From hotspot to flashpoint: how tourism pushed Barcelona to breaking point, and how social movements are fighting back

By Claudio Milano, Researcher, Lecturer and Consultant, Universitat de Barcelona
Antonio Paolo Russo, Professor, Universitat Rovira i Virgili
Marina Novelli, Professor of Marketing and Tourism & Director of the Sustainable Travel and Tourism Advanced Research Centre, University of Nottingham

On April 27 2024, near the Sagrada Familia in Barcelona, a touring bus was blocked, sprayed with water pistols, and a banner bearing the slogan “let’s put out the tourism fire” was stuck to its front. It was a headline-grabbing protest against the stranglehold tourism holds over the city, and underscored growing tensions between touristification processes and an increasingly vocal local backlash.

Large-scale protests have made…

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