2 years ago
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Posted On: January 31st 2025, 03:27 am
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Who really owns the places we stay in when we travel? That question kept coming up as I put this list together.
I wanted to find locally owned hotels in the Global South, because I’m tired of opting for default luxury and tourism in the same tired destinations—Paris, London, Rome, & Co. Places that take from us—our labor, our art, our history—without giving anything in return. Meanwhile, when they do look to our lands, it’s to build exclusive resorts that extract more than they give, pushing out locals and repackaging our cultures for profit.
But finding locally owned places in the Global South shouldn’t have been this hard, right? I learned that this industry is built to obscure who actually profits. Too often, the most stunning, culturally rich stays are just another extension of outside wealth, with little benefit to the communities that make these places special. Call it what it is: colonialism with a prettier brochure.
But we don’t have to buy into it.
This guide is for those who want to travel differently—who want their tourism to be as intentional as their activism. These are hotels and lodgings, to the best of my ability to verify, that are locally owned or deeply tied to their communities. We don’t need to keep pouring money into places that exploit us while erasing us.
I wanted to find locally owned hotels in the Global South, because I’m tired of opting for default luxury and tourism in the same tired destinations—Paris, London, Rome, & Co. Places that take from us—our labor, our art, our history—without giving anything in return. Meanwhile, when they do look to our lands, it’s to build exclusive resorts that extract more than they give, pushing out locals and repackaging our cultures for profit.
But finding locally owned places in the Global South shouldn’t have been this hard, right? I learned that this industry is built to obscure who actually profits. Too often, the most stunning, culturally rich stays are just another extension of outside wealth, with little benefit to the communities that make these places special. Call it what it is: colonialism with a prettier brochure.
But we don’t have to buy into it.
This guide is for those who want to travel differently—who want their tourism to be as intentional as their activism. These are hotels and lodgings, to the best of my ability to verify, that are locally owned or deeply tied to their communities. We don’t need to keep pouring money into places that exploit us while erasing us.
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