Cultural Impacts of Mass Tourism at Hidden Costs for Local Communities in 2025

Abstract

The rapid growth of Vietnam’s tourism highlights the powerful cultural signs of mass tourism as the number of visitors from abroad more than doubled from 2015 to 2019, reaching 18 million. Despite this surge, which amounted to 8 percent of the country’s GDP, this has had a heavy price on local communities, in particular the Cham people and the heritage it represents.A worrying culture of commodification has gone hand in hand with the transformation of sacred spaces into tourist attractions. Currently, the Po KlaongGarai temple is undergoing the threat of commercialization, which was not the case when it was only a spiritual place for the Cham community. Therefore, local communities are facing pressure to change their traditional practices and rituals to meet tourist expectations so as to slowly erode the cultural authenticity.In this comprehensive analysis, we will take a look at how mass tourism affects the local communities’ cultural identity, spiritual practice, and social fabric. To understand how this balance is achieved, we look at the detailed case studies, as well as the expertise of the leading experts that will create potential solutions to frame sustainable tourism practices that will honour and accommodate indigenous interests.