Tourism crime
Tourism crime refers to the act of traveling to specific destinations to engage in illegal activities, often due to the lax enforcement of laws or the legality of certain actions within those locations. The two most prevalent forms of tourism crime are drug tourism and sex tourism, each carrying significant social and economic consequences. Drug tourism involves individuals seeking out destinations with more permissive laws regarding substances like cannabis or psilocybin mushrooms, often leading to increased visitor traffic in places like the Netherlands, Uruguay, and various South American countries. Sex tourism, on the other hand, typically involves traveling to exchange money for sexual services, which can become criminal when it involves minors or violates local laws.
Countries with emerging tourism crime issues often experience this due to economic disparities and the demand for illegal activities, impacting vulnerable populations, particularly children. The proliferation of technology and international travel has exacerbated issues like child sex tourism, leading to significant concerns in regions such as Southeast Asia and Central America. Efforts to combat these activities include international laws aimed at prosecuting offenders regardless of where the crime occurred. Overall, tourism crime is a complex issue that intertwines with local cultures, legal frameworks, and global travel trends, highlighting the challenges of addressing illegal activities in a tourism context.
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Tourism crime
Tourism crime is the practice of traveling to particular destinations for the purpose of engaging in illegal activities. Individuals who engage in tourism crime do so because the activities they intend to pursue are not subject to strict enforcement standards, are more widely available, or are legal in the destination country. Drug tourism and sex tourism are the two most common types of tourism crime, and both having far-reaching and complex social and economic implications.
Agencies that track tourism crime typically classify destinations as "established" or "long-affected" and "emerging." Changes in the legal guidelines regarding issues such as drug use, prostitution, and the age of consent can affect a given country's popularity as a tourism crime destination. Developing countries tend to have higher rates of tourism crime, especially with regard to sex tourism, child sex tourism, and human trafficking.
Background
Tourism crime often revolves around drugs and/or sex. Some countries are noted for their tolerant attitude toward drugs that are illegal in many other parts of the world. For instance, the Netherlands is known for its permissive stance on soft drugs such as cannabis. It is common for people to travel to the Netherlands, and particularly to its largest city, Amsterdam, to use cannabis without fear or worry about legal repercussions. Similarly, psilocybin mushrooms are federally illegal in the US and most states do not allow them. However, their usage is legal and several countries and some countries, such as Jamaica and the Netherlands, captialize on this by offering psilocybin retreats to tourists interested in utilizing psilocybin mushrooms.
Other forms of drug tourism are more based in the local culture than in prevailing nationwide attitudes toward substance use. In some cultures, certain drugs are an entrenched part of the local way of life, and people from other parts of the world who want to partake in such an experience may travel to do so. For example, the psychoactive drug peyote is technically considered illegal in Mexico, but some indigenous tribes who have used it for spiritual and ceremonial purposes for centuries are exempt from federal laws that prohibit it. Individuals who want access to peyote may seek out members of these indigenous communities in an attempt to have a drug experience or to obtain quantities of the drug for later transport back to their country of origin. While it can be difficult to pinpoint exactly if or when a visitor commits a drug-related crime in a destination where drug use is tolerated, authorities universally consider the transport of drugs across international borders to be a form of trafficking and, therefore, illegal.
Researchers typically define sex tourism as international travel undertaken for the purposes of exchanging money or material goods for sexual contact with a local individual. Travelers engage in sex tourism for a variety of reasons, including anonymity in a foreign destination, more affordable access to prostitutes, and lax local attitudes toward prostitution.
Sex tourism becomes criminal when such transactions are illegal under the destination country's laws or when they involve minors or children. Some countries have passed laws making it possible to prosecute citizens who travel abroad for the purposes of having illegal sexual encounters with underage partners, without regard as to whether the act was detected by authorities in the destination country. For example, Canada passed a law in 1997 making it possible to prosecute Canadian citizens in Canada for child sex crimes committed in other countries. Canadian authorities can pursue such prosecution regardless of whether the offender was charged with or convicted of the crime in the destination country.
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Drug tourism is a global phenomenon. As of 2024, several US states, including Alaska, California, Colorado, Maine, Massachusetts, Oregon, and Washington, have legalized cannabis products for recreational use, enticing drug tourism from both domestic and international travelers. In South America, Bolivia and Uruguay are noted hotspots for drug tourism. Cocaine tourism is particularly prominent in Bolivia, which is noted for its combination of loose law enforcement and police corruption that makes it easy for visitors to obtain illegal drugs. In Uruguay, cannabis products are openly and legally available to all citizens over the age of eighteen. While Uruguayan laws technically prohibit the sale of cannabis products to foreign nationals, the laws are routinely overlooked by retailers. Meanwhile, many tourists go to Peru, Colombia, and Ecuador to obtain the hallucinogenic drug ayahuasca.
In addition to the Netherlands, Portugal has emerged as a popular European drug tourism destination. Portugal decriminalized all drugs in 2001, electing to treat drug abuse as a public health issue rather than a criminal issue. While street drugs technically remain illegal in Portugal, the changes in enforcement guidelines have made them more easily available to both locals and visitors. Reports seem to indicate that Portugal's experiment has been a success, as drug overdose death rates have fallen to historic lows since the changes were made. In 2010, the Czech Republic amended its drug laws to make possession for self-consumption an administrative offense carrying a small fine rather than a criminal offense for which one can be arrested, and subsequently became a destination for the purchase of marijuana and, later, crystal meth. Most drug tourists in the Czech Republic are from elsewhere in Europe, particularly neighboring countries such as Germany and Austria.
Numerous Asian nations are popular with drug tourists. Countries such as Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Thailand, and Vietnam are known to cater to backpackers and young travelers seeking drug experiences, and some countries feature establishments that offer drug menus containing a wide range of prescription drugs and illicit substances to patrons. Opium and heroin are widely available in Afghanistan and Myanmar (Burma), which combine to account for a large majority of the world's opium production.
Like drug tourism, sex tourism is a global phenomenon. While prostitution is legal or regulated in many parts of the world, criminal problems emerge when underage individuals or children are coerced into taking part in the sex trade. The proliferation of Internet technology and the advent of low-cost international airlines have been cited as key contributors to rising worldwide rates of child sex tourism.
According to ECPAT International, an agency dedicated to combating the commercial sexual exploitation of children, countries that have been "long-affected" by child sex tourism include Brazil, Mexico, the Philippines, and Thailand. Changing economic and political conditions have led to numerous "emerging" child sex tourism destinations, with ECPAT International identifying Colombia, Ghana, Kenya, Mongolia, India, Vietnam, and some parts of northwestern Russia and Eastern Europe as problem areas.
In addition to the commercialized sexual exploitation of children, other forms of tourism crime include human trafficking, child marriage, and the production of child pornography. Minors and children are sometimes transported across international borders to meet the demand of child sex tourists, with Southeast Asia and Central America having particularly pronounced problems with such issues. The production, distribution, and sale of images and videos featuring the sexual abuse of children are problematic in areas with high rates of child sex tourism. ECPAT International notes that child marriage, defined as a union between an adult and a person under the age of eighteen, is a variant form of child sexual exploitation that is common in some Middle Eastern and South Asian cultures, where marrying young is a widespread and socially acceptable practice.
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