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Introduction |
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What future for tourism? |
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Craig Webster and James Leigh |
The idea for this book began with James Leigh pondering how the major economic, political and social changes in the world would impact upon the tourism industry. It seems that most tourism studies concentrate upon short-term superficial concerns such as marketing, profitability and the creation of new products and services for tourists. Few academic journal articles deal with longer-term issues such as real sustainable tourism, the impact of climate change on tourism and other issues that are of a longer-term concern. We have sought to create a book to deal with the fundamental drivers of tourism and build a longer-term vision of the future and what tourism would look like 20 to 50 years from now. This is a book that evolved out of the concern to give a platform to those in tourism studies who want to speculate about the future and what the future may mean for tourism.
As a book of composed of submissions from multiple authors, we were able to include the perspectives of many leading academics worldwide who have contemplated the future of tourism. This is a major strength of this book â it enables tourism researchers from around the world to have their say regarding the future of tourism. The authors come from many countries and are also based in many countries, giving readers the benefit of the insights and opinions of researchers from âthe four corners of the Earthâ. Another major benefit for the reader is that the authors come from many different academic backgrounds (such as geography, political science, management, economics and, of course, tourism). The variety of academic backgrounds adds diversity to the perspectives expressed in the book.
The contributors to this volume are some of the best academics in the field who have practiced and published widely and have excellent academic reputations. We are honored to have all these contributors and appreciate that they were willing to collaborate with us to produce this unique and ground-breaking book. We are especially grateful for having Ian Yeoman as a contributor, since he is largely recognized as the leading futurist in tourism studies. Having a book on this topic would have seemed inappropriate without his input.
It may be intriguing to those reading the book from beginning to end â chapter to chapter â that the âexpertsâ disagree about what the future is going to look like and what future tourism may be like. Also noteworthy is that some of the authors take a softer view towards the future, by not confronting some of the dramatic issues as seen by others. Such authors tend to see historical continuity, believing that the next hundred years will be more or less like the economic boom since World War Two. These authors see a future with prosperity and further economic development for much of the worldâs population. It may be that the majority of our readers will hope these optimistic views prove to be correct.
Astute readers will note strong clashes in the trajectories of tourism put forward by the different authors. For example, it would be harder to imagine more diametrically opposed views of the future of tourism than those given by James Leigh and Ian Yeoman. Such a dissonance would not appear in a single-author book and is one of the bookâs strengths, since it is a reflection of the free expression of ideas that a book of readings offers.
Although such dissonance between the authors may undermine the coherence of an argument about the future, it is a reflection of our intention to enable multiple voices a space to express themselves. This is beneficial, because it will urge readers to think critically about the future and the forces driving humanity to a variety of potential futures. However, in spite of the dissonance, it is apparent to most of the authors that there are serious challenges ahead for tourism to surmount.
When dealing with something that has not yet happened, there is the risk that the speculation may not fully play out. Some of what is speculated about in the book may prove to be laughable in hindsight, while much of it risks being astutely accurate, illustrating trends that the tourism industry now should take into account, because the implications of some of the trends could be substantial. Just because some speculation may not be vindicated by future events and trends, readers should not be put off. Instead, we urge readers to read through the chapters to determine for themselves which chapters have perspectives that should be of practical use for tourism planning. Indeed it would be a good exercise to consider the most serious potential threats and prepare for them, without neglecting some of the less serious ones or even opportune possibilities ahead.
Apart from this introduction and a concluding chapter, the book is composed of three major sections. Part I deals with global changes and their probable impact on tourism in the future and consists of two chapters. In Chapter 2, James Leigh looks at the issue of Peak Oil, the decline of petroleum supplies/production in the next few decades, and relates the decline in petroleum supplies to implications for society and tourism. In Chapter 3, Craig Webster and Stanislav Ivanov look into competing visions of the global political economy of the future, exploring various ways that states may organize themselves to react to the challenges of tourism and the likely responses of the state to crises in the tourism sector in the future.
Part II looks into the political and social trends and issues that will likely influence tourism in the future. Chapter 4, by Michael Clancy, considers the issue of security and the future of tourism. This includes political violence and terrorism, vital issues that are currently on the publicâs mind in many countries. Chapter 5, by Chris Stone, explores the under-researched phenomenon of social tourism, exploring how developed countries supply tourism opportunities to their least fortunate citizens and how states, civil society and the private sector are likely to deal with supplying the least fortunate people tourism opportunities in the future. In Chapter 6, Susanne Becken looks into forecasting tourism by considering some of the key drivers (Peak Oil, environmental decline, demographic change, terrorism, etc.) in an attempt to predict which ones will shape future tourism. In Chapter 7, Nicos Kartakoullis and his coauthors deal with future tourism and its role in the quality of life of citizens. Finally, this section ends with a reflection by C. Michael Hall in Chapter 8 on future tourism and academiaâs perceptions of the future of tourism.
The third part is dedicated more to the managerial issues that future tourism professionals will have to deal with. In Chapter 9, Ulrike Gretzel speculates about technological change and how tourism will be experienced differently in the future due to rapidly developing technologies. In Chapter 10, Scott Richardson deals with human resource issues and needs for the future, including a look into role of education and training of professionals in the field. In Chapter 11, Werner Gronau assesses the much-discussed topic of sustainability in tourism and the future trajectory of these efforts in tourism. Finally, in Chapter 12 Ian Yeoman focuses upon what he expects tourism will look like in the future, using New Zealand as a case study.
Chapter 13, our final chapter, is a conclusion, tying together what has been learned from the insights of the authors in the book. The conclusion highlights that there is a very real divergence in how the authors view the future, some with a sense of optimism about the economic, political and social future of humanity, and some with a more pessimistic outlook. We feel that the conclusion could be a powerful motivator as a call to action for some.
The intention of the book is largely to stimulate thinking about the future of tourism. Indeed, we feel that this will be useful for several reasons. Thinking of the future is necessary because there has been little or no discussion about the major drivers and their impact on the long-term future of tourism. Much of what has been produced in academic circles for some time has been superficial and short term.
Speculation about the future should also be an incentive to plan and prepare for future challenges. Indeed, predictions and forecasts about the future may be quite accurate or off the mark. However, without thinking about the future it is impossible to plan for it or proactively prepare to overcome more dramatic scenarios. Thus, this book should help readers to speculate about a different future that they may have to deal with, and thus begin pre-emptive planning for likely challenging and unexpected futures that they may have never contemplated before.
This book goes into largely uncharted territory without precedents in society and tourism. Going into such territory is a bold step. Many of the projections may be vindicated, while others may become invalidated by future history.
While this is an edited book of readings, we made no attempt to edit the intentions of the authors. The book has been left to reflect the bold concepts expressed by the authors. There was no attempt by the editors to âtone downâ the chapters to make it more digestible to readers. As such, the assertions, predictions and forecasts of some of the authors may seem bold or wide of the mark. Readers will have to use their own intuition and minds to evaluate the arguments and forecasts made by the authors.
The authors all appear to take the Western assumption that there is a past, present and future and that humans are experiencing all of this in a linear way. With this assumption, we see that there is the notion that humans are empowered and have the ability to change the future, whatever it may be. This means that humans can empower themselves to change the course of the future and it only requires them to take action to avert those events that are undesirable in the future. It may be, as in the Terminator film franchise mantra, that there is âno fate but what we makeâ.
This is a very âpoliticalâ assumption, since different warnings about the future presume that political means must be taken to avert the unpleasant futures some of the authors assume will happen under the current trajectory. However, it is also a very political notion that the current trajectories of the global economy will ensure a bright future for all humans and have all the positive things that some of the authors assume will happen. Indeed, this book is at its core highly political and seems to embody the notion that political thought is a form of political action. Even if it does not appear to be an overtly political book, with a little reflection, readers will be able to see that this is a political book. The viewpoints of the authors suggest that humanity should do little or nothing to expect a bright future or that humanity must either take action to avert disaster or prepare for dark days ahead.
We expect that readers will find this volume interesting, challenging and even provocative and confrontational. It is an important time for us all to ponder the future seriously and take action. Even though readers may find some chapters more relevant to their interests than others, we will be pleased if this volume stimulates readers to think about the future, not only of tourism, but also of humanity.
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Part I
Global changes and their impact on future tourism
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| 2 | âPeak Oilâ confronts society and tourism |
| A futuristic view |
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| James Leigh |
Introduction: peak phenomena
The comprehensive concept of peak phenomena is not a new concept. In their seminal work The Limits to Growth,1 the authors predicted almost 40 years ago that the world could not continue to support universal and unlimited economic growth because resources, including world conventional oil supplies, were finite (Meadows et al. 1974). Donella Meadows and her coauthors (1993) talk of âovershootâ. This occurs when human consumption grows beyond the level which the Earth can supply. Paul Cherfuka (2007) defines this overshoot point as having occurred when human consumption exceeds the ability of the Earth and its environment to maintain the demanded supply. At this point, when the Earth cannot supply the level of humanityâs desired consumption, people may increasingly experience various barriers that limit or slow civilizationâs ability to continue in its established ways of development to care for the worldâs growing population. At the same time, a high level of denial, manipulation and intentional misleading of society from the establishment may reach dangerous levels.
Within this context, it may be that we are on the blistering edge of a peak phenomena storm with looming dwindling resource supplies across the board for many necessities (Baland and Platteau 1996; UNEP 2007; Grubb 2010). Oil is at the heart of humanityâs massive and voracious energy economy as well as the basis for a food supply (Cherfuka 2007). The abundant supply of cheap resources has fueled modern developed society with its unquenchable, escalating and huge appetite for goods and services and the progenitor, making the supply of all those resources possible through the various processes of extraction, production and transport of them, was cheap and abundant oil.
Within this context of a possible peak phenomena era, in this chapter I will investigate the Peak Oil model and consider its contemporary relevance to understand the implications of dwindling conventional oil supply on society and tourism.
âPeak Oilâ
Well before Meadows and her coauthors presented Limits to Growth on the world stage, the âPeak Oilâ model originated in the 1950s from the work of geologist Dr. Marion King Hubbert. Peak Oil suggests that the rate of world oil production typically goes through several phases that follow a bell-shaped curve. First, discovery, then the rate of exploitation, will rapidly rise to meet increasing demand and as production becomes more efficient, and so costs increasingly fall. Second, as oil is consumed at ever increasingly higher rates, the oil resource is set to become increasingly scarce: costs therefore will increase as production levels off to an all-time peak (Peak Oil level). Third and finally, increasing depletion or scarcity, from dwindling available oil in the ground, leads to a rapidly growing decline in the rate of oil extraction, faster than new supplies are discovered. Available oil is increasingly difficult to extract as the price to do so becomes prohibitive, and the limits of technology for continued extraction are reached â oil flow stops.
The term Peak Oil refers to the maximum production level point when typically half the available oil inventory in the ground has been extracted: from here the rate of extraction falls into increasingly higher rates of decline until the exhaustion point of the available oil. Figure 2.1 shows the production levels of the various phases of Peak Oil.
This final Peak Oil phase, at a global level, will also be a prompt for the development of conventional oil alternatives. One of these alternatives is nonconventional oils which are heavy or deep-ground oil, or oil from oil sands and shale. All of these nonconventional oils are difficult and costly to access or produce. There is also ...
