The place of Southern Europe in international tourism: a global historical perspective

This chapter aims to place Southern Europe in the context of the international tourism market from the 19th to the 21st centuries. Based on a new dataset of international tourist receipts, we identified three phases in the history of the tourism market: the first characterised by British travellers (from the 19th century to the First World War), the second dominated by Americans (during the interwar and immediate postwar years), and the last defined by the emergence of new international tourists, including German and Scandinavian tourists from the 1950s to the 1970s, Japanese tourists from the 1980s, and Chinese and South Korean tourists in the new millennium. Southern Europe has never been an important origin of tourism flows, except for France. Conversely, this region has a consolidated tradition as a tourist destination dating back to Medieval pilgrimage and the Grand Tour. Competition among the destinations was always quite strong, both in Southern European countries and the rest of the world. France remained the leading global destination for more than a century, then she was surpassed by the United States, which is still number one today. In Europe, between 1958 and 1971, Italy took the lead, followed by decades in which Spain often gained the top position. However, France kept alternating in the leading positions with Spain and Italy. During the same period, small Southern European countries and the islands enlarged their market share.