Abstract:
The development of a national tourism industry is encouraged by donor organisations and welcomed by many developing countries as a tool for generating economic growth. Often, the level of economic benefit that is hoped for fails to materialise and there is ample evidence to show that economic growth alone is not sufficient for the alleviation of poverty. Moreover, the negative impacts of tourism on the physical, social and cultural environment of the destination country can become a significant cost that is borne by the host. The phenomenon of child sex tourism is one such cost and is the focus of this thesis. The emergence of child sex tourism in Sri Lanka is used to research the links between international tourism, poverty and child exploitation and to understand how the different ways that the issue is problematized limits the solutions. I explore child sex tourism not as a discrete activity but one that emerges from a number of complex intersections between the local and the global. Because of this complexity the response to the problem needs to be multi-faceted, multidimensional and to recognize the issue as one of children’s rights. I argue that it is primarily the role of the Sri Lankan government to adopt such a response based on its legal obligations, its access to the special powers that reside in the state and its connection at state level to global networks.
