Human Rights Issues in Tourism

Atsuko Hashimoto, Elif Harkonen, Edward Nkyi

• Éditeur: Routledge
• Année: 2020
• ISBN:
  9781351033848
• Édition: 1
• Sujet: Commerce
• Sous-sujet: Industrie de l'hôtellerie, du voyage et du tourisme

This book uniquely focuses on human rights issues associated with tourism development and tourism businesses. Tourism is a manifestation of globalization and it intersects with human rights on so many levels. These implications are increasingly relevant in light of the COVID-19 pandemic and subsequent global economic hardship.

Split into two main sections, the first establishes a background to human rights issues with reference to tourism, and the second provides a multi-disciplinary analysis of a range of selected human rights issues in tourism; these include displacement, security, privacy, discrimination, freedom of movement, the rights of Indigenous people, sex tourism and labour conditions. All chapters include case studies to showcase specific issues such as legal rulings or tourism policies/regulations. This book is written by a highly regarded team of authors specializing in tourism studies and human rights law.

This significant volume on the interaction between tourism development and the safeguarding of human rights will be of interest to a variety of disciplines, in the fields of tourism, political science and tourism/human rights.

Section 1

Background of human rights in tourism

1

Introduction to human rights and civil rights in tourism and hospitality

Atsuko Hashimoto, Elif Härkönen, and Edward Nkyi

1.1 Introduction: human rights and tourism

Human rights issues have long been the subject of debate, and numerous attempts have been made to protect and record human rights from ancient times. The United Nations (UN) Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) was adopted in 1948 and since that time, a diversity of other human rights covenants, treaties, and publications have been added, establishing the framework for improving human rights. In addition to forming the basis of law in many countries, human rights have been advocated for by a variety of organisations including governments, businesses, civil society, and non-governmental organisations (NGOs). Despite progress, there continue to be many individuals and groups of people around the world who do not enjoy the benefits of human rights protections. In looking towards twenty-first century challenges in human rights, Brysk (2019) notes that while the “scope conditions” for the effectiveness of human rights have improved, there has not been a commensurate enhancement of human rights. Interstate war has been replaced by protracted internecine conflicts with horrendous war crimes and sexual violence, while the rise of democracy has been “blunted by overlapping combinations of stalled transitions, regressions, illiberal democracies, populism, and rising authoritarianism that undermine civil liberties and treatment of minorities” (Brysk, 2019, p. 7). Collective human rights are also under threat in the context of climate change, and governments have been pressured to implement stronger regulation to protect the environment. While there is a duty for the state to protect human rights, there is also a growing concern over exploitation in the work environment under globalisation (Venkatesan, 2019). Globalisation has facilitated the rapid growth of tourism, and not surprisingly, there have been violations of human rights caused by a variety of organisations and individuals, including states, the tourism industry, and tourists. Vulnerable individuals and communities face issues of displacement, loss of livelihoods, loss of access to natural resources, exploitation, and poor pay as a result of tourism development (Tourism Concern, 2019). Still others face discrimination and barriers to travel. Ruggie (2009) argues that all rights need to be considered within the context of protection, empowerment, accountability, and remedy. In 2011, the UN Office of the High Commissioner of Human Rights (OHCHR) released the “Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights: Implementing the United Nations ‘Protect, Respect and Remedy’ Framework”. The document affirms that states and businesses have distinct yet complementary responsibilities and focuses on three areas: (1) the state duty to protect against human rights abuses by all actors, (2) corporate responsibility to respect human rights, and (3) access to a remedy when a right is violated. With an evolving framework on human rights, and differing levels of commitment to human rights in destinations around the world, the purpose of this book is to explore a range of human rights issues in tourism.

With tourism and hospitality gaining in popularity since the mid-1950s, there has been increased competition amongst a growing number of destinations. Unfortunately, the growth in tourism has also led to an increasing number of human rights abuses and violations. In 2019 international tourist arrivals (overnight visitors) reached 1.5 billion, with all regions enjoying an increase in arrivals (UNWTO, 2020a). Tourism continues to be viewed as an economic engine for development. While international arrival numbers have in recent years continued to grow, others are prevented from travelling. Overtourism has become a significant challenge in many destinations, resulting in the displacement of local residents, forcing governments to regulate the tourism industry, including those employed in the sharing economy. Greater numbers of tourists have been reaching into ever more remote locations, raising the possibilities of human rights violations and requiring an evaluation of the role of tourism in the development process. The COVID-19 pandemic (the disease was declared a pandemic in March 2020 by the World Health Organization (WHO)) will change tourism and travel patterns for many years to come. It is still too early to predict the lasting impact of the pandemic on tourism development, but the United Nations World Tourism Organization (UNWTO) (2020b) estimated in May 2020 that tourism arrivals could decline by 60–80 percent in 2020. This would lead to a loss of US$910 billion to US$1.2 trillion in export revenues, as well as put 100 to 120 million direct tourism jobs at risk. Poor and marginalised people have suffered disproportionately from the worldwide lockdowns of non-essential businesses and services. According to the World Bank, low- and middle-income countries will suffer the greatest consequences in terms of extreme poverty, with estimates suggesting that COVID-19 will push an additional 71 million people into extreme poverty (Mahler, et al., 2020). Extreme poverty is both a cause and consequence of human rights violations (OHCHR, 2012). It is therefore plausible that human rights violations will become more common in the tourism sector as a result of the pandemic, making the topic of this book even more important when the tourism sector starts to recover in 2021 and beyond.

Since the 1990s, development studies have been focusing on human development and global development. At the heart of the development agenda has been the UN Millennium Development Goals, which were replaced by the 2030 UN Sustainable Development Goals. The year 2016 was the 30th Anniversary of the Declaration on the Right to Development (OHCHR, 2016), while 2017 was declared the International Year of Sustainable Tourism for Development by the UNWTO. In support of this and in association with the UN Sustainable Development Goals, the Berlin Declaration on “Transforming Tourism” was signed in March 2017 by a diverse group of participants from civil society. One of the fundamental concepts of the Declaration is that “[h]‌uman rights and self-determination of communities must be at the core of every tourism development” (Transforming Tourism, 2017).

Various organisations including international NGOs, such as Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch, raise awareness and generate campaigns for human rights. Amnesty International is present in over 150 countries and characterises itself as a global movement of more than 7 million people who campaign to end human rights violations. The organisation also raises climate change as a human rights issue (Amnesty International, 2019). Human Rights Watch investigates and reports on human rights abuses and publishes an annual review of human rights practices in specific countries around the world. As a reflection of the scope of issues related to human rights, Human Rights Watch also engages in specific work on “children’s rights; women’s rights; arms and military issues; business and human rights; health and human rights; disability rights; the environment and human rights; international justice; terrorism and counterterrorism; refugees and displaced people; and lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgendered people” (Human Rights Watch, 2019). In addition to the aforementioned NGOs, non-profit organisations such as Tourism Concern, ECPAT, and World Vision have been advocating a human rights approach to tourism. The study of human rights issues in the context of tourism began to appear in academic literature in the form of case study-based journal articles, while some tourism textbooks have started to incorporate sections on human rights: yet, there is no book in Tourism and Hospitality that focuses exclusively on human rights issues associated with tourism development and tourism businesses.

The UNWTO and other tourism-related organisations are aware that there has been a clear shift in the tourism market. While high-income countries, predominantly developed nations, continue to participate in international tourism activities at a slightly slower rate, middle-income countries such as China and India had been increasingly sending larger numbers of international tourists abroad. Prior to COVID-19, in 2019, China had the highest international tourism expenditure in the world. Several other Asian countries/territories, Hong Kong (China), Korea, Singapore, India, and Japan, were included in the top 15 countries (UNWTO, 2020b). Several factors have contributed to the increase in outbound travel in Asian countries. Many South-East Asian countries liberalised their aviation industries in the late 1990s and 2000s, allowing low-cost carriers to operate in their countries, benefiting tourism in the region. China, however, has been conservative in its liberalisation of the aviation industry and low-cost carriers have a low penetration rate in the country (Lai et al., 2019). Chinese outbound travel has instead mainly benefited from the easing of visa-issuing procedures for Chinese citizens, high economic growth, increased disposable income at home, and more liberalised policies towards tourism in the first decade of 2000s (Xie and Tveterås, 2020). As noted in the Travel and Tourism Competitive Index for 2019, the Asia-Pacific region has continued to grow in importance, being the second largest destination for international travellers, receiving the second largest volume of international tourism receipts, and being the biggest source of global outbound spending, with the majority spent on intraregional travel (based on 2017 data) (World Economic Forum, 2019). The dynamics of international tourism will continue to change in the near future as a result of COVID-19, yet it is clear that there has, in recent decades, been a shift from Western dominance in tourism to more Asia-Pacific dominance. Many new tourist destinations will continue to open up as travel restrictions are reduced, and tourists will face challenges in destinations in which human rights are viewed differently and where laws are different. For example, an increasing number of openly Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer/Questioning (LGBTQ+) persons are travelling. However, there are many destinations where laws do not protect the human rights of LGBTQ+ persons. In 2019, being homosexual was a punishable offense in 70 countries (Mendos, 2019). Members of the LGBTQ+ community have faced protests when travelling, and cruise ships focusing on this market have been turned away from ports, highlighting the fact that sender and destination countries of tourists sometimes view human rights differently.

In order for human rights in the UDHR to be effective, these rights must be enshrined and protected at the national level. There are examples throughout this book that demonstrate how human rights can be in conflict with each other and as a result, human rights of individuals or groups of people can be restricted. What is worse, some laws or policies of nation-states, regions, or provinces have been recently revised to restrict the freedom of religion or discriminate against certain groups of people based on sexual orientation. For example, during the decade from 2007 to 2017, the number of countries imposing “high” to “very high” levels of restrictions on religion increased from 40 to 52 governments (Lipka and Majumdar, 2019). Also, anti-homosexual laws existed in 33 African countries in 2019 (Mendos, 2019) and 30 states in the USA introduced 129 anti-LGBTQ+ laws in 2017 (Moreau, 2018). Another example addressed in this book is when existing laws and regulations hinder the protection of human rights. One such case is the right to a healthy environment (see Chapter 11). For example, many transportation laws were made when non-petroleum-based micro-mobility vehicles (e.g. e-automobiles, e-scooters, e-skateboards, Segways, self-balancing unicycles, and e-motorised bicycles) did not exist. Legislation needs to be updated to adapt to new forms of personal vehicles, which can help cut CO₂ emissions, as long as the safety of pedestrians and other vehicles is not compromised. The use of e-vehicles is becoming increasingly more popular among tourists, and strong demands for the right to clean air from locals and tourists are forcing governments to take action. The updati...