Why does no one ask the children?

Our Brazil-focused research analyses tourism development by deliberately disregarding the limited perspective of the economy-centric paradigm of children in tourist destinations. In consumerist logic there are limited numbers of works related to children in tourism. As a result, we know little about children’s perceptions of tourism given that they are a highly neglected social group in terms of their opinions and perceptions. Yet evidence exists that when children are invited to participate in tourism planning they voice perceptive opinions. Brazil’s academic tradition creates potential to plan long-term tourism development yet ignores children. Brazilian tourism is labour-intensive in precarious working hours and engages a failure in experiencing upward social stratification; thus parents and their children remain locked into the social system at the entry-level.