Tourism in dictatorships

[rory_20_uk]

I assume that we can go to countries such as the USA with a clear conscience as they never do anything morally ambiguous.

[Kralizec]

I expect the natives will be concerned mostly with their day-to-day life, which would of course be the same whether they live in a Western-style liberal democracy or an authoritarian regime. Of those who do spend any amount of thought on it, quite a few would most likely not even want the former.

The exception would be totalitarian regimes like North Korea or failed states like Somalia. But you probably wouldn't be going there anyway.

I realize that the average person in a dictatorship spends more thought on stuff that is directly relevant to himself (employment, housing and whatnot) but that strikes me as a rather flimsy excuse.

When somebody mentiones "North Korea" it is universally remembered and recognised as a horrorible dictatorship. Most dictatorships are not that bad, and have even became "salonfähig". Before the events of the Arab spring it had become perfectly normal to travel to Tunesia or Egypt to enjoy their sunny beaches and whatnot. When trouble did break out in Tunesia, a French minister even suggested that France should send personel and aid to help Ben Ali's regime against the protestors

But the naked truth is that those countries are dictatorships, and a western tourist who's only there for a couple of weeks actually enjoys more freedom than the natives do in their own country. If by a slip of the mouth such a tourist makes a casual joke about the regime, the authorities wouldn't lay a finger on him for the plain simple reason that they don't want a diplomatic incident or endanger their tourism industry. Yet for the native who overheard the joke and laughs about it, it could be a different story.

I assume that we can go to countries such as the USA with a clear conscience as they never do anything morally ambiguous.

Assuming that this is referring to the way that the USA deals with other countries, that's besides the point - the point of the OP is how people are treated in their own countries.

[rory_20_uk]

So... as long as countries only abuse and murder persons outside their border that is all fine and dandy and we should adopt a Western holier-than-thou attitude on those that treat their own in the same way?

[Kralizec]

So... as long as countries only abuse and murder persons outside their border that is all fine and dandy and we should adopt a Western holier-than-thou attitude on those that treat their own in the same way?

If all this is a reason for you not to visit the US, be my guest. It just hasn't anything to do with the reasons I've outlined in the OP, which I've explained well enough I think.

[Papewaio]

If we use one of the arbitrary freedom indexes and only visit countries with equal or more freedom then:
One of them ranked 1. Norway, 2. Australia

So Aussies should only ever be tourists in Norway and Norwegians should never leave home.

=][=

The thing is what effect does tourism have on the locals and the local economy. Not all tourism is equal and a large portion is based on exchange rate exploitation ie sex tourism.

However as noted with the hypothetical joke about the regime it is very hard to separate tourists from the local workers and merchants. Where money flows so does information and vice a versa.

So as a way to inject ideas and money into an economy tourism generally beats oil and mining. Tourism requires a level of stability and idea acceptance far in advance of mining.

So instead of looking at all tourism as bad, look at the ones that have a positive effect. For instance some eco tours will end up creating national parks, funding rangers and looking after endangered species. Tourist service work for families is generally better conditions then factory working. Also the changes made in cleaning up a city for tourism improves life for the locals.

[HoreTore]

So Aussies should only ever be tourists in Norway and Norwegians should never leave home.

I can support this. When's your next vacation, pape? I'll buy you a round!

[Kralizec]

I get the impression that I'm not taken seriously here...

If we use one of the arbitrary freedom indexes and only visit countries with equal or more freedom then:
One of them ranked 1. Norway, 2. Australia

So Aussies should only ever be tourists in Norway and Norwegians should never leave home.

I didn't really say anything of the sort, did I now? Don't tell me you don't see a qualitative difference beteween Poland and Russia, for example. Things aren't always black and white but to insist both are simply different shades of grey is missing the point.

I seriously doubt wether the Norse or the Australians are more free than I in any meaningful sense, but let's take that as an example. If you visit my country, you're largely treated the same by the authorities as me, a native. The same can't be said if you visit some thirld world dictatorship that somehow manages to advertise itself as a tourist resort.

The thing is what effect does tourism have on the locals and the local economy. Not all tourism is equal and a large portion is based on exchange rate exploitation ie sex tourism.

However as noted with the hypothetical joke about the regime it is very hard to separate tourists from the local workers and merchants. Where money flows so does information and vice a versa.

So as a way to inject ideas and money into an economy tourism generally beats oil and mining. Tourism requires a level of stability and idea acceptance far in advance of mining.

So instead of looking at all tourism as bad, look at the ones that have a positive effect. For instance some eco tours will end up creating national parks, funding rangers and looking after endangered species. Tourist service work for families is generally better conditions then factory working. Also the changes made in cleaning up a city for tourism improves life for the locals.

The point is the double standard. For an example of where this double standard isn’t present I could point to the cases where Dutch people (and other nationalities, I’m sure) get arrested, convicted and incarcerated in Thailand for many years for possessing small amounts of drugs for recreational purposes. The friends and relatives of the convict, who’re still in the Netherlands, complain and nag to the Dutch government that they’re not doing enough to get the guy out of prison. While I agree that the punishment itself is draconian, it’s not worse than a Thai citizen would receive, and my only reaction to the whole incident would be “you broke the law and got caught, what did you expect?”

This, and the apparent dissociation from reality that comes hand in hand with enjoying the sun and cocktails in a country that represses its own citizens, suggests that westerners expect to be treated better than the citizens of Cuba, the PRC, Tunesia etc – even when they’re on the territory of those countries. And to be frank, I think that the notion is obscene.

I don’t dispute that tourism brings in cash and can be beneficial for the locals in the long run. But you could easily argue that in an underdeveloped country with high employment and chronic food shortages, it would actually be beneficial to put kids to work in factories to manufacture clothes, shoes and whatnot to bring in cash from western consumers. Either way, they're not going to school (until any are built, anyway- protests and boycotts against child labour aren’t usually accompanied by an equivalent increase in development aid) and at least this way they're earning money and by extension can be fed. Yet very few people would chose to wear clothing they knew was manufactured in sweat shops by illiterate kids. And why? Because it would ruin the joy of wearing that sweatshirt or those jeans.

[Vladimir]

So... as long as countries only abuse and murder persons outside their border that is all fine and dandy and we should adopt a Western holier-than-thou attitude on those that treat their own in the same way?

Don't visit us, we'll kill you: http://www.thedenverchannel.com/news...19/detail.html

If we do this to our own people, imagine what we'd do to you.

[Major Robert Dump]

I had a couple of soldiers visit China on R&R from Afghanistan, and during their 2 week stay their hotel room was broken into three times. All that was ever taken were subtle pieces of proerty, like SIM cards, thumb drives and memory chips from cameras. Hows that for creepy?

[Vladimir]

I had a couple of soldiers visit China on R&R from Afghanistan, and during their 2 week stay their hotel room was broken into three times. All that was ever taken were subtle pieces of proerty, like SIM cards, thumb drives and memory chips from cameras. Hows that for creepy?

Sorry, those aren't "subtle pieces of property." Those are memory storage devices. Probably more than petty theft.

I take it they didn't stay at the Hilton?

[Major Robert Dump]

They stayed at one of the nicest hotels in the country, according to what they were telling me. They reported the thefts to the Embassy and to the S2 shop when they returned to country. Nothing important was on any of the devices, just some pictures of lesbian girls doing PT and lesbian girls traveling the countryside. But yeah, nothing ever came of it. Had there been photos of combat ops, or equipment, things may have been different, but I doubt it.