ABSTRACT
This is a chapter about the future of tourism and tourism studies. Both are considered because they are inextricably linked, although the degree of real influence that academics have on the trajectory of tourism development is a moot point. The focus of the chapter is on the forces that shape contemporary tourism. It is also a personal view. Indeed, it has to be because from a social constructionist perspective the selection of method, epistemology, approach, ontology, problem definition and what you say in publications and where you choose to say it reflects the values of the author. Therefore, rather than hide behind a thin veneer of empiricist rationality, the author has decided to be much more intellectually honest.
