| This study takes a socio-historical approach to uncover the reasons behind the continuing links between colonialism and tourism flows. It is informed by a core examination of the ways in which colonialism affects tourism development. It investigates whether the legacy is a product of the tourism development process, the result of a deep and pervasive relationship between the colonies and colonisers, a strategic decision made during the decolonisation period, or a combination of the three. In that effort, three distinct and interconnected types of substantive inquiry recognised in the literature of history and colonialism as explanations of change are used to probe the patterns in tourism movements and development: · The role of historical inertia; · The lock-in effect from a colonial past that feeds on historical inertia; and · The conscious decisions affecting tourism development that perpetuated economic colonialism and hegemony in the post-colonial period. The study examines the core case of Mauritius, the candidate's country of origin. The study covers the time frame of 1940 to 1980, with some incursion into data from the more recent past.;The methodological approach is based primarily on the grounded theory method of research and analysis. Its operationalisation was accomplished through a historical method that employs archival research and a socio-historical study of Mauritius. Archival data related to development and the island tourism sector in assistance from rich nations after independence. The study reveals tourism as a means of economic diversification has evolved into an operational tool of unequal relationships between source markets and destinations. It has provided local economic elites with new opportunities to perpetuate their historical advantages based on the plantation system, with its inherent systems of inequality. It has also provided the pretext to maintain historical socio-cultural links with former colonial powers. Tourism extends historical ties of dependency within a framework of economic internationalisation. Furthermore, maintenance of these links also rests on the key role played by individual personalities, and the associational ties of local elites the bureaucracy, itself a potent legacy of colonial rule. |
