ABSTRACT
In this chapter we will present the evidence for a necessary engagement by the tourism academy with public affairs work. This will be achieved by describing the activities of the subject association for tourism in UK universities, the Association for Tourism in Higher Education (ATHE). Formed as the National Liaison Group for Tourism in Higher Education (NLG) in 1993, primarily to promote industry/university collaboration, the ATHE now provides a context-specific case study of the impacts of changes in a higher education system upon a maturing academic community. We will explore the ATHE’s responses to policy and market changes and its more recent attempts to shape the agenda surrounding tourism higher education in partnership with an increasingly diverse array of academic organizations that have also set out to ‘make the case’ for their own subjects and activities. Drawing on the archives of the ATHE, we will identify several phases of public affairs and pressure group work over the past 20 years arguing that the ATHE has emerged from an outsider, low-profile, position to become an insider pressure group that is now embarking on more proactive, profile-raising initiatives. We conclude with a review of the lessons learnt by the ATHE and the future challenges facing tourism higher education in the UK.
