Tourism,heritage and cultural performance: Developing a modality of heritage tourism

Research has shown that heritage is a contested concept which not only creates unnecessary binaries but also perpetuates essentialized First World imagery of Asian countries. To assist in its reframing, this paper proposes critical ethnography. It is argued that through it, a more nuanced and community-based understanding of cultural heritage can be developed, thus allowing the articulation of modalities of cultural heritage and the formation of alternative imaginaries. To develop this point, the essay problematizes the heritage concept, examines how governing policies and tourism frameworks define cultural heritage vis-àvis its use in the tourism industry, and discusses the theoretical sources and intellectual legacy of critical ethnography. Cases from Batanes and Marinduque provinces, the Philippines, are reviewed to serve as background. With critical ethnography as a strategic method, the essay suggests that the semiotics of heritage tourism can be broadened and possibilities for social change in Asian tourism and hospitality established.     

The influence of artistically recreated nature on the image of tourist destinations: Lanzarote's art,cultural and tourism visitor centres and their links to sustainable tourism marketing

Can distinctive natural assets in tourist destinations be artistically recreated and used to improve destination image and attract more visitors? This paper analyses the formation of the tourist image based on artistically recreated local nature icons, and shows how those images can enhance the overall destination image. It focuses on the island of Lanzarote, a destination with its development based on promoting an environmental image founded on the creation of a network of multifunctional, high-quality art, culture and tourism centres exhibiting artistic recreation of its unique environmental assets. The methodology utilizes a questionnaire (n = 453) structural equations modelling approach in which the overall image of the destination is directly dependent on the image of the environmental conditions and indirectly influenced by the image of the artistically recreated centres. Results show that the destination's image is significantly grounded on the image of the art, culture and tourism centres using art based on Lanzarote's natural assets. They suggest that destinations have relevant opportunities to artistically enhance natural assets to improve their tourist image and marketing, that quality multi-functional visitor centres can be important within a sustainable tourism policy, and part of the emerging breadth of approaches taken by sustainable tourism marketing.     

Mix,match & move: Shaping the future of tourism Asia pacific tourism association seventh annual conference Manila,the Philippines, 2001

This research investigates the psychological turnover theory, which is developed based on the Mobley's model, and compares the hotel employees of two culturally different countries: U.S.A. and South Korea. It takes the controversy of transferability of management theories in different cultures into consideration. This study also compares the influencing factors in the particular behavior between the two groups. For both samples, the path analyses using a series of multiple regression analyses have shown the existence of a particular linkage among the four psychological construct variables studied: job satisfaction, organizational commitment, thinking of quitting, and withdrawal intentions, thus supporting the model. Given the possible problems of collinearity between the predicting variables and thereby instability of the regression coefficients, stepwise regression analyses have been employed to serve the second objective of this study, resulting in significant differences between the two samples. In addition, a dummy variable has been created to examine the role of nationality in predicting the turnover behavior, with the nationality turning out to be an important predictor, however, its influence is indirect through organizational or psychological factors.     

Decomposition of tourism greenhouse gas emissions: Revealing the dynamics between tourism economic growth,technological efficiency,and carbon emissions

This study proposes an analytical framework for decomposing the national tourism carbon footprint and carbon efficiency to identify the dynamics between economic growth, technological efficiency, and environmental externality. Using the environmentally extended input–output model and decomposition methods, tourism carbon changes are decomposed into the economic factors of total consumption and purchasing patterns, and the production factors of industry input structure and technological improvement. This macro-level approach provides a basis for 1) assessing whether total tourism emissions increase in direct proportion to tourism consumption over time, 2) tracing the underlying determinants and their effects on tourism emissions expansion and eco-efficiency performance, and 3) comparing the carbon performance of the tourism industry against the national average. Based on the example of Taiwan, the results demonstrate that we are a long way from the goal of using the technological efficiencies of production to offset tourism-based carbon emissions.     

The coastal tourism industry in the Mediterranean: A critical review of the socio-economic and environmental pressures & impacts

Tourism is a vital economic source in the Mediterranean basin. The sun and beach tourists are of major social and economic importance for almost all Mediterranean countries. However, this industry's extensive and uncontrolled growth may negatively impact these fragile natural coastline areas. In the present study, we review and analyse the driver's forces, pressures, and impacts of the tourism sector development in the Mediterranean countries' environment and economy by using the D (Driver) P (Pressure) S (State) I (Impact) R (Responses) analytical framework. The analysis highlights the critical social and economic roles the coastal tourism industry plays while the steady and uncontrolled growth of this sector and related activities compromise these coastal countries' ecology and environmental quality. This requires the decision-makers and stakeholders' attention toward adopting new strategies and approaches toward greening the blue tourism industry to ensure sustainable economic, social and environmental growth of this industry. In this perspective, we point out the necessity to incorporate environmental issues with economic and socio-cultural needs to obtain complete and harmonized sustainable tourism indicators in the Mediterranean.     

Protected areas,wildlife-based community tourism and community livelihoods dynamics: spiraling up and down of community capitals

Participation in wildlife-based community tourism within and around protected areas is seen as a tool to link biodiversity conservation and community livelihoods improvement. However, there is a deficiency of frameworks currently used to understand complex and dynamic relationships that exist among conservation, tourism and development. The community capitals framework is adopted to assess these linkages from a systems-thinking perspective in which community capitals’ stock and flow, explained by a community's participation in tourism determines the direction of change. Results of the Chobe Enclave Conservation Trust in Botswana indicate that all community capitals are interdependent and play a dynamic role in shaping the spiraling of community livelihoods. Participation in tourism led to both the spiraling up and down of community capitals. The spiraling up of community capitals is explained by increased livelihoods and diversification options facilitated by increased tourism income. The spiraling down is explained by the heightened human–wildlife conflicts and fragile wildlife–livestock co-existence, which led to livestock diseases, loss of beef market and the ecosystems’ fragmentation through the introduction of veterinary fences. Thus, the spiraling of community capitals is explained by the transformation of one stock of community capital to another in a systems-thinking dynamics fashion.     

Convinced,ambivalent or annoyed: Tyrolean ski tourism stakeholders and their perceptions of climate change

Its focus on snow-dependent activities makes Alpine winter tourism especially sensitive to climate change. Stakeholder risk perceptions are a key factor in adaptation to climate change because they fundamentally drive or constrain stakeholder action. This paper examines climate change perceptions of winter tourism stakeholders in Tyrol (Austria). Using a qualitative approach, expert interviews were conducted. Four opinion categories reflecting different attitudes toward climate change issues were identified: convinced planners, annoyed deniers, ambivalent optimists, convinced wait-and-seers. Although the findings generally indicate a growing awareness of climate change, this awareness is mainly limited to perceiving the issue as a global phenomenon. Awareness of regional and branch-specific consequences of climate change that lead to a demand for action could not be identified. Current technical strategies, like snowmaking, are not primarily climate-induced. At present, coping with climate change is not a priority for risk management. The findings point out the importance of gaining and transferring knowledge of regional and branch-specific consequences of climate change in order to induce action at the destination level.     

Tourists and albatrosses: the dynamics of tourism at the Northern Royal Albatross Colony, Taiaroa Head, New Zealand

Wildlife tourism attractions in New Zealand, like those elsewhere in the world, have experienced rapid growth in demand since the mid-1980s in association with the ecotourism phenomenon. Fortunately, the body of research on the impacts of tourism upon wildlife, both domestic and international, is beginning to reflect this growth. This article presents a consideration of wildlife tourism as it has developed in the New Zealand context. Specifically, it addresses the complexities of understanding the impacts of non-consumptive wildlife tourism. This term describes tourist engagements with wildlife that take place in the habitat of the focal species without the deliberate disturbance or removal of that species. To this end, the case of the North Royal Albatross Colony, Taiaroa Head, New Zealand, is examined. Various secondary data sources are employed to test the application of Duffus and Dearden's (Biological Conservation 1990, 53, 213–231) conceptual framework to this bird colony, with all components of the framework proving to be upheld. It is concluded that site users, contact wildlife species and the natural habitat of the focal species all demonstrate various dimensions of change over time. Several conclusions are drawn from this study. First, that in the absence of deliberate management intervention, wildlife tourism attractions evolve over time to the detriment of both the visitor experience and the focal wildlife species. Secondly, the impacts of tourism upon wildlife transcend tolerance. In other words, wildlife species may appear to be perfectly tolerant of tourists while significant impacts still occur. Thirdly, the application of the core components of Duffus and Dearden's framework dictates that wildlife impact research is not transferable, but rather research of this nature is both site- and species-specific. Finally, it is recommended that research in this domain should involve long-term monitoring of wildlife impacts. Many significant impacts go undetected in the absence of time series data. Failing this, research into the impacts of non-consumptive wildlife tourism must give consideration of the possible long-term biological consequences of tourist engagements with wildlife species.