Demonstration effects or relative deprivation? The counter‐revolutionary pressures of tourism in Cuba

Much has been written on how formal political systems affect tourism but little on how tourism impacts upon political culture. This paper reclaims relative deprivation theory from the field of general political sociology as an analytical framework for understanding the impact of tourism on political socialisation in host countries. The paper argues that relative deprivation theory, long established in political sociology, but never utilised in tourism-impact anlaysis, provides valuable insight into understanding the socio-cultural effects of tourism on host societies, particularly those relating to political acculturation, offering significant improvements on “demonstration effect” analysis. Relative deprivation theory can be systematically developed to specify testable hypotheses on the differential effects of tourism upon the political culture within different kinds of societies. Data from Cuba is used to support the theoretical discussion which suggests an intractable paradox – that governments in poor socialist countries which most need tourism to achieve economic growth, may be those most likely to be subverted by it politically. © 1997 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.