Ital Itineraries: Rastafari Eco-Tourism in St Lucia/Iyanola and Visions for Community Autonomy

The island of St Lucia has undergone a dramatic transformation in a matter of decades, metamorphosing from a monocrop banana economy to a high end tourist destination which generates billions of dollars of revenue for those who operate it. This transformation has, however, seen a tourism industry develop that relies on Western models of environmental destruction and degradation. For Rastafari communities in St Lucia this represents a direct challenge to a deeply green ecological ethic which lies at the heart of the movement. Instead, some offer an alternative—eco-tourism. Several Rastafari are today engaged in offering an experience to visitors which brings them closer to this naturality rather than separating them from. To do so, however, is not without challenge. Many Rastafari seek to avoid as far as is possible all forms of engagement with a ‘Babylonian’ system that has persecuted the movement and debased all around it. For these individuals, it is only through the establishment of agrarian communes entirely separate from governmental systems and means of production that Rastafari might achieve a spirituality and a living modality free from corruption. These Rastafari eco-tourism ventures offer an alternative to this vision in presenting a different path to a shared ambition of self-sufficiency. Through ethnographic research on the island this paper seeks to situate and explore Rastafari eco-tourism as a vision for community autonomy in St Lucia.