Drug consumption tourism as a social phenomenon

Abstract

Narcotourism was initiated in the second half of the 60th of the Twentieth century by the North American and Western European participants of counterculture movements, especially hippies. Over the years, it has been undergoing transformation, but its purpose remained the same. Changes were primarily expressed in expanding drug deals, adapting the tourist facilities to the needs of narcotourists and opening new geographical directions. It is worth noting that a significant proportion of change was also associated with changing of the type of tourists interested in psychoactive substances. This article presents the phenomenon of drug tourism, which is still rarely discussed phenomenon. Socio-cultural development, the relative improvement of the economic situation and the increasing amount of free time contributed to the strong growth in tourist activity. According to the World Tourism Organization (WTO), in 1990 415 million people participated in the international tourism, in 1998 the number rose to 625 million, in 2005 - to about 1 billion and as predicted in 2020 the global tourism should cover about 1.6 billion people. (1) According to the Institute of Tourism of the School of Tourism and Recreation, in 2011 the Polish borders were crossed by nearly 43.3 million Polish citizens travelling to other countries. It was about 500,000 times more than in the previous year. Among those crossing the border, there were 5.5 million of people aged 15 years and over, 0.8 million - to the age of 14 years.