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The potential role of tourism in enhancing a balanced territorial development is officially acknowledged by the EU. However, little is known regarding the extent to which tourism in Romania contributes or could contribute to reducing regional inequalities. The present study approaches the matter of the growth of tourism demand and supply in relation to the type of territory (lagging, intermediary, leading), at both regional and local levels. The results indicate a significant geographical concentration of tourism activity, despite a noticeable diffusion of tourism across the country in the last decades. This derives from the fact that the leading territories, which already took the lion's share of the tourism supply and demand also retain the highest part of the increases in tourism demand. As a consequence, tourism sector stands out more as a factor that can increase territorial disparities than contribute to their reduction. However, a considerable potential for tourism growth in terms of tourism supply characterizes the lagging regions. Accordingly, differentiated tourism public policies related to the type of territory could be considered.

The modern concept of smart city rose from a relatively ambiguous term dealing with the future of urban areas to one of the most popular contemporary fields of research. Tackling a considerable range of topics from digitalization, citizen involvement, sustainability or governance, it managed to rapidly attract both academics and policy-makers. This study reviews the research papers published on smart city concept with application to European Union, and especially to the new member states from Central and Eastern Europe. The results indicate many common features of smart cities in EU, but also some peculiarities of CEE in this regard, many deriving from their socialist inheritance. Meanwhile, it can be noticed the rather incipient status of smart cities approaches, the insufficient resources allocated by local authorities, which rely extensively on EU funding, the lack of awareness from citizens and the lack of a comprehensive and structured strategic approach. In order to tackle the abovementioned issues, our paper suggests a series of measures and directions for policy-makers, local administrations and business environment.

EU post-socialist countries are nowadays the epicenter of urban shrinkage, despite economic growth trajectories reported during the last decades. However, systematic assessments of urban shrinkage patterns for this part of the continent are surprisingly insufficiently addressed in the literature, and the relationship between urban demographic decline/growth and economic decline/growth is still to be understood. This paper first delivers a state-of-the-art of the peculiarities of urban shrinkage in East-Central EU countries. Secondly, it employs an analysis grid to assess severity, prevalence, persistence, speed and regional incidence of urban decline in Romania—one of the most affected post-socialist countries within the European Union. Thirdly, it explores the statistical association between urban shrinkage severity and economic growth, on one hand, and between urban shrinkage severity and municipality revenues, on the other. Results show that urban shrinkage is currently increasing in prevalence and severity among Romanian cities, thus continuing an alarming trend that started in 1990. Secondly, the results pinpoint a statistically significant association between demographic shrinkage, local economic output and municipalities’ own-source revenues. However, the size effects are rather weak, suggesting a more nuanced relationship between economic and demographic urban growth than that predicted by some theories of urban change.

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This paper explores the tourism-related official actions undertaken by the government in Romania during the COVID-19 pandemic from a stakeholders’ perspective. The approach is based on answering three research questions: (1) Which are the policies that tourism stakeholders benefitted from during the pandemic? (2) How do tourism stakeholders appreciate the utility and efficiency of the measures implemented by the government? and (3) To what extent do the stakeholders perceive these measures as providing long-term benefits? Methodologically, the study relies on the statistical analysis of data collected through a questionnaire applied to tourism stakeholders from Romania. The results indicate mixed perceptions regarding the implemented policies, with most stakeholders considering the received support as less than optimal. A positive perspective is given by the fact that although most stakeholders regarded the positive impact of the policies only in relation to the pandemic period, there are also stakeholders indicating long-term benefits of these policies. These results are useful for providing lessons from the recent pandemic and for suggesting ways for improving governments’ response to future crises.

Collaboration in tourism is widely perceived as a solution for achieving success and for ensuring sustainability in tourist destinations. However, collaboration is a complex and dynamic process, and although there is a growing interest in understanding its mechanisms, much remains unexplored on the matter. The aim of this paper is to operationalise a network approach in analysing characteristics of collaboration in tourism and then to reveal structural weaknesses and strengths from a destination management perspective. The background for analysis is a well-known tourist destination in Romania (Vatra Dornei) that can be considered illustrative for a large spectrum of Eastern European destinations. Methodologically, Social Network Analysis (SNA) techniques were employed, centred on matters related to density and centrality of the tourism network. The results reveal a series of deficiencies inside the network, which have to be addressed by policymakers: (i) a general low level of collaboration; (ii) poor communication between public and private sectors; (iii) a reduced number of central stakeholders but high diversity regarding their fields of activity. The study contributes to the literature by advancing knowledge on particularities of collaboration among tourism stakeholders, while also adding evidence to the utility of SNA in understanding relational dynamics specific to tourism destinations.

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