Community-based tourism in the context of a solidary economic enterprise in the Pantanal of Mato Grosso do Sul, Brazil

Abstract

This article aims to understand, from a qualitative research, how the perspective of community-based tourism can be inserted in the dynamics of a Solidary Economic Enterprise (SEE) located in the city of Corumbá, in the Pantanal of the State of Mato Grosso do Sul, in the Brazilian Midwest. As a strategy for data collection, in-depth interviews were conducted with people who are part of the SEE. The interviews were recorded and transcribed. For the analysis and interpretation of the data, Critical Discourse Analysis techniques were used. In addition, the texts resulting from the transcription of the interviews were submitted to the Iramuteq software, which, among a series of possibilities, allows word clouds to be generated with the most recurring terms in people's speeches. In summary, the results of the article indicate that, in the scope of the SEE studied, community-based tourism, although not yet a reality in the SEE, reveals itself as an activity with significant potential to generate occupation and income for people historically subalternized in the territory, in a scenario coherent with the principles of solidarity, cooperation and fraternity, which characterize community tourism and the solidarity economy movement itself. Finally, it should be noted that the results of the article point to the demand that the government and other businesses in the tourism production chains be protagonists in the development of strategies and policies that insert the SEE in the tourist itineraries of the territory.