The Impact of Tourism on Latin America:

Issue Editor - Tamar Diana Wilson

Tourism in the developing world has alternatively been applauded for its role in economic development and criticized for deepening economic dependency on the developed world. For example, neo-liberal and structural adjustment policies have led to massive unemployment throughout Latin America ; tourism, a labor-intensive sector, helps to provide jobs, yet they are most often low-waged while higher management positions go to foreigners. In the case of Cuba, after the fall of the Soviet Union the government sponsored tourist enclaves in order to revive the economy; however, the local population has no access to these luxury tourist facilities and prostitution, driven by the tourist market, has become common. In Mexico, tourism is a major source of foreign exchange, but ecological impacts such as the dying of the coral reef in Cancún, have cropped up in various tourist centers. Tourism has further been criticized for re-implementing colonial hierarchies with first world peoples being serviced by Third World peoples. Dependency is deepened as high-end profits from hotels and marinas leak outward since they are often financed and controlled by foreign capital. Social and cultural impacts that erode local systems of morality and a sense of community, foment consumerism, and turn indigenous art forms into tourist kitsch have also been noted.

This issue of Latin American Perspectives seeks articles that touch on one or more of the following issues (though is not restricted to these issues) in one or more Latin American countries.
1. How hierarchies of power between core capitalist and semi-peripheral countries are reconstituted in interactions between affluent guests and poorer hosts, including the low-wage workforce in the tourist industry.
2. The history of tourism to a given country and/or site(s) within that country and its relations to imperialism, colonialism, or, in the case of Cuba, the fall of the Soviet Union.
3. The social and cultural impacts (positive and/or negative) on the local community and local people and/or on indigenous peoples and their crafts.
4. The ecological consequences, positive or negative, of tourism.
5. Evaluation of tourism as a force for economic development or as a force leading to, or deepening, economic dependency.
6. The impact of sex tourism (male or female) on local gender and family systems (and as an instance of class and racial hierarchies of power)..
7. Exploration of tourism as an instance and promoter of globalization (and its discontents).
8. The possibilities for sustainable, "alternative" tourisms.
9. .An evaluation of "social tourism', i.e. tourism by the working classes.
10. The importance to women of work in the tourist sector.

This issue is being coordinated by Tamar Diana Wilson. For more information about the issue, please contact Tamar Diana Wilson (tamardiana@yahoo.com) or the LAP  Office.

Manuscripts should be no longer than 25 pages of double-spaced text in English, Spanish, or Portuguese. If possible, submit two copies along with a cover sheet and basic biographical information. With these items, we also require that the manuscript be sent on a CD-R, by e-mail, or on a floppy disk if the other formats are not available. The LAP style guide is available on request or online.

Please send any manuscript submissions to:
Managing Editor, Latin American Perspectives¸ P.O. Box 5703, Riverside, California 92517-5703