Tourism has been identified in recent years as one of the sectors experiencing the greatest amount
of growth and development in the world, a trend that is predicted to become more pronounced in the
immediate future. This is reflected in macroeconomic data used by specialist institutions and
companies. Due to their intrinsic characteristics, tourism activities, which are by definition
transversal, act as economic catalysts in the territories in which they are carried out.
Visitors’ spending in a specific destination has direct or indirect repercussions on various
spheres: on transportation companies of various levels and formats, on different types of
accommodation, restaurants, culture and leisure, on a wide range of businesses… in short,
creating jobs and economic benefits for the host community. Theoretically.
In the midst of the globalisation process, we are witnessing the consolidation of an
international phenomenon with profound effects: the progressive delocalisation of the main economic
activities, initially agricultural and financial but now also extending to services. An uncertain
and complex environment, full of threats but also offering great opportunities such as that which
has been discovered in traditionally agricultural or industrial areas of Europe upon considering
tourism as a means (often and preferably complementary, but sometimes the sole means) of economic
development. Tourism is an option that many developing countries have also identified as an
opportunity to join the international division of labour. In short, although from different
starting points, it is a global option that is turning the tourism market into one of the most
competitive on the planet.
Fortunately, we can see many cases of tourism that show how it can truly act as a motor for
economic development and as a useful tool to fight against poverty. However, in practice we also
find numerous examples in which this is not the case. Too many tourist destinations spread around
the planet show social inequality so acute that they reveal obvious problems of efficient
distribution of wealth that lead to high rates of poverty, which the arrival of considerable
numbers of tourists does not ease. There are projects which are theoretically tourist related in
nature that frequently respond to purely speculative criteria and disregard the most essential
environmental and sustainability warning signs when faced with the pressure of “impatient
capitalism” –an accurate reflection of that extreme market outlook that unceremoniously
gives priority to the seeking of short-term profit and does not take into consideration, or simply
disregards, social interest and a long-term sustainable vision.
Although tourism is not at the root of these problems, which are structural in nature and in
many instances have been deeply entrenched for centuries, it is no less true that the positive
effects promised by the transversality of tourist activity remain unseen in those places that
require approaches that guarantee a more equitable and efficient distribution of the profits
generated. Rules must be established, which are compatible with those of the market place, but
which take into consideration ethical criteria, whether explicit or implicit, such as social
responsibility and sustainability. In other words, fair tourism as a path towards a globalisation,
which is probably irreversible, but which can and should also be more just. And we would defend
this in terms of one of the activities that best represents an idealised world without borders:
travel.
There is one factor that makes tourism unique in relation to other spheres: the consumption
of services occurs in the same place in which they are produced, a circumstance that makes the
sustainability of the host territory vitally important. Fair tourism, particularly, has a bearing
on the development of tourism through the active and direct participation of the local population
in an exchange that, in turn, guarantees the levels of quality demanded of the services offered and
the equitable distribution of the profits generated.
This way of looking at things has implications on different levels. On one hand, it affects
the businesses in the sector as they can no longer, as they have from the 1980s until now, limit
their concerns to the sphere of their products or services, satisfied with simply guaranteeing
quality standards required by each of the segments of the national or international markets. Nor is
it sufficient (although necessary) for them to show greater concern, concern that is more recent
than in the previous case, for certain environmental aspects in the tourist destinations in which
they operate, in part under pressure from demand. With the 21st century underway, companies and
organisations in the sector must unavoidably involve themselves in the social development of the
tourist areas they operate in, a circumstance that demands that the activity be developed taking
into consideration the interests of local communities.
In other cases, the local communities are the agents that have organised their own tourism
offer from the ground up and established, from the start, criteria of economic, environmental and
social sustainability in their initiatives. These criteria must reconcile private and public
interests since the former pay greater attention to the short- or mid-term, while the latter should
set their sights on the long-term collective good. The concept of truly participative and not
merely formal democracy is, in this context, essential. In those territories in which the organs of
citizen participation are limited or nonexistent, these types of projects must be able to encourage
this spirit of collective cooperation that tourist activities can promote.
In this context, we can see a growing international demand that is still on a small scale,
but very conscious of these issues, discerning and with increasingly greater access to information
(thanks to the revolution in technology and communications). These are tourists who are motivated
by feelings rather than cheap, standardised experiences that can be reproduced the world over. The
determining factor nowadays for choosing a destination for a large part of consumers is no longer
price; instead they feel more comfortable with the value added provided by initiatives involving
social responsibility. This is a differentiating element that increasingly takes on greater
importance and influence to the extent that, in the framework of globalisation, this new consumer,
with easy access to information, becomes aware of the interrelationship of problems and begins to
understand that their choices for purchases and consumption have a decisive influence.
It is to this increasingly common type of traveller, and to the organisations and businesses
that work along these lines, that this publication is addressed.