Abstract

Rising international tensions during the Cold War saw peace become one of the driving ideals for global tourism scholars and practitioners in the management of tourism development. Could the tourism industry be an avenue for the de-escalation of tensions or even peace building? The Declaration on World Tourism (1980) and the Tourism Bill of Rights and Tourist Code (1983), for example, provided guidelines for how tourism could contribute to the development of international understanding and the promotion of friendship and peace. According to Moufakkir and Kelly (2010: xxiii), tourism is an activity capable of not only promoting economic development but also of breaking down political, cultural, and ethnic barriers within and between nations.