From Heritage to Terrorism: Regulating Tourism in an Age of Uncertainty

Abstract

The idea for this book grew from the course Law, Tourism and the State taught at Flinders University of South Australia by Brian Simpson from the late 1990s until his departure to take up an appointment at Keele University in the United Kingdom in 2002, and then by Cheryl Simpson from 2003 until 2005. The aim of that course was to engage in a critical examination of the law as it affected, and was affected by, tourism. Importantly, this was done in the context of the Legal Studies Discipline at Flinders University which we believed could provide an interdisciplinary and critical approach to the study of legal phenomenon. Unlike Law Schools, our view was that Legal Studies was not hampered by the narrow confines of professional admission requirements and the perceived need to address the 'practical' at the expense of the 'theoretical'. The existence of a course in Law, Tourism and the State at Flinders was itself some evidence of that, as to the best of our knowledge it is not an area of study in any Law programmes in this form. At the time of its creation, it was felt that a critical examination of tourism and its intersection with law would provide more useful insights into how the law in this area 'works' (and does not work) than a more standard (and dry) discussion of the laws which govern the tourism industry. This background is of central relevance to the content of this book as from the outset we wish to make it clear that this is not a book about the manner in which the law regulates travel and tourism. If we were to explain the focus of this book in a few words it would be to say that it is an attempt to explore how law thinks about tourism. For the most part, and with few exceptions, we feel this is a neglected part of tourism studies for the simple reason that it is also a neglected part of law studies.