Psychological capital,coping mechanisms and organizational resilience: Insights from the 2016 Kaikoura earthquake,New Zealand

Psychological capital (PsyCap) of tourism business owners and managers in the face of adversity has received scant attention. This study explores how the four components (self-efficacy, hope, optimism and psychological resilience) of PsyCap affect organizational resilience in a post-quake environment. Using a case-study approach and in-depth interviews with small tourism business owners and managers in Kaikoura, New Zealand, we found that problem-focused and emotion-focused coping mechanisms enabled participants to activate PsyCap components to build organizational resilience. Realistic optimism of owners and managers, for example, fuelled problem-focused coping strategies that led to greater situation awareness of changes in both the internal and external business environment. The findings have implications for small tourism businesses as they navigate the recovery process following major disasters.     

Social marketing,sustainable tourism,and small/medium size tourism enterprises: challenges and opportunities for changing guest behaviour

ABSTRACT

This paper investigates the impact on the guest experience of initiatives promoting water efficient behaviour in small/medium-sized enterprises (SMTEs) offering tourism accommodation. Interviews with 16 SMTE managers revealed businesses were unable to incorporate many initiatives previously examined in the literature, due to the small size of their businesses. In the interviews, however, they contributed three new ideas not previously examined in existing sustainable tourism dialogues. A subsequent questionnaire (n = 408) was administered to potential guests to better understand their water use behaviour, explore how initiatives might impact their accommodation experience, and to assess guest reactions to social marketing messages. Eight initiatives and five messages were tested. Cluster analysis revealed three distinct water user segments with one cluster showing the greatest promise for targeting to increase return on investment. Guests reported the highest positive impact on their experience from initiatives SMTEs stated were not operationally viable. This may indicate that larger firms have a competitive advantage over SMTEs if applying social marketing to change guest behaviour. However, the study found that two of the new initiatives, suggested by SMTE managers as more appropriate to their businesses, would be viable in engaging guests and at acceptably low costs.     

Sustainable urban tourism success factors and the economic performance of small tourism enterprises

The aim of this study is to introduce the relationship between sustainable urban tourism success factors and the economic performance of small tourism enterprises (STEs). The related data was obtained from 330 STEs business owners/managers in Eskisehir (Turkey). To determine the dimensions Exploratory Factor Analysis was performed and Confirmatory Factor Analysis was used for verifying these dimensions. Structural Equation Modelling was applied in order to introduce the relation which is foreseen. As a result of the analysis, seven dimensions of urban tourism success factors and two dimensions of the economic performance of STEs have been determined and a significant relation was found between them. These findings provide an insight to literature and new directions and suggestions for local governments, regional marketing organizations and business managers on how tourism development and sustainability can be achieved in urban areas.     

Entrepreneurship in the tourism industry: Issues in developing countries

The tourism industry in Malaysia is one of the most important sectors in terms of its contribution to the growth of the nation. The extensive demand on the tourism industry has stimulated the emergence of many small and medium hotels, resorts, and chalets in Malaysia. According to the literature, small and medium hotels are an extension of the entrepreneurial characteristics of the owners/managers of the hotels. In Malaysia, small and medium hotel entrepreneurs (SMHEs) have not been given much attention. Looking at this gap, this study aims to provide a significant result on entrepreneurship issues in Malaysia. The main objective of this study is to examine the characteristics of small and medium hotel owners/managers and the issues and problems they confront in relation to their survivability in the industry. The result revealed that the majority of owners/managers of small and medium hotels were male, middle-aged and older, with secondary and upper level of education, and whose prior specialisations or knowledge were not related to tourism. With strong self-confidence and independent personality characteristics, the majority started to establish their businesses after the financial crisis in 1997–1998. The result also defined small scale to mean hotels with less than 50 rooms, which had been constructed with limited personal funding and bank loans. Information technology was found to be an important tool to promote their hotels, but conventional techniques such as word of mouth and signboards were still significant. The owners/managers of small and medium hotels were in agreement over their weaknesses in terms of lack of knowledge and skills in running the business. At the same time, they also felt that the government should play a more proactive role in promoting the tourism industry.     

Management models and differential agency challenges arising in Australian multi-titled tourism accommodation properties

This paper reports the interview findings of a study designed to appraise differential agency challenges arising between unit owners and resident managers in three distinct types of strata titled tourism accommodation (STTA) operation. The three distinct contexts of STTA management delivery investigated are: 1) management service provision by small independent owner-operators in a single STTA apartment complex, 2) management service provision in strata titled hotels, and 3) management service provision by organizations that manage multiple STTA apartment complexes. Using the four dimensional agency theoretical framework developed by Lambert (2001), it has been found that the potential for agency challenges appear to be greatest in the context of an STTA complex managed by a small independent owner-operator.     

Understanding small firms in tourism: A perspective on research trends and challenges

Although small firms in tourism have featured on the agendas of policy-makers for several decades, academic interest over the same period has fluctuated. Certainly the flurry of activity that occurred during the early 1990s became a steady flow of somewhat fragmented output rather than the ambitious and coherent programme of research that was anticipated at the time. The paper traces progress in this field by reviewing inter-, multi- and disciplinary studies that contribute to current understanding of small firms in tourism and how this understanding articulates with wider debates within tourism studies. In so doing, it challenges some conventional wisdom and provides an agenda for future research.     

Imagining the Nepali ‘nation’ through tourism

Tourism is considered to present a contrived and inauthentic version of a nation and that there is a big gap between touristic image and the social reality of the nation. By contrast, some scholars have argued that tourism can be an important tool to articulate nationhood and nationalism as it represents an authentic national culture. This paper looks into the representation of the Nepali nation in tourism and sees how fairly it represents ‘national imagery’ and culture. Data collected through unobtrusive methods and observations show that tourism is presenting a picture of Nepal that is largely partial and unrepresentative of its composite character. The imagery of Nepal in tourism is full of references to Himalayan heritage and there is a serious under-representation of the region of Terai and its people. The portrayal of Nepal in the two sources used reflects the representations of some kinds of ‘conservative nationalism’ in Nepal. This study also stresses that such (under)representations prevents tourism from playing a meaningful role in bringing in more ‘sub-national’ identities into the composite imagery of Nepal and solidifying and expressing Nepali national identity and nationalism.     

“Where fantasy becomes reality”: how tourism forces made Brazil a sexual playground

This paper examines the political economy of tourism representations and destination imaging in Brazil and its effect on tourism impacts in the country. The central argument is that the way Brazil and its women are represented in tourist images has an important effect on how they are consumed. By investigating the representation of Brazil and its women during colonial times by Europeans, by the Brazilian Government and by the contemporary Western media, this study explores how these representations have made Brazil a sexual playground for tourists. The study contributes to the tourism literature by concluding that Brazil's image is not a direct outcome of tourism representations alone; rather its destination image is strongly connected with complex historical, political and cultural processes.     

The sustainability behaviour of small firms in tourism: the role of self-efficacy and contextual constraints

This article presents a grounded theory to explain why some small businesses in tourism adopt sustainable business practices while others do not, even when they share environmental and wider sustainability concerns. It does so based on research undertaken among business owners in Crete. The paper starts by considering studies on sustainability awareness, knowledge and the mechanisms for accepting responsibility. Secondly, it summarises the influence of task difficulty and effort on sustainability self-efficacy. Thirdly, it focuses on social comparisons and vicarious experiences, as a way of learning what is important. Finally, it examines powerlessness due to perceived situational constraints. In so doing, the study finds that self-efficacy helps to explain sustainable attitude formation and the attitude-behaviour gap; it partly shifts the locus of responsibility for an inability to act sustainably away from the individual and towards their context. The paper contributes to the theoretical literature on small businesses and sustainability, and leads to new avenues for policy interventions.     

Boundary-work and sustainability in tourism enclaves

Tourists, workers, and business owners from diverse cultural backgrounds and social positions meet at tourism enclaves. Yet, the spatial layout of most enclaves encourages segregation instead of celebrating and benefiting from this diversity. This paper examines the genesis of enclave tourism boundaries. It proposes boundary-work as a sustainability practice to work out segregating propensities, and transform exclusionary boundaries or make them more permeable. Life story interviews in a Mexican Caribbean enclave revealed segregation's appalling consequences for workers, implicit costs for business owners, and the personal involvement of tourism actors in historical struggles over boundaries. This analysis constitutes a first step to untangle exclusionary propensities and render tourism boundaries more workable from a sustainability governance perspective. The paper explains the need for sustainable tourism research that identifies opportunities to: (1) address traumatic experiences born of discriminatory practices, (2) turn adversarial emotions between workers and business owners into productive collaborations across boundaries, and (3) challenge power asymmetries by providing tourism actors with knowledge about the physical, symbolic, and imaginary dimensions of boundaries. It concludes that the influence of any individual agent is profoundly limited; the transformation of long-standing boundaries demands a deliberate reformulation of sustainable tourism as a multi-dimensional decolonizing force.     

Rukai indigenous tourism: Representations,cultural identity and Q method

In tourism, cultural representations of indigenous destinations are problematic. They are essential to the promotion of tourism, making destinations understandable and desirable to visitors. But they are also blamed for upsetting the cultural equilibrium of smaller destinations. However, in practice, the origin, mechanism and effects of touristic representations are not easy to identify. In this study, the problem of representations and resident cultural identity in indigenous tourism is explored. In consideration of the generative nature of representations and the contingency of subjectivities toward them, this study is context-specific, focusing on a small but significant community in southern Taiwan where indigenous tourism is a dominant industry and social issue. Q method, a technique designed for the systematic study of subjectivity in terms of opinions, beliefs, and attitudes is employed, eliciting responses from a P set (sample) of 30 participants. Subjectivities were elicited using photographs of one cultural representation, the indigenous Rukai standing stones. It was found that representations must be learned but can be ignored, and that in this community tourism is not the only socio-economic power that drives the feedback loop between representations and subjectivity. For tourism management, implications are that representations can be highly effective tools for destination promotion when informed by the diverse and highly individualized subjectivities of its residents and the production of quality local products.     

“Managed evils” of hedonistic tourism in the Maldives: Islamic social representations and their mediation of local social exchange

This paper explores resident attitudes toward tourism development in the Maldives. Findings from 50 semi-structured interviews and 200 household surveys collected in two island communities provide insights into the reconciliation of deeply held Islamic social representations with proximate hedonistic tourism. In the less tourism-affiliated island, religious affinity and social exchange were central as to how residents viewed tourism as an ‘evil’ from which their community should be insulated. In the more tourism-affiliated case, social exchange and social representations influenced how tourism is rationalised as a ‘managed evil’.     

Social value creation through tourism enterprise

Despite the role of social entrepreneurship to create social value and transformation, little is still known about how social value can be generated. Drawing upon the service dominant logic and entrepreneurship literature, the paper aims to identify the resource needs of a tourism social enterprise and evaluate the means by which these resources are mobilised. Twenty seven face-to-face interviews were conducted with key informants in a developing country case study context. The key resources required for social value creation in tourism are natural; financial; political and institutional and human capital. These resources enable the generation of social value at three levels with interlocking value creation processes: at an individual stakeholder level; at the meso level and at the macro-level. Strategies associated with resource mobilisation are stakeholder involvement and collaboration; and relationship development and local community empowerment. A shared understanding of the role of tourism and cultural values is critical.     

Determinants of radical innovation in clustered firms of the hospitality and tourism industry

Social capital is a key resource encouraging innovation in clustered firms of the hospitality and tourism industry, however it may be influenced by managers perception of market dynamism. This paper analyses the moderator role of ma’rket dynamism perception among the three dimensions of social capital −structural, relational and cognitive- and radical innovation. We conducted an empirical study on a sample of 215 hospitality and tourism firms located in World Heritage Cities of Spain, by considering each city as a cultural tourism cluster. The structural equations analysis shows divergent direct and moderated effects for the dimensions of social capital. Specifically, the negative effect of structural social capital on radical innovation worsens when market dynamism perception is higher. However, market dynamism perception improves the effects of relational and cognitive social capital on radical innovation. The study contributes to the understanding of the antecedents of radical innovation at firm level in the context of cultural tourism clusters.     

Racialised boundaries in tourism and travel: a case study of the UK black Caribbean community

Studies of tourism motivation and behaviour have not accounted significantly for the aspirations and experiences of ethnic minority groups living in metropolitan societies. This conceptual paper presents a case study of the UK black Caribbean community and seeks to indicate ways in which members of this community perceive places, spaces and destinations in Europe. Attention is directed to how black people’s perceptions and experiences are influenced and structured by the social conditions of racialism and racism. The discussion considers how the incursive nature of the white gaze, and popular representations and stereotypes of black societies and cultures, contribute to black people’s disengagement from ‘tourism experiences’. Racialised experiences and encounters call into question an individual’s right to adopt a tourist identity. As the discussion partly focuses on ways in which black visitors perceive ‘white others’, the work strongly implies that there is a fundamental need to remove the ‘white gaze’ as the only or dominant way to observe and make sense of the world. Given that this paper contributes to an understanding of how race relations are reproduced within tourism environments, it concludes with suggestions as to how future studies of ethnic minority tourism and travel might be conducted.     

Aggravated fragmentation: A case study of SME behaviour in two emerging heritage tourism regions

This paper investigates the behaviour of small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs) within the heritage tourism supply chain (HTSC), in two emerging heritage regions. SMEs are conceptualised as implementers, working within the constraints of government level tourism structures and the heritage tourism supply chain. The research employs a case study approach, focusing on two emerging regions in Northern Ireland. In-depth interviews were carried out with small business owners and community associations operating within the regions. The research identifies SME dissatisfaction with the supply chain and the processes in place for the delivery of the tourism product. To overcome the perceived inadequacies of the heritage tourism supply chain SMEs engage in entrepreneurial behaviour by attempting to deliver specific products and services to meet the need of tourists. The challenge for tourism organisations is how they can integrate the entrepreneurial, innovative activities of SMEs into the heritage tourism system.     

Creating a scale for assessing socially sustainable tourism

As destinations absorb ever increasing number of visitors, destination managers become progressively more concerned about the longer term viability of tourism from a resident's perspective. However, few studies have examined the application of real-time social sustainability within tourism, particularly how to measure impacts on social sustainability. This study outlines the development of a valid and reliable scale – the Scale of Social Sustainability (SSS) – for tourism that provides an assessment of social sustainability in destination settings. A 10-step procedure was developed drawing upon the related literature. A telephone poll-based survey generated 1839 valid responses from Hong Kong residents. Hong Kong's growing popularity as a destination provides a rich array of host–guest conflict situations. Dimensionality was identified using exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses. Construct validity, reliability, and stability were assessed, and found good, showing that the scale could be used by other destinations worldwide. The theoretical and managerial implications of the scale are discussed, including options for annual surveys giving policy-makers alerts before situations worsen. Detailed host resident viewpoints and the large scale of the survey can help local residents be informed about tourism development and better involved in the policy formation process.     

Family Vs. Non-Family Business Owners’ Commitment to Their Town: A Multigroup Invariance Analysis

This study examines differences between family-owned and non-family-owned small and medium tourism enterprises (SMTEs) operating in regional tourism destinations. The research focuses on SMTE owners' commitment to stay in the town in which they are embedded. Based on samples of family (N?=?157) and non-family (N?=?141) businesses in regional South Australia, was used to test the construct validity of SMTE owners' “commitment to stay”. Multigroup invariance was used to test the factorial equivalence of scores from the commitment model across family and non-family businesses. Results support the validity of the “commitment to stay” CFA model. Multigroup invariance analysis suggests family business owners have a greater commitment to staying in their town. These results contribute to our understanding of the unique objectives and behaviours of family businesses in tourism as well as present important implications to destination managers aiming to support sustainable entrepreneurial development.     

Understanding pioneering orientation in tourism clusters: Market dynamism and social capital

The aim of this paper is to study whether and how closed ties and diverse ties moderate the relationship between firms' market dynamism and pioneering orientation in a tourism cluster. We use original data on a sample of 215 firms belonging to the World Heritage Cities of Spain. The results show a curvilinear U-shaped relationship between market dynamism and pioneering orientation. This relationship is accentuated by higher closed ties, and is attenuated by higher diverse ties. Managers are advised to pay attention to changes in consumers’ needs so as to identify first-mover opportunities. Furthermore, firms located within tourism clusters might benefit from developing social capital. Specifically, managers should strengthen their closed ties when market dynamism is high and their diverse ties when the first changes in the market emerge.     

The effect of tourism activity on housing affordability

Although researchers have confirmed the impact of tourism on housing prices in many destinations affected with overtourism, they do not consider housing affordability in relation to the population's income levels. This study explores the relationship between tourism activity and housing affordability, using a sample of Croatian municipalities. Specifically, the study investigates how tourist accommodation, concentration, seasonality and overall vulnerability to tourism influence housing affordability in this emerging tourism-driven European country. The results obtained reveal tourism intensification's deteriorating effect on local residents' abilities to afford housing. The findings indicate a particularly strong tourism seasonality impact, suggesting the presence of common negative externalities, such as employment fluctuations, difficulties in maintaining economic status, and revenue instabilities, in localities prone to seasonal tourism fluctuations.