When Cassie got to Bali to work as a digital nomad for two months, she was hoping to experience the local community, but instead, she stumbled upon "a mini-Australia" in Canggu.
Canggu is one of Indonesia's popular tourist spots and has become a hot spot for digital nomads.
Cassie is an Australian works from around the world as a virtual assistant — when she realised in 2020 that she could work from anywhere, and stumbled upon the idea of being a virtual assistant on TikTok — she bailed on her office job and daily commute as soon as her lease ended last year. She now works remotely from wherever she pleases, doing virtual social media and inbox management.
And she has seen first-hand how digital nomads can have a good and bad impact.
Canggu has become a popular destination for digital nomads escaping the traditional desk life. Credit: Cassie Gallegos, Unsplash
Digital nomads are booming thanks to the WFH era — they usually work in freelance digital roles, such as social media management or content creation — even finance — and they espouse the freedom of living and working from overseas, choosing their own hours and how they'll spend the day.
And the tourism and hospitality industries are welcoming them with co-working cafes serving cocktails and offering pool access, while co-living hostels provide high-speed wifi and group activities. Canggu is dotted with signs encouraging tourists to set up their remote working life — and the tourism dollar provides opportunities for the region.
But, as some on TikTok have questioned, is the digital nomad movement a type of neo-colonisation? While the tourist comes and goes, the digital nomad may set up for weeks, months, or years, potentially adding to gentrification and even housing crises.
Recently, the New York Times reported that Mexico City had become a hub for nomadic workers, but that the surge had stressed the city's already tight housing market, pricing locals out. It said housing activists accused city leaders of allowing "a modern day 'colonisation'".
The rise of the digital nomad
Countries around the world have done a hard launch into the era of the digital nomad dollar. Fifty countries, from Dubai to Iceland, are all offering specific visas for the new type of traveller. To work remotely from Mexico, you'll need to prove you've had $43,000 in your savings account over the last 12 months, for Portugal you'll need to have an income of at least $4,500 a month, and for Indonesia, you'll need but can carry out "investment and other activities".
These requirements mean many digital nomads use tourist visas and leave the country when it expires, only to re-enter again.
The ABC reported last year that 3000 foreigners used Indonesia's B211 A tourism visa to work as digital nomads between January and September last year.
One enthusiastic, numbers-focused nomad has there will be one billion digital nomads by 2035, influenced in some part by the rise of fast internet and freelancing, along with the fall of home ownership and marriage rates.
Are digital nomads engaging in neo-colonisation?
Some communities have pushed back against the influx — residents of Mexico City say they're seeing gentrification and loss of housing to foreigners seeking a cheaper home.
Shaun Busuttil is an anthropologist and PhD candidate researching digital nomadism at the University of Melbourne — he believes digital nomads are enacting some kind of neo-colonisation, but that it's not all black and white, or good and bad.
"Colonialism historically, has been when one when one group of people with more power or more resources come into a space and effectively take it over, [using] the space in order to serve their own ends," he explains in an interview with Erik Muth of the Rising Nomad YouTube channel.
"What are we doing [as digital nomads], we're coming into spaces, we're taking them over, we're using them for this space for its cheap cost of living."
He explains that shops and businesses end up catering to the new tourist for their economic power.
"So instead of an old fruit-and-veg shop that's been in the town or the village for years, for generations, now that's suddenly turned into a cafe to appeal to [digital nomads]. So, whether digital nomadism is a form of neocolonialism?" he asks.
"Well, we're coming in we're taking over effectively."
"Look at Lisbon, and even Mexico City, Barcelona, local people are being displaced by foreign remote workers and digital nomads."
While usually, it's people with less resources that suffer the most from gentrification, people with more are able to capitalise on the economic opportunities tourism provides, he tells Mr Muth.
How to not contribute to the problem
Cassie has thought a lot about her impact in the communities she visits, and how she can try to make it a positive one.
"As a digital nomad, I feel like we should really make sure that we're contributing to the local economy — eating at local restaurants, staying in local accommodation, making sure we're paying a fair price for those things."
Both Shaun and Cassie echo that tourists should pay full price for services, perhaps instead of bargaining.
"Make sure that you are conscious of [your impact] when you are travelling," Cassie says.
"So that you are getting out into the local community, eating at local restaurants, staying in local accommodation, and just giving back to the local community."
For now, she loves the pace of life that being a digital nomad provides, and doesn't have any plans to pause.
"Being able to smash out my work in the morning and then clock off and go spend my afternoons adventuring — I did paragliding and Laos, which was incredible, swimming waterfalls — I just feel like you get to experience so much more out of life when you when you are able to set your own schedule."
