Following WWII, the authoritarian and morally austere dictatorship of General Francisco Franco's Spain became the playground for millions of carefree tourists from Europe's prosperous democracies. This book chronicles how this helped to strengthen Franco's regime and economic and political standing.

Introduction
Travel and Tourism in Spanish History
Tourism and International Engagement, 1945-1957
Building a Mass Tourism Industry, 1945-1957
Breakthrough, 1957-1962
Tourism and the Politics of Development, 1962-1969
Touristic Consciousness
Disillusionment and Reorientation
Conclusion: Tourism and the European Challenge

SASHA D. PACK is Assistant Professor of History at the University at Buffalo, the State University of New York, USA, where he teaches courses in Modern European and World History.