LAS NUEVAS FRONTERAS DEL TURISMO
study, vulnerability for tourism livelihoods increases with changes in the external environment along each of the six dimensions of capital: natural, human, social, cultural, physical, and financial (See Figure 3). Analysis of the external environment in Aysén revealed that factors of the external environment contributing to the vulnerability context spanned local and national levels of scale and extended to conditions, shocks, and trends at the global level. For example, consider the resulting shock for tourism that resulted from the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center in the USA, in 2001. Although this attack had an isolated geographical direct impact, the indirect impact of this event reached into local communities around the globe, with devastating effects for tourism, often lasting for a number of years. This study suggested a strong connection between macro-level disturbances and trends, resulting national and global level responses, and local citizen potential for tourism livelihood success. At times, trends and changes in the external environment led to what could be viewed as increased opportunities for local tourism-based livelihoods. For example, given the geography and location of the region, recent worldwide growth in awareness and interest in the concept of global-warming is likely to affect travel trends in Aysén. If locals successfully recognize changes in worldwide interest and connect this trend with their local market, they might be able to prepare and capitalize on increased opportunities for tourism based livelihood pursuit. However, in the past, when locals in Aysén were not prepared for these opportunities, vulnerability arose, which culminated in negative environmental and social impacts for both visitors and hosts. During the study, one of the cases of interest shared this memory: Two years ago there was a huge problem in Tortel [a small town in the region], where they received three thousand people during the tourist season, but the capacity to provide services for these people did not exist in Tortel. So there were people sleeping in the walkways, tents on the beach. It was impressive. And the following year, when it was time to develop promotions, Sernatur, [the national tourism ministry], published its webpage and all of its posters with pictures of Tortel. So, there they were, a little disconnected… there was not a connection between what really exists and what was being promoted, by the other hand. This illustration provides a clear example of the vulnerability created through tensions and disconnects in the external environment arising between industry components on different levels of geopolitical scale. If there had been alliance or a common vision between the locals in Tortel and the national tourism ministry, Sernatur, promotion could have matched capabilities, and might have resulted in an increased opportunity for income generation and an ability to meet visitor expectations. Sernatur however, responded to an unexplained increase in global demand for Tortel as a destination, without consideration of the local infrastructure
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