TOURISM AS CONFLICT IN POLYNESIA: STATUS DEGRADATION AMONG TONGAN HANDICRAFT SELLERS

This study of social encounters in a tourist handicraft market in Tonga (West Polynesia) illustrates how interaction with uninformed tourists intent on bargaining demeans Tongan hosts by lowering their social status in the eyes of their Tongan peers. This status degradation is initiated through the act of handicraft selling itself which many Tongans view as a public admission of poverty. Although an economically lucrative income-producing option in a society plagued by overpopulation, unemployment and limited natural and financial resources, it is not culturally valued and frequently turned to as a last alternative.;However, sellers manage their status degradation through "talk," particularly by using covert ridicule (conducted in Tongan for a Tongan audience and unknown to tourists) to disqualify tourist statements and actions as irrelevant. Their "talk" about tourists also publically reinforces Tongan cultural values by accentuating the differences between Tongan and tourist behavior.;A comparative interactional analysis of social relations between buyers and sellers and, between sellers in both the tourist market and a local produce market reveals that the status degradation of Tongans is furthered when, faced with uninformed, bargaining tourists,these sellers are frequently forced into what they regard as unduly competitive and culturally inappropriate behavior. In both markets, social relations are "ideally" characterized by a lack of overt competition, cooperation and mutual trust. These ideals are manifest through passive selling approaches and somewhat uniform prices for given items. Although the potential for peer criticism maintains the behavior of most sellers within the boundaries of this informal code of ethics, some (particularly in the tourist market) willingly employ aggressive selling strategies, e.g., hawking, or undercut other sellers by asking unrealistically low selling prices. These code violators are condemned as socially disruptive and as "without empathy" for other sellers. Yet tourists, who are uninformed about prices and quality and who frequently approach their transactions with Tongans using a competitive market model, offer unrealistically low prices to Tongans who, forced by economic need, often accept. By lowering prices, however, sellers are further humiliated since such behavior suggests competition and is thus culturally inappropriate.