Populism in mediated anti-tourism discourse: a critical analysis of the documentary tourist go home!

ABSTRACT From a critical discursive perspective, this paper analyses the documentary Tourist go home! which produces a populist anti-tourism discourse, in which tourism is framed in terms of cultural and economic anxiety. Cultural anxiety is based on the construction of danger for people and places threatened by the arrival of many mobile Others and echoes anti-immigration discourse, typical of Right-wing populism; similarities can be seen also in terms of discursive strategies such as instilling fear, praising the past, opposing we-locals vs them, personalizing the Other and devices such as metaphors of danger, quantification, and exclusive deixis. Economic anxiety is based on the construction of winners and losers and resonates with a Left-wing populist discourse reclaiming wealth redistribution and popular sovereignty; similarities concern discursive strategies such as opposing we/loser/People vs them/winners/Elite; praising the People and despising the Elite; depersonalizing the Other; and devices such as metaphors, qualification, and inclusive deixis. The analysis also revealed the ideological dilemmas of this anti-tourism discourse, including the conflicting relationship with cosmopolitanism, asymmetry in the right to the city, an economic conception of tourists as resources, the horizontal (elsewhere) and vertical (above) displacement of the outgroup (Elite) to preserve the ingroup (People) homogeneity and inclusiveness.