<abstract xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><p>Different approaches to the analysis of tourism destinations as the basic units of research in tourism, are reviewed in this paper. Traditional geographical and economic perspectives are presented as the bases for more modern system and networking approaches. Network analysis is discussed as the most useful current approach to understand cooperation and coopetition processes taking place in destinations. This approach, developed in general management theory, however, if implicated directly in tourism, is not free from major problems and may lead to misleading conclusions. Among such problems, spatial embeddedness and the non-voluntary character of membership in a network, the crucial role of free goods in product creation, the predominance of SMEs in a destination network, differences between particular destinations and the difficulty in setting clear borders between networks, are discussed.</p></abstract>

Different approaches to the analysis of tourism destinations as the basic units of research in tourism, are reviewed in this paper. Traditional geographical and economic perspectives are presented as the bases for more modern system and networking approaches. Network analysis is discussed as the most useful current approach to understand cooperation and coopetition processes taking place in destinations. This approach, developed in general management theory, however, if implicated directly in tourism, is not free from major problems and may lead to misleading conclusions. Among such problems, spatial embeddedness and the non-voluntary character of membership in a network, the crucial role of free goods in product creation, the predominance of SMEs in a destination network, differences between particular destinations and the difficulty in setting clear borders between networks, are discussed.

Tourism destination: The networking approach

Department of Tourism and Regional Studies, Institute of Geography, Pedagogical University in Cracow,

Moravian Geographical Reports

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 3.0 License.

{"article-title":"Tourism destination: The networking approach"}

Different approaches to the analysis of tourism destinations as the basic units of research in tourism, are reviewed in this paper. Traditional geographical...

Tourism destination: The networking approach

Published Online: Feb 23, 2017

Page range: 2 - 14

Received: Dec 17, 2015

Accepted: Jul 25, 2016

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1515/mgr-2016-0018

Keywords
tourism destination, networking, destination governance, destination management

© 2016 Michał Żemła, published by De Gruyter Open

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 3.0 License.

Tourism destination: The networking approach

Published Online: Feb 23, 2017

Page range: 2 - 14

Received: Dec 17, 2015

Accepted: Jul 25, 2016

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1515/mgr-2016-0018

Keywordstourism destination, networking, destination governance, destination management

© 2016 Michał Żemła, published by De Gruyter Open

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 3.0 License.

Keywords
tourism destination, networking, destination governance, destination management