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"To Hell with Paradise: A History of the Jamaican Tourist Industry"
It's not a cheap book but my library was able to get it from a city 3 hours away so maybe yours can too, if they don't have it.
I read this in one night and promptly got incredibly busy with work so haven't been able to write a proper review. I'm still busy so please pardon my typos, I want to get this down and then I'll come back when i have more time.
But here are some things that struck me as i read.
I'll say first that one big things I did NOT like about the book was that I wish the history had continued...the book basically stops in 1973 and so many issues have come up since then that I would have liked to learn more about - degradation of coral reefs and environment in general, the rise of the mega-AI-resorts, a new community tourism model such as the folks in Treasure Beach are working on, etc. There is a short epilogue that mentions some things as recently as 1990, but very little discussion is given. The book was written in 1993 so I'm not sure why he stopped writing about anything past 20 years earlier, but oh well.
The book is a little dry...you can tell this is an academic tome, not really meant to be a pop novel, but even so, the subject matter is so interesting that you move right along.
OK, that said....
Preface everything below with "according to the book".
There wasn't really any effort by the government to promote tourism until the 1840's, then no real action until the 1890's. The original idea seemed to be to bring more white people to Jamaica in the hopes that they would like it and stay...the white people living there seemed very concerned about the growing black and shrinking white population and tourism was seen as a means to reach an end of whites being not such a minority.
Also, as sugar became less profitable, it was seen as a way to replace some of that income, along with bananas. The book says bananas were grown by small (black) farmers mainly until UFC began to create its monopoly.
The first large hotels were built by the United Fruit Company who was bringing ships regularly to get bananas and would also carry tourists. The government funded or gave tax breaks or in other ways paid for a lot of these hotels, yet they were built by Americans, run by Americans and all but the most low-paying jobs were given to foreigners, either American or European.
So from the get-go the minority white J'cans are using tourism as a tool to increase their numbers, and excluding the majority population from participation in it in any real way...which has been the norm with sugar and bananas too.
The book says from the beginning black J'cans felt resentful of tourism, did not think their tax $ was used wisely in supporting these early hotels and just didn't see any benefit to them...and i must agree, tourism wasn't about improving the life of any ordinary J'can.
Also there was great concern that the American race attitudes (this is Jim Crow time) would be brought to Jamaica along with the tourists.
And from the get-go tourists felt that resentment from the J'cans they interacted with, and complained that the J'cans were "uppity", rude, service was slow, etc. (Nowadays no tourist will say "uppity" but many still complain about rude and slow...). The book says the slowness and lack of "friendliness" was a sort of passive resistance.
It's not a cheap book but my library was able to get it from a city 3 hours away so maybe yours can too, if they don't have it.
I read this in one night and promptly got incredibly busy with work so haven't been able to write a proper review. I'm still busy so please pardon my typos, I want to get this down and then I'll come back when i have more time.
But here are some things that struck me as i read.
I'll say first that one big things I did NOT like about the book was that I wish the history had continued...the book basically stops in 1973 and so many issues have come up since then that I would have liked to learn more about - degradation of coral reefs and environment in general, the rise of the mega-AI-resorts, a new community tourism model such as the folks in Treasure Beach are working on, etc. There is a short epilogue that mentions some things as recently as 1990, but very little discussion is given. The book was written in 1993 so I'm not sure why he stopped writing about anything past 20 years earlier, but oh well.
The book is a little dry...you can tell this is an academic tome, not really meant to be a pop novel, but even so, the subject matter is so interesting that you move right along.
OK, that said....
Preface everything below with "according to the book".
There wasn't really any effort by the government to promote tourism until the 1840's, then no real action until the 1890's. The original idea seemed to be to bring more white people to Jamaica in the hopes that they would like it and stay...the white people living there seemed very concerned about the growing black and shrinking white population and tourism was seen as a means to reach an end of whites being not such a minority.
Also, as sugar became less profitable, it was seen as a way to replace some of that income, along with bananas. The book says bananas were grown by small (black) farmers mainly until UFC began to create its monopoly.
The first large hotels were built by the United Fruit Company who was bringing ships regularly to get bananas and would also carry tourists. The government funded or gave tax breaks or in other ways paid for a lot of these hotels, yet they were built by Americans, run by Americans and all but the most low-paying jobs were given to foreigners, either American or European.
So from the get-go the minority white J'cans are using tourism as a tool to increase their numbers, and excluding the majority population from participation in it in any real way...which has been the norm with sugar and bananas too.
The book says from the beginning black J'cans felt resentful of tourism, did not think their tax $ was used wisely in supporting these early hotels and just didn't see any benefit to them...and i must agree, tourism wasn't about improving the life of any ordinary J'can.
Also there was great concern that the American race attitudes (this is Jim Crow time) would be brought to Jamaica along with the tourists.
And from the get-go tourists felt that resentment from the J'cans they interacted with, and complained that the J'cans were "uppity", rude, service was slow, etc. (Nowadays no tourist will say "uppity" but many still complain about rude and slow...). The book says the slowness and lack of "friendliness" was a sort of passive resistance.
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