Democracy and tourism demand in European countries: does environmental performance matter?

Does countries' environmental, social and governance (ESG) risk rating influence international tourism demand? A case of the Visegrád Four

“…The social pillar incorporates issues that concern human rights, food security, public health, demographic change, crime and safety. The link between social pillar issues and tourism potentials have also been established in the literature (Ghalia et al, 2019;Kim et al, 2020;Usman et al, 2020). Lastly, the governance pillar examines a country's efforts at improving corruption control, institutions, rule of law, accountability, political rights and civil liberty.…”

“…Similarly, in a study involving 131 tourist origin counties and the top 34 destination countries, Ghalia et al (2019) identified better institutions and lower risk of conflict in both origin and destination countries as critical drivers of increased tourist flow. Furthermore, from the standpoint of health and security subdivision of social factors, Usman et al (2020) found a negative relationship between crime rate and tourism demand in Malaysia. In the same study, the 9/11 terrorist attack on the USA on 11 September 2001 and the 2003 avian flu epidemics have a negative impact on Malaysia's tourism demand.…”

“…As mentioned earlier, the literature has established relationship between environmental performance and international tourism demand (e.g. Berrittella et al, 2006;Hamilton et al, 2005;Usman et al, 2020). The social pillar incorporates issues that concern human rights, food security, public health, demographic change, crime and safety.…”

“…This position is reinforced by Hamilton et al (2005), who claimed that extraordinary destinations might attract more tourists than warm ones due to the effect of global warming. Similarly, in a recent study of Malaysia, Usman et al (2020) established a negative relationship between environmental pollution and tourism demand, thereby arguing that the quality of the Malaysian environment is key for potential tourists in their choice of the country as future tourism destination.…”

The Adverse Impact of Air Pollution on China’s Economic Growth

“…Given the fact that good environmental quality is an indispensable characteristic of attractive tourist destinations [36][37][38][39][40], tourism is heavily hurt by air pollution [10,11,41]. Air pollution inhibits sightseeing activities, damages the tourist experience, poses potential health risks, and, thus, reduces the competitiveness of a tourism destination [37][38][39][42][43][44]. The number of tourist arrivals and amount of tourism revenue both decline in air-polluted regions [45,46], as many tourists are unwilling to visit polluted areas.…”