‘From the Flames to the Light’: 100 years of the commodification of the dark tourist site around the Verdun battlefield

Sandrine Virgili (), Hélène Delacour (), Frederic Bornarel () and Sébastien Liarte ()
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Sandrine Virgili: CEREFIGE - Centre Européen de Recherche en Economie Financière et Gestion des Entreprises - UL - Université de Lorraine
Hélène Delacour: CEREFIGE - Centre Européen de Recherche en Economie Financière et Gestion des Entreprises - UL - Université de Lorraine
Frederic Bornarel: CEREFIGE - Centre Européen de Recherche en Economie Financière et Gestion des Entreprises - UL - Université de Lorraine
Sébastien Liarte: BETA - Bureau d'Économie Théorique et Appliquée - INRA - Institut National de la Recherche Agronomique - UNISTRA - Université de Strasbourg - UL - Université de Lorraine - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique

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Abstract: In order to contribute to research on dark tourism, this article details the process of commodification of a dark site by adopting a supply approach. We empirically apply the dark tourism spectrum (Stone, 2006) to the battlefield of Verdun in France from 1916 to 2016. In doing so, we shed light on the relationship between the temporal distance from the tragic event and potential economic exploitation. Our findings reveal that commodification is possible from the very creation of the site and becomes more complex as temporal distance increases, notably due to the multiplicity of stakeholders and their incompatible interests. Our results contribute to the improvement of the dark spectrum; we add the stakeholders' structure as a new and dynamic attribute.

Keywords: Dark tourism; Supply; Commodification; Verdun; Stakeholders (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2018-01
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Published in Annals of Tourism Research, 2018, 68, pp.61-72. ⟨10.1016/j.annals.2017.11.005⟩

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:hal:journl:hal-02511413

DOI: 10.1016/j.annals.2017.11.005

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