Tourism and (De)marginalisation: How to Minimise the Cost of COVID-19 in Porto

ABSTRACT

The COVID-19 pandemic has reached dimensions and caused impacts which were never predicted. 2020 will remain in history as the year in which all global economic activity was largely suspended with the tourism sector being the most affected single sector. Managing tourism and strengthening resilience in response to the pandemic has gained an increasing importance in a globalised world, where changes and interrelationships have become increasingly complex. The COVID-19 pandemic has shown that natural risks are not the only factors responsible for the marginalisation of many touristic areas. In this chapter, the impact of the pandemic on tourism, and what it means for our understanding of resilience and marginality is examined, before looking at the situation in Porto. In this city, literary tourism is explored as a valuable new and alternate form of tourism in a post-pandemic world to address marginalisation. The starting point for the discussion is about the possibility of inviting tourists to Porto through a focus on literature, and, in that sense, we will present a reflection about literary tourism as an innovative tourist opportunity that can expand touristic offer to new audiences and minimise the marginalisation effects caused by the lockdown imposed by the pandemic. © 2022, The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG.