Critical Sustainability: Setting the Limits to Growth and Responsibility in Tourism

Jarkko Saarinen
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Jarkko Saarinen: Department of Geography, P.O. Box 3000, FI-90014 University of Oulu, Finland

Sustainability, 2013, vol. 6, issue 1, 1-17

Abstract: The idea of sustainable development has been discussed in tourism research for almost a quarter of a century. During that time, sustainability has become an important policy framework for tourism and regional developers guiding their planning and development thinking. Sustainability has also emerged academically as an important field of research with an emphasis on defining the limits to growth and responsibilities in tourism. However, while there are urgent needs to incorporate sustainability into tourism, there is also a growing amount of frustration among scholars on the conceptual nature of sustainability and how tourism as a private-driven economic activity relates to the ideals of sustainable development. This has created an increasing need to understand and potentially reframe the concept. The purpose of this paper is to overview the conceptual dimensions of sustainable tourism and discuss some of the main sources of frustration. Based on this, it is concluded that while a conceptual plurality seems to be unavoidable, there is a need to re-frame i.e ., rescale and decentralize tourism in policy frameworks and practices aiming towards sustainability.

Keywords: sustainable tourism; responsible tourism; limits to growth; governance (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2013
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (8)

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:6:y:2013:i:1:p:1-17:d:31516

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