General theory of tourism â the case of war and terrorism

Abstract

The title might appear to be facetious or a provocation, but it is neither. It is what the author claims as a consequence of the application of his general theory of tourism. This general theory of tourism is based on the micro-economic vision of tourism which establishes the offer as the central focus of the analysis, and not the demand or consumption as is the case in the conventional, sociological and macroeconomic vision. This work in the first place explains the two sociological positions -first, which exalts tourism and a second which is critical. We expound the anomalies of each position. The author continues by explaining his micro-economic vision, the only one which permits the identification of both the tourism product and the tourism enterprise in an objective and unequivocal way. It is this identification which permits the generalisation of tourism to include acts of war and terrorism. This does not in any way suggest the acceptance of war or terrorism, as one thing is scientific logic, while moral sentiments are quite another.

The Fragmentation and Knowledge in Tourism Fields: An Alternative Viewpoint

“…However, some epistemologists have recently alerted that not only tourism-research failed to develop an unified consensus of what tourism is, but also lack of a coherent epistemology that helps organizing the produced material. In this respect, tourism is subject now to an atmosphere of "indiscipline" where the produced knowledge leads to scattered (limited) conclusions [4][5][6][7][8][9][10].…”