City and Tourism

CT - ISSN 2976-5897 - © ISTE Ltd

Journal issues

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Recent articles

Tourism, heritage and crafts

Tourism, heritage and crafts are intertwined to shape the tourism economy, culture and identity of territories. This third volume of Cité et Tourisme, City & Tourism explores these themes through two European studies exploring the links between urban cultural tourism and crafts. Caught between modernization, globalization and health crisis, territories benefit from the opportunities offered by tourism and events, while being forced to adapt. The importance of preserving know-how to maintain authentic local production requires adapting the means of training and craft sales. In this issue, heritage is associated with sustainable mobility and the rehabilitation of historic buildings. The image of the destination is a challenge for European metropolises that must reconcile the fact of being ever more attractive while being respectful of their environment, their history and local craft resources. Finally, innovation and training are the pillars of the return to authenticity in a redesigned heritage framework as for the restoration and reopening of the Cathedral of Notre-Dame de Paris in December 2024 showing the heritage and sociological stake of national pride. Cultural identity is valued and by ricochet becomes an instrument to think about new sustainable mobility and the fact of rethinking the financing of architectural rehabilitations. This volume brings new issues and analyses concerning the risks and the relevance of sustainable solutions committed to tangible and intangible heritage, this for a local development of small towns and the emergence of a circular artisanal economy generating economic growth.

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Urban Cultural Tourism and Crafts in Andalusia. The Case of platería in Cordoba

This article looks at the changes taking place in the urban crafts, against a backdrop of a drastic increase in cultural tourism in Cordoba (Spain), spurred on by its four UNESCO nominations. The city also boasts a jewellery industry that has been the city’s flagship since at least the Middle Ages. After summarizing the development of jewellery craft, I show the fragility of this intangible heritage, which is supported by local players, and the delicate relationship between the craft, which is struggling to survive, and luxury industrialization, while highlighting the difficulties faced by these professionals in the face of tourism, which is changing the physiognomy of the city and the activities of these craftsmen.

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“Slow tourism”, towards a new model of European Capital of Culture?

The article examines territorial and urban development through the prism of the “European Capital of Culture” label, with a particular focus on the tourism strategy, and in particular the adaptation of cultural tourism in a context of ecological transition. The candidacies of four French cities for the title of European Capital of Culture for 2028 are analyzed: Rouen, Bourges, Clermont-Ferrand and Montpellier. For these medium-sized and smaller cities seeking to assert themselves on an international scale, a new urban imaginary is proposed by those involved in the bid. In the age of the Anthropocene, the tourism narrative is part of this dynamic, with a common positioning for the four cities, through the notion of “slow tourism” and a focus on natural heritage. The case of the winning city in the national competition is explored in greater depth : Bourges and its cultural project based on the idea of a capital on a “human scale” outside the dynamics of metropolization. This discourse, rooted in the concept of “happy frugality”, raises questions about the urban policies implemented and the repositioning of the tourism offer.

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The effects of covid-19 on the sport tourism sector in the main cities of Cambodia

Tourism has become the second-strongest industrial sector in Cambodia in 2018, and the number of tourists visiting the country has reached 6.2 million (Un & Lue, 2020). However, when the pandemic situation broke out, the government decided to close the borders for tourism. The main tourist destinations were forced to close tourist attractions such as museums, restaurants, sports clubs, and travel agencies that didn’t offer organized tours. Many tourist destinations, such as sports tourism sites have been suffering because of the lack of tourists. In the sector, a significant number of employees have lost their job. This study has focused on analyzing the effects of the pandemic situation on sport tourism services in Cambodia. The analysis was based on reviewing the changes in sports tourism elements, such as environmental changes, accessibility, becoming more complicated, and limited opportunities to attend sports events or participate in sports activities. It also analyzed how the Cambodian government reacted to the situation and how they supported initiatives to save the local tourism providers. A content analytic method was used mostly from governmental published sources for the general analysis. The perspectives of the visitors were analyzed by the feedback of travellers published on the international tourism homepages. The results stated that the tourism sector experienced an 80% drop in its international visitors and a loss of an estimated USD 5 billion in revenues. The travel restrictions significantly affected the tourism flow as of May 20th, 2020. Although the government introduced several projects to save this sector, still today’s recovery has not reached the number of tourists that came before Covid-19.But, the crisis presents an opportunity for the tourism sector through the improvement of its infrastructure and events. Sports tourism is becoming a lever for action and strategic support for the renewal of the Cambodia destination.

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Events in cities: between tourism attractiveness and negative externalities

Events in the city: between attractiveness and negative externalities. Through events, it is the staging, storytelling and production of a renewed tourist offer that is in question. The commercial, cultural and sports city questions in more ways than one. What are the lasting effects of the ephemeral in urban areas and for whom? Citizens, consumers, elected officials and national and international tourists show and think differently about the mega-event according to their interests and practices. The instrumentalization of events also involves pre and post-event assessments and support processes for infrastructures (convention and fair grounds or Olympic village) and public spaces bequeathed (seafront urban leisure facilities ) .The renewed attractiveness to attract more and more tourists comes up against the Sustainable Development Goals. The negative externalities mentioned in the various articles in this special issue of City & Tourism show that it is necessary to reflect upstream on the meaning that the actors wish to give to their event, its societal repercussions, and the limits, beliefs conveyed to this subject.

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Event and creativity in Saint-Etienne: Links, changes and conflicts in the fabric and practice of the urban

By adapting the creative city model to the local context, Saint-Etienne has been implementing an urban policy since the mid-1990s with the aim of renewing its urban tissue and producing a dynamic urban image. With design as a marker, local public and private actors have had recourse to events, emblematic architectural or urban achievements, a heritage policy of labelling and to the development of a creative tourism offer. By combining analyses of discourses and documents, observations of individual and collective practices during events or in transformed places with the analysis of the spaces themselves, this analytical and exploratory study discusses the articulations, transformations and tensions between the event-based and the creative in the thinking, the making and the practice of the urban.

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Residents’ perception, a key element of sustainable tourism associated with sports mega-events: The case of the 2014 World Cup and the 2016 Olympic and Paralympic Games in Rio de Janeiro

Sporting mega-events, such as the Football World Cup and the Olympic Games, are among the major marketing tools for territories. However, they can generate innumerable problems when they are organized by developing or emerging countries. Indeed, in these countries, the impacts are greater because the supply of services and infrastructure is not yet sufficiently supported and only a limited range of the local population benefits from the investments made. The general objective of this article is to understand the perception of part of the local population of Rio de Janeiro of the sports mega-events in Brazil, from a socio-territorial point of view and in terms of tourism. From an ethnographic approach, we show that the most vulnerable groups suffer the negative effects of such mega-events (expropriations and evictions of the population residing in priority investment areas). The creation of a real state of exception in the territory of the city of Rio de Janeiro, combining gentrification and social sanitation, has caused conflicts between a city designed for inhabitants and a city designed for sports tourists. However, the planning and organization of these sporting events could have taken place according to other logics.

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Crowding out effects associated with the Olympics. Some lessons learned from ex ante surveys in Paris and Tokyo

The Olympic and Paralympic Games generate expectations in terms of tourist attraction, but the ex post literature relativizes them due to crowding out effects. In order to understand these possible effects in 2020 in Tokyo and those likely to take place in Paris in 2024, two surveys were carried out with 305 international tourists in Tokyo and 1,265 international and French tourists in Paris respectively. If the pandemic has called into question the interest of research for Tokyo, since the JOP, postponed to 2021, took place without spectators, these surveys nevertheless make it possible to draw a certain number of lessons on the type of tourists likely to divert from Paris in 2024.