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Cited by 281Diverse Aspects of Tourism ResearchUrban Planning and GovernanceTourism, Volunteerism, and Development

Overtourism and degrowth: a social movements perspective

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Milano, Claudio, Novelli, Marina, Cheer, Joseph M.·2019·Journal of Sustainable Tourism
DOI 10.1080/09669582.2019.1650054
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Abstract

Overtourism is a contemporary phenomenon, rapidly evolving and underlined by what is evidently excessive visitation to tourist destinations. This is obvious in the seemingly uncontrolled and unplanned occurrence of urban overtourism in popular destinations and arguably a consequence of unregulated capital accumulation and growth strategies heavily associated with selling cities as tourism commodities. The vested interests of social movements has converged into growing protests against overtourism and associated degrowth campaigns have emerged out of this activism that calls for alternative governance and management measures that eschew touristic monoculture and simplistic economic growth-oriented models. Accordingly, we explore the evolution of the tourism degrowth discourse among social movement activists in Barcelona, and in particular, where this is related to claims associated with overtourism and the extent to which this might be influencing a paradigm shift from ‘tourism growth’ to ‘tourism degrowth’. Methodologically, we draw from an overarching framework that leverages long-term ethnographic research in Barcelona. Here, we employ in-depth semi-structured interviews, participant observations, informal conversations and retrospective evaluation of field diary entries.

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  • Tourist carrying capacity establishes a theoretical threshold beyond which tourism pressures become unsustainable.

    “TCC establishes a theoretical threshold beyond which tourism pressures become unsustainable; we can see this approach in Koens et al. [4], UNWTO [10], WTTC and McKin-sey&Company [15]”

    From Agent-Based Model Applied for the Study of Overtourism in an Urban Context (2025) · cites this paper as [15]

    The Introduction discusses excessive tourism growth and its effects, and the Conclusions refer to limits of acceptable tourism growth. Neither section states that tourist carrying capacity establishes a theoretical threshold beyond which tourism becomes unsustainable; the paper mentions carrying capacity only in reference titles. (LLM, conf=0.76)

    Experimental — accuracy not yet measured

  • The methodology proposed by WTTC and McKinsey&Company uses information from Tripadvisor and classifies the 5 most visited MZs for the concentration indicator and the 20 most visited MZs for density.

    “For the diagnostic indicators, the methodology proposed by WTTC and McKin-sey&Company [15] was used, which uses information from Tripadvisor.This methodology classifies the 5 most visited MZs for the concentration indicator and the 20 most visited MZs for density.”

    From Agent-Based Model Applied for the Study of Overtourism in an Urban Context (2025) · cites this paper as [15]

    The Methodology section describes interviews, participant observation and field diaries, not a WTTC–McKinsey diagnostic method. Searches of our copy for Tripadvisor, concentration and density indicators, and the five- and twenty-zone classifications found no passage addressing the claim. The retrieved sections have no page numbers. (LLM, conf=0.76)

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Authors
Milano, C., Novelli, M., & Cheer, J. M.
Affiliations
  • Universitat de Lleida (ES)
  • University of Brighton (GB)
  • Wakayama University (JP)
Corresponding author
Milano, Claudio
ORCID
Venue
Journal of Sustainable Tourism
Publisher
Informa UK Limited
Published
2019-09-16
Volume
27
Issue
12
Pages
1857-1875
ISSN
  • 0966-9582 (ISSN-L)
  • 1747-7646
DOI
10.1080/09669582.2019.1650054
OpenAlex
W2974250692
Cited by
281
References
2
Citations by year
2026: 52 · 2025: 28 · 2024: 40 · 2023: 40 · 2022: 38 · 2021: 43 · 2020: 38 · 2019: 2
FWCI
60.93
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
Licence
other-oa
Locations
  • Journal of Sustainable Tourism (publishedVersion)
  • University of Brighton Repository (University of Brighton) (submittedVersion, other-oa)
Topics
  • Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Diverse Aspects of Tourism Research
  • Social Sciences › Urban Studies › Urban Planning and Governance
  • Social Sciences › Demography › Tourism, Volunteerism, and Development
Keywords
overtourism, degrowth, social movements, urban tourism, Barcelona, tourism governance, alternative governance, tourism growth, capital accumulation

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