Socio-spatial threats in Post-COVID Spanish touristic cities. Drift to exclusion in Seville and Malaga

Abstract

This paper aims at recognizing the effects of social exclusion and the degradation process of public spaces and heritage environments in Spanish touristic destinations of Seville and Malaga. While it cannot be argued that after a lock-down as the experimented one, everything can return to the previous state, especially in environments where resilience has not been considered a value, in the early post-COVID lockdown days the mayors of these Andalusian cities reaffirmed the need to support the tourism sector as the only way to recover the economic breakout. We discuss the transformations that touristification and COVID-19 are driving into these cities, looking at the relaxed action of control and inspection on tourism activities and the offer of public “singular spaces” in the centre of the city for new activities related with the tourism industry and real estate speculation. Other European experiences are presented, showing that more focused measures on liveability and neighbour-centred recovery of urban life are possible.