Tourism and security issues and why don't people visit particular countries - case study: Kosovo

First of all, the strand under which this conference paper is falling under, is: The issues concerning Tourism and Security. For this purpose, the case study of Kosovo has been chosen by the author of this academic piece of work, since Kosovo is a country that has been involved in a war during the ‘90s and coming out of it back in 1999. Located in the Balkan Peninsula, Kosovo has declared itself as an independent state on 17th of February 2008. The literature and the academic sources used in this conference paper have enabled the author to illustrate some of the issues concerning the tourism and the many disadvantages that the war has brought with it for Kosovo’s tourism industry in particular, and the extent to which it has affected the visitors’ choices, especially those from abroad and whether these have continued to consider Kosovo as one of the destinations they would like to visit after the war has ended and up to this moment. Considering that Kosovo was an old province of its now neighbour - Serbia, the conflict between the two have started due to the fact that Serbia wanted to reattach the province to its territory and since the majority of the Kosovo’s population was represented by Albanian ethnics, a serious conflict between the Serbian and the Albanian population has started, a conflict which has rapidly turned into a war.

The conflict which has quickly developed into a war as previously mentioned, has not only brought loss of many lives of both the Serbian and the Kosovar populations, but many negative consequences and significant levels of damage to the entire country (some of the most damaged examples being: the Mitrovica region, Skenderaj, Drenas or the back then Drenica and many others) as well as to its infrastructure, i.e. buildings have been bombed, houses, companies have too been badly affected by the serious conflict between the two places, therefore this big issue has only brought negative consequences which Kosovo has suffered back in the 1990s and immediately during the post-war period of time as well as now taking into account the fact that the war has severely affected the perception of people from other countries, more precisely those originating from the Western countries and how they have started to be concerned about the security of the country and its “unsafety” when considering to travel there. All the media reports and news presented from and about Kosovo during and after the war have been seen or/and heard by the whole world, a fact that has contributed to the creation of a negative image in the people’s eyes, people who could have been potential tourists prior to the war in which the state has been implicated.

Furthermore, the instability from many points of view that the war has brought along with it, has further significantly concerned the national authorities in a sense that they would not be able to reconstruct whatever has been damaged, they would be unable to reconstruct new buildings and/or other facilities, or making new roads and other transport industry related recoveries; and also considering the fact that the economy of the country has had to suffer at high levels, it is obvious that the authorities have struggled to cope with a new start from many points of view, therefore due to the lack of financial possibilities, there have not been much change, which means that automatically the tourism industry has too been negatively affected, fact that has been mirrored in the yearly statistics and figures referring to the number of tourists, specifically tourists coming from other countries (from European countries and abroad). Since media seem to have dramatized the situation even to a higher level, this has too contributed towards the creation of a less positive perception of the country by the International individuals, which have stopped showing an interest in visiting the new declared state, especially in more recent periods of time, therefore being concerned of the security of the country and not believing that it would be safe to travel there, not many people are going to visit Kosovo due to their negative perceptions; a fact that shows that this country’s tourism industry is not able to bring high contributions to the local/national economy, therefore there are no funds and no money to be able to promote Kosovo as a tourism destination and to attract more visitors.


References

Campbell, D,, D. Fiske (1959) Convergent and Discriminant Validation by the Multitrait Multimethod Matrix, PsychologicalBulletin

Goodall, B. (1990) How Tourists Choose Their Holidays: An Analytical Framework, In Marketing in the Tourism Industry: The Promotion of Destination Regions

Judah, T. (2000), Kosovo: War and Revenge. New Haven: Yale University Press

I chose to comment on this paper because it is, personally, an interesting subject to read about, as security reasons nowadays are the main reasons why people don’t visit particular places or countries.

First of all writer has explained the reason why Kosovo is portrayed as an unsafe place to visit and why many people chose not to go there. It is very important that the reasons of war and why people were fighting were mentioned, as it gives a better picture to a reader and explains why some chose to avoid the place. However, at some point I felt like there was too much information given on the history of the war and the destruction it brought rather than giving more information why it is an unsafe place to visit nowadays. On the other hand, it outlines the key things that country is improving since the end of the war in order to make it a better and safer place for a visit.

Another important factor that brought my attention to this specific paper, is the fact that many people nowadays are ignorant towards the destinations that have suffered the wars, poverty or any other social and political instabilities, therefore I found it very interesting to read about the place that is not as advertised as any other tourism destination. It made me understand that places that we don’t usually trust have their own history, national heritage and culture that we are missing out on just because we find them unsafe places to be at. It would be interesting to see if the actual conference paper have discussed the psychological reason why people tend to avoid the destination and what influences people to think that they are still in danger in places where there is no dangerous activity anymore (Seattle Times, 1999).

I found the structure of the paper easy to read. By being paragraphed it actually outlines the different topics of the matter and makes it easier for the reader to read and concentrate on the work in the right manner, because I have written mine in one plain text and now it makes me understand that I made it a harder piece of work for anyone to read about.

Overall, I found this paper a very interesting piece of work to read about. It has given me enough information to get an idea of the place, why historically people are scared to travel there and what is being done in order to make it a better place. Reading this has made me become interested in the subject even more, so reading the full conference paper would have been an amazing experience which would give me certain knowledge in this specific area of tourism.

Reference

KOSOVO WAR DAMPENS TOURISM TRAFFIC ACROSS EUROPE: FINAL Edition 1999, , Seattle Times, Seattle, Wash.