Sex-tourism as a development strategy

Abstract: Abstract This bachelor thesis is examining sex-tourism as a mean of economic develop¬ment. The purpose of the paper is to examine how sex-tourism is being used as a mean for development and also why it can be considered to be a part of a coun¬tries development strategy. There are many different types of tourism and ways for a country to use tourism as an income source. Although sex-tourism probably not is considered to be a morally legitimate reason for tourism, it does, as we know, however occur and since it is an existing phenomenon it also becomes an income source for the country of destination. This work has an overlapping theme; using dependency theory as a base it tries to connect the question of sustainable development to sex-tourism. While tourism in general is regarded as a private sector activity where market forces are predominating, the fact is that states are very much involved in the business of tourism. The involvement might very from country to country but by far all gov¬ern¬ments are active in tourism and its development, which is why dependency theory has been chosen as the starting point for the thesis, it is also the reason why the concept of sustainability is being connected to sex-tourism. The paper follows both a broad perspective and a detailed focus. The broad perspective evaluates tourism and sex-tourism in general while the detailed focus lie on Costa Rica. Costa Rica has been chosen as an empirical example for the paper due to its interesting affiliation with sex-tourism and tourism in general.