Oct 06 2023 57 mins 2
On this episode of The End of Tourism Podcast, my guest is Macià Blázquez-Salom, a professor at the University of the Balearic Islands, who specializes in the Geography of Tourism, Territorial Planning, Sustainability and Degrowth. He utilizes his teaching and research activity in the environmental movement (and vice versa), and through his activism in the Grupo Balear de Ornitología y Defensa de la Naturaleza (GOB) and Alba Sud.
Show Notes
Macia’s Journey in the Balearics
The Beginning of Mass Tourism through Currency Devaluation
Contradictions in Mallorca
Cocoon Tourism in Spain
You Want to Work in the Balearics, You Have to Sleep in a Tent
Boosterism and Green Boosterism
Degrowth Definitions and Contradictions
Imagining Other Modes of Travel
Imagining Other Modes of Resistance
Homework
Google Scholar: Macia Blasquez
Orcid: Connecting Researchers with Researchers
Transcript
[00:00:00] Chris: Welcome Macia, to the podcast. From what I've been able to dig up around your life and work that you've been studying, tourism and its contradictions for a very long time. Now, I'd like to ask you what drove you towards a career as a professor and critic of the tourism industry?
[00:00:24] Macia: Well, in fact, even before finishing my degree, I was involved in social movements here in the Balearics, in Mallorca, particularly. I was member of the committee of the volunteers collaborating with the GOB, which is the biggest ecologist group. Then by the eighties and perhaps influenced by this collaboration, I decided to study geography and to analyze the relation in between tourism and natural conservation, because by then we had promotion after the tourism boom in the sixties and seventies.
The eighties Spain became member of the European Union and some of our politicians, they decided and they were promoting the Balearics as second residents destination for north European people, and this means that investment in the real estate market even increased with foreign people buying second residencies and promoting as well the promotion of more urban development for this purpose.
And that was written in the natural areas due to what we call "green" or "gray-grabbing" with new facilitation of land here in the Balearics. And this was the main aim I had to develop my research on this topic, with special planning and natural conservation in the Balearics.
Afterwards we had what we called the real estate bubble that began in the nineties and burst in 2008. And that was a period when I was more involved, particularly in the social movements. In fact I feel more related with activism than with academia. After the crisis with my age, I took the decision of giving support to younger people in the social movements and devote more time to the academia with colleagues Ivan Murray or Ernest Canada or Robert Fletcher or Nora Muller, other people who are working in this research group in the University of the Balearics Islands. But I still working with the NGOs Alba Sud, particularly the GOB, and other social movements in this region in the Western Mediterranean region particularly.
[00:03:03] Chris: I have some questions regarding these social movements that I think maybe we'll get to in just a bit.
But, I'd like to try to offer a bit of context for our listeners in part because before I heard of your name and before I interviewed our mutual friend Ivan, for the first episode of the podcast, I don't think I had ever heard of Palma or Mallorca before, even as someone who had traveled through Europe and many other parts of the Mediterranean.
And so I'm curious if you could give us a bit of background on how Palma came to be over touristed, or at the very least, what you've seen come to pass in your time there. I mean, I know it's, it is also historically has a lot of deep importance for the Spanish state and Mediterranean history culture.
[00:03:55] Macia: I'm sure you have heard about the dictatorship of Franco in the forties, fifties. Mm-hmm. Fifties. He was given support to the Luther in the second World War. And after the defeat, the technical support he had was coming from Opus Dei, was introducing tourism and real estate business as a way to have foreign direct investment.
And as a result, Spain had a very important development of, of real estate business in this new areas particularly related with sun and sea tourist resorts. Perhaps you have heard about Costa Del Sol, Benidorm in Costa Blanca, or Costa Brava in Catalonia. And the same for the Balearic Islands. During that period, in the case of of M we had a huge amount of new hotels being double developed.
And they were financed partly by people coming from North Europe, particularly from Germany. There was a novel accumulation of capital in that, in those regions that have had industrial development and investors realized that tourism could be a good business, introducing this way of consuming savings, consuming income for working class people in the UK, in Germany, and this is how in the Balearics we had the development of what we call the tourist boom in the sixties with hundreds of hotel being built up every month really in Mallorca, in Ibiza. Perhaps you have heard about Ibiza, right?
[00:05:52] Chris: And this is just to be clear, this is in the first decade of international mass tourism post-war, correct?
[00:06:01] Macia: In the Sixties, because the two first decades after the war, our regime, the dictatorship of Franco was defeated. I mean, they were given support to Hitler and Mussolini and Spain was set aside. And the model they were following was self-sufficiency. We became members of the UN United Nations by the end of the Fifties when Franco decided to take this option of promoting foreign investment, making the change of currency with the foreign currencies possible.
And it was through devaluation of the peseta, this means that investing from the UK, Germany, or even the United States, or for tourists coming to Spain, visiting our country, was so cheap due to this devaluation of the currency. And this way we had that mass tourism development and mass foreign investment, foreign investment and flows of people coming here for holidays and enterprises developing their activities for profit.
This was the beginning and the result were that after all those years, we now have eight hundred thousand tourist beds in the B alearics and we had 16.5 million tourists last year in the Balearics, 2022. And this is a huge amount of tourists for an archipelago that just has. 5,000 square kilometers, 1.1 million inhabitants.
Most of our tourists are coming from the UK. Let's say 25%. Germany, another 25%. This means 8 million tourists coming from Germany. Then we have 13% coming from mainland to Spain. And then we have people from Scandinavia, Norway, Sweden Denmark, the Netherlands. They come here looking for sun warm weather conditions during the summertime, particularly during the high season.
This is July, August, September. This is when we are having more over crowded beaches, traffic jams in the roads and the touristification of every single place in our islands. Because by the beginning, tourists were going particularly to the tourist resorts. But nowadays the countryside, natural areas, villages and, and even the historical center of the cities is being touristified.
You can find boutiques, you can find terraces of bars and restaurants, all of them changing very quickly, the landscape and the way of life of our places.
[00:09:17] Chris: At what point in your life did you arrive in the Balearics, in Mallorca, or are you from there?
[00:09:23] Macia: I'm from the Balearics. The mother of my father Fr was from Palma. And the parents of my mother were from M and I was grown here. It's quite common in places like Balearics to have roots, to have grown people is not moving that much. Right. I attended my degree and I finished my PhD thesis, and now I have my job here and this is common. We're not moving that much.
[00:09:54] Chris: Well, it's a bit of a blessing to hear that there are people in the world still who live in the same place they were born, which is more and more rare. I guess I'm curious, you know, over the course of your life then, in Palma, is there one thing that you might be able to single out as perhaps the most startling or biggest or devastating change that you've seen there?
[00:10:19] Macia: Yeah. Well in fact it has to do with my political position during that moment because we had a right wing go government from 2003 to 2007 with Lots of cases of corruption related with mega pr This means projects with a budget higher to 1000 million euros. They were projects to promote highways, to promote big infrastructure, transport infrastructure, a new harbors, enlarging the airport equipment.
Instead of refurbishing the hospital, they decided to build a new hospital. And this is nice, but at the same time, they were meeting and we have collected information about those meetings to arrange, Communicating in between big entrepreneurs and politicians. Where and how was that development going to be?
And they were changing this information to give advantage to the investors in a way which is nowadays considered as corruption. Many of those politicians are even nowadays in jail because of those cases. And during that period I was involved as a representative, as a volunteer giving support to the campaigns for the right to the island, demanding the politicians and the public institutions and the entrepreneurs not to follow with that promotion which was jeopardizing our land promoting socio-spatial segregation destroying natural habitats. That was the peak of the real estate bubble. Just before 2008 when I was involved. We were preparing something which is called a popular initiative to the parliament.
I was myself defending the initiative in the regional parliament which was in fact making a proposal not to allow more enlargement of the transport infrastructure, enlargement of the urban for instance, protection of natural areas. And that moment was particularly stressing, even violent with lots of discussions and pressures with people lobbying.
But now I feel I did something nice. We have some successes, therefore it was worth doing that.
[00:12:58] Chris: Beautiful. And I'm, I'm curious as well, I guess on a general scale on the island, how has civil society begun to respond? And I mean, we're talking about 60, 70 years now, so, you know, of, of tourism development there.
How has civil society, how has the government, the NGOs responded to this over tourism, and what, if any, contradictions do you see in those responses? You've already spoken a little bit about the corruption.
[00:13:33] Macia: Yeah, you're right. This is a very good question because I was a young guy perhaps having looked to the situation from an naive point of view.
And now that I see it after some time, I understand some contradictions. Perhaps the biggest contradictions that I see now is that, Fighting to promote natural artist protections, for instance, or fighting for a better environment. They took profit of our campaigns to find new ways to earn money, to take profit from the situation. This is to say that nowadays we see how what was the biggest threat, the gray grabbing, is now becoming another model to exploit the land and the people, which is what we call "green grabbing."
Capital and entrepreneurs and investors are taking profit of the land that was protected, setting aside urban development to promote a new image of the Balearics as a good refuge for capital investment and for the elites, and this is not that nice. After the time you realized that you were instrumentalized to promote the business of those that are nowadays refurbishing the hotels, a lot of investment is being devoted to the built environment.
Because the real estate business is even more profitable nowadays. And as it is becoming scarred because we have stopped the urban growth these houses and these buildings, whatever they will be, perhaps hotels, are becoming more and more expensive and people is being fired. The people is not any long being able to live in the villages because they are becoming too expensive or in the Catholic shelter of the city and people is not being able to follow living in the Balearics and they have to go to live mainland.
And this is a contradiction of the natural environment and the quality of life. It's becoming more exclusive.
[00:15:59] Chris: Yeah, this was something that our mutual colleague, Ivan, had mentioned to me at some point. He was referring to the way that after the lockdowns, during the pandemic, once the government travel restrictions were dropped, that there was this pattern emerging or seeming to emerge around the stratification of tourism towards elite either travel or investment.
So we could call maybe the elitification of tourism and tourism investment. And I imagine that's kind of what you're speaking to now. Is that correct?
[00:16:41] Macia: Yeah. they were talking about cocoon tourism. People looking for a secure place to spend their holidays.
At the same time, it has to be accessible. At the same time, it has to be sustainable. Now they are talking about circular economy, and the Balearics are leading this labeling, this branding, you know? Mm-hmm. It, it's like we, we are the best in the world to innovate in these terms.
We were defending the natural areas. Afterwards, there was a limit of the number of tourists beds. We have eco-tax cuts for the accommodation, which is then invested in mitigating the problems that tourism is provoking. Now we have this circular economy system applied to the hotels that are having public support to invest in energy efficiency.
And the result is that we have an elitization, we have elites grabbing built environment, grabbing land. And this promotes socio-spatial segregation in the islands. I imagine that it's the same that has happened in Bahamas or in Hawaii. It's like refugee for capitals and elites looking for security, looking for profitability, away from migration from the south because not that much migration is arriving to the Balearics.
The mainland spain is closer to Africa or the Canary Islands. They are much more closer to Senegal, for instance, but not that much amount of boats coming from Africa with migrants looking for better living conditions are coming to the We have many, many marinas with huge yachts, very expensive.
And this is another icon, you know, another example of the gentrification of the islands is a tourist gentrification. Second residences, good airport connections. The airport is growing and growing, that they are promoting more enlargement of the airport capacity, highways, rent al car and the local population is being set aside even more if you are not local, if you want to come to the Balearics to work during the high season, perhaps you have to sleep in a balcony or in a tent or in a car.
Because it's so difficult to find dwelling, to find, to find accommodation if you are working. Wow. Yeah. Prices are increasing so quickly. Hmm.
[00:19:38] Chris: On that note and in the context of these eco taxes and the island becoming a destination for this certain type of elitism I'm also curious about this term that Ivan introduced me to, that precedes a question that he actually wrote in for me to ask you. And the term that he mentioned, which I had never heard of before, is green boosterism or boosterism in general. Perhaps first you might be able to explain what Boosterism is for our listeners.
And then secondly Ivan was mentioning this in the context of Spain receiving public funds from the EU in order to redevelop the tourism sector. And so the second question, then what do you think the trajectory of tourism is in Spain with this extra money?
[00:20:36] Macia: The original government that allowed different ways to have new incomes coming from the tourist activity. One of them was tourist which is paid by those tourists using legal accommodation in hotels or in short term rental.
And they have another way to have this. Income in the regional government, which is if you want to open a new hotel or to create a new short term rental in your house, there you have to pay to have the license. 3,500 Euros per bed is now what it is. With this money, regional government has income, which is not controlled by the central government.
Perhaps you have to imagine that Spain is a federal nation, and it has a state, and our state, which is the Balearics is having control over this amount of money which is being collected through this status. In addition to this, as you said, European Union is giving support to the recovery of the Spanish economy with a budget, which is known as next generation.
Is the way in which the European Union is promoting boosterism to recover the activity, the intensity I mentioned you before. In 2019, we had 16 and a half million tourists coming to the Balearics, and the result of this boostering after the COVID pandemics was successful as far as we had again, 16 million and a half tourists come to the Balearics in 2022.
Therefore, they succeeded in boosting, recovering tourism as the most important activity in the Balearics. Half of our economy is based on tourism, 54% of our GDP. And this is as Ivan told you, something that our authorities are promoting. This is a way in which our politicians have decided to govern, to steer our economy, our society, going back to over tourism, going back to promoting the real estate business related with tourism as many tourists as possible.
Promotion in the places where tourists are coming from, particularly Germany, the uk, Scandinavia, or nowadays in the States because we have a new direct fl from Palma to New York since half a year ago. Therefore, boosterism is in this way understood promoting growth. And green boosterism is, related with dressing it with sustainability, with circularity, with security, accessibility and natural areas protection.
Greening that is increasing prices for people in Europe. Perhaps Magaluf is well known because it's a tourism destination for spring breakers, as you will say in the states. And nowadays, investment in hotels, refurbishing hotels is multiplying the price of the accommodation per 10. If you paid 40 euros before per night, now you have to pay 400.
And this is a mass tourism destination that was popular among hooligans coming from England and nowadays is being gentrified. Through this process of elitifcation.
[00:24:36] Chris: It's something that I wonder about from time to time, the increasing costs of travel and tourism being ways of certainly propping up the tourist economy or tourist economies, and then the real costs of tourism and how much of a discrepancy or a difference there is between those two things, right?
Because so many of these tourist bureaus and governments and hotels and businesses are claiming that they are now, or at least moving towards charging people this kind of true cost, but certainly the true cost of these things goes well beyond our ability to pay for them in money, in cash, right?
There are certain things someone, I think it was Deborah McLaren, someone who's been dealing with these issues for as long as you some, some 20 or 30 years. She said on that episode that there are things that you can sell that you can never buy back.
So I'm always wondering about, it's like, okay, well we have these eco taxes and you know, surely, a lot of them just go into the pockets of the rich or the government. But even if they are being spent in good ways is that really a way of being able to measure the consequences and the cost of tourism?
And so I wanted to take this opportunity to move a little bit towards the social movements that you've also been a part of there on the island. And to start with this notion of de-growth that seems to usually be set up in opposition to sustainability.
Sustainability at the end of the day is really only trying to sustain the industry. You can say that, oh yeah, we're sustaining people and the planet, but insofar as the industry succeeds and then so de-growth a term that in my part of the world. And I think among most tourists is, is kind of a stranger.
I think most people have still yet to really understand the depths of this term outside of perhaps over touristed places. But essentially, this manner of considering sustainability as keeping things where they are now, not reducing, not really changing anything, just giving the industry a more long-term success route.
I know there's a lot of definitions and opinions on this, so I'll turn it over to you momentarily. But this willingness to shrink the tourist economy, whether it be just a little bit or whether it be to an incredible degree. But there's a lot of different opinions on this.
And so de-growth becomes, in the last few years, in the last 10 years, something that really becomes a necessary possibility in the context of over tourism. I consistently come across reports and definitions that kind of vary in extreme degrees from what you've written as being neo Malthusian ideas, all the way to kind of post capitalist goals.
And so I'm curious, why do you think there is all of this confusion in regards to the definitions of de-growth, and how much of it do you think is, again, just another form of greenwashing a way of saying, okay, so actually we're gonna change things dramatically on a systemic level, but we're only gonna do so insofar as it serves the industry.
[00:28:16] Macia: Well, as you say it's so easy and it's so common greening the industry, the tourism industry, and giving support to those who have the power. And to those who get the benefits in economic terms. You can easily apply many different concepts, sustainability, circularity, or even degrowth.
I will say degrowth in terms of having less people traveling, but with higher income. And you can say, okay, this is degrowth. This is fake because it's not considering the roots of the problem. It is perhaps solving environmental problems. This is greening, but i t is increasing inequality.
Therefore, how can we make a definition of degrowth in a more appropriate way. There is another author in Barcelona, which is Giorgos Kallis. He's from Greece. He has been working in Barcelona for a long time. He has made a very good definition of degrowth. And he's establishing three particular characteristics of degrowing or degrowth political project.
First of all, looking for decreasing the amount of energy and materials per capital. They call it "throughput." Is the amount of materials and energy that you use for your everyday life, or in this case for your tourist activity. This means that if you are traveling with a private jet or you are spending 10 times more water gardening, this is the kind of tourist behavior that has to degrow.
This means contraction of the amount of energy and materials, but towards convergence because you cannot ask those not spending big amounts of energy and materials to contract. Those who are more guilty are the richest, you know, those who are spending more. This is the first characteristic.
The second characteristic of this, degrowth political project, is that it has to promote redistribution and equity. You cannot consider a solution for tourist destination degrowing in the number of tourists if working class, middle class is being set aside, is being displaced, dispossessed.
Therefore, this is the second characteristics. And the third one it is that the political project has to be planned and has to be democratic. People has to agree. Therefore, what is more important perhaps is awareness, the public debate, as you are doing with your podcast.
Chris, congratulations. I like it a lot and changing opinions and talking about it and promoting thinking in the long term, not today, for tomorrow, but Jorge Riechmann in Spain is talking about precaution principle, because if you just think about your everyday life and don't consider future generations and people in the south and animals, plants, beings in the world.
Therefore, the result is that we are behaving in an unsustainable way. And instead of degrowth, what we are going to have is recession without warning, directly to the collapse.
[00:32:08] Chris: Yeah. Or end without end.
de-growth, while it's something that you can look up and you can find in academic journals and articles and books, that it also shows up in the social movements. I think most famously among the Association of Neighborhoods for Tourism de-Growth in Barcelona. Barcelona, yeah. Right. And so we interviewed Daniel Pardo, one of the representatives of that group early on in the first season.
And just so our listeners know, Spain is by far one of the most overt touristed countries in the world. And so we see, generally, in places like this, in overt Touristed places, a huge amount of backlash, protest, and as well alternatives against or in the face of the tourist industry.
And so I'm curious Maia, about what kinds of social movements have risen up in Palma and what shape or form they take and what place you've played in them.
[00:33:13] Macia: We like defining that movement in terms of right to the city or right to the land, or right to the island because it's, it is the movement of residents who are defending our rights. Going to the beach or just having access to housing is becoming so difficult. And in Palma there is a movement called Ciutat Por La Vida, the City for Those Who Are Living There. Like in Barcelona, they have trade union of people renting housing because they have organized an association to defend the rights.
These are social struggles and we are also including the less favored people. I mean particularly people coming from Latin America or coming from Africa who are suffering the worst working conditions. And you can compare how those moving migrating, because they are looking for better living conditions are considering are considered by the system as those who have not right to do it.
And at the same time, the system in this case capitalism is promoting tourists which consists of people who is also moving and perhaps they are even looking for a place to live as well because they are looking for the sun or looking for the culture or the hospitality of Latin community in Catalonia or in And this is not just environmental, it's not just being possible to be solved through greening. It has a social meaning. And it has to do with the system. It has to do with the salaries. It has to do with the model that is being applied to solve the problems. And the model the capitalist system is growth.
The model in places such as Spain is more real estate development, more tourists coming. And we are seeing with phenomena such as the climate change or the rising prices of energy and the problems with migration, inequalities, growing inequality, the solution have to be perhaps out of the system looking for post capitalist solutions.
And in this terms, degrowth and degrowing tourism.
[00:35:52] Chris: Yeah. Sometimes I'll be talking to people here in Oaxaca or in other places regarding tourism and over tourism and what I think the end of tourism is or looks like, right? And certainly towards a certain degree of de-growth. And then I would, you know, also add for me personally abolition. Maybe I don't get that far. Maybe I do. And then someone often says " yeah, but what would we do without tourism," in a kind of angry, knee-jerk response? Right? And the question is always asked as if it's rhetorical, as if the question doesn't actually need to be posed, and if the answer doesn't actually need to be wondered about, right?
What would we do without tourism? And I mean mm-hmm. You know, I have to ask the person why that isn't the real question, why you aren't asking yourself, really, what would you and your family and your community dream into the world without having this kind of dependency on this economy that is essentially, extremely precarious and exponentially damaging and destructive.
So, in places like the Centro Historical of Oaxaca. And I'm sure in places like Paloma, 50%, over 50% of the economy is tourism. It is extremely difficult for people to imagine things otherwise. But you did mention there are groups in Mallorca that are actively engaging and fighting the tourist economy.
GOB, I think one was you mentioned. Yeah. And Alba Sud, which is a little more on the academic side, I think.
[00:37:44] Macia: We have designed research projects and they are looking for these bottom proposals from social movements, not that much u p-down from public institutions or entrepreneurs, and establishing as a goal different steps towards a better future. First of all, we decided to talk about a social transformation of the currently assisting tourism.
This means that once you identify, for instance, low salaries in the tourism industry, or long day working conditions too much activity demanded to those, for instance, cleaning the rooms of the hotels. That is something that Ernest Canada has been analyzing in Spain in terms of "Kellys" the hotel maids. Therefore, social transformation on tourism, of tourism, of the currently assisting tourism means solving these problems.
Or the same with energy consumption. The "throughput" we were mentioning before. It's like being pragmatic with the solutions is looking for short-term solutions to the problem. And then well, the same with biodiversity, for instance, or the same with climate change. But then the question is what about the future?
What about he best of the scenarios you can imagine. Your utopia, right? Because I think we will agree with most of the people who is hearing your podcast that a better scenario for the future is having more leisure time. Mm. And leisure means we say cultivating yourself, reading, perhaps listening podcast or cooking for your friends, relatives, taking care of the children, the elderly people.
This means some kind of wave that is improving the wellbeing of yourself and those around you. But at the same time, perhaps you are also willing to move and spend the night of out of your everyday life place. Therefore you visit relatives in another city or you spend days still walking for enjoying sports or perhaps sailing.
I dunno. And this is tourism and this is improving your health, is improving your image of other places.
Mm-hmm. When you were backpacker, you were traveling and that activity gave you a broader view of the world. Mm-hmm. You saw people, you met people in Mexico, for instance, and you decided to change your life and to take another position, political position, giving support to other ways of life. And the situation that the people in Oaxaca is having or had then before this. In this terms, tourism can give us opportunity to improve our life and the life of other people. We have to consider it, for instance, in the case of, imagine or teenager visiting places different to where they have grown and this is the way in which they develop alterity.
Mm-hmm. They recognize what they are ,understanding what other people is. Mm-hmm. What are their living conditions and perhaps you see that they have a bathroom which is so different to the one you have at home, and therefore you appreciate the conditions you have at home. You have never thought how nice is the place where I am living the sanitary conditions?
But if you visit, for instance, the case of Spain, wherever in Africa, you think, "okay, now I understand what is happening with those people who is even losing their life trying to cross the Mediterranean to come to the, to to Spain." I think that introducing this traveling is something that belongs to the culture in terms, for instance of pilgriming.
People was visiting other places because it was a duty they had according to their religion. But it was also a way of becoming mature, realizing, being aware of what are the privilege you have and how valuable is your family? Once you see it from abroad, you think, okay, what you want to do is go back home because I feel unsafe.
And this is a feeling that is helping you to improve, to become mature, to improve your understanding of the world. Therefore, we have to find the balance and perhaps not doing short breaks to spend a lot of energy in a weekend. But considering how much transformative is this kind of experience for teenagers, for instance. Therefore, perhaps as you said in your podcast, we are not anti-tourism.
We want to find a way in which we can transform tourism in a social term and perhaps identify the way in which more leisure time can have as an small part of it, tourism as a way in which we become aware and we can help other people and we change things in the world. Mm-hmm.
[00:43:53] Chris: And so on those lines, perhaps that would be some of the advice that you might have for our listeners or other people who might consider visiting Palma one day is go slow, pilgrimage. What would the end or transformation of tourism look like to you as an individual, as a resident of that place for people visiting?
You know, it's, it's a little bit of a way of saying what kind of advice would you have for people who wanted to visit, but perhaps also taking into consideration what that world would look like.
[00:44:33] Macia: Well, giving support to the social movements that are defending the right to the land, to the island, not interfering. And having in consideration social class struggles the environmental conflicts, dealing with pollution. Not coming to the Balearics for a short break, which means spending a lot of energy and polluting or short period of time not going into conflict with housing, using short term rentals, you have many, many important things to do. And perhaps a good way to do it is doing it from home beforehand. And promoting the networking in between people who has this awareness. This is why I think that, for instance, your podcast, another journalist activities is so important.
Solving the problem of the language. I'm sorry for my English. Bridging the cultures and bridging the continents and the places that are so similar. I'm sure that in Mexico, in the Caribbean, in South America, in the United States, many places have problems which are so similar to those we are having in Spain or in the Balearics, in Mallorca or in Ibiza.
Therefore networking is so nice. Mm.
[00:46:11] Chris: Excellent. Thank you Maia. You were mentioning for a worthy traveler mm-hmm. Who might arrive on your shores is someone who is willing to engage and meet and know of the issues and the social movements and the activists and the activism in a particular place, and to be a guest as opposed to a tourist perhaps.
And these social movements that exist in Spain, not necessarily against tourism, but in the context of tourism, most often, have a lot of time in. They usually have been around for years, if not decades, and the consequences of over tourism are now starting to reach other places much more quickly.
I think Mexico is one of them. Mexico City, Oaxaca, certainly the obvious beach resorts. But in cities where people are starting to mobilize against] Airbnb gentrification pollution, as you said, among other issues. But these struggles and these movements are very young.
Okay. And I'm wondering what kind of advice you might have for these grassroots movements that are just beginning. Coming from the point of view of grassroots movements that have been undertaken for years, if not decades now.
[00:47:45] Macia: In my personal experience, what is more profitable perhaps is the link with the academia.
Because nowadays it's so difficult to find independent, rigorous thinkers, let's say, people willing to contribute from an independent and rigorous point of view. I mean, in the case of Spain, we are lucky because most of the universities are public universities. And we still have most of the staff at university, we who are civil servants.
In my case, we are working for the public administration and we are paid to think and teach and write to do this research. And this has been very profitable for the social movements in my opinion. This is my personal experience. You can also find other scientists in the society not related with the public institutions, not related with the academia.
For instance, in the case of Alba Sud, we call it a post capitalist popular university because they, they don't depend on. Public funds, but they develop a very important, independent, rigorous research trying to establish these kind of foundations strong, very well based on writings of people that you have heard about them and you know, perfectly David Harvey from the City University of New York, for instance, or Jason Moore who works on Capitalism as well, or Silvia Federici, many other authors reading them and establishing the links.
You have many, many good researchers, scientists in the States and in Canada and also in Mexico. Daniel nearly. For instance, in Mexico, you can use their writings and in this way develop the discourse with this strong foundations. This is what I will suggest. Perhaps it's, it's my own, you know, way the way in which I have done it.
I suppose that you can find others, but if you maintain this independency and you work in a rigorous way, I always think that perhaps we won't win, but we will do what our conscience will mark, you know, as we have what we have to do. And this is a good enough for me. I dunno if we will stop the struggle with climate change and over tourism, migratory conflicts, people just dying while they are willing to cross towards the north. But we have to do all what we can, this is what can make us happy.
[00:50:54] Chris: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Thank you, Macia.
It's been a pleasure.
Yeah. And you know, I'd like to thank you on behalf of our listeners for joining us on the pod today, and being willing to speak in a language that is not your mother tongue for our Anglophone listeners. And before we depart today, I'd just like to ask for them on behalf of them once more.
How might they find out more about you and your work? How might they read your writings and what you've put yourself to?
[00:51:29] Macia: We have just finished a research project entitled Overtourism and Degrowth and you relate it with the University of the Balearic Islands?
We have designed a webpage where we offer downloading papers, books. We have translated them to English, some of them, or we have published them. If not, if you cannot download them because some journals are asking you to pay, never do it because knowledge has to be free of charge, in my opinion, unless that knowledge that is being developed in the public institutions such as our university. Therefore write us message, you will find a way in which you can count at me or Ivan or Ernest, and we will send the documents in a digital way.
And in this terms, I think that you can find whatever. And I am available for anyone who will want to know more about the topics we have been researching and welcome them. Welcome you as well to Mallorca whenever. Mm.
[00:52:46] Chris: Beautiful. Thank you, Macia, once again. You're welcome for joining us today.
[00:52:50] Macia: Thanks, salud.
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