Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
( financial ) and they are also against the idea of
a further expansion of the EU budget. Increas-
ing scepticism of the effectiveness of the EU and
the overall success of common policies has
also fuelled these attitudes. Therefore, for some
member states there is general apprehension
towards the transfer of new competencies as a
matter of political ideology rather than simply
the reluctance towards a tourism competence
( pragmatic ).
In addition, in several member states there
is already no central government involvement in
tourism. In particular, in federal structures such
as Austria, Belgium and Germany, federal gov-
ernments tend to have limited powers over the
regional governments, which often have exclu-
sive competence in a number of policy areas.
For instance, the German Länder are primarily
responsible for tourism and the federal govern-
ment does not have any authority or decision-
making power for tourism. Strong regional
governments such as the Länder want to ensure
they maintain their powers over federal and
supranational structures (Jeffery, 2000), so they
object to the idea of an EU tourism competence,
wishing to retain responsibility and control of
tourism development in their areas.
However, it is not only federal states, but
also countries with devolved authorities where
tourism is only marginally handled at the national
level. For instance, in the UK, Scotland, Wales,
England and Northern Ireland each deal with
tourism independently and in Spain each
administrative region has its own tourism policy
(Velanzuela, 1991). The style of political admin-
istration and the dominant political philosophy
in the management of tourism at the national
level ultimately condition expectations of involve-
ment in tourism at the supranational level.
In this way, the transfer of a competence to the
EU level can be perceived as a step towards
recentralization, as tourism policy issues in a
number of member states are handled at the
subnational levels - a step backwards rather
than forwards.
Furthermore, these remarks highlight the
importance of local and regional authorities in
the design and delivery of tourism policy within
member states. However, as decisions concern-
ing tourism are made at ministerial level the
authority mismatch in this institutional setting is
evident. Despite their importance in tourism
management and development at the national
level, regional authorities have no influence in
the decision-making process at the EU level. By
not including regional authorities as an equal
partner in the equation, a dead-end situation
is created, as some national ministers simply
have no authority to make decisions on tourism
matters.
Moreover, member states fear that under a
common policy their respective tourism sectors
might fare worse than now. In each policy area
there are 'winner' and 'loser' member states
because policy impacts are asymmetrical
(McCormick, 1999). Intra-regional competition
is fierce as the main market for European tour-
ism are intra-regional tourists accounting for
nearly 85% of all international tourist arrivals to
Europe (WTO, 2000; Eurostat, 2002). An EU
tourism policy could lead to potential imbal-
ances with unexpected consequences to the
tourism sector. It could affect the competitive-
ness of tourism enterprises and lead to a loss of
control of the sector with member states unable
to intervene. Member states, it was suggested,
are simply very protective of their sectors and
believe that they are better off on their own as
they can sustain control.
Finally, because of the complex nature of
tourism there is usually some degree of involve-
ment at all levels of public administration:
national, regional, local and destination. This in
turn complicates how the EU would be involved
as there is already so much being done within
member states and at various administrative
levels. An interviewee argued that a convincing
case has not yet been made about what the EU
can do that is not being done already at the
national level. These comments raise the impor-
tance of issue definition and the apparent lack
of it at the supranational level. The findings
demonstrated that agreeing what needs to be
done was the most problematic stage in decid-
ing on an approach. In addition, member states
were employing subsidiarity as the main argu-
ment against the transfer of a competence.
Although the principle was established as a
means of dividing power between the national
and
supranational level,
it
was
being
used
largely
as
a
constraint
mechanism
to
any
expansionist tendencies.
This situation was posing problems in insti-
tutional involvement in tourism. For instance,
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