Sociology of Tourism - Pro Poor Tourism

The number of trips taken by Britons overseas has declined by 12.6 million, from 69.4 million to 56.8 million between 2007 and 2011, according to the research by Travelodge. This means that 5.9 million holidays and trips have come out of the market altogether when the number of domestic holidays and trips are factored in. This is shy of the government’s stated ambition for domestic trips to replace the number of missing overseas trips, the report says. However, the analysis shows that ‘staycation’ breaks were up by 5.6% as the recession proved that holidays are an essential rather than a luxury. UK city breaks account for 23% of domestic tourism but seaside towns are in decline by 5%. Total tourism revenue was up 12.6% to £40 billion between 2007-2011 against the general economy up 8%. Employment numbers in tourism have bucked the wider trend, thanks to strong growth in 2011 when 120,000 new jobs were created. The UK’s appeal as a tourist destination endured during the double dip, with overall visitor numbers up by 3.1% to 157.4 million, the report shows. Staycations form the backbone of the tourism economy, with domestic trips and holidays increasing by 5.6% to 126.6 million.

Several studies have investigated the perception of the local community on the tourism impacts and tourism development. The research by Ramkissoon and Nunkoo (2011) in Port Louis showed that favorable attitude toward the tourism industry was found to support for tourism development, with higher insights of positive tourism impacts, this means that the community shows higher support for the industry. Nejati, Mohamed & Omar (2014) found that locals in Perhentian Island have an ominously greater level of outlook towards the positive economic impacts of tourism than residents in Redang Island after comparing the two islands in Malaysia. Aside from the perceived negative environmental impacts of tourism, locals on both islands

While many problems are associated with International tourism, it can still offer some advantages. For one thing, International tourism can open job opportunities for the native citizens. To demonstrate, when tourists visit an area, the vast majority of them don’t have a clue on

Discuss the environmental and social impacts of tourism in the UK and consider whether the benefits exceed the costs.

While there is research conducted on the factors that affect the perception of British tourists, more research needs to be carried out to find out how their behavior and decision-making is affected.

Since the beginning of human civilization in the world, travelling has been an ongoing event. The early humans travelled for hunting and food gathering. Later, as society evolved, travelling became more prominent but became limited to trade, pilgrimage, studies, migration, royal affairs and exploration, rather than for pleasure and entertainment. From this knowledge it is evident that travelling is part of human nature but tourism is a process and activities of a new and moderately recent phenomenon. The evolution of tourism can be divided into three phases.

For a variety of reasons, host communities often are the weaker party in interactions with their guests and service providers, leveraging any influence they might have. These influences are not always apparent, as they are difficult to measure, depend on value judgements and are often indirect or hard to identify. Impacts arise when tourism brings changes in value systems or behaviour, threatening indigenous identity. Changes often occur in community structure, family relationships, collective traditional life styles, ceremonies and morality. But tourism can also generate positive impacts as it can serve as a supportive force for peace, foster pride in cultural traditions and help avoid urban relocation by creating local jobs. Socio-cultural impacts are ambiguous: the same objectively described impacts are seen as beneficial by some groups and as negative by

These social impacts affect on the local people of host communities of their direct and indirect association with tourists. Tourists come face to face with the object of exchanging information and ideas. This situation is more important for international understandings. The tourist is mobile, relaxed, free spending; enjoying the leisure and absorbing the experience of being in a different places whereas the local people are stationary and employed in the tourist industry, spend a large portion of the time for needs and desire of visitors. The demonstration effect is also an aspect of the direct social impact of tourism. Tourist influences the behavior of the host population. The local people tend to observe and learn the life style of the richer visitors from affluent societies and try to emulate their way of life. However expansion of tourism, cause cultural commercialization, increase in crime rate, gambling, drug abuse, prostitution is common. Thus impacts of tourism on traditional life styles are important, where these traditions are considered from the basis of the tourism

Describe and evaluate the negative social, cultural or environmental impact caused by tourism in a destination of your choice. Analyse the causes of this impact and judge to what extent sustainable tourism strategies and methods could eliminate or ameliorate them and thereby secure the long term future of the destination.

This section discusses psychological factors of tourism activities. In terms of psychology, tourism is indication of tourists’ ideas and opinions about going on trips, about where to go and what to do, and about how to relate to other tourists, locals, service personnel. (Leiper, cited in Richardson & Fluker 2008, p. 6). Nowadays, there are various choices

One can gain experiences by acknowledging and understanding social and cultural differences throughout the world. Travel helps enlighten these aspects along with humanitarian efforts. Tourism provides insight to economic standings of various cultures. Through tourism society can “promote peace and understanding between peoples.” (…)

Critically analyse and evaluate the relationship between tourism and development & illustrate your arguments with practical examples from a variety of destination areas.

A very important issue also identified is that of culture management. Tourist must be given a code of conduct and be educated to behave in a certain way when visiting particular sites as to conform and integrate with the local community to avoid conflict. Tourist themselves have, or should have, an obligation to observe codes of behaviour and be aware of cultural norms in the destination they are visiting (Howie, 2003).

Despite wars, political turmoil, natural disasters, terrorist threats, and economic and energy crises in various areas of the globe, the tourism industry surges and has become one of the fastest growing economic sectors in the world. According to the UNWTO World Tourism Barometer, in 2014 over 1 billion tourist traveled to other nations (World Tourism Organization, 2015). The tourism industry is a vital component of the global economy. It helps to promote peace & stability in the developing world by providing jobs for the locals, generate revenue/income, and promote cultural awareness. Put together, tourism generated nearly seven trillion dollars in 2014 worldwide (Statista, 2014). As the years’ progress, so too will the number of tourists.

The large-scale impacts of Tourism include both positive and negative impacts on environmental, socio - cultural and economic aspects. The concept of sustainability is factored into these tourism impacts, when the size of the impacts becomes large enough to drastically alter economic, socio-cultural and environmental areas of a tourist destination. Especially the sensitive places like conflict-affected regions, these impacts need to be analyzed and evaluated carefully. Apart from obvious and visible effects on the economy and the physical environment, tourism can contribute to social and cultural changes in host societies, including changes in value systems, traditional lifestyles, family relationships, individual behavior or community structure.