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‘Tour­ism degrowth’ is viewed sus­pi­ciously by some as a con­spir­acy to tear down cap­it­al­ism and vastly reduce travel. 

Accord­ing to Tazim Jamal, how­ever, tour­ism degrowth is much more about fos­ter­ing heal­ing and nur­tur­ing rela­tion­ships with people and our plan­et. And she thinks that we should tran­scend labels and divisions.

It’s a “Good Tour­ism” Insight. [You too can write a “GT” Insight.]

Between 2009 and 2019, real growth in inter­na­tion­al tour­ism receipts (54%) exceeded growth in world GDP (44%). Inter­na­tion­al tour­ist arrivals grew 4% to reach about 1.5 bil­lion in 2019. Tour­ism was one of the largest and fast­est grow­ing eco­nom­ic sec­tors until the COVID-19 pan­dem­ic ground mobil­it­ies to a halt in March 2020.

Strong recov­ery lies ahead. Inter­na­tion­al tour­ism saw a 182% year-on-year increase in Janu­ary-March 2022, and des­tin­a­tions glob­ally received about 117 mil­lion inter­na­tion­al arrivals com­pared to 41 mil­lion in Q1 2021.

The dev­ast­at­ing pan­dem­ic gave us time to con­tem­plate the free­dom and right to travel, but also the social and eco­lo­gic­al costs of mass tour­ism that has been enabled by tech­no­lo­gic­al innov­a­tions and globalisation.

A single-minded focus on eco­nom­ic growth, profit, and con­sump­tion to feed large, glob­al­ised cap­it­al mar­kets has led to unpre­ced­en­ted eco­lo­gic­al dam­age, unsus­tain­able resource exploit­a­tion, and cli­mate change.

Many des­tin­a­tions seek to avoid old mis­takes and engage with pur­pose and pos­it­iv­ity to facil­it­ate good tour­ism, res­tor­at­ive justice, and healing.

Con­sider Ams­ter­dam, for instance, where 11 mil­lion vis­it­ors in 2005 grew to almost 18 mil­lion in 2016, with 23 mil­lion tour­ists anti­cip­ated by 2030 (Van der Zee, 2017).

Loss of neigh­bour­hood iden­tity and social cohe­sion, and phys­ic­al and envir­on­ment­al degrad­a­tion, are just some of the adversit­ies of over­tour­ism that Ams­ter­dam­mers and oth­er highly pop­u­lar des­tin­a­tions have exper­i­enced. Their res­id­ents seek more respons­ible tour­ism as we emerge from this pandemic.

Many advoc­ate ‘degrowth’ as an import­ant goal.

Degrowth is a label denot­ing a reversal of growth, but what does it really mean?

Dual­isms (bin­ary divi­sions) like nature-cul­ture and growth-degrowth detract from the rich rela­tions between humans and all that sus­tains them. It is time to go bey­ond dual­isms to seek a rela­tion­al per­spect­ive that enables well-being and sustainability.

The Him­alay­an coun­try of Bhutan, for example, strives to live with­in plan­et­ary means and has been pro­act­ive instead of react­ive to bur­geon­ing vis­it­or growth.

Bhutan’s devel­op­ment policies are ori­ented to ‘High Value, Low Volume’ tour­ism, eco­lo­gic­al sus­tain­ab­il­ity and social, cul­tur­al, and spir­itu­al well-being. These gen­er­at­ive prin­ciples are part of a cen­tur­ies-old philo­sophy of Gross Nation­al Happiness.

Cul­tur­al and tra­di­tion­al know­ledge com­ple­men­ted by tech­nic­al and sci­entif­ic know­ledge offer a liv­ing devel­op­ment altern­at­ive for respect­ful, appre­ci­at­ive rela­tions between land, cos­mos, and people (vis­it­ors and diverse res­id­ent groups included).

As we move for­ward, many des­tin­a­tions are re-envi­sion­ing tourism.

Old ways of dual­ist­ic think­ing, e.g., (eco­nom­ic) growth ‘versus’ degrowth, are giv­ing way to com­mun­al rela­tions and val­ues that facil­it­ate well-being and good tourism.

Mod­ern­ist and colo­ni­al­ist-cap­it­al­ist val­ues of self-inter­ested indi­vidu­al­ism and con­sump­tion-driv­en growth — meas­ured pre­dom­in­antly in terms of mar­ket growth and bot­tom-line profit — are being replaced by com­munity-driv­en col­lab­or­at­ive endeav­ours, and loc­al and Indi­gen­ous val­ues that have been his­tor­ic­ally suppressed.

Prin­ciples of justice and eth­ics add strength to guide sus­tain­ab­il­ity and resi­li­ence. They include ensur­ing equit­able dis­tri­bu­tion of costs and bene­fits and fair rep­res­ent­a­tion and recog­ni­tion of diverse and under-served groups in the des­tin­a­tion. Also import­ant is incor­por­at­ing an eth­ic of care and empathy to guide not just equit­able con­trol and own­er­ship of the means of pro­duc­tion, but also res­tor­at­ive justice and reconciliation.

Per­spect­ives like regen­er­at­ive tour­ism draw upon prin­ciples of justice and care while avoid­ing colo­ni­al­ist and mod­ern­ist think­ing. Like regen­er­at­ive agri­cul­ture, which aspires towards improv­ing the soil and eco­lo­gic­al resi­li­ence, regen­er­at­ive tour­ism is about improv­ing the des­tin­a­tion; leav­ing it bet­ter and health­i­er than what it used to be. It, too, eschews the Euro­centric growth-driv­en mode and engages in com­munity-led tour­ism and eco-cul­tur­al conservation.

The edu­ca­tion­al sec­tor is rising to the chal­lenge with new ini­ti­at­ives aimed at enga­ging com­munity, youth, and stu­dents in sus­tain­ab­il­ity chal­lenges that dir­ectly affect them, e.g., col­lab­or­at­ing with Eld­ers on tra­di­tion­al Indi­gen­ous prac­tices that enable food secur­ity and cul­tur­al con­ser­va­tion.

Again, we should go bey­ond dual­isms and labels to focus on val­ues and eth­ics for a pur­pose-driv­en tour­ism that enables flour­ish­ing and well-being, while cel­eb­rat­ing and enjoy­ing what we share with oth­ers. This approach is deeply rela­tion­al: par­ti­cip­at­ory and col­lab­or­at­ive, inclus­ive and equit­able, res­tor­at­ive and heal­ing.

Tour­ism has immense poten­tial to facil­it­ate an act­ive, informed, and par­ti­cip­at­ory civic soci­ety that determ­ines for itself what it means to live a good life in rela­tion­ship with oth­ers (human and non-human oth­ers). A par­ti­cip­at­ory civic soci­ety can determ­ine if and how to share eco­lo­gic­al and social-cul­tur­al com­mons, and to heal and nur­ture a vul­ner­able Earth and all who share it.

The end goal of tour­ism degrowth is not to grow vis­it­or num­bers and rev­en­ues, nor to boost ever-increas­ing con­sump­tion, self-reg­u­lat­ing mar­kets, and growth-driv­en cap­it­al mar­ket expansion.

Pro­vi­sion­ing for food sov­er­eignty and food secur­ity, com­mun­al­ity, and flour­ish­ing eco­sys­tems, where we are attent­ive to the well-being of both human beings and non-human oth­ers, are a good start towards healthy and joy­ful rela­tions with each oth­er and to the vul­ner­able plan­et Earth in the Anthropocene.