A NEW ADMINISTRATIVE LAW FOR A NEW TOURISM: NOW OR NEVER There are currently certain legal instruments that allow us to curb this excessive growth, but we must adopt a firm and not hesitant, clear stance10. In this sense, the Pandemic may cause the exorbitant growth we were experiencing before the virus to take two very different paths: i. The first and most encouraging one, that we shake off that short-term vision that brings quick profits, but to very few, and make a proper medium-long term planning, based on essential factors such as quality and sustainability. ii. The other path I am referring to, which I believe we cannot afford, is to continue with the above, that is, to increase the number of tourists at all costs, without taking into account other public interests worthy of protection. We run the risk that the eagerness for tourist recovery will lead us back to this obsolete model11. And this cannot imply a negative vision of tourism. We start from the necessary assumption that tourism is positive, an essential asset for our economy. And we are a country especially prepared for these flows of people12. Therefore, I do not share 10 ROMERO PADILLA, M., ROMERO MARTÍNEZ, J. M.ª. y NAVARRO JURADO, E., (2020), “Reflexiones desde el post crecimiento: ideas, estrategias y tácticas para el turismo post-COVID-19” en Turismo post-COVID-19. El turismo después de la pandemia global. Análisis, perspectivas y vías de recuperación, op. cit., p. 4, “Tourism is an activity marked by developmentalist thinking, almost exclusively economistic, related to the evolution of the global economy and with a geographical growth/expansion unprecedented in history. International tourism reached 1 billion tourists for the first time in 2012 and continued to grow to 1.5 billion in 2019, an increase of more than 30% in just 7 years.” 11 RODRÍGUEZ-BARCÓN, A., CALO, E. y OTERO-ENRÍQUEZ, R, (2021), “Una revisión crítica sobre el análisis de la gentrificación turística en España”. Rotur, Revista de Ocio y Turismo, 15(1), Op. Cit., They refer, for their part, to the risk we run of wanting to make up for lost time: “Will we witness a structural and profound transformation of the processes of tourist gentrification, for the sake of greater – and indispensable – urban sustainability? Or, on the contrary, once the worst phases of the pandemic have been overcome, will we observe a sharpening of hedonism and a liquid desire for new tourist experiences and, consequently, will we witness a widening of the problems associated with this type of gentrification? In any case, the analytical treatment of the eight themes identified here in the Spanish literature, in our opinion, will probably constitute the “continent” of the answers to these questions”. 12 RIVERO CEBALLOS, J. L., HERNÁNDEZ HERNÁNDEZ, J., CORRAL QUINTANA, S. y NAVARRO IBÁÑEZ, M., (2021) “Una breve reflexión desde el cero turístico”, en SIMANCAS CRUZ, M., HERNÁNDEZ MARTÍN, R. y PADRÓN FUMERO, N. (Coords.), Turismo pos-COVID-19. Reflexiones, retos y oportunidades, Op. cit., p. 63, “Unfortunately, there is a widespread view that tourism is concentrated in regions and countries that are not capable of doing better, so that available resources can only be allocated to tourism activities. Hence some voices have been heard during the current pandemic urging the replacement of the supposedly low or non-existent value of tourism with activities that provide greater economic and social value. Moreover, the reduction of tourism in particular in the way we have known it in Spain would, according to this vision, mean less dependence on the outside world and a considerable improvement in economic and environmental sustainability. For all these reasons, it is not superfluous to call attention to the fact that we should avoid falling into such a biased (and erroneous) perspective of the very varied and diversified tourism activities”.
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