Conservative democracy and conservative tourism (?): Identity politics and investigation of transforming priorities of tourism in Turkey

Tourism is a very powerful combination of historical, cultural, economic, and political phenomena; it has multiple meanings, destinations and applications loaded with the uncertainties summarized by Zygmunt Bauman's concept of liquid modernity (Bauman, 2005). Tourism continues to grow as the second largest item in world trade today. Its continued growth confronts tourists with an astonishing array of sights, destinations, and decisions on a scale hitherto unimaginable. Its continued growth confronts tourists with an astonishing array of sociocultural and historical destinations as well as decisions on a scale previously unthinkable. At the same time, Tourism continues to be a hot topic of discussion in both international and national politics. As such, tourism is a political field full of optimistic forecasts for national economies and source of harshest criticism. However, it has been almost completely ignored by political sociology in our country. Tourism provides economic development to countries due to its on-site service feature and is also directly related to politics. It can be said that Turkey's political position and policies direct and clearly affect tourism. Since the return to the identity and culture that has dominated since the 1990s is a dominant political division and conflict axis in our country, it seems inevitable that tourism and tourism policies will also be affected by this process (Delibaş, 2008). It is observed as an expected situation that tourism, which is directly fed by culture and social structure, undergoes a transformation and that tourism policies are shaped in the context of lifestyle politics. The main purpose of this study is to investigate and shed light on the claims of conservatism in tourism-sector of with the reflections of the tourism-sector and the appearance of tourism policies and practices in the sector, based on the 'conservatization' debates over culture and identity politics. In the study, interviews with tourism workers on the axis of 'identity politics', 'conservatization' and 'social change' were held in four different cities, namely Istanbul, Antalya, İzmir/Çeşme and Aydın/Kuşadası. A field study was conducted with a total of 773 people using the survey technique, and a parallel study was conducted with 19 people using the in-depth interview technique. Conservatism in tourism can be mentioned as a reflection of the identity politics targeted within the scope of the research. However, although the conservatism discussions first suggest halal tourism, these discussions are not limited to this. Therefore, the intervention in tourism is mostly seen as a lifestyle policy. KEY WORDS: Tourism and culture, Tourism policies and priorities, Cultural change, Conservative democracy, Halal tourism, Identity politics and Transformation in Tourism