Caruana and Crane (2008) demonstrate how responsibletravel.com constructs certain (ir)responsible identity positions for tourists; Caruana and Crane (2011)
163 suggests that the same website proffers certain ‘ways of seeing’ and ‘doing’ over others in a way which demarcates “important limits” (pp.1507-08) around consumers’ freedom to (dis)engage with certain practices and subjectivities; and Hanna (2013) employs the Foucauldian constructs of ‘power’, ‘knowledge’ and
‘ethics’ to demonstrate how responsibletravel.com invites consumers to
‘experiment with subjectivity’. While it is unsurprising that such ‘ways of seeing’ and ‘doing’ are found within responsibletravel.com – given that it is considered an “exemplar company from which to gain an insight into the promotion of sustainable tourism” (Hanna, 2013: 369) – the data of this project finds that the promotion of ethical practices and subjectivities does not typically transfer to guidebooks and/or other forms of marketing from travel companies.
This is perhaps surprising, given that Lisle (2008: 155) argues that the Lonely Planet guidebook particularly advocates “a form of responsible independent travel”.
Although Alex claimed that such guidebooks do “tell you like ‘here’s the right thing to do’. Like ‘here’s the way to interact with that country’”, and Maisie suggested that “there are little sections in the front like ‘how to go’, ‘how to dress’ and that”, participants predominantly tended to problematise the lack of information pertaining to ethics (Table 4.4). On the one hand, Giovanna emphasised that there should be more information equipping tourists with the knowledge against which they can make their own choices pertaining to the types of (ir)responsible activities they do or do not engage in (i.e. “at least the guidebook should give you a hint of where to go, and then you decide”). On the other hand, Connor suggested that having more information would provide a bigger overview of environmental and socio-cultural “issues” of a destination,
164 Table 4.4 Problematising the lack of ethical information in guidebooks and/or market materials
better informing his responsible tourism “approach” and “opinions”. When asked what he reads to inform his understanding, Connor answered guidebooks,
Anne (A10_P)
I mean to be honest though the guidebooks are kind of limited in that respect – in terms of how you behave. I mean they’ll give you an idea, but I tend to go on the internet and look things up as well. I don’t just rely on guidebooks for things like that.
Connor (C8_P)
[Guidebooks] often don’t have much information about the ethics or responsible tourism of the places that you’re going to.
Giovanna (G1_R)
Giovanna: To be honest, the guidebook never mentioned those places where we actually been to and we experienced that issue with... the responsible tourist issue. So that wasn’t a problem for the guidebook [laughter]
Interviewer: Yeah [laughter]. So the responsible tourism very much came from you rather than the guide? Ok [laughter]
Giovanna: Yes. Which is not a great thing, because at least the guidebook should give you a hint of where to go, and then you decide, and then you do some extra research.
Mabel (M7_P)
Travel companies very rarely tell you what you should do and what you shouldn’t do. There’s a lot of assumptions that people will behave […]. But as a tourist, I found very few guidelines on how to behave. It’s really about where to eat in restaurants, and where we’re going to take you, and where you’ve got to take the photographs.
Maisie (M3_R)
I don’t think ethical tourism is promoted enough. I think that it’s, it’s kind of aimed at, the ethical tourism is aimed at kind of hippies, and tree-huggers and new-age people. And people who have got quite a lot of money, who can afford to live in a super, massive house with solar power [laughter], which seems a bit, you know, weird. But I don’t think there’s enough, at all, about the little ethical steps that regular people can make. And I don’t think people are aware of the ethical choices that they could make. I think people think that ethics is, like ethical tourism is for rich people that can go and trek Nepal for six months every year, and go and live in the Andes for their six weeks, and...
Maria (M9_P)
I don’t buy travel guides for example. I don’t believe in that.
That doesn’t tell me anything about the culture of the country really. It tells me what is the most trendy places to go. But for me not necessarily it represents the country.
165 but immediately noted that they were lacking in ethical information, impeding a proper understanding of the country:
Extract 12 (C8_P): But I suppose... I think, for me, gaining an understanding of the culture and the issues facing that area that you’re visiting, that informs my own development of a responsible tourism, you know, approach if you like. So, if I have an understanding of what are the particularly environmental issues, socio-cultural issues in that area, understanding what... how the people live, you know, what are the potential... what’s the economic situation like, you know, that sort of thing, that’s what then I form my opinions.
Following from Connor’s extract, it appears that having more information on environmental and socio-cultural issues would be particularly useful, and important, when visiting destinations that are culturally-disparate to the tourist’s home country. For instance, when discussing guidebooks in the Prospective Phase, Anne recalled how her holidays to Mexico and Egypt required much more information than her trip to America, “because it’s very different”. She rationalised:
Extract 13 (A10_P):
Anne: Like we went to Egypt a few years ago and I was very aware that I didn’t want to offend anybody. So we read up a lot about what was acceptable clothing and things like that. So no, we do. If we’re going to a culture that we don’t know very well we do do a lot more research. But I did quite a bit more of research in Mexico than I did for America, I think
Interviewer: Yeah?
Anne: Yeah, because it’s a very different. Although America is a very different culture you’ve got an idea, much more of an idea of what it is like. But Mexico is quite unknown to us, so we did do much more research about where it was safe to travel as well. And the food, and that kind of thing as well. So we want to know everything really, as much as possible I think. You know, part of being looking after ourselves as much as anything else
166 Anne wanted to know as much as she could (“as much as possible I think”) both as a means of ensuring that her conduct was culturally-sensitive toward others (“I didn’t want to offend anybody”) and protecting herself in an unfamiliar destination (“looking after ourselves as much as anything else”). Although Anne did have sufficient information, if, in similar situations, other tourists faced ambiguities surrounding what is ethical, a lack of information and guidance represents a serious issue. As evidenced by Anne, this issue is significant in terms of outer-oriented reasons – i.e. abiding by best practice (e.g. wearing
“acceptable clothing”) – and inner-oriented reasons, such as staying “safe”.
More specifically, this finding is of extreme practical importance, as it suggests that guidebooks need to contain more information pertaining to how to be and act in different cultures and environments both in order to respect the host and safeguard the tourist.
It is also noted that this practical implication is especially significant given McWha et al’s (2017) recent work into the ethical dilemmas faced by contemporary travel writers. McWha et al (2017) conclude that travel writers
“actively aim to contribute to sustainability outcomes through their work in travel writing” (p.15); namely through ‘cultural mediation’, striking a balance between ‘fact versus fiction’, and attempting to diminish the ‘Lonely Planet Syndrome’ (defined as “where a destination that may not have the capacity (or desire) for tourism is faced with a mass increase of visitation” (p.1)). While the current (in)effectiveness of these strategies directly links to the positive and negative perceptions relayed throughout section 4.4 – i.e. ‘cultural mediation’
(“‘here’s the way to interact with that country’” (Alex)); ‘fact versus fiction’
(“fairly accurate” (William), “romanticising” (Josh)); ‘Lonely Planet
167 Syndrome’ (“too over-publicised, so they become too touristy” (Sophie)) – it is evident that contemporary sustainable travel writing would benefit from having more information on ethical issues.