Suchergebnisse

"Vacationing in Dictatorships: International Tourism in Socialist Romania and Franco's Spain examines international tourism in socialist Romania and Franco's Spain with an eye on the ways in which tourism built networks that went against the Cold War divide and transformed the two dictatorships from below."

The role of market-oriented tourist policies in the planned economies of socialist Eastern Europe has been long overlooked. This article examines how the socialist regime in Romania moved from sheer ideological rhetoric to commercialism and market-driven strategies when promoting Romania as a tourist destination in the 'West' between the 1960s and the 1980s. It argues that there was a continual shifting between using tourism as an ideological tool and a certain pragmatism that was needed to turn socialist Romania into a desirable tourist destination.

This chapter examines how Romania's opening to Western tourism in the 1960s impacted on the everyday life of ordinary citizens. It analyses how the influx of foreign tourists from capitalist countries seeking to profit from the local shortage economy created a shadow economy for scarce consumer goods. Drawing on a range of archival sources and oral history interviews, the chapter focuses on the practices of consumption between the 1960s and the 1980s and explores how the Romanian state reacted to the informal economy, which exposed the socialist state's inability to fulfil citizens' desires. The lure of capitalism: foreign tourists and the shadow economy in socialist Romania of the 1960s-1980s. ; The research leading to this article is part of the project PanEur1970s, which has received funding from the European Research Council (ERC) under the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme (Grant Agreement No. 669194).