Contexto da (in)segurança e políticas públicas de desenvolvimento turístico local

Abstract

The scenario of violence and public insecurity has aroused interest of researchers and it has expanded into areas of tourist dynamics. In the tourism field, it follows the perspective that focus on tourist behavior, and violence and public insecurity are perceived as an indicator of tourist destination choice. What is lost in this perception is that, despite not being a recent phenomenon, insecurity and violence dates back to the first organizations in society, it has accompanied substantive changes in lifestyle. Therefore, there is a necessity to incorporate into this debate, a discussion of urban and social development process. In this sense, this thesis aims to analyze how urban development policies have impacted the socio-spatial dynamics of tourism and insecurity in the Ponta Negra neighborhood, Natal/RN. Under the complexity method, criminal, tourist, and urban statistical data were collected; documental, legislative, and public policy analysis were conducted; and data from empirical testimonies were collected through an immersion in everyday life and through narratives constituted under public insecurity. Structured in three chapters, the thesis discusses, at first, the established consensus that the increase in crime causes the decrease in tourist flow. In the second moment, it evidenced the roots of the relationship between tourism and public insecurity from the perspective of urban development process encompassed by the physical and symbolic dimension of the production of space. In the third moment, based on the empirical field testimonies, it became evident that there is no feeling of insecurity, but several feelings, in the plural sense of the word, and they are not presented randomly. The results of this thesis show that public insecurity works as an inherent risk in the dynamics of globalization and social mobility. In this context, tourism gains a fundamental role as a globalizing industry. It is concluded that, on the one hand, urban development policies lead to an aesthetic beauty for certain areas, especially where there is socio-spatial dynamics of tourism. On the other hand, other areas are segregated and, consequently, stage of the feeling of insecurity due to the scenario of disorder, incivility, and absence of public services. Public insecurity moves from an emotional feeling to a rational one. Tourism feeds back the feeling through social mobility, the advent of new economies and flow of people, using an environmental and landscape appeal to please transitory peoples.