Infuse partners with the University of Melbourne to provide internship opportunities. This article was written by Yilan Li, who has been working with us in 2026. It explores some of her interests in relation to tourism and degrowth.

We need to de-commodify tourism. Shifting way from treating places, cultures, and nature primarily as products to be consumed, towards rethinking tourism as a form of connection, learning, and ecological responsibility.

Undesirable outcomes of tourism

Tourism is often presented as a driver of prosperity. The basic premise is that increased tourism volume brings increased investment and economic growth, resulting in widespread societal benefits. Yet this ‘growth-is-always-good’ logic has increasingly come under scrutiny.

Globally, expanding tourism economies have led to increased carbon emissions and patterns of overconsumption. Between 2009 and 2019, for example, tourism emissions grew by around 3.5% per year, accounting for 8.8% of total global emissions (Sun et al., 2024). At the local scale, unsustainable forms of ‘overtourism’ have led to environmental degradation, forced displacement, and numerous detrimental social and cultural effects on local and Indigenous communities (Fennell, 2020; Jamal, 2022; Nieuwland, 2025).

Tourism is not merely an industry, but a ‘social force’ that includes environmental conditions, economic structures, and social relations (Higgins-Desbiolles, 2006). As Hall and Lew (2009) elaborate, tourism plays a dual role as both an agent of change and a respondent to wider social and environmental transformations. Understanding tourism in this way raises a critical question: if tourism growth is not always desirable, what other trajectories might tourism economies take?

One answer to this question is degrowth – an idea that challenges the necessity and desirability of continuous economic expansion.

Understanding Degrowth

Degrowth challenges the idea that continuous economic growth is always necessary and desirable, particularly as the environmental and social cost of economic expansion outweigh benefits. However, degrowth is not the same as recession or depression. Instead, it calls for a sustainable and equitable shift to ‘downscaling’ or ‘rightsizing’ of production and consumption, with the aim of achieving better social and ecological wellbeing (Dwyer, 2023).

A key thinker on degrowth is Giorgos Kallis.

For Kallis, degrowth questions the assumption that economic expansion automatically leads to social wellbeing, and that people’s happiness is contingent on increased wealth (Kallis, 2018). Kallis notes that many social challenges – such as inequality, inadequate social welfare systems, unemployment, and geopolitical crises – persist despite growth. While growth marches on, broader structural dynamics such as neocolonialism and uneven global development continue to drive societal inequities (Hickel, 2021; Werner & Bair, 2019). Such tension highlights that economic growth’s functionality for supporting social wellbeing is limited, and that there is a need for more equitable alternatives.

Alongside persistent social inequity, Kallis also points to challenges of ecological sustainability. From climate change to biodiversity loss, the ecological impacts of growth are pushing against planetary boundaries. The continued expansion of fossil fuel burning under growth-oriented energy systems has already led to rising global temperatures, intensifying extreme weather events such as heavy snow, heatwaves, floods, wildfires, and droughts (Zero Carbon Analytics, 2024). In addition, by 2022, the World Wildlife Foundation (WWF) was already reporting that wildlife populations had experienced a decline of about 70% since 1970. Such ecology-economy tensions are widespread and make clear that much economic growth has been at the expense of nature. Degrowth calls for immediate action to improve ecological conditions, insisting that growth-generating activities must align with this goal, and that some scaling down of economic activity is essential to future sustainability (Kallis, 2018).

When compared against our current, extractivist and growth-centric, global political economy, degrowth is ambitious and idealistic, calling for a less-is-more approach to wellbeing. There are philosophical questions to be explored here, but perhaps the most immediate questions are – is it achievable… and when it comes to ‘less growth,’ what should we do differently to live well within ecological limits?

A growing body of research suggests a degrowth transition is achievable, but requires a wide range of multi-sectoral changes. To provide just a few examples, progressive taxing on consumption and resource usage could be used to better fund welfare and public services, reduce working hours, and cap GHG emissions, whilst promoting investment (with subsidized support) in more eco-friendly and socially just infrastructures (Cosme et al., 2017). Such measures need to also be supported by shifts in mindsets and cultural norms to consume less, extend the lifespan of products, support local production and business, and use low-carbon transportation (Deschner & Hurst, 2018; Hall; 2009 and Plomteux, 2024). None of this requires a sacrifice of quality of life, rather, what is needed is a societal reorientation towards greater ecological wellbeing and social equity.

Offering much more than critique of extractivist growth, degrowth invites us to rethink social systems and everyday practices to increase equity and wellbeing. So, what might this look like for tourism economies?

Degrowth in Tourism

Degrowth in tourism is not simply about reducing volume, rather it involves a rethinking of how the industry operates and could operate more effectively. As Murray et al. (2023) explain, tourism degrowth can be pursued through three interconnected transformations:

First, reducing the scale of tourism, particularly in over-tourism destinations, is necessary;
Second, we need to acknowledge that many tourism impacts contain structural violence, inequalities in who benefits, whose land and resources are used, and whose voices are excluded from decision-making (Büscher & Fletcher, 2016);
Third, we need to de-commodify tourism. This is a call for shifting away from treating places, cultures, and nature primarily as products to be consumed, towards rethinking tourism as a form of connection, learning, and ecological responsibility.

Building on these ideas, pathways such as slow travel, regenerative tourism, and responsible travel have increasingly emerged as alternatives for rethinking tourism beyond growth-oriented models. Among these, community-based tourism and ecotourism provide useful approaches for understanding how degrowth can be translated into tourism practice.

Community-based Tourism

Community-based tourism places communities at the center of decision-making and tourism benefits. In this approach, tourism is not something imposed on and extracted from local communities, but something they actively own and shape.

In community-based tourism, sustaining meaningful value requires a rejection of ‘endless growth’ in favor of other economic outcomes – local employment, reduced profit leakage towards large external tourism operators, distribution of benefits across the community, and the building up of economic stability and resilience (Kellett, 2022). Income and livelihoods matter, but the value of successful community-based tourism also extends beyond economic outcomes to support skills development, improve local infrastructure, and enhance environmental conservation, whilst also strengthening cultural preservation and social cohesion. In many cases, opportunities for women’s participation and leadership are also created (Cañada, 2021; Intrepid, n.d. ; Kellett, 2022).

Together, these outcomes demonstrate that tourism can not only improve local experiences, but redistribute power, value, and benefits within the tourism system. From a degrowth perspective, it reflects a shift away from economic growth as the primary goal, towards a model that prioritises equity, community wellbeing, and ecological sustainability. In this sense, reciprocity, long-term community wellbeing, and stronger stewardship are regenerating the value of travel to the community.

Ecotourism

Ecotourism represents another pathway through which degrowth can be translated into tourism practices. Ecotourism emerged as a relational strategy for reconciling conservation (both wildlife and cultural) with human development (Das & Chatterjee, 2015; Meletis & Campbell, 2007). In simple terms, ecotourism initiatives generate revenue that can be reinvested in conservation efforts, while also providing local employment and supporting livelihoods in and around protected areas (The International Ecotourism Society, 2015). This generally involves conservation of natural and cultural heritage, local participation and benefits, environmental education, low-impact tourism activities, and small-scale and ethically oriented practices.

What differentiates ecotourism from other tourism practices is its strong focus on supporting conservation whilst providing enriching visitor experiences. Ecotourism often still operates through market-based mechanisms, with tourism revenue reinvested into conservation and livelihoods, but rather than a growth-first model, it shifts the focus to supporting sustainability – aligning with degrowth’s emphasis on operating within environmental limits and questioning the benefits of endless growth.

Not expansion but transformation

Degrowth encourages us to ask a difficult but essential question: how can tourism contribute to living well within ecological limits while supporting the wellbeing of communities it engages with?

In this sense, degrowth is not only about reducing harmful tourism, but about doing things differently, and more responsibly.

For tourism operators, this means thinking carefully about how and where growth is needed, and where it should be avoided. It means seeking out rich experiences beyond mass tourism destinations, actively shaping tourism economies to support and build real connections with local communities and supporting environmental care and conservation. Much of the current rethinking of the tourism sector is focused on ‘regenerative’ approaches. For tourism to be truly regenerative, it might also need to embrace degrowth.

Author Bio

Yilan Li (She / her) is currently completing a Master of Development Studies at the University of Melbourne. Her professional interests focus on applied development and impact-focused work, particularly social impact assessment (SIA) and monitoring and evaluation (M&E), as well as ESG-related practice in organisations. She is concerned with human rights in the context of climate change and energy transition. She is also interested in sustainable ways of living and everyday practices of sustainability.

References

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