Putting social sustainability at the heart of tourism policies.

How can social sustainability become a fully-fledged component of tourism policies, when public strategies are currently largely shaped by the challenges of the environmental transition? This was the central question addressed by ISTO during a webinar held on 23 June, focusing on the role of social tourism and access to holidays in public policy.

Moderated by Coralie Marti, from the Association pour le Tourisme Équitable et Solidaire (ATES), the webinar brought together two national perspectives: that of Francisca Retamal, from Chile’s National Tourism Service (SERNATUR), and Betty Rech, from Acteurs du Tourisme Durable (ATD) in France.
Despite their different national contexts, both contributions highlighted the same need: to consider access to tourism, benefits for destinations and social cohesion as structural dimensions of the tourism transition, alongside environmental and economic challenges.

Social sustainability: an issue still too often overlooked

Tourism policies are increasingly focused on decarbonisation, resource conservation and adaptation to climate change. Yet the social dimension of sustainability remains more difficult to integrate into public strategies. It is not simply a matter of individual access to holidays. It also concerns tourism’s ability to contribute to social cohesion, territorial balance and local economic development.
A sustainable tourism policy must therefore address several fundamental questions: who can travel, under what conditions, what benefits tourism generates for destinations and their communities, and what role local populations can play in tourism development.

In Chile, social tourism as a public policy tool

The experience presented by Francisca Retamal provided a concrete illustration of this approach. In Chile, social tourism is structured as a public policy through several programmes targeting, among others, older people, women, families and young people. One of the main lessons from this experience is the way social, economic and territorial objectives can be combined. The programmes operate particularly during the low season, with mechanisms to support the cost of holidays. They therefore make holidays more accessible to certain groups while helping to sustain tourism activity when visitor numbers are lower.
Social tourism thus becomes a policy instrument that can address certain market failures while supporting tourism businesses and local economies. This approach nevertheless requires funding, sustained stakeholder engagement and the ability to measure results. The Chilean experience highlights the importance of indicators capable of documenting the social, economic and territorial impacts of social tourism policies and strengthening their legitimacy over time.

In France, access to holidays remains a major challenge

In France, Betty Rech’s contribution placed these issues in the context of the 90th anniversary of paid holidays, celebrated in 2026. Despite the existence of numerous schemes designed to facilitate holidays, a significant proportion of the population still does not go away. However, this cannot be explained by income levels alone. There are also social, psychological and organisational barriers: lack of information, difficulty identifying available schemes, complex procedures, or even difficulties imagining and planning a holiday.
This reality calls for a broader understanding of access to holidays than purchasing power alone. It also means addressing non-take-up, strengthening support and enabling people to turn their holiday plans into reality. From this perspective, access to holidays can be understood as a genuine social inclusion policy, rather than simply a policy aimed at supporting tourism consumption.

Making access to holidays a national cause

Against this backdrop, a new collective dynamic emerged in France in 2026. Betty Rech presented the involvement of Acteurs du Tourisme Durable, which joined the collective led by Essentiem, an interest-general fund dedicated to promoting more engaged tourism. Created in 2020 at the initiative of several tourism stakeholders, Essentiem acts as a vehicle for philanthropy and the funding of projects serving the public interest, while bringing together stakeholders around social, societal and environmental issues in tourism. In February 2026, Essentiem launched, together with an initial collective of 35 organisations, a call to make access to holidays a national cause. The initiative brings together businesses, associations, institutions and stakeholders committed to social and sustainable tourism.
This diversity makes it possible to move the issue of access to holidays beyond the specific field of social tourism and to make it a shared concern across the tourism ecosystem.
The mobilisation also aims to better understand the barriers to taking holidays and identify possible areas for action: funding, information, simpler procedures, tackling non-take-up and providing support. Working sessions bringing together civil society, economic and institutional stakeholders have helped to develop common proposals.

From collective mobilisation to public action

This dynamic reflects an important shift: access to holidays is increasingly being viewed not only as an issue for social tourism, but as a genuine tourism, social and territorial policy issue. However, stakeholder mobilisation cannot replace public action. Private, community and philanthropic initiatives can test new solutions, mobilise resources and foster cooperation, but they cannot address the scale of holiday non-departure on their own.
The challenge is therefore to better connect collective engagement and public action. Tourism stakeholders can develop complementary solutions and strengthen links between tourism professionals and social support organisations. These initiatives must nevertheless be part of a long-term public ambition.

Towards a truly social, environmental and economic tourism transition

The discussions on 23 June highlighted a shared conviction: the tourism transition cannot be sustainable unless it is also social. This means better documenting the social and economic impacts of tourism, making the territorial benefits of social tourism and access to holidays more visible, and giving these issues a more central place in public policy.
For ISTO, this reflection is fully aligned with its role as an international platform for exchanging experiences and fostering dialogue among social and solidarity tourism stakeholders. By bringing together the Chilean experience of a structured public policy and the dynamics currently emerging in France, the webinar highlighted several common challenges: making access to holidays a public policy objective, strengthening cooperation between stakeholders, and placing social sustainability on an equal footing with the environmental and economic dimensions of the tourism transition.

The question is therefore no longer simply how to make tourism more sustainable, but also who it should be sustainable for, and how to ensure that the transition effectively benefits as many people as possible.