20 years of Nordic climate change crisis and tourism research: a review and future research agenda

Abstract

Climate change poses an existential crisis for tourism and destinations. Nordic researchers have been at the forefront of research on climate change impacts, adaptation and mitigation. The review provides a brief account of some of the main themes in Nordic climate change research from a regional and international perspective and potential future research directions. Key themes identified include the environmental, economic and social sensitivities of the Nordic region, the implications of climate change for winter-oriented tourism businesses, and the substantial international contribution of Nordic-based researchers to international research on the climate crisis and tourism.

A review of studies on tourism and climate change from 2007 to 2021

“…Similarly, past review studies focused predominantly on the impacts of climate change on different tourism sectors and related adaptation strategies. The trend continued in recent years with articles reviewing the literature about climate change and its impacts on coastal areas and islands, with Arabadzhyan et al (2021) considering coastal tourism and Pedapalli et al (2022) looking at impacts on SIDS and on specific geographic regions such as the Nordic countries (Hall and Saarinen, 2021). Moreover, resilience in tourism is receiving much greater research attention as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, and climate change has begun to enter this recent discussion (Gössling and Higham, 2021; Wang et al , 2022).…”

“…Several review articles have focused on issues regarding tourism and climate change. Most of these studies addressed special interests or particular perspectives to investigate the interrelationships between climate change and tourism, including reviews of the influence of climate change on international tourism (Scott et al , 2012b) and tourism in specific geographic regions, such as in Canada (Dawson and Scott, 2010; Hewer and Gough, 2017), Austria (Gühnemann et al , 2021), Indonesia (Satyawan et al , 2021), China (Wang et al , 2017), the Nordic countries (Hall and Saarinen, 2021) and in small island developing states (SIDS) (Pedapalli et al , 2022); the projected impacts of climate change on coastal and marine tourism (Arabadzhyan et al , 2021; Moreno and Amelung, 2009) and ski tourism (Steiger et al , 2019); climate change adaptation (Kaján and Saarinen, 2013; Phan et al , 2021; Njoroge, 2015), destination resilience and management (Gössling and Higham, 2021; Pedapalli et al , 2022; Weaver et al , 2022); tourist perceptions and responses to global climate change (Gössling et al , 2012); and quantitative approaches in climate change impact assessment for tourism (Rosselló-Nadal, 2014). All these works provided useful insights on the complex issues of climate change in tourism based on geographical, environmental, social, psychological and methodological concerns.…”

Glacier tourism without ice: Envisioning future adaptations in a melting world

“…Such dark tourism would enable tourism stakeholders to commemorate these vanished glaciers. Examples of such commemorative acts already exist, such as the ceremonies on the Okjokull Glacier in Iceland (Hall and Saarinen, 2020) and the Swiss Pizol Glacier (RTS, 2019) in 2019. Therefore, as the Mer de Glace recedes, the Montenvers site could become a site to commemorate the disappearing glacier.…”

The learning model of crisis management: the COVID-19 case in the hospitality industry

“…Because the tourism and hospitality industries are vulnerable to external events beyond their control, it is possible that they could be adversely affected by high degrees of risk and uncertainty (Evans et al , 2012). The impact of COVID-19, at least from an economic point of view, has been more devastating than any other crisis in recent history (Michael Hall and Jarkko, 2021). Innovative methods and practices have been applied globally to help the whole industry establish solid strategies for business resilience.…”