Power Struggles Within and Between Organizations in Tourism Business: A Bourdieusean Approach to Organizational Analysis

Abstract

Organizational analysis in the tourism industry within a broader sociological framework has largely received scant scholarly attention. This article is an effort to elicit new insights that Bourdieu's sociological paradigm may bring to organizational analysis in tourism. This article seeks to examine and explain contestations for domination within and between travel agencies within the framework of Bourdieu's relational analysis, using his theoretical triad—capital, habitus, and field. Examining contestations at the individual level (capital and dispositions), the mesolevel (habitus), and at the macrolevel (field) within and between travel companies, the article proposes to investigate organizational practices and strategies within and between travel companies. The article argues that organizational practices such as those of maximizing the distinction between tourist and traveler, and overwhelming promotion of ecotourism and "authenticity," and emergence of boutique travel agencies and hotels can practically be explained within the contours of Bourdieu's relational analysis. Drawing empirical evidence from travel companies, this article, through archival research and analogical theorizing, also proposes that organizational members import capital and habitus from their previous fields of struggle, from the social and professional arenas of their past, to organizational fields to form and shape organizational habitus.

Reframing informal tourism entrepreneurial practices: Capital and field relations structuring the informal tourism economy of Chiang Mai

“…However, through possible collaborations between informal and formal entrepreneurs, these capitals may increase the value of existing capitals in the network and enhance the competitive positioning of stakeholders, bringing greater dynamism to the fields (Sassen, 2007). Such collaboration would help informal entrepreneurs to increase their knowledge in marketing, planning, and monitoring, which are organizational strengths of the formal sector (Ahmad, 2017;Damayanti et al, 2017).…”

“…The study responds to recent calls for practice-based approaches that examine complex social structures in tourism (de Souza Bispo, 2016;Lammers et al, 2017), and we show how Bourdieu's' theory of fields can elaborate such practices. The model proposed offers scope for further research to understand how practices and actors are constrained or facilitated by complex, multi-dimensional interactions with interlocking actors in the field in which they operate (Ahmad, 2017). Future research could consider examination of informal entrepreneurs' habitus, including their background, professional and subjective life-worlds in conjunction with their relationship to the fields and their logic of practice.…”

“…In a very recent study, Ahmad (2017) argues, "organizational analysis in the tourism industry within a broader sociological framework has largely received scant scholarly attention" (p.47). He examines power struggles and contestations within and between travel agencies in India using Bourdieu's framework of relational analysis.…”

Creative Tourism Consumption: Framing the Creative Habitus through a Bourdieusian Lens

“…The qualitative research conducted in this study followed a Bourdieusian analytical research framework, where its main theoretical concepts (habitus, capital and field) were used relationally consistently with the need to include all the thinking tools of Bourdieu (Table 1) [52][53][54] when applied to tourism studies. The case study was based on the Loulé Criativo network promoted by the town hall of Loulé in Portugal in the Algarve region.…”

The practice of informal tourism entrepreneurs: a Bourdieusian perspective

“…The study responds to recent calls for practice-based approaches that examine complex social structures in tourism (de Souza Bispo, 2016; Lammers et al, 2017), and we show how Bourdieu's' theory of fields can elaborate such practices. The model proposed offers scope for further research to understand how practices and actors are constrained or facilitated by complex, multi-dimensional interactions with interlocking actors in the field in which they operate (Ahmad, 2017). Future research could consider examination of informal entrepreneurs' habitus, including their background, professional and subjective life-worlds in conjunction with their relationship to the fields and their logic of practice.…”