Elsevier

Annals of Tourism Research

Volume 43, October 2013, Pages 150-169
Annals of Tourism Research

THE POLITICS OF AESTHETICS IN VOLUNTEER TOURISM

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.annals.2013.05.002Get rights and content

Highlights

  • I examine the “politics of aesthetics” in volunteer tourism in Chiang Mai, Thailand.

  • Research is based on longitudinal ethnographic fieldwork among three NGOs.

  • Volunteer tourists aestheticize poverty by describing it as authentic and cultural.

  • Volunteer tourists perpetuate an aesthetic structure that depoliticizes poverty.

  • Volunteer tourism needs to be reframed to make history and politics “sensible”.

Abstract

In this paper I address the “politics of aesthetics” in volunteer tourism. By “aesthetics,” I mean two things. First, I adopt Jacques Ranciere’s notion of aesthetics as the structured way human sense is organized. I argue that volunteer tourism perpetuates an aesthetic structure that systematically depoliticizes the global economic inequality on which the experience is based. Second, drawing on recent scholarship in critical tourism studies as well as 16 months of ethnographic research in Chiang Mai, Thailand, I illustrate how volunteer tourists aestheticize the host community members’ poverty as authentic and cultural. This reframing contributes to the legitimization of volunteer tourism as a celebrated cultural practice that perpetuates the aestheticization rather than the politicization of poverty in the encounter.

Section snippets

INTRODUCTION

One of the fastest growing niche tourism markets in the world, volunteer tourism is a type of tourism where people pay to participate in conservation or development projects (Lyons et al., 2012, Mintel, 2008). Drawing on recent scholarship in critical tourism studies as well as 16 months of ethnographic research in Chiang Mai, Thailand, I address the “politics of aesthetics” in development oriented volunteer tourism in the Global South. By “aesthetics,” I mean two things. First, I draw on

POVERTY AESTHETICS

Poverty is a core aspect of development oriented volunteer tourism where experiences are based on a common goal of overcoming economic and social marginalization. Yet, when volunteer tourists confront poverty, they often become uncomfortable and seek ways to negotiate personal anxieties regarding the inequality of the encounter by aestheticizing the host community members’ poverty as authentic and cultural. This strategy, I observed, facilitates opportunities for volunteer tourists to continue

AFFECTIVE ENCOUNTERS WITH POVERTY

In addition to aestheticizing poverty, volunteer tourists’ encounter with poverty tends to evoke an affective response. Affect refers to the impulsive aspects of human proclivities that are beyond empirical identification and are increasingly seen as integral to the tourism experience (Picard, 2012, Robinson, 2012). Often used as a synonym for emotion, affect refers to what are perceived as prediscursive embodied feelings, movements and human drives. The prediscursive emotionality of affective

POLITICIZING AESTHETICS IN VOLUNTEER TOURISM

Within volunteer tourism, the relationship between givers and receivers are naturalized. This binary implies a priori uneven power relationship on which the experience is based. Yet, this relationship is “naturalized” within the “helping discourse” (Dove, 1994) that is widely perpetuated throughout the industry. This process leads to the depoliticization of volunteer tourism. As Zizek describes Ranciere’s theoretical perspective, “the basic aim of antidemocratic politics always—and by

VOLUNTEER TOURISM AND SOCIAL JUSTICE

As Margaret Swain observes, “Tourism is an industry built on distinctions between strangers and friends, with inherent potentials for both oppression and empowerment” (Swain, 2009, p. 505). Volunteer tourism is particularly well positioned to facilitate opportunities for both outcomes because of the intimacy of the encounter. Indeed, the capacity for volunteer tourism operators to contribute to broader social justice agendas has been questioned (Guttentag, 2009, Lyons et al., 2012, Raymond and

CONCLUSION

In this article, I reflected on the politics of aesthetics in volunteer tourism in Chiang Mai, Thailand. Drawing on Ranciere’s notion of aesthetics as the structured way human sense is organized as well as recent work in critical tourism studies on the role of aesthetics in tourism encounters, I argued that volunteer tourism provides an aesthetic structure that depoliticizes and dehistoricizes the framing of global economic inequality. This aesthetic structure is perpetuated by the

Acknowledgements

This article is based on research supported by the Fulbright-Hays Dissertation Research Abroad and Foreign Language Area Studies Fellowships. I kindly acknowledge Chiang Mai University and Payap University in Chiang Mai which acted as local institutional sponsors. The National Research Council Thailand provided me with research clearance. I am grateful to the NGOs who facilitated the opportunity for me to conduct my research at their organizations as well as the host community members and

Mary Mostafanezhad (Lecturer in the Department of Tourism at the University of Otago, P.O. Box 56, Dunedin, Otago 9054, New Zealand. Email: <[email protected]>). Her main research interests lie at the intersection of the cultural politics and political economy of tourism development in Southeast Asia. This paper is based on longitudinal ethnographic fieldwork in Chiang Mai, Thailand. She has published on volunteer, cultural and ecotourism.

References (81)

  • A.S. Lo et al.

    Motivations and perceived value of volunteer tourists from Hong Kong

    Tourism Management

    (2011)
  • K. Lyons et al.

    Gap year volunteer tourism. Myths of global citizenship?

    Annals of Tourism Research

    (2012)
  • N.G. McGehee

    Oppression, emancipation, and volunteer tourism. Research propositions

    Annals of Tourism Research

    (2012)
  • N.G. McGehee et al.

    Social change, discourse and volunteer tourism

    Annals of Tourism Research

    (2005)
  • A. Pritchard et al.

    Hopeful tourism: A new transformative perspective

    Annals of Tourism Research

    (2011)
  • H.L. Sin

    Volunteer tourism–“Involve me and I will learn”?

    Annals of Tourism Research

    (2009)
  • H.L. Sin

    Who are we responsible to? Locals’ tales of volunteer tourism

    Geoforum

    (2010)
  • C.J. Steiner et al.

    Understanding existential authenticity

    Annals of Tourism Research

    (2006)
  • J. Taylor

    Authenticity and sincerity in tourism

    Annals of Tourism Research

    (2001)
  • G.L. Watson et al.

    Interpretations of tourism as a commodity

    Annals of Tourism Research

    (1994)
  • K.M. Adams

    Ethnic tourism and the renegotiation of tradition in tana toraja

    Ethnology

    (1997)
  • R. Bernard

    Research methods in anthropology

    (2011)
  • R.V. Bianchi

    The ‘critical turn’ in tourism studies: A radical critique

    Tourism Geographies

    (2009)
  • S. Brown et al.

    Travelling with a purpose: Understanding the motives and benefits of volunteer vacationers

    Department of Hospitality and Tourism Management

    (2005)
  • R.L. Bryant et al.

    Consuming narratives: the political ecology of ‘alternative’ consumption

    Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers

    (2004)
  • J. Butcher

    ‘Making a difference’: Volunteer tourism and development

    Tourism Recreation Research

    (2010)
  • J.G. Carrier

    Protecting the environment the natural way: Ethical consumption and commodity fetishism

    Antipode

    (2010)
  • K. Charmez

    Constructing grounded theory

    (2006)
  • A. Coghlan

    Volunteer tourism as an emerging trend or an expansion of ecotourism? A look at potential clients’ perceptions of volunteer tourism organisations

    International Journal of Nonprofit and Voluntary Sector Marketing

    (2006)
  • A. Coghlan et al.

    Towards an understanding of the drivers of commercialization in the volunteer tourism sector

    Tourism Recreation Research

    (2012)
  • E. Cohen et al.

    Current sociological theories and issues in tourism

    Annals of Tourism Research

    (2012)
  • J. Comaroff et al.

    Millennial capitalism and the culture of neoliberalism

  • É. Crossley

    Poor but happy: Volunteer tourists’ encounters with poverty

    Tourism Geographies

    (2012)
  • A. Decrop

    Trustworthiness in qualitative tourism research

  • Dove, M. (1994). Marketing the rainforest: ‘Green’ panacea or red herring. Asia Pacific Issues...
  • Dowling, R.K. (2003). Volunteer tourism: Experiences that make a difference: Stephen Wearing; CABI Publishing,...
  • R. Duffy et al.

    Neoliberalising nature? Elephant-back tourism in Thailand and Botswana

    Antipode

    (2010)
  • A. Escobar

    Encountering development: The making and unmaking of the third world

    (1995)
  • A. Escobar

    Beyond the third world: Imperial globality, global coloniality and anti-globalization social movements

    Third World Quarterly

    (2004)
  • Cited by (65)

    • “Doing it for the 'gram“? The representational politics of popular humanitarianism

      2021, Annals of Tourism Research
      Citation Excerpt :

      Recently, however, they have come under critical scrutiny, with voluntourism becoming a practice of particular concern (M. Mostafanezhad, 2014a, 2014b; Richey, 2016; H.L. Sin, 2009, 2010). Indeed, Mostafanezhad (2013c, p. 150) even suggests that ‘volunteer tourism perpetuates an aesthetic structure that systematically depoliticises the global economic inequality on which the experience is based’. Voluntourism has thus been criticised for becoming a cultural practice that contributes to the aestheticisation, rather than problematisation, of poverty.

    • Capital deployment and exchange in volunteer tourism

      2020, Annals of Tourism Research
      Citation Excerpt :

      First, Fig. 1 illustrates how volunteers and host project managers understand schools to be valuable for assisting impoverished children who they see as eager and in need of aid. Scholars have noted how perceiving and experiencing this poverty alleviation is of particular importance to the volunteer tourist (Frazer & Waitt, 2016; Mostafanezhad, 2013; Sin, 2009). Therefore, this accentuates the objectified cultural capital of the school, as schools are perceived as locations central to poverty alleviation of impoverished children.

    View all citing articles on Scopus

    Mary Mostafanezhad (Lecturer in the Department of Tourism at the University of Otago, P.O. Box 56, Dunedin, Otago 9054, New Zealand. Email: <[email protected]>). Her main research interests lie at the intersection of the cultural politics and political economy of tourism development in Southeast Asia. This paper is based on longitudinal ethnographic fieldwork in Chiang Mai, Thailand. She has published on volunteer, cultural and ecotourism.

    View full text