mostafanezhad is an assistant professor in the Department of Geography at the University of Hawaii at Manoa. Her work examines the political and cultural geography of tourism in the Asia-Pacific region.

Nha Nguyen

Nha Nguyen is a research assistant at RMIT University Asia Graduate Centre. Her area of interest ranges across various topics among the field of gender and sexuality. She is currently conducting a study on young Vietnamese’s women’s use of social media in relation to governmentality of gender.

Truc Ha Thanh Nguyen

Truc Ha Thanh Nguyen is a research assistant at RMIT University Asia Graduate Centre. Her area of interest ranges across various topics among the field of ethics and leadership. She is currently conducting a study on ethical leadership in Vietnam and a study on young Vietnamese’s women’s use of Facebook.

Matthew McDonald

Matthew McDonald in the senior lecturer is a RMIT University Asia Graduate Centre. His area of interest ranges across various areas including the social psychology of work and leisure, Continental philosophy, consumer culture and political economy.