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Remnants of prehistoric civilisations; vast deserts with nomadic peoples and green oases; the life-giving Nile, Tigris and Euphrates Rivers; the tales of Lawrence of Arabia and the Arabian Nights; the abiding cultures of Persia, Arabia, Egypt and the Maghreb; the Tower of Babel and the Land of Ur; Mesopotamia and the ancient empires of Assyria, Egypt, Babylon, Greece and Romeâthese and multitudes of other quintessential representations have long conjured up images of romance, faith and fantasy, and fed the wanderlust of explorers, traders, pilgrims and tourists. The region commonly referred to today as the Middle East is home to some of the most remarkable historic localities, imposing topography and natural phenomena, richest resources, and venerated religious hearths on the planet. These have cultivated classical sagas and buttressed iconic places that have become the foundations of legends, motion pictures, novels, medieval explorations and modern day travel.
Despite its pivotal past and present, there is no consensus on the geographical extent of the Middle East and North Africa. Various organisations, international bodies, and geographical societies define the region in different ways using disparate criteria. For example, the World Bank includes Djibouti but does not include Afghanistan, Israel or Turkey. The World Tourism Organization, a UN-affiliated agency, classifies Israel and Turkey as Europe, and Iran as part of South Asia. Some international agencies include the Caucuses countries of Armenia, Azerbaijan and Georgia in their definitions, while others include Turkey, Cyprus, Sudan, South Sudan, Niger, Chad, Mali, Mauritania, Afghanistan and Pakistan as part of MENA. Thus, there are considerable geographical disparities between which countries are part of MENA and which are not, and these classifications are typically based upon the mandates of each agency involved.
Strictly in locational terms, MENA is comprised of two major areas: Southwest Asia and North Africa. Southwest Asia is frequently referred to as the Middle East and includes two sub-regions based on landforms and culture: the Arabian Peninsula and the transition zone between the Arabian Peninsula, the Mediterranean Sea and the Mountains of Iran and Turkey (Lew, Hall, & Timothy 2015). The Arabian Peninsula is dominated by a true desert landscape and Arab culture and is home to Yemen, Oman, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Bahrain and Kuwait. The transition zone is comprised of highlands, smaller deserts, more water resources and fertile areas, and is more culturally diverse. It includes Iran, Turkey, Iraq, Syria, Jordan, Lebanon, Palestine and Israel.
In North Africa, Western Sahara is a stateless territory that is administered partly by Morocco and partly by the displaced government of the Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republicâconsidered a government in exile by much of the international community. Thousands of displaced Sahrawis, a Berber people, live in refugee camps in Algeria near the border of Western Sahara. The Maghreb (the land where the sun sets) was the traditional region that today includes Morocco, Algeria and Tunisia, although Libya is now frequently included as part of the Maghreb. Egypt and Southwest Asia have been known throughout history as Mashriq, or the land where the sun rises (Lew, Hall, & Timothy 2015). The Maghreb, together with Egypt, comprise the region of North Africa, which is characterised by desert environments, high mountains in Morocco and Algeria, Arab and Berber cultures, and Islamic religious traditions (Drysdale & Blake 1985; Heing 2017).
Geographers define regions not only by their locations but also by their boundaries, which unite areas using certain criteria that reflect a degree of homogeneity in cultural and/or physical characteristics (de Blij & Muller 2006). Thus, Southwest Asia and North Africa are defined by their cultural qualities, including their ancient role as cultural hearths or origins of great civilisations and innovations; the ubiquity of religious, cultural and ethnic conflicts; the dominance of Arabic-speaking populations; their role as the source area of three major world religionsâIslam, Christianity and Judaismâand the current predominance of Islam as the main religion in every country, except Israel. The physical or natural features that also help define the realm include the dominance of hyper-arid deserts, scarce water supplies, and an abundance of oil and natural gas (Davis 2012; Downing 2007; Hobbs 2009; Longrigg 2017; Stewart 2013).
The term âMiddle Eastâ is frequently used in popular lexicon, the media, educational spheres, and amongst government agencies to refer to Southwest Asia and North Africa, again owing largely to their association with Islam and arid environments. The term âMiddle Eastâ was initially used by the British India Office in the mid-nineteenth century in reference to Southwest Asia. East and Southeast Asia were known as the âFar Eastâ; the area of the Ottoman Empire that is today Turkey was known as the âNear Eastâ, and the âMiddle Eastâ referred to the area of Southwest Asia that lies southeast of Turkey. The term has been widely criticised for its Eurocentric undertones and geographical imprecision (Adelson 2012; Bonine, Amanat, & Gasper 2012; de Blij & Muller 2006; Lew, Hall, & Timothy 2015) but has nonetheless become commonly used throughout the world.
For the purposes of this book, based on location and geography, climate and limited water resources, and religion, ethnicity and culture, the Middle East and North Africa includes the following countries of Southwest Asia: Bahrain, Iran, Iraq, Israel, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Oman, Palestine, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Turkey, UAE and Yemen. In this book, North Africa is delineated as: Algeria, Egypt, Libya, Morocco and Tunisia (see Table 1.1).
Table 1.1The countries of MENA and their basic characteristics
In common with other world regions, MENA is a mix of affluence and poverty. Qatarâs per capita GDP of US$124,900 is the second highest in the world, second only to that of Liechtenstein. Yet Yemen, a country sharing the Arabian Peninsula, has one of the worldâs lowest (US$2,300). In Egypt, the most populous country in the realm, less than 3 per cent of the total territory is arable land, and agriculture is overwhelmingly concentrated in a narrow strip along the banks of the Nile River, yet the country produces a significant portion of its food products. Several countries have vast oil and natural gas resources (e.g. Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Iran, Iraq, Kuwait, UAE, Egypt, Bahrain), while others have little or none. Those with few petroleum products have tended to rely much more on tourism and other service sectors than the states with vast oil wealth. Several countries have large, agriculturally productive areas fed by rainfall and plentiful groundwater (e.g. Morocco, Algeria, Turkey, Iran), while others cannot feasibly grow their own foodstuffs owing to the prohibitive cost of ocean water desalination, which makes them overdependent on imports. Global patterns of climate change continue to exacerbate the water scarcity in much of MENA, while a few countries, including Israel, have adapted to limited water resources by creating extremely efficient irrigation systems that enable them to limit their reliance on imported agricultural products.
MENA is endowed with vast deserts, snow-capped mountains, coastlines and beaches, rivers, forests, marine environments and many other natural attractions. It is home to a wide range of modern cultures, ancient traditions, trade routes, marketplaces, material culture and archaeology, villages and cities, colonial and indigenous architecture, labyrinths of languages, diverse religious traditions and hospitality unmatched by other cultures (Timothy 2011; Timothy & Daher 2009).
Instability and security concerns dominate the socio-political and economic landscapes of the Middle East and North Africa (Hall, Timothy & Duval 2003). Nearly every day, news headlines around the world depict the turmoil deriving from the geopolitical problems of MENA. While there were wars during the Ottoman period, those since its collapse in the 1920s have lasted longer and been more impactful on entire nations and regional development. At the time of writing (2018), Syria is embroiled in a civil war, and Islamist extremism has divided the country and spilled over into Iraq and Turkey. The recent IranâIraq War, while officially over, continues to overshadow contentious relations between the two large neighbours. The US invasion of Iraq had destabilised the country, giving rise to extremist elements and internal conflict, and eventually helping to empower Iraqi Kurdistan to hold an independence referendum in September 2017. Soured relations between Iran and the West have placed an otherwise resplendent destination country on many statesâ travel warning lists. Turkey is experiencing internal conflict between the state and the independence-minded Kurds, who are accused of terror activities throughout the country. Turkeyâs image has also been tainted in recent years by human rights violations against its Kurdish population and political dissidents, which has been a major stumbling block to its joining the European Union. Israel continues to occupy and control the Palestinian territories with increasing settlement encroachment in the West Bank and limitations on Palestiniansâ mobility. Qatar is currently under a complete trade, travel and diplomatic embargo by several of its neighbours for political reasons. Morocco continues to occupy Western Sahara, forcing most of the Sahrawi nation to live in exile in nearby Algeria. The 2011 Arab Spring affected the political, social and economic lives of several MENA countries, resulting in a failed Libyan state and an overthrow of governments in Egypt and Tunisia and persistent unrest in several countries. In addition to this, the region has suffered many high-profile terrorist attacks directly against tourists and the tourism establishment.
The long-time geopolitical hostility in the region that was exacerbated by colonial interference before and after the collapse of the Ottoman Empire, the establishment of Israel in 1948, religious conflict, territorial disputes, and contemporary Islamist extremism, have kept tourism at bay and dictated the types of tourism that have grown and developed in the region (Almuhrzi, Alriyami, & Scott 2017; Daher 2006; Hazbun 2004; Kalesar 2010). They have furthermore contributed to environmental degradation and the mass destruction of some of the worldâs most important historic sites. Except for Sub-Saharan Africa, there is no other region on earth that is so well endowed with cultural and natural assets yet lacks the level of tourism development commensurate with its potential (Timothy & Nyaupane 2009). For some observers in the region, this is not an entirely negative prospect. Tourism is often regarded as a corrupting influence in the conservative societies that dominate MENA, and several countries or factions within those countries have been quite vocal in their disdain for tourism and their desire to avoid it, or certain manifestations of it, where possible (Hazbun 2006).
This book
The chapters in this book address these and many other core issues facing the MENA region today. They reflect the growing importance of the Middle East and North Africa not only as a tourist destination but also as a laboratory for understanding tourism in the face of environmental, political, cultural and security challenges. Every effort was made to involve a wide range of authors from throughout MENA, as well as others with considerable research experience in the region. This proved to be challenging for a variety of reasons that shall not be enumerated here. Nevertheless, success was achieved with a balance of authors from MENA and from other parts of the globe with expertise in subjects that are directly relevant to the Middle East and North Africa.
For organisational purposes, ease of reading and based upon current trends and issues in MENA, the book is divided into the following seven parts: (I) The space and place of MENA; (II) Heritage, culture and urban space; (III) Religion and tourism; (IV) Natural and environmental challenges; (V) Tourism and geopolitics; (VI) transportation; and (VII) Contemporary trends. The chapters in Part I provide an overview of the social, cultural and environmental contexts of the region, examining the most pressing human and physical geographical issues in the region today to help set the context for the broader discussions that follow. It also provides a tourism context, looking at patterns and trends throughout the region.
Part II examines the human foundations of tourism from a cultural and heritage perspective. Mairna Mustafa describes the most prominent elements of intangible patrimony that help define MENA and sell it as an important heritage destination, including, amongst others, oral traditions and folklore, music and dance, handicrafts, festivals and community life. He also identifies several of the threats facing intangible culture in the region. Marcus Stephenson and Nazia Ali examine the cultural and theological foundations of the world-famous Arab hospitality, as well as the importance of private and public spaces of Arab hospitality. In Chapter 7, Christine Buzinde considers the concepts of deterritorialisation and reterritorialisation in the context of colonialism and indigenous knowledge in North Africa. In her chapter on urban and built heritage, Aylin OrbaĆlı looks at the role of tourism in maintaining the survival of historic Arab cities, as well as how these urban spaces are depicted by locals and interpreted for commercial gain from an Orientalist perspective.
MENAâs critical position as the birthplace of the Abrahamic religions, which provides the impetus for much of the regionâs tourism, is the focus of the third part. Daniel Olsen probes the relationship(s) between religion and tourism in the Middle East and contends that the region has unique challenges in managing pilgrim and religious tourism than the challenges facing other religious destinations. Within the broader context of Middle East tourism, Hamira Zamani-Farahani, Michele Carboni, Carlo Perelli and Neda Torabi Farsani examine the long-established but only recently studied Islam-oriented tourism, most noteworthy being the annual Hajj in Saudi Arabia. They consider intra-regional and global Muslim tourism and ask critical questions about cultural appropriateness and intercultural relations, religious needs, codes of conduct, and the impact of geopolitics in Muslimsâ travel patterns. Noga Collins-Kreiner surveys Jewish tourism in the Middle East. While obviously most Jewish travel takes place in Israel, there are other ...
