Attempts have been made since the 1960s to analyse tourism from a systems approach, based on the realisation that tourism is a complex phenomenon that involves inter- dependencies, energy flows and interactions with other systems. Leiper’s basic whole tourism system (Leiper 2004) places tourism within a framework that minimally requires five interdependent core elements:
1 at least one tourist
2 at least one tourist-generating region 3 at least one transit route region 4 at least one tourist destination
5 a travel and tourism industry that facilitates movement within the system (see figure 2.1).
Geopolitical systems
Hydrological systems
Technology systems
Geophysical systems
Meteorological systems Legal
systems Sociocultural
systems
5 Tourism industry Economic
systems
4 Destination region
2
Tourist-generating region
3 Transit region 1
Departing tourists
1 Returning
tourists
Source: Adapted from Leiper (2004)
FIgURE 2.1 A basic whole tourism system
The movement of tourists between residence and a destination, by way of a transit region, and within the destination, comprises the primary flow of energy within this system. Other flows of energy include exchanges of goods (e.g. imported food to feed tourists) and information (e.g. tourism-related social media exchanges) that involve an array of interdependent external environments and systems in which the tourism system is embedded. The experience of the tourist, for example, is facil- itated (or impeded) by the economic and geopolitical systems which, respectively, provide or do not provide sufficient discretionary income and accessibility to make the experience possible. Natural and cultural external factors can have dramatic and unpredictable effects on tourism systems, as illustrated by the Indian Ocean tsunami of 26 December 2004. This event killed an estimated 200 000 local residents and tourists, and devastated destinations throughout the Indian Ocean basin. Tourism businesses in heavily affected destinations — such as the popular Thai seaside resort province of Phuket — were forced to adjust, and some were able to demon- strate greater resilience than others (see the case study at the end of this chapter).
Within Australia, various external (nontourism) factors during the early twenty-first century, including a high Australian dollar, the persistent global financial crisis, and increasing fuel costs, have combined to seriously harm the domestic and inbound tourism systems.
Tourism systems in turn influence these external environments, for example by stimulating a destination’s economy (see chapter 8) or helping to improve relations between countries (see chapters 9 and 11). Following the 2004 tsunami, a high priority was placed by affected destination governments and international relief agencies on restoring international tourist intakes, on the premise that this was the most effective way of bringing about a broader and more rapid economic and
psychological recovery (Henderson 2007). Despite such critical two-way influences, there is a tendency in some tourism system configurations to ignore or gloss over the external environment, as if tourism were somehow a self-contained or closed system.
The internal structure of the tourism system is also far more complex than implied by figure 2.1, thereby presenting more challenges to the effective management of tourism. Many tourist flows are actually hierarchical in nature, in that they involve multiple, nested and overlapping destinations and transit regions (see figure 2.2).
Take, for example, a Canadian from Vancouver who travels across the Pacific Ocean (‘regional transit route’) to visit Australia (‘tourist destination region’) and then spends time in Sydney, Uluru and the Whitsundays (i.e. three ‘tourist destination places’), travelling between them along various ‘internal transit routes’. Cumulatively, the global tourism system encompasses an immense number of individual experiences and bilateral or multilateral flows involving thousands of destinations at the international and domestic level. Regarding the stakeholders depicted in figure 1.1, the tourists and the tourism businesses (or tourism industry) are present throughout Leiper’s tourism system (figure 2.1), as are nongovernmental organisations (NGOs) and educational institutions. However, tourism businesses are mostly concentrated in destination regions, with transit and origin regions respectively less well represented, as indicated by the triangle in figure 2.1. Host governments and communities are by definition located in the destination region, while origin governments are situated clearly in the tourist-generating region.
TGR Tourist generating region TDR Tourist destination region TDP Tourist destination place RTR Regional transit route ITR Internal transit route
TDP4 ITR3
TDR2 RTR3
RTR1 RTR4
ITR4 TDP6 RTR2 TDP5
TDP1
TDP2 ITR1
TDR1 ITR2
TDP3 TGR
ITR5 TDR3
ITR6 TDP9 TDP7
TDP8
Source: Adapted from Leiper (2004)
FIgURE 2.2 Tourism system with multiple transit and destination components
Finally, the overall tourism system is a hyperdynamic structure that is in a con- stant state of flux. This is apparent not only in the constant travel of millions of tourists, but also in the continuous opening and closing of accommodation facilities
and transportation routes across the globe. This instability represents yet another challenge faced by tourism managers, who must realise that even the most up-to-date profile of the sector soon becomes obsolete. The only certainty in tourism systems is constant change.
T H E T O U R I S T
As suggested in chapter 1, the definition of tourism is dependent on the definition of the tourist. It is therefore critical to address this issue in a satisfactory way before any further discussion of management-related issues can take place. Every tourist must simultaneously meet certain spatial, temporal and purposive criteria, as dis- cussed below.