| Summary: | This paper is a historical analysis of the background and evolution of the concept of development and the limits to development, supported by links with economic science, thus pervading all social sciences. The assumptions of developmentalist theories, the so-called modernization theories, are shown and identified as traditional, conservative and consensual, thus differing from critical theories which adopt the assumptions of historical materialism. The paper examines those aspects of globalization which pertain to new approaches to development, whereby tourism becomes a link between the local and the global. The study explains how and why development is an unequal and joint process. Underdevelopment is a result of the structural adjustments which determine concentration of wealth and income, generating poverty as the ultimate expression of social inequality. It is shown that development only takes place when people benefit, when a human scale is reached, that tourism can both connect with concentrated economic growth and promote social development, otherwise known as local development
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