Dr Elisa Wynne-Hughes

(she/her)

Publication

• Date
• Type

Research

The international politics of tourism

My research critically examines tourism as a form of governance within urban, postcolonial, neoliberal and revolutionary contexts. I investigate how tourism reflects and reinforces global inequalities through mechanisms such as securitisation, authoritarianism, cultural representation and the regulation of mobility.

In collaboration with Sarah Becklake, I recently co-authored 'The Touristic Transformation of Postcolonial States: Human Zoos, Global Tourism Competition, and the Emergence of Zoo-Managing States' (Tourism Geographies, 2023), which introduces a theoretical framework to understand how tourism actively shapes postcolonial state practices and identities. Our newest article, 'Touristic Zoopolitics: Colonial capitalist zoopolitics and touristic governance' (Geopolitics, 2026), develops the concept of 'touristic zoopolitics' to reveal how global tourism governs through processes of (de)humanisation, reproducing variously (de)valorised-(de)humanised subjects and spaces that support the global colonial capitalist order.

My earlier work includes 'The Battle of the Camel: Revolution, Transition and Tourism in Cairo' (Political Geography, 2021), which offers a theoretical and ethnographic analysis of how Egypt's 2011 revolution served to entrench existing social hierarchies. In 'Governing Through Garbage-City Tourism' (Interventions: International Journal of Postcolonial Studies, 2015), I explore how 'ethical' Western tourism in Cairo's Garbage City operates as a technology of governance that constructs neoliberal subjectivities and perpetuates postcolonial power asymmetries. Additionally, my article "'Who would go to Egypt?' How tourism accounts for 'terrorism'" (Review of International Studies, 2012) analyses Western guidebook narratives that simultaneously depict Egypt as both a dangerous and desirable destination by framing 'bad' Muslims as threats, thereby reinforcing counterterrorism discourses that uphold the Western liberal order.

In 2024, I co-organised an interdisciplinary workshop '(Re)Theorising Touristic Governance in the Shadow of Empire', funded by the Canadian Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council. This event brought together international scholars to critically examine how tourism governs through the entangled dynamics of political economy, security, and coloniality. The workshop laid the groundwork for a collaborative research network and a forthcoming Special Issue in Geopolitics.

Complicating Cities

I work with interdisciplinary networks studying how walking tours can decolonise urban spaces. In 2024, I was part of an interactive guided tour and creative workshop project, funded by Cardiff University and the 'Being Human' Festival, working with The Wallich (Welsh homelessness charity) to uncover and engage with marginalised histories of Cardiff. Based on this project, I am co-authoring a book chapter, 'Complicating Cardiff: University "Community Engagement", Colonial Pasts and Contemporary Tensions' for a book, Confronting Colonialism in Welsh Higher Education: Re-mapping an institutional memory for a different future (edited by Gareth Hoskins, Esther Muddiman and Melissa Mendez).

In addition, I worked with CLUSTER (an urban architecture and design lab in Cairo) and Artstation (and Art cluster in Uzbekistan) on a British Council-Funded project on Soviet Microdistricts in Samarkand. The project worked with students to highlight how privatisation/securitisation reshape common spaces and explores grounded, inclusive approaches to city life through observation, discussion and shared mapping. Based on this project, I am co-writing an article ‘Negotiating the In-Between: Liminal Urban Space and Neoliberal Transformation in Post-Soviet Samarkand’, co-written with Anastasia Galimova and Omar Nagati (CLUSTER, Cairo).

I am currently developing a project exploring colonial connections between Cardiff and the Global South, in collaboration with CLUSTER (Cairo Lab for Urban Studies, Training and Environmental Research). We are designing a two-part walking tour linking Welsh colonial histories with Cairo’s urban landscape, which has received initial Taith Research Mobility funding. 

Everyday sexual violences and neoliberal authoritarianism in Egypt

This research focuses on the intersection of tourism, gender, and neoliberal authoritarianism within the Egyptian context surrounding the 2011 revolution. In my recent article, 'Building Consent for Counterterrorism: Lonely Planet and Rough Guide Tips for Women Tourists to Revolutionary Egypt' (Annals of Tourism Research Empirical Insights, 2023), I argue that guidebook portrayals of sexual harassment contributed to building consent for national and global counterterrorism agendas during Egypt's 2011 revolution.

My ongoing research investigates anti-street harassment activism and neoliberal authoritarianism in revolutionary Cairo through a study of HarassMap, an independent initiative responding to street harassment, from 2011 to 2018. This work critically examines how HarassMap both contested and, paradoxically, supported the emergence of a gendered neoliberal authoritarian regime in post-revolutionary Egypt.

Precarity and Postcolonial Governmentalities

My co-edited volumes have brought together scholars engaging with key theoretical debates in International Relations, particularly around precarity, governmentality and postcolonialism. The volume Precarity and International Relations (co-edited with Ritu Vij and Tahseen Kazi) foregrounded precarity as a central concern in the discipline, offering both theoretical innovation and empirically grounded insights from leading scholars. Another co-edited volume, Postcolonial Governmentalities: Rationalities, Violences and Contestations (with Terri-Ann Teo), brings together governmentality and postcolonial approaches to examine contemporary governance, advancing the concept of 'postcolonial governmentalities' through both theoretical development and empirical analysis.

Teaching

Current Teaching:

• Critical Approaches to Middle East Politics (2nd Year, UG)
• Popular Culture and World Politics (3rd year, UG)
• The International Politics of Tourism: Difference, Discovery and Desire (PGT)

Previously Taught:

• Introduction to Globalization (1st Year, UG)
• International Security (2^nd Year, UG)
• The International Politics of the Middle East: Security, Development and Governance (3^rd Year, UG)
• Popular Culture and World Politics (PGT)
• Gender, Sex and Death (2nd Year, UG)
• Colonialism, Global Political Economy and Development (2nd Year, UG)
• Issues in International Relations (PGT)

I have completed the Cardiff Postgraduate Certificate in Teaching and Learning programme, and am a fellow of the Higher Education Academy.

Biography

Education and Qualifications

• PhD in Politics, Bristol, UK
• MA in Political Science, York University, Toronto, Canada
• BA (Honours) in Political Studies and English Literature, Queen’s University, Kingston, Canada

Career Overview

• 2014 - present: Cardiff University School of Law and Politics, Department of Politics and IR

Supervisions

I welcome proposals for research projects in my areas of research. These include:

• popular culture and world politics
• the international politics of tourism
• transnational responses to everyday sexual violences
• neoliberal subjectivities
• neoliberalism authoritarianism and urban tourism in Egypt
• postcolonial governmentalities
• postcolonial, feminist and poststructural approaches
• discourse analysis and ethnographic research methods

Current supervision

Vicky Sutch

Teaching Associate and PhD student

Genevieve Gunn

Ali Kourani

Hazel Choi

Shahrzad Akbari