Tourists, Shoppers, and Smugglers: Brazilian Re-configurations of Circuits of Imported Goods

In many countries, imported products resold in stores, fairs, and digital platforms arrive in tourists’ suitcases and carry-on luggage. The categories of accompanied baggage and exception quota for travelers are central to understanding contemporary forms of mobility and commerce, providing the script through which many irregular practices take place. This article analyzes two ongoing processes at Brazilian land borders that represent efforts to regulate the flow of commercial mobilities by recalibrating the relationship between tourism and shopping: the creation of a specific micro-import regime for Ciudad del Este and Foz do Iguaçu on the border between Paraguay and Brazil and the authorization of free-shops in Brazilian border cities. In the first case, trying to regulate the activity that for years attracted thousands of buyers to the Paraguayan city. In the second case, internalizing in the Brazilian territory the exceptional spaces that attracted Brazilian buyers abroad or in free-shops at airports for decades.