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Today, tourism is one of the fastest-growing sectors globally and plays a decisive role in the economic development of countries. In recent decades the Yucatan peninsula has undergone great transformations connected to an uncontrolled and unrestrained tourism development. Multinationals and financial capital more and more interfere with national organizations and policies, under the banner of increasingly globalized tourism generating cultural models and lifestyles that risk emptying these contexts of functions and typical activities, distorting traditions, culture, and local identities. The paper is the result of a study carried out in south-eastern Mexico. The study investigates the other side of tourism, in an attempt to highlight the aspects closely related to the intensification of the tourism phenomenon and a low attention to the management of resources.

In postmodern society, speed has increasingly affirmed itself as synonymous of efficiency, capacity and competence. As result, this rapidity has produced a growing gap between a slow world and one more and more fast, with negative consequences on the environment and especially on the wellbeing of people. On the other hand, slowness has gradually established itself as a kind of manifesto which opposes the dominant system of values and reaffirms the importance of other dimensions of life in addition to labour and productivity. In this perspective, the study focuses on the set of “slow” practices aimed at enhancing territories and implementing sustainable development models, also in connection with tourism. For this purpose some Italian slow cities’ experiences are taken into consideration.