Europe’s Favourite Dictatorships

In the decades following the Second World War, the existence of authoritarian regimes on the Iberian Peninsula undermined the idea of a "free West." At the same time, Spain and Portugal were emerging as ever more popular holiday destinations for West European tourists. This book analyzes how tourism shaped the relations between West European democracies and the Iberian regimes: Government officials and entrepreneurs established touristic infrastructures, travel writers addressed the tension between visitors’ leisure and locals’ oppression, activists called for a boycott of tourism to the authoritarian regimes. In a period shaped by the Cold War, tourism turned the Iberian regimes into Europe’s favourite dictatorships.