Michel Foucault in tourism research: problematizing practices and experiences

Abstract

The aim of this article is to understand the post-structuralist perspective inspired by Foucault in tourism research. This is a qualitative-quantitative exploratory-descriptive study. The data collection method used was bibliometrics, carried out at Scopus, Web of Science and Science Direct databases, by searching for the terms "Foucault" and "Foucauldian" combined with the term "Tourism" in titles, abstracts and keywords of complete articles. The results were 99 articles published between 1999 and 2023. From these, 158 authors were identified. The most frequently used keywords in the articles were Foucault, Tourism and Discourse. In order to delve deeper into the themes, articles published between 2020 and 2023 were selected, totalling 35 papers. In these articles, tourism is discussed using the Foucauldian concepts of discourse, heterotopia, power relations, biopower/biopol-itics, governmentality and ethics, highlighting emerging themes in the field of tourism that materialise postmodern concerns and discussions, including: the tourist gaze; the sharing economy; dark tourism; tourismphobia; working conditions in tourism and hospitality; tourism and indigenous peoples; relations between leisure and the use of smartphones; and gender relations in tourism.