ABSTRACT
In this chapter, the authors seek to offer a bridge to our previous publication Ethical and Responsible Tourism: Managing Sustainability in Local Tourism Destinations. This edited text-book, in its conclusions, reflected on issues affecting ethical and responsible tourism and their future development within the framework of the local tourism environment. The reflections focused on:
Three key themes of ethical and responsible tourism development – destination management aspects; environmental and social aspects and the business aspects
Critical issues in the development of ethical and sustainable tourism in local destinations
Understanding the longer-term view
This presented a picture of where we were in the field of ethical and sustainable tourism in the closing months of 2020. We had described the problems that we and our contributing authors had identified, and we had made some outline of how we may face the challenges ahead. Those challenges are now significantly greater than we may have imagined. The effect of the COVID-19 pandemic, covered in this chapter, develops from the perspective that the effect on tourism as a whole could not be foreseen. Therefore this chapter seeks to show where we were, before we consider where we might be going.
