Towards a New Political Economy of Global Tourism Revisited - Tourism and Development: Concepts and Issues - page 301

encouraged the sell-off of state-owned enterprises, which included
government-run tourism enterprises in well-known destinations such as The
Gambia (Sharpley & Sharpley, 1996: 32) and Kenya (Dieke, 1995). Privati-
sation programmes also stimulated a massive influx of capital into develop-
ing nations, precipitating the shift of assets from the public sector into the
hands of foreign investors and domestic economic and political elites. In
Costa Rica, for example, structural adjustment has led to the displacement
of indigenous village entrepreneurs in nature-based tourism, and budget
cuts in a number of state-funded conservation services (Place, 1998). Coun-
tries in sub-Saharan Africa and Latin America arguably suffered the most
from the social, economic and political upheaval as a result of rising debt
burdens and the austerity measures imposed by the IMF and World Bank
during the 1980s. Where the state had previously played a key intervention-
ist role in the development and planning of tourism resorts in countries such
as Mexico (Clancy, 1999) and Peru (Desforges, 2000), the combined influ-
ence of the debt crisis and deregulation of global financial markets signalled
the decline of state-controlled tourism development. By 1987, it was esti-
mated that 71% of the top two classes of hotel chain in Mexico were oper-
ated by TTCs (Clancy, 1999: 13) while in Peru, the state tourist board had
its budget reduced to zero (Desforges, 2000: 186). The extent of neoliberal
ideological influence on tourism policy extended to conservation, as mani-
fest by the privatisation of 13 national parks in Thailand (Honey, 1999: 39).
Similar proposals were put forward by Peru's national tourism director who
argued that national parks (including the famous Inca ruins and World
Heritage Site of Machu Picchu) should be franchised to private investors
(Desforges, 2000: 186).
Indeed, the prevailing neoliberal economic order is clearly reflected in
tourism, in which hotels and other strategic assets in the tourism-hospitality
sector are seen as, 'part of the essential business infrastructure necessary
to attract potential investors and to establish a modern market economy'
(Pryce, 1998: 81). Notwithstanding the participation of powerful cliques of
Mexican investors in three of the largest Mexican-based hotels chains, each
with a considerable presence in other parts of Latin America, by 1994 the
United States and Canada were responsible for 70% of total investment in
tourism-related activities in Mexico, even before the effects of trade liberali-
sation under the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) had
begun to have an effect (Rodríguez & Portales, 1994: 320). Similarly, the
move towards a more liberalised international trading regime in tandem
with the consolidation of regional trading blocs (NAFTA, European Union
(EU)) further threatens the survival of small-scale Caribbean agricultural
and manufacturing producers, as well as domestic tourism businesses, thus
intensifying regional dependence on TTC-controlled tourism (Pattullo,
1996: 7). Although it has been argued by some (e.g. Harrison, 2001b: 33-39)
that governments have not been particularly effective managers of tourism