Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
Figure 1.3:
Organising framework for
the topic
The role of the state and government policy as a determinant of tourist and recreational
opportunities is examined, as are issues of access to public and private space for tourists
and recreationists.
Chapter 4 examines the differing types of impacts generated by tourist and
recreational activities and the way in which different methodologies have been devised to
analyse the environmental, socio-cultural and economic impacts. The following four
chapters (5-8) consider the distinctive nature of tourist and recreational activities in a
variety of contexts (urban, rural, wilderness, coastal and ocean areas), emphasising their
role in shaping and influencing people's tourist and recreational opportunities, and the
effects of such activities on the places in which they occur.
One of the strongest contributions of geography in the tourism and recreation field is
in terms of the development of planning and policy analysis. Chapter 9 reviews the need
for developing a planning and policy framework at different geographical scales with
particular concern for the different traditions of tourism planning which exist. Chapter 10,
the final chapter, examines the future prospects of the field and the potential contributions
which geography and geographers may make to understanding tourism and recreation
phenomena. Tourism and recreation have been the direct subject of geographical analysis
since the late 1920s and have developed into a significant area of applied geography. In
that time methodologies and philosophies have changed as has the subject matter.
Tourism is now regarded as the world's largest industry. Tourism and recreation are
