"What impacts do mega events have on a tourism destination? How can government manage a mega event for the purpose of promoting tourism in the host country/city?"

Thèmes abordés

Mega-events, olympic games, impacts, destination management, tourism management

Résumé du document

There is no doubt about it, mega-events can completely transform a city. Some undeveloped and completely forgotten places can raise suddenly the attention of a whole country. A war against pollution and waste begins, the mobility is increased,… At first glance, we would say that these events have numerous advantages and no disadvantages. But it is absolutely not the case. Indeed, the organization of mega-events has always raised a lot of debate between the researchers in tourism considering the positive but also all the negative effects that are generated by mega-event. The aim of this paper will be to try apprehending this issue and analyze some of the impacts of such events on the host community.

In order to be able to make an in depth analysis, we will only explore the economic and the physical aspects of the question. The second part of this paper will address some recommendations about how the government can manage the mega-event in order to promote tourism in the host destination. Before going into the analysis of the impacts, let us first well define what a mega-event is. In order to do that, we will look at the definition of different authors and try to bring to light the main features of these events.

Extraits

[...] New Zealand Management, Volume 46 (Issue pp. 30-35. Miguelez F. and Carrasquer P. (1995) The repercussion of the Olympic Games on labour. In The Keys to success (De Moragas M. and Botela M.). Centre d'Estudis Olimpics I de l'Esport, Universitat Autonoma de Barcelona. Morphet J. (1996) The real thing. Town and country planning, Volume 65 (n°11), pp. 312- www.oboolo.com Preuss, H. [...]

[...] Schimmel K.S. (1995) Growth politics, urban development, and sports stadium construction in the United States: A case study. In The Stadium and the City (Bale J. and Moen O.). Keele University Press. Spurr R. (1999) Tourism. In Staging the Olympics: The Event and Its Impact, Cashman R., Hughes A., NSWUP, Sydney, pp. 148-156. Stevens, T., Bevan, T. (1999) Olympic legacy. Sport Management, Volume 19 pp.1619. [...]

[...] The host destination has thus to be really attractive for the potential tourists. One word that rhymes most of the time with attractiveness is uniqueness. Consequently, a good promotion should rest on the ability of the destination to offer a unique selling proposition (Fayos-Sola, 1998). According to Essex and Chalkley (1998, in Malfas et al. 2004), one of the best examples of a destination that has well understood what we just said previously is Barcelona for the 1992 Olympics. Indeed, the city has made heavy investments for the transport system and for the renewal of the coastal area that was decaying. [...]

[...] Nevertheless this point as to be analyzed more in depth. Indeed, we have to consider the collateral effects of this huge inflow of tourist coming for the mega-event. In fact, Baim (2004, in Li and Blake, 2009) speaks about the fact that some tourists, national or international, will give up their plan to go in the country where the Olympic Games will take place because of this mega-event. Preuss (2004) goes a bit further and sorts out these people into three categories: the avoiders, the runaways and the changers. [...]

[...] 337- www.oboolo.com And finally, the third point relates to the fact that, after the event, government continue paying for the maintenance of these infrastructures that are most of the time less used when the Olympics are finished. So, we do have not to forget that the huge investments for mega-events are surely bringing benefits to the host country but that they have also to be considered as costs As we mentioned in the introduction when considering AT Kearney's (2004) paper, the legacies of the mega-event will mainly determine if the choice of hosting such an event was good or not, in other words, that the mega-event has been successful and the long term strategy thoughtful. [...]