Crisis- Crimes effects on Tourists Decision to Return to a Destination

Abstract
As the number of crises affecting the tourism industry increases, it is becoming necessary to understand the nature of this crises and how to manage the impact of such incidents.

Discussion Paper
According to Sharma, (2006) the industries travelling product is like no other and it becomes addictive. It is for good reason that people say they have been bitten by the 'travel bug' because is life changing and exchanging experience. It makes people to travel to a destination for relaxing and get away for a while from their problems or the things bothering them. The industry attracts people couple, group or individuals who are energetic and open to new experiences and ideas (Sharma, 2006).
Now days many crises occur which are undesired, extraordinary, often unexpected and timely limited process with ambivalent development possibilities for the tourists such as earthquake, volcanic ash, economic crisis (Glaesser, 2007). Crises demands immediate decisions and countermeasures in order to influence the further development again positively for the organisation or industry and to limit the negative consequences as much as possible (Sharma, 2006).
It was always risky the distance travelling and included with the risks but now the difference is that these risks are progressively more evident (Laws, 2007). Events such as gulf war, the Asian financial crisis, the 11 September 2001 terrorist attack on the USA (Bierman, 2003). A major anxiety of tourist destinations is the impact of crime, theft, terrorism on tourist arrivals (Mansfeld, 2006).
The issue of the theft that as it shown in many studies is the most prominent crime against tourists, the terrorism that also is a big affection of tourists decision making to return or not to an destination and as a crimes that against tourists, such issues occurs the world on a daily basis (Mansfeld, 2006). Those crisis events unfortunately made tourists and travellers to be always victims of both violent and nonviolent crimes (Mansfeld, 2006).
Those kinds of incidents have caused a major decline in tourism industry demand in various parts of the world (Sonmez, 1998). Whether it is a coup d'état in Fiji, violent demonstrations against the Group of Seven nations (G7) in several different venues, the uprising of the Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza, or riots in the Chiapas region of Mexico, such incidents paralyzed or severely impacted the local tourism industry as a result of trip cancellation behaviour and a shift of bookings to safer alternative destinations (Mansfeld, 2006).
As it is known all the tourists destinations try to make a destination marketing of their areas in order to attract travellers to visit (Mansfeld, 2006). However the governments as well as the media frequently inform the public about the dangers of travelling to destinations that shown under often criminals activities that against tourists, such as in United States. Authorities need to make travellers aware of the potential tourist's safety, security concerns and warn them about travelling to certain areas (Mansfeld, 2006). The media is also a playable role in the dissemination of this information.
According to Mansfeld, (2006) the media is providing negative influence to the tourist destinations. It also can scare the tourists with their statistics of the crimes and may cause declines to the destination by the tourist's arrivals (Mansfeld, 2006). Moreover, sometimes the tourism destination could blow out of the proportion because of the relationship to crime incidents (Mansfeld, 2006).
Nevertheless, Mansfeld, (2006) stated that media is an important news generator of security incidents observation. The media can provide and examine the information with the most vivid and explicit analysis of the incidents when they occurs. Therefore, tourists will be informed with up to date real life information when they would be creating markets about a high- risk image of the affected destination. Although in some cases there was obvious that some information about the incidents that were provided by media were biased and lie about the true risk when travelling to the affected areas (Mansfeld, 2006).
Influences of international travel related to past experiences, risk, and safety issues during international travel are very important. These factors were studied in combination with the individual taste to travel and to avoid places on their previous travelling plan (Mansfeld, 2006). According to previous results travel experience and risk perceptions have been studied for future travel behaviour. There are many aspects that influence people safety when travelling. In the past, travel experiences where and safety have been experienced gives people the choice to decided whether or not to avoid certain areas (Mansfeld, 2006).
The taken as a whole, the results obtained showed that travellers who travel for personal reason like visiting friends or family were less likely to return to a destination if they want to whereas for business travellers they don't really have a choice of returning to the destination or not (Mansfeld, 2006).
Finally the destinations where crimes are against tourists making the bad result of negative image in the minds of prospective visitors (Fujii, 1980). The crisis is an unexpected event so the proper management of tourist destination should include a certain degree of potential crisis preparation (Hall, 2004). The preparation should include planned strategies for crisis handling, and it should be decided the person who would be responsible for key jobs, such as speaking to journalists, establishing information centre also include an updated web site, so the image of the destination would not be destroyed of the overstated news (Hall, 2004).

Reference
Glaesser, D. (2007) Crisis management in tourism industry. 1st ed. Oxford.

Mansfeld, Y. and Pizam, A. (2006) Tourism, Security and Safety: from theory to practice. 3rd ed. UK: Oxford.

Sharma, K. K., (2006) Tourism and Travel industry [online]. New Delhi: Darya Ganj. [Accessed 8 February 2011]. Available at: <http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=7qaO_GM_LuMC&printsec=frontcover&dq=tourism+and+travel+industry+sharma+k.k&hl=en&ei=GalRTeiNNsPKhAf2tJWICQ&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=book-thumbnail&resnum=1&sqi=2&ved=0CDQQ6wEwAA#v=onepage&q&f=false>.

The author offers an interesting insight into the effects that crime plays on the thoughts of tourists. By taking into account issues such as terrorism, the economic crisis and the recent Icelandic volcanic eruption that ground the majority of planes in Europe, a comparison between well-known tourism related issues is made. This shows that crime is a large problem for the tourist industry. As you suggest it can cause people to stop visiting a destination, if they have either been a victim of crime there or hear that crime is rife at a specific destination. By mentioning terrorism as the most significant form of crime that involves tourist further emphasises the issue and that terrorism is a major problem worldwide.
The author also suggests that the media plays a key role in peoples' thoughts on travel. In the way that they will see a story about crime abroad and instantly worry that they will be involved in crime if they travel there. It also suggests that the media only like to focus on the negative side of things. The author also makes the point that suggests the magnitude of the problem created by media scaremongering. This is a very valid point. Many countries that have an issue with crime have seen a significant decline in tourist numbers; maybe an example of a country that has had this problem could have been given. This would have made the issue easy to understand as it would have been possible for the reader to look into this issue themselves.
The author mentions the effects the government plays on where people travel. This has both positive and negative issues, the reason for this that they feel the need to inform tourists from their country where to travel to and where not to. This information is available of the Foreign Office's website.
The author makes a valid point by mentioning the need for crisis management schemes to be put in place in tourist destinations. This will help to make people feel safer whilst travelling and could alleviate problems that you mentioned. This will also make sure that the media coverage isn't all negative. This would also give the resort the chance to give their side of the story and inform the audience of the positives. It will also mean that they can defend what has happened and give accurate statistics that could show that crime is not as bad as people make it out to be.
Overall this is a good report into tourists concerns about being involved with crime. However have actual statistics that show the areas that have higher crime against tourists and compare it with a destination that has lower crime figure. There did seem to be too much emphasis on just one author's writing, this does cause a problem as it is only one person's thoughts on the subject. Had the author used more it would have brought a different aspect to the arugement.

The author discusses the topic rather comprehensively and points out the different aspects impacting on the tourist's decision on returning to a destination. The author states that after the September 11th 2001 68% Americans felt that terrorism is the most feared risk before war and natural disasters (Sackett, 2006). The number is quite high and surely has an impact on the tourism industry since the fear of terrorism may affect on the decision-making. The safety issues play the important role on the decision-making process. Mura (2010) writes that safety is especially appreciated in the context of overseas travel.

The author writes that the crises are often unexpected. It is studied that the terrorists are expressly in the business of uncertainty and have attacks suddenly and randomly to keep people in fear (Toohey and Taylor, 2008). When the tourists are unsure when and where the possible attacks may take place, the tourist behavior may appear as unwillingness to travel to any destination. The high level of uncertainty, too, affects on the change of travel plans (Lemerty et al, 2006). It is mentioned in the paper that the previous travel experience has an impact on the tourist behavior. It is studied that the tourists who do have a lot of travel experience are more likely not to cancel or make changes on their travel plans (Sönmez and Graefe, 1998).

The author states that the riots in the Chiapas, the region of Mexico caused trip cancellations and tourists to seek alternative destinations. It has been found by a Travel Industry of America poll (cited in Floyd and Pennington-Gray, 2004) that directly after the September 11 attacks 30% cancelled their trips or made some changes to them. The scary events, human- or nature-made naturally influence in such a way that tourists do not want to travel there. In order the tourists to return to a destination, it has to have a safe image. After a crisis such as terrorist event it may take a long time after a tourist would consider returning to a destination, whereas after a natural disaster the tourist simply neither can return to a destination nor wish to travel there.

The author raises the issue of the impact of the media. It is interesting to notice that the author mentions that 'the media is providing negative influence to the tourist about destinations' (Mansfeld, 2006). It is studied that Woods et al (2008) list 'government authority, the media, lack of knowledge and strong attitudes and emotions' as factors influencing the most, and in addition the experience in traveling. It has been studied that after the September 11th 2001 the Australians did not feel that fear of terrorist attack to Australia due to the geographical location (Howie 2005). However, they do have a perception of fear of terrorism and it is the primary source of fear, although there has never been a terrorist event in Australia. Howie (2005) points out that "the threat of terrorism based on their media consumption". The media's reportage is not just informative but exaggerating. However, the knowledge of a previous or a possible attack in a destination with or without media's influence may impact on the tourists' return to a destination as terrorism is feared the most.

Overall the author provides good insights. However, the subject needs more researching what factors the destination needs to attract the tourists again.

The aspect of risk is an interesting one in tourism. As stated in the paper tourists are an easy target for violent and non-violent crime and furthermore to natural disasters and terrorism. These events are impossible to predict and therefore in my opinion are extremely difficult to defend against. The Interesting thing about tourism is that for the most of us it is an opportunity to get out of our comfort zone and in order to feel like we've succeeded in this a certain amount of risk is necessary. It can be argued that things like age, marital status and general standings in life affect the fact how much risk does a tourist want to engage in during their holiday.
It has to be questioned whether or not tourism suffers long term from political turmoil and terrorism. The riots that erupted in Egypt for example are still affecting their tourism product but rest assured that the country boasts such cultural destinations that it will bounce back when the political turmoil ceases.
As stated in the paper security is an important factor of any destination and it should be made clear to the tourist if they in fact are entering a dangerous area. Media's role in informing the tourist is a questionable as media like news stations and papers do not operate in the sole idea of presenting news or statistics subjectively. Effectively they report news the way that will both inform people but so that they are also media sexy as stated by the author. This is why the tourists should be informed by a government agency on the possible dangers in the area. In a way governments could be speculated to downplay their security issues regarding tourism as it may affect tourism negatively. This may be the case with countries that heavily rely on their tourism as a major source of income The idea of media purposefully attacking a destination idea seems odd as it can be argued that there would be no gain in destroying a destinations image just for the sake of it. It is unfortunate that we live in a world where things like tsunamis and murder happen but media does play an important role in advising people where to go and where not to during dire times.
Altogether the author's points are valid ones and the subject area does deserve more studies.