Colonizing space and commodifying place: tourism's violent geographies

ABSTRACT

Across Latin America, non-traditional tourism sectors, like eco-tourism and cultural tourism, have grown dramatically in the last 30 years. Neoliberal ideologies, reforms, and infrastructure set the stage for growth, but neoliberalism alone does not explain why the tourism industry is an acute site of struggle over territory, identity and history. From Guatemala's Maya Biosphere Reserve in the heart of Central America's “Mayan World” tourism initiative, this article asks: Why is contemporary tourism such a powerful and pervasive site of contentious socio-spatial politics? It argues that neoliberal reforms have combined with tourism's dual violent practices of spatial colonization and the commodification of place to fuel this growth and politicization. Spatial colonization refers to the commodification of “nature” and practices of land dispossession that define capitalism's expansion into “underdeveloped” and “green” spaces. The industry also commodifies the culture, identity and experience of a place and its people as objects of tourist consumption, which infuses tourism's representational practices with immense, yet subtle power. This article further illustrates how tourism landscapes are carved out of practices of material and intangible dispossession, as well as practices of state territorialization. This violence often engenders diverse forms of resistance by “hosts” living in other people's playgrounds around the world.

KEYWORDS:

• Eco-tourism
• colonization
• commodification
• space
• violence
• Guatemala

Acknowledgments

A special thanks goes to Bernard Lane for his support and mentorship at the Journal of Sustainable Tourism. Thank you as well to Diana Ojeda, Kimberley Kinder, John Stehlin and three anonymous reviewers for your constructive feedback. All errors in fact or interpretation are mine.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1. From 1995 to 2007, Latin American countries experienced a 49% increase in tourist arrivals, and a 61% growth in tourism receipts (expenditures by visitors) (WTTC, 2015a). In the last decade, tourism receipts increased again by 50% (IADB). In 2014, tourism contributed $US 417.4 billion to Latin America's GDP, making up 9.2% of the region's economy (WTTC, 2015a). In Guatemala, the figure is slightly lower, at 8.8% of total contribution to GDP (WTTC, 2015b).

2. The Four Jaguar project was called Cuatro Balam in Guatemala, which is a linguistic mix of Spanish and Mayan languages. The name draws on the project's focus on Maya archaeology, the Maya creation story of the universe, the Popul Vuh, and the four cardinal directions. Jaguars are endangered and endemic to the reserve, and are a symbol for many conservation efforts.

3. Thanks to John Stehlin for this clarification (personal communication, 14 June 2016).

Additional information

Funding

The Inter-American Foundation Grassroots Development Fellowship and the John L. Simpson Memorial Research Fellowship in International and Comparative Studies at the University of California, Berkeley, funded this research.

Notes on contributors

Jennifer A. Devine

Jennifer A. Devine is an assistant professor of geography at Texas State University. Her research and teaching focus on US--Latin American politics, human environmental change, social movements and critical social theory. She received a PhD degree in geography from the University of California, Berkeley, in 2013. She has published and forthcoming articles in Environment and Planning D: Society and Space, Antipode, Latin American Research Review, the Journal of Peasant Studies and L'Espace Politique.