From its late nineteenth century origins, the concept of protected areas has increased in scope and complexity. It now has to come to terms with the twenty first century world of neo-liberal politics, performance metrics and the growing and complex demands of tourism. This international collection of papers explores how this might be done, detailing the issues involved, and the value and values that protected areas have for economies, peoples and environments. Special attention is given to World Heritage Sites, tourism planning and their communities, to the growth of private protected areas, and to the health values of protected areas. Other subjects include private sector business involvement in protected areas, concessions policy experiments, and how the work of the world’s largest protected area agency, the US National Park Service, is adapting to changing political and market demands, and to the challenges of sustainable development. It concludes with a searching interview with a member of UNESCO’s World Heritage Committee. The chapters were originally published in a special issue in the Journal of Sustainable Tourism.

From its late nineteenth century origins, the concept of protected areas has increased in scope and complexity. It now has to come to terms with the twenty first century world of neo-liberal politics, performance metrics and the growing and complex demands of tourism. This international collection of papers explores how this might be done, detailing the issues involved, and the value and values that protected areas have for economies, peoples and environments. Special attention is given to World Heritage Sites, tourism planning and their communities, to the growth of private protected areas, and to the health values of protected areas. Other subjects include private sector business involvement in protected areas, concessions policy experiments, and how the work of the world’s largest protected area agency, the US National Park Service, is adapting to changing political and market demands, and to the challenges of sustainable development. It concludes with a searching interview with a member of UNESCO’s World Heritage Committee. The chapters were originally published in a special issue in the Journal of Sustainable Tourism.

Recently, the Nordic countries have experienced a rapid growth in numbers of visitors. At some popular nature attractions this has resulted in crowding, environmental damage, costly rescue operations and overload on public infrastructure. Implementation of economic policy instruments have hence been suggested to secure a more sustainable development. While the applicability of e.g. entrance fees is restricted by the public rights of access, economic instruments tend to represent short-sighted solutions. Sustainable development requires holistic policies, which take environmental, social and economic aspects into consideration in a long-term perspective. To achieve a more sustainable development of tourism, it is suggested that a limited use of economic instrument should take place in combination with adaptive management strategies and available legal and administrative instruments.

The role of governance has only recently begun to be researched and discussed in order to better understand tourism policy making and planning, and tourism development. Governance encompasses the many ways in which societies and industries are governed, given permission or assistance, or steered by government and numerous other actors, including the private sector, NGOs and communities. This book explains and evaluates critical perspectives on the governance of tourism, examining these in the context of tourism and sustainable development. Governance processes fundamentally affect whether – and how – progress is made toward securing the economic, socio-cultural and environmental goals of sustainable development. The critical perspectives on tourism governance, examined here, challenge and re-conceptualise established ideas in tourism policy and planning, as well as engage with theoretical frameworks from other social science fields. The contributors assess theoretical frameworks that help explain the governance of tourism and sustainability. They also explore tourism governance at national, regional and local scales, and the relations between them. They assess issues of power and politics in policy making and planning, and they consider changing governance relationships over time and the associated potential for social learning. The collection brings insights from leading researchers, and examines important new theoretical frameworks for tourism research. This book was originally published as a special issue of Journal of Sustainable Tourism.

Over the past decade, there have been an increasing number of publications that have analysed and critiqued the potential of tourism to be a mechanism for poverty reduction in less economically developed countries (LEDCs). This book showcases work by established and emerging researchers that provides new thinking and tests previously made assumptions, providing an essential guide for students, practitioners and academics. This book advances our understanding of the changes and ways forward in the field of sustainable tourism development. Five main themes are illustrated throughout the book: (1) measuring impacts of tourism on poverty; (2) the need to evaluate whether interventions that aim to reduce poverty are effective; (3) how unbalanced power relations and weak governance can undermine efforts; (4) the importance of the private sector’s use of pro-poor business practices; and (5) the value of using multidisciplinary and multi-method research approaches. Furthermore, the book shows that academic research findings can be used practically in destinations, and how practitioners can benefit from sharing their experiences with academic scholars. This book was based on a special issue and various articles from the Journal of Sustainable Tourism.

Roy and Jan have assembled a timely snapshot of our current understanding of ecotourism, both as a concept worthy of scientific inquiry and as an increasingly significant segment of global commerce and industry. A terrific piece of work! Sam Ham, University of Idaho, US In the 30 or so year since it became established in the tourism literature and in tourism practice, ecotourism has attracted as many proponents as opponents. This Handbook now brings together some of the leading scholars worldwide in this field, to explore the current position of this form of tourism. In doing so, it offers serious critiques, it explores meanings and paradoxes, it offers best practices and it looks to the future. It is the Handbook for one of tourisms fastest growing and controversial sectors. David Airey, University of Surrey, UK This is a most welcome and needed book. With a very strong editorial team and contributing authors, the Handbook covers all the key issues of ecotourism. It cuts through the confusion surrounding the much-misunderstood concept of ecotourism, clearly dealing with definitions, concepts and research issues. The Handbook is particularly welcome for its focus on the visitor experience, a strength of the editors, and for clearly linking the theory of ecotourism with practice in the field. Christopher Cooper, Oxford Brookes University, UK This Handbook brings together contributions from over forty international experts in the field of ecotourism. It provides a critical review and discussion of current issues and concepts it challenges readers to consider the boundaries of what ecotourism is, and could be. The Handbook provides practical information regarding the business of ecotourism; insights into ecotourist behaviour and visitor experiences; and reflections on the practice of ecotourism in a range of different contexts. The Handbook is designed to be a valuable reference book for tourism scholars and researchers.

For many people, holidays are an increasingly central feature of contemporary western society. The tourism industry has expanded rapidly since 1950, but this book poses the significant question of consequent environmental impacts: are environments being benefited or damaged, by the tourist who visit them? A well-balanced introductory text, this topical book on the relationships between tourism, society and the environment, examines 'tourism' and 'environment' in detail, and gives a historical overview of the growth of the tourism industry. It discusses how the tourism industry markets physical and cultural environments to be consumed by the tourist, and the consequences of the tourism they then attract. It explores: * how the economics of tourism can be adopted in a positive way to aid conservation * whether the concept of sustainability can be applied to tourism * provides a critique of the 'new' forms of tourism, that have developed in recent years. An extensive range of international case studies from both the developed and developing world are used to illustrate the theoretical ideas presented, and to aid the student, it includes end of chapter summaries, further reading guides and boxed vignettes focusing on contemporary environmental issues and debates.