The Role of NGOs in Touristic Securitization

The Case of La Antigua Guatemala

authored by

Sarah Jane Becklake

Abstract

This article focuses on the role of nonprofit, nongovernmental, international development organizations (NGOs) in touristic securitization, the practice of securing tourists to sustain tourism. Especially in the Global South, NGOs are incorporating tourism into their operations/ funding strategies and, thus, becoming touristic securitization stakeholders and actors. Through focusing on Western NGOs in and around Guatemala’s main tourism destination, La Antigua
Guatemala, this article investigates how NGOs rely on, contribute to, and/or engage in touristic securitization. While the article demonstrates that NGOs help make Western tourists feel safe enough to travel to Guatemala, as well as help to keep them from harm while visiting, it also shows how touristic securitization is informed by and informing of intersecting inequalities and (re)producing human insecurities, especially for poor, often indigenous, Guatemalans, the very people NGOs aim to help. The article argues that touristic securitization is securing different worlds of (in)security.

External Organisation(s)

Lancaster University

Type

Article

Journal

Space and Culture

Volume

23

Pages

34–47

No. of pages

14

ISSN

1206-3312

Publication date

01.02.2020

Publication status

Published

Peer reviewed

Yes

ASJC Scopus subject areas

Cultural Studies, Geography, Planning and Development, Arts and Humanities (miscellaneous), Tourism, Leisure and Hospitality Management, Urban Studies

Electronic version(s)

https://doi.org/10.1177/1206331219871888 (Access: Closed)