LINKING TOURISM, THE ENVIRONMENT, AND
CONCEPTS OF SUSTAINABILITY: SETTING THE STAGE
Stephen F. McCool
In: McCool, Stephen F.; Watson, Alan
E., comps. 1995. Linking tourism, the environment, and
sustainability - topical volume of compiled papers from
a special session of the annual meeting of the
National
Recreation and Park Association; 1994 October 12-14;
Minneapolis, MN. Gen. Tech. Rep. INT-GTR-323.
Ogden, UT: U.S. Department of Agriculture, Forest
Service, Intermountain Research Station.
ABSTRACT
The tourism and recreation industry is at a crossroads
in
its development. Now one of the world's largest
industries, it is increasingly confronted with
arguments
about its sustainability and compatibility with
environmental protection and community
development. Consideration of tourism, the
environment, and concepts of sustainability should
consider four key challenges:
(1) a better
understanding
of how tourists value and use natural environments;
(2)
enhancement of the communities dependent on
tourism as an industry;
(3) identification of the
social
and environmental impact of tourism; and (4)
implementation of systems to manage these impacts.
THE CHALLENGE
The tourism and recreation industry is confronted with
serious and difficult choices about its future. The
decisions made now will for decades affect the
lifestyles
and economic opportunity of residents in tourism
destination areas. Many of these decisions are
irreversible because once communities lose the
character
that makes them distinctive and attractive to
nonresidents, they have lost their ability to vie for
tourist-based income in an increasingly global and
competitive marketplace.
One option is to continue the road of the past,
focusing
on delivering the service and retail sectors that have
provided the bulk of economic benefit to local
communities lodging, transportation, food and retail
sales without considering the emerging concerns about
the industry. This option is based on assumptions
about
stability in values and preferences of travelers, and
it
delays answers to vital questions about the tourism
product, appropriate scale and type of development,
sustainability, and hosts' quality of life. These
assumptions are questionable in an era
of rapid social change where the future is no longer a
straight-line projection of the past.
Worldwide, tourism is undergoing fundamental
change, from the experiences and settings travelers
demand to the regulations governments impose to
protect the environment. Signs of these shifts are
everywhere, from tourism industry statements on the
value of the environment (Cook and others 1992) to the
demand for "ecotourism." This transformation of
demand and values leaves the industry no alternative
other than to pursue a different, yet difficult,
course one
that builds upon the key questions of purpose,
objectives, values, and strategies.
Decisions about tourism development are difficult. The
fundamental questions they imply such as the visions
we have for our communities, how changes brought
about by development will impact these visions, and
how the community can absorb such changes have
largely been ignored in the past. These decisions are
controversial because they will prevent or diminish
some traditional uses of natural resources and affect
the
people who have or who might have benefited from
those uses. Powerful economic forces entrenched in the
current direction are reluctant to open dialogue. The
decisions are essentially judgments reflecting
divergent
value systems and how those value systems will be
integrated.
Our clients, primarily the public, are communicating
through changes in tastes and preferences and,
consequently, they are demanding that the industry
pursue sustainability and care of the environment. We
need to systematically explore the linkage that
exists,
whether recognized or not, between tourism, the
environment, and sustainability. To begin that
exploration, I will briefly review the significance of
sustainability and the environment and the questions
that implies for tourism researchers.
CONCEPTS OF SUSTAINABILITY
As we humans become more aware of our impact on the
Earth and its life support systems, we increasingly
look
for examples of economic and community development
other than unconstrained growth. Some have argued
that gross national product or per capita income are
incomplete measures of well-being. These measures
may not accurately portray the distribution of
economic
benefits among people, they do not faithfully capture
important quality of life factors, and they do not
measure the temporal or social distribution of
existing
and anticipated costs and benefits of resource
development programs.
Many argue for the development of "sustainable"
economies as the new guidepost to deal with issues of
growth, economic and community development, and
environmental protection. Sustainable growth and
natural resource development will help communities
use natural resources more prudently and sensitively
than in the past and ensure their continued survival.
Sustainability contains the appeal of an attractive
model
for action but is difficult to implement practically
or
operationally. Sustainability is often associated with
such terms as "sustainable development," "sustainable
management," "sustainable agriculture," "sustainable
forestry," and "sustainable tourism." In the tourism
and
recreation context, it is frequently associated with
discussions of "ecotourism" and "nature-based tourism"
(Boo 1990; Whelan 1991).
Sustainability has become an attractive ideal for both
scientists and activists, but operational details,
objectives, or actions provided by advocates are
scarce.
Dixon and Fallon (1989) conclude that the
sustainability
debate involves "how to pursue the goal and how to
measure progress toward it." Sustainability, as Dixon
and Fallon note, was originally a biophysical concept
that is now being applied in a social and policy
context,
contributing to confusion about what is to be
sustained
and for whom. For example, by sustainability do we
mean sustaining physical outputs, such as board feet
of
timber or room occupancy, or do we mean the ecological
patterns and processes that maintain naturally
occurring
ecosystems? Or by sustainability are we concerned with
the ongoing social, political, and cultural processes
that
give communities character and individuals security?
Gale and Cordray (1991) defined eight approaches to
the
concept of forest sustainability, then in 1994
expanded
this to nine (table 1). Gale and Cordray portray the
discussion about sustainability as answers to four
defining questions: What is to be sustained? Why
sustain it? How is sustainability measured? And what
are the politics? One of their approaches emphasizes
the
economic sustainability of natural resource-dependent
social systems. This is a narrow approach, however,
and
does not address other relationships communities have
with natural resources that make them dependent on
these resources, such as access to forests for
recreational,
educational, and spiritual purposes. A related
approach,
also defined by Gale and Cordray, is the
sustainability of
human benefits that flow from natural resources.
Again,
this approach is narrowly focused on specific product
benefits.
Often, discussions of sustainability are presented
within
the context of stability, particularly about
communities
(defined in a territorial versus an interest sense).
We
generally want our communities to be stable and
predictable and to provide a sense of belonging.
Sustainability goes beyond economic considerations and
biophysical issues; it must deal with important
concepts
of social order, such as hierarchy, territory, and
norms
(Burch and DeLuca 1984). We must understand how
tourism development may impact the distribution of
wealth or power, may affect land uses and zoning laws,
and may interject new behaviors or institutions. We
must discuss the acceptability of tourism-based
interventions in the normative social order: What do
these changes mean for community stability? And we
must consider factors affecting a community's capacity
to
deal with such interventions. In other words, how do
the type and intensity of tourism-induced disturbances
affect our social world?
Sustainability definitions also frequently speak to
intra-
and intergenerational equity and option maintenance.
The tourism industry receives substantive criticism
about the distribution of jobs and income (Barrett
1987;
Smith 1989). While job quality encompasses more than
wages and monetary benefits, inequities in income are
a
major concern that residents hold about tourism
development (Martin and McCool 1992). Nearly 58
percent of the adult Montanans participating in the
Martin and McCool (1992) study agreed that tourism
industry jobs are low paying, and over 55 percent
disagreed that their household standard of living was
higher because of tourist expenditures. What is an
equitable distribution of options and income?
Sustainable tourism allows visitors to enjoy an
attraction, community or region with a volume and
impact in such a way that the local culture and
environment are unimpaired (Hill 1992). Strictly
speaking, tourism and recreation use always lead to
some level of impairment in natural systems. The
question is primarily how much change is acceptable.
Hunt (1993) argued that the tourism industry should
care both for visitors and for the places they visit:
"the
communities in which we live." Clearly, researchers
view sustainability as more than physical commodities
from natural ecosystems.
Despite the extensive discussion about sustainability
since the 1987 report from the World Commission on
Environment and Development, which popularized the
issue, few answers have been found. Entering
sustainability-based management is essentially a value
judgment, a decision that says that current management
is inadequate or inappropriate. Sustainability is a
concept decision makers can use to assess the consequences of
actions on human communities. A human focus is
deliberately taken here because it is the human
population that places values on social structure,
cultural values and traditions, economic opportunity,
and ecosystems and their species. Maintenance of
ecosystems and the protection of individual species
are
human-based values and, therefore, can be described
from only a human viewpoint.
Human communities are impacted in a variety of ways
by tourism, including social structure and function,
cohesiveness, economic and educational opportunity,
community stability, provision of and payment for
services (police protection, fire), physically
(architecture,
location and design of highways), competition in
access
to recreation opportunities and other services, and
interaction with the natural environment and the
non-commodity values it produces. The general concept
is that sustainability is not only a goal for specific
industries, but it is also an objective for the human
communities that benefit and that are impacted from
various economic development scenarios. Industry
sustainability goals are most likely physical output
or net
revenue goals, such as board feet of timber,
room-nights
occupancy, and skier visits. These sustainability
goals,
however, may not achieve broader community
sustainability goals, goals that may be difficult to
quantify and measure.
Several other questions must be dealt with. At what
spatial or social organizational scale do we want to
measure sustainability globally, regionally, locally?
We
also are concerned about the temporal scale of
sustainability tomorrow, next week, next year, and the
next generation. We need to examine not only industry-specific sustainability, generally addressed by
physical
commodities, but also the impacts of distinctive
economic development actions on the larger
community.
Returning to Gale and Cordray's four defining
questions, can we determine what should be sustained,
for what reason, and how? Would our clients have
similar answers to these defining questions about
sustainability? What processes would we use to address
these questions and resolve differences? These
questions
would certainly confront the tourism researcher. While
discussions of sustainability may not result in
on-the-ground applications, the discussions do force debate
about scale (both temporal and spatial), fundamental
purposes, and appropriate means. The result is that
sustainability discussions require biologists and
sociologists.
Tourism and the Environment
Cook and others (1992) state that "environment is the
travel industry's base product." While many tourism
promotion efforts banner the climate, sun, warmth, and
sand of particular destinations, tourism's dependency
on
environments, in particular, nature-dominated
environments, does not appear to be well understood
within the tourism and recreation industry. That
dependence is rarely discussed in the literature. Cook
and others, for example, focus more on how the tourism
industry is meeting legal obligations for
environmental
protection (such as emissions) than the dependency of
tourism on high-quality natural environments.
The importance of the environment in attracting
vacation travel is significant, and as Williams (1992)
states, "natural beauty and cultural heritage
represent a
competitive advantage" for many areas. In a recent
poll
(Angus Reid Group 1993), 65 percent of California
travelers stated that "a place that takes care
of its
environment" is very important in choosing a
destination outside of the state. "A chance to see
wildlife
and undisturbed nature" was rated as very important by
44 percent of the respondents. While there is a
question
about the congruence of attitudes and behavior, such
relatively high ratings of environmental attributes
signal the increasingly important role of ecosystem
amenities in tourism development. In their study of
visitors to Montana during the fall, Menning and
McCool (1993) report that potential visitors who hold
both an environmental motivation and an image of a
destination as "natural" were more likely to visit the
area than were other respondents
The linkage between environment as an attraction and
economic impact can be substantial. Yuan and Moisey
(1992) estimated that about half of the economic
impact
from Montana's tourism industry can be attributed to
recreation activities occurring in wild land settings.
Obviously, impacting these settings negatively could
significantly affect the jobs and employment of
thousands of people.
Our examination of linkages should consider four key
questions.
First, we need to better understand how
tourists value and use natural environments. We know
that outdoor recreation activities (pursuits that are
heavily dependent on natural environments) are
important components of many states' tourism
industries. For example, in Idaho, about 42 percent of
the
nonresident visitors participate in these activities.
Among vacationers in Montana, scenery is the most
important reason for visiting the state and is the
most
frequent source of visitor satisfaction. Research not
only
can help us better understand the motivations of
visitors attracted to natural environments (Eagles
1992)
but can also identify attributes important to
visitors,
how to maintain those attributes, and how visitors
interact with them. Science can also play an important
role in identifying the benefits visitors derive from
interactions with the environment and how those
perceived benefits can be measured. Through research
we may find specific linkages between benefits sought,
recreation behavior, and money expenditures.
Second, research can help tourism development
agencies use this information to enhance the
livability
of communities that are dependent on this industry.
All
too often, we have viewed tourism agencies as
concerned with promotion, but not concerned with the
fundamental rationale for their marketing efforts. I
submit that the reasons we are interested in tourism
are
to provide communities with the necessary resources to
enhance their livability, to protect their natural and
cultural heritage, and to provide economic opportunity
for their citizens. Tourism agencies narrowly view
their
mission as one of promotion and have neither
considered the effects of promotion nor placed their
efforts within a larger context of community
development. Understanding alternative theories of
economic development in this case sustainability may
help put promotion within a context that helps
communities identify their goals and the role of
tourism
in achieving them.
Third, researchers play an important role in
identifying
the social and environmental impact of tourism.
Rigorous discussions of impacts on the environment as
well as useful conceptual models of impact processes
are
sadly lacking in the tourism literature. While a body
of
literature has been developed to deal with impacts at
the
micro scale (see Cole 1987 for an example), few
tourism
researchers have concerned themselves with identifying
impacts on the natural environment. Because the
environment is the product, we need to understand
how people may negatively affect the very values they
seek.
Fourth, we need systems to manage both the
environmental and social impacts to tourism. This
concern has been popularized in the phrase "tourism
destroys tourism," although a paraphrase could be
applied to many resource extractive industries and,
therefore, the concern is not a differentiating
characteristic of this industry. In marketing
terminology,
we need more knowledge of product quality
management. Any amount of tourism use results in
some impact. So the questions that most tourism
communities and environmental managers are
confronted with deal with acceptability and
manageability of tourism impacts. While some (for
example Getz 1983) advocate a carrying-capacity
approach, such approaches may be too simplistic for
the
complexity and range of issues presented by tourism
development. Williams and Gill (1991) conclude:
Despite the rhetoric concerning tourism use 'limits,'
'ceilings,' 'thresholds,' difficulties with
traditional
numerical carrying capacity indicators exist. As for
recreation, little evidence exists to suggest that by
simply
lowering or raising a specific carrying capacity
standard,
predictable changes in an area's ability to handle
tourist
use will occur. Instead, the key appears to lie in how
change associated with tourism is managed.
An adequate framework would
(1) recognize that the
interface between tourism and the environment
involves primarily social questions as opposed to
biotechnical ones,
(2) avoid the excessively reductionistic
and limited perspective provided by a
carrying-capacity-based approach, and
(3) include the wide range of
stakeholders affected by tourism development choices
in
the planning and management processes (McCool and
Stankey 1993). One such framework was proposed by
Williams and Gill (1991) in their monograph on growth
management. The limits of acceptable change process
(McCool 1994; Stankey and others 1985) is another.
CONCLUSIONS
Sustainability and the linkages to both social and
natural
environments that the concept implies provide new
challenges for tourism researchers. Our research must
now be more holistic, more encompassing, and more
sensitive to the needs for relevant policy.
The science of tourism can play an important role in
discovering implications for the choices facing the
industry. If not pointing the way, it can inform the
industry of the consequences of alternative paths to
economic development, resource protection, and
enhancement of our quality of life. It can illuminate
both the costs and benefits of alternative economic
development scenarios and provide challenges to the
conventional wisdom of tourism development.
We must begin to think in terms of appropriate
frameworks of tourist-environment-community
interactions, how these can be modeled, how hypotheses
can be tested, and how results can be implemented. We
need to define the role of the researcher in tourism
and
community development issues. How the industry and
the research community respond to value changes will
have much to say about the industry's continued
viability .
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Stephen F. McCool is Professor of Wildland Recreation
Management, University of Montana, Missoula, MT
59801. At the time of the symposium, he was on special
assignment as a Social Scientist to the Pacific
Northwest
Research Station, Forest Service, U.S. Department of
Agriculture.
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