The Mediterranean Region is currently experiencing dramatic developments at both socio-political and economic levels. Countries in the Southern Mediterranean Region (Tunisia, Libya and Egypt) have seen major uprisings of the local populations against the established political order, whereas countries in the Northern part of the Region (especially Greece and to a lesser extent Portugal and Spain) suffer from major economic problems. Having the above in mind, it is natural to wonder whether the focus on ‘participatory planning in tourism in the Mediterranean Region’ makes any sense at all: given all this turmoil, is this activity yet another unnecessary luxury designed by an intellectual elite to satisfy primarily its own surreal needs? The answer is clearly negative. In fact, participatory planning in tourism may be a solution to many of the problems that we currently face in the Mediterranean Region.