This brief review of the lines of thought about modernity, and the expla- nations of the tourism phenomenon that are associated with these lines, clearly demonstrates that modernity is a controversial and ambivalent concept. Consequently, there is no univocal, unambiguous explanation of tourism. Much debate has arisen on the question of whether the West has undergone or is undergoing a transition from ‘Fordism’ to ‘post-Fordism’, from ‘Materialist’ values to ‘Postmaterialist’ values, or, in tourism terms, from ‘tourism’ to ‘post-tourism’. Usually, Fordism is linked to modernity and post-Fordism to postmodernity. Fordism is named after Henry Ford, the inventor of the assembly line, which is representative of the modern mass-production system. It grew throughout the 20th century in the West, reaching its peak in the 1950s and 1960s, and showing signs of decline from the mid-1970s. Some major features of Fordism include the mass
production of homogeneous products, the use of inflexible technologies, economies of scale and a mass market for the homogenized products of mass-production industries. Clearly the period in which Fordism tri- umphed was also the time in which mass tourism reached its peak (Wang, 2000, p. 102). Poon (1993) preferred to talk about ‘old’ tourism (before 1978) versus ‘new’ tourism (after 1978) rather than ‘post-tourism. ‘Old’
tourism is associated with mass tourism, with standardized and rigidly packaged trips, whereas ‘new’ tourism is flexible, independent, seg- mented, environmentally-conscious (id). The debate is ongoing, but it is for sure that Fordism has not yet entirely disappeared; on the contrary, many of its elements are still alive and coexist with post-Fordism. Ritzer’s McDonaldization of society is a clear example of the great influence of Fordism in contemporary years. Standardized packaged tours, cruises, all-inclusive resorts are booming faster than they ever did before.
Whether or not we stand at the opening of a new era, which is taking us beyond modernity itself, is not to be discussed here. According to Giddens, we are moving into a period in which the consequences of modernity are becoming more radicalized and universalized than before, rather than entering a period of post-modernity (1990, p. 3). Wang (2000, p. 16) prefers to treat so-called postmodernity as late modernity, because postmodern changes have not transcended rationalization, but, on the contrary, postmodernity is viewed as a new form of the same order (ratio- nalization). Still, current years are different from recent decades in several respects. First, the clear and fixed dichotomies of the 1970s and 1980s, such as work versus leisure, everyday life versus holidays, home versus away, real versus fake, authentic versus inauthentic no longer apply as they once did. Second, as a consequence of the first respect, leisure in general and tourism in particular cannot be seen any more as ‘escape’ from every- day or ‘normal’ life, but are an integral part of it. Whether late modern or post-modern, this de-differentiation of traditional categories is a recent phenomenon. Third, the centrality of production in postwar years has given way to a consumer culture in the end of the 20th century. Fourth, what characterizes ‘liquid modernity’ according to Bauman (2000) is the abandonment of the search for a blueprint for human society to impose a newer, better solid form of social order. Instead, we have slowly but surely undermined and undone all forms of inflexibility and restraint, most dramatically perhaps with nation state borders and the freedom to travel – whether the cargo is trade goods, information or human travellers.
It is precisely this world that we need to grasp, yet, like all liquids it does not hold its shape for long. Transformation and states of becoming are the social realities we have to deal with and Bauman has characterized our central roles as consumers in liquid modernity as rather like tourists.
(Franklin, 2003b, p. 205)
These four aspects will be explained in some more detail now, the first two taken together.
De-differentiation of traditional categories
The emergence of tourism as a modern mass phenomenon is traditionally explained in terms of ‘escape’ or ‘push-motives’. At least three lines of thought lead to escape motives. One is the line of rationalization, which views tourism as a rational and functional escape, as a necessary comple- ment to and a compensation for work, as a means of enhancing productiv- ity and efficiency, and as an essential element of a reasonable standard of living (Hessels, 1973; Pimlott, 1976). A holiday allows workers to refill the batteries and re-energize to be able to do their jobs efficiently. In addition to that, Cohen (1979a) refers to tourism as a ‘pressure-valve’: when mod- ern man cannot take the pressures of daily living any more, he goes on vacation.
Today, compensation motives are still very much alive. It is true that – on paper – we have more leisure time than ever before, but life is hectic, for every type of worker as well as for their employers. The work itself, the care for children and household, the maintenance of properties, the use of the media, our social network, congestion and traffic jams, and a differen- tiated consumption pattern, all add up to an agitated way of life. The felt need for frequent travelling is more pressing than ever. Surveys con- ducted in Western European countries demonstrate that ‘getting away from it all’, ‘relaxation’, ‘having a break’, ‘Erholung’ are the principal motives for going on holiday (van Egmond, 1996). Again, destinations can be anywhere.
A second line is MacCannell’s and Cohen’s line of alienation.
MacCannell (1976) found escape motives explicitly in the alienation of individuals from society. Only by breaking the bonds of their everyday existence can modern man or woman have authentic experiences. Mean- ing is sought in the life of others. Cohen (1979a), too, takes modern individuals’ alienation from their society as a starting point. Whereas MacCannell thought of one single mode to cope with alienation, that is, the search for authenticity, Cohen specified five ways in which the individual could try to find a spiritual centre away from their everyday world (recreational, diversionary, experiential, experimental and existen- tial modes, to be explained elsewhere).
Although the views of MacCannell and Cohen turned out to be very influential in tourism discourse, being cited frequently, the empirical sup- port for these views is limited. One of (Erik) Cohen’s modes of tourist experiences, the diversionary mode, refers to ‘a mere escape from the boredom and meaninglessness of routine, everyday existence, into the
forgetfulness of a vacation, which may heal the body and soothe the spirit’
(1979a, p. 96). This mode is quite similar to the view formulated by (Stanley) Cohen and Taylor (1976, 1992) who regard the holiday as the archetypical free area, the institutionalized setting for contemporary excursions away from the domain of paramount reality. In this line of thought both leisure in general and tourism in particular offer ways of escape, not in order to recuperate and renew energy for daily work, but escape from the constraints of reason and rationality. They offer ‘structur- ally separated (mostly) legitimate zones, where instincts, impulses, desires, drives of play and pleasure, feelings, emotions, imaginations, and so on are no longer required to be subdued, constrained and controlled, but released, satisfied, or consumed’ (Wang, 2000, p.35), that is, they offer opportunities both to ‘escape from’ constraints and ‘escape to’ freedom and extraordinary experiences. In addition to that they offer therapeutic opportunities to those who are victimized by repression and control of irrational factors and impulses.
Although their theoretical perspectives might be different, this approach of leisure and tourism in terms of escape from rationalization, external control, alienation, boredom, routine and meaninglessness of work life or everyday life has been very common among researchers in the 1970s and 1980s. The early years of tourism thus evoked many critical, even pessimistic discourses about the origin and nature of tourism.
A possible explanation of this pessimistic approach is offered by the concept oflong waves in history. This concept is based on the Kondratiev- cycles and developed by Gaus (2001). It offers a framework to explain the dynamics in the appreciation of tourism over the years. The Russian statis- tician Kondratiev gave the name ‘long waves’ in 1925 to the well-known phenomenon of cyclic trends in the economy. Gaus elaborated upon the Kondratiev cycles by postulating cycles of increasing and decreasing uncer- tainty and anxiety among citizens. Like the Kondratiev cycles these cycles of anxiety take 50 years, about 25 years of increasing (the descending phase) and 25 years of decreasing anxiety (the ascending phase) respec- tively. In recent years anxiety is presumed to have increased between 1971 and 1990 and from 1990 on we are becoming less uncertain and less anxious. With growing uncertainty and existential anxiety everyday life becomes increasingly displeasing. Escape routes from the conscious experi- ence of the present-day life will become popular. That is why the emer- gence of mass tourism in the 1970s was associated by many writers with escape, compensation or ‘push’ motives. Growing interest in nature has, according to Gaus, undoubtedly its roots in that it offers a universe free of people in which all those feelings which make the life of the anxious and uncertain human so troublesome are absent (2001, p. 155). The always emo- tional and arguably romantic return to nature therefore only occurs if human society in the long run has lost a lot of its attractiveness because of
its more uncertain and anxious perception (p. 155). Moreover, the descend- ing phase brought along pessimism about the future of our planet, includ- ing the impacts of tourism, whereas the ascending phase focuses rather on corporate social responsibility and sustainable development issues. In the ascending phase that is supposed to have started in the early 1990s, escape motives will lose ground, whereas exploratory (‘pull’) motives and adven- ture seeking, including seeking physical risks, will gain interest. Publica- tions about tourism will lose their pessimistic view or even bring an ode to
‘The Holiday’ (Löfgren, 1999; Inglis, 2000). Playfulness is not appreciated by uncertain and anxious people. In the current ascending phase playful- ness, carnivalesque Eros,homo ludenswill get a greater share in people’s daily life. Whether or not this concept is valid, it demarcates the transition between explanations of tourism in terms of escape motives to late modern or postmodern explanations.
The dichotomy between ‘everyday life’ and holiday no longer applies.
Although compensation motives may still play an important role in holiday motivation and participation, it is not fruitful any more to regard leisure in general and holidays in particular as search for a
‘centre-out-there’ or escape from daily life conditions. ‘Tourism is now so pervasive in postmodern society that, rather than conceiving tourism as a “departure” from the routines and practices of everyday life, tourism has become an established part of everyday life culture and consumption’
(McCabe, 2002, p. 63).
Consequently, tourism not only represents a microcosm of everyday life and provides a frame through which everyday life is not abandoned, but enriched and heightened (p. 70), but the routines and practices of everyday life are more and more part of tourism as well. Everyday life’s rationalization, external control, alienation, boredom, routine and mean- inglessness permeate in contemporary holidays. Holidays seem more and more dominated by everyday rationalizations and routines (Bargeman, 2001, p. 24).
How can holidays become part of routines and practices of everyday life? Can even long-haul trips to exotic destinations that, for long, were supposed to be extreme contrasts to ‘normal’ life, become routinized?
To explain this several concepts will be used. These are: ‘novelty seek- ing’, as developed by Berlyne (1960) and Lee and Crompton (1992), ‘rest- lessness’, as developed by Rojek (1995), Giddens (1990) ‘symbolic tokens, expert systems and trust’, and Schutz’s ‘world within attainable reach’.
A variety of definitions of novelty have been proposed, but the pre- vailing view is to define it as the degree of contrast between present per- ception and past experience (Lee and Crompton, 1992, p. 733). Thus, in assessing whether a stimulus is novel, individuals compare it with other stimuli present at that time and with stimuli they have encountered in the past. In the present context, a tourist’s perception of the extent to
which novelty will be present at a vacation destination will be a function of the perceived novelty of objects (e.g. historical landmarks), the environ- ment (the cultural atmosphere) and other people (residents or visitors).
The degree of perceived novelty associated with objects, environment, or other people may be expressed in terms of experience. The antithesis of novelty is familiarity (p. 733). Berlyne (1960) reported a direct relationship between novelty and exploratory behaviour. Exploratory behaviour is an overt expression of curiosity that is aroused by an environment perceived to be novel. Berlyne postulated that every individual has a unique, nor- mal, and adaptive optimal level of arousal he or she seeks to maintain, ranging from a high level of arousal that is characteristic of arousal seek- ers, to a low level that is characteristic for arousal avoiders.
This psychological approach of tourism seeking an optimal level of arousal is static and a-historical. The optimum in level of arousal, however, is changing. In our present ‘modern consumer culture or global informa- tion culture’ (Lash, 1999) we are used to more stimuli to reach an optimal level of arousal than ever before. ‘The ever-changing stimuli of modern culture flood our senses’ (Simmel, in Rojek, 1995, p. 109). According to Rojek (p. 109), the dialectic between Modernity 1 and Modernity 2 can be understood as producing a perpetual sense of corrosive restlessness in the human psyche. This is reflected in leisure behaviour in, for example, the endless pursuit of novelty. Some individuals might develop strategies to defend themselves against today’s sweeping and overwhelming informa- tion flows. The most common defensive strategy is ignoring these flows and withdrawing oneself into a small controllable life world. Others might fall victim to stress or neurasthenia, physical disease or the tightening of the nerves, as a response to the constant assault of ever-changing stimuli. But many are getting used to ‘a state of tension and expectancy’ and ‘flit from activity to activity in search of genuine escape and satisfaction’ (Rojek, 1995, p. 109). Novelty seeking becomes routinized. What’s challenging and thrill- ing today will be boring tomorrow. Yesterday’s kick becomes today’s routine. In the end this might lead to what Simmel (in Rojek, 1995) refers to as the ‘blasé attitude’, an incapacity to react to new sensations.
Unable to commit ourselves to any of the ephemeral stimulations that we encounter, we are nonetheless incapable of living without them. Leisure is experienced as colourless, unvarying and incapable of providing genuine release. Our leisure activities simply become ways of killing time. Neverthe- less, because our craving for escape has not been satisfied, we are driven on to helplessly search for excitement, escape and release.
(Rojek, 1995, p. 109) Restless novelty seeking is the quintessence of our modern consumer culture. ‘Wanting new and different things in an endless pattern of discontent’ (Campbell, 1983, p. 282) brings along a search for ever-new
stimulations, sensations and activities. The fear of missing something has become a major motivator of consumer behaviour. In the words of Rojek:
We crave the latest commodity or commodified experience but forget them almost as soon as we have consumed them. We are captivated by the style and boldness of the latest advertising campaign or fashion craze but we have trouble remembering anything about them six months later. Our leisure seems to be crunched up in the endless search for novelty and variety but leaves nothing memorable behind. Modern leisure experience, it might be said, is often marked by a disappointing sense of anti-climax – a feeling that despite all of the excitement that surrounds us there is nothing really exciting left to do any more.
(Rojek, 1995, p. 109) Consequently, the roller coasters in amusement parks have to grow longer and more exciting all the time, sex and violence in movies and on television must become more and more explicit and extreme, the most remote areas of the world are exploited touristically, the main subject of conversation during our holiday is what the next holiday will be like.
New disciplines emerge in academia to studyimagineering: how to create concepts that bring the thrill, adventure, surprise, novelty, boredom alle- viation modern consumers demand.
During the 1990s long-haul exotic holidays became part of touristic consumption of many. Having started as a mass phenomenon only after the economic crisis of the early 1980s, it is a recent phenomenon.
How can exotic long-haul trips become routinized? Let’s first turn to two types of disembedding mechanisms mentioned by Giddens (1990). By disembedding he means the ‘lifting out’ of social relations from local con- texts of interaction and their restructuring across indefinite spans of time- space (1990, p. 21). The two types of disembedding mechanisms Giddens distinguishes are the creation of ‘symbolic tokens’ and the establishment of ‘expert systems’. By symbolic tokens he means media of interchange which can be ‘passed around’ without regard to the specific characteris- tics of individuals or groups that handle them at any particular juncture (p. 22). Money is an excellent example of such a medium of interchange, credit cards are even better examples when international tourism is con- cerned. Money/credit cards permit the exchange of things, wherever in the world, regardless of whether the goods involved share any substan- tive qualities in common with one another. The growth of the credit card made possible a massive increase in international consumer spending, without needing to purchase foreign currency. By expert systems Giddens means ‘systems of technical accomplishment or professional expertise that organize large areas of the material and social environments in which we live today’ (p. 27). The systems in which the knowledge of experts is integrated influence many aspects of what we do in a continuous way.
Driving a car, boarding a plane, booking an organized trip, paying with a credit card means relying on abstract expert systems. Both symbolic tokens and expert systems depend upontrust. Trust is therefore involved in a fundamental way with the institutions of modernity. Trust here is vested, not in individuals, but in abstract capacities (p. 26). All trust is in a certain sense blind trust. It rests upon faith in the correctness of principles of which one is ignorant, not upon faith in the ‘moral uprightness’ (good intentions) of others. It concerns theproperworking of systems rather than their operation as such (p. 34).
Today’s tourism and travel industry consists of various kinds of expert systems, from transnational hotel chains and transport systems to central reservation systems and tourist information systems. Thomas Cook’s first inclusive group tour in 1841 heralded the new era of expert systems in the tourism and travel industry. These expert systems allow present-day consumers to book trips to the most remote areas of the globe without risks. Trust in aviation systems, tour operating systems, informa- tion systems and so on is justified because risks are minimized. Moreover, trust is supported by consumer protection systems that allow consumers to hold suppliers responsible for their services. According to Ritzer, many systems have been McDonaldized (Ritzer, 2000) or McDisneyized (Ritzer and Liska, 1997), in terms of efficiency, calculability, predictability and control through non-human technology. It is objectively safe now to book an organized trip to exotic countries. Consumers can trust that the tour operator has taken care of eliminating most of the physical, financial and psychological risks. It is also subjectively safe. In our globalized world the whole world has become our domain of consumption. We do not travel to discover the world, but because the world has been discovered. In the 1950s, Spain was a destination for pioneers. For any British or German holidaymaker the step to Spain in 1950 was a far bigger one – in terms of psychological impediments – than the step to Thailand, or even Vietnam, in present days. Whereas the first long-haul trip might have been a source of thrill and excitement, the fourth one was much more routinized. The first trip commonly goes to well-known destinations, where many prede- cessors have set foot. Consequently, there is a hierarchical order among destinations in terms of familiar high priority countries on top to unfamil- iar ones at the base. This is a dynamic process, as is dramatically demonstrated on one hand by the rise of Vietnam and Namibia after war and the fall of tourism to former Yugoslavia on the other.
We are part of a collective learning process. We do not only learn from our own experience, but also from the experience of others and from mass communication. Holidays, even to exotic long-haul destinations, are now for many of us, in the terms of Schutz and Luckmann (1974), part of our
‘stock of knowledge’. The sector of the world which is accessible to one’s immediate experience is termed by them asthe world within actual reach.It