Author: Peter Tarlow
ISBN No: 9780 1241 15705
Review date: 25/07/2026
No of pages: 312
Publisher: Butterworth-Heinemann, Elsevier
Publisher URL:
http://www.bh.com
Year of publication: 03/09/2014
Brief:
Tourism Security: Strategies for Effectively Managing Travel Risk and Safety 9780 1241 15705. Online price ยฃ25.49, 312 pages
price
£25.49
A book on tourism security wins reviewer Mark Rowe over.
Tourism – leisure travel – is a big industry, for old cities of the developed world and beaches of the developing world alike. Security is another important industry; guarding against everything from terrorism at the airport to petty theft in a hotel bar. Yet Peter Tarlow was ploughing new ground when he wrote a book that put the two together.
There may be a reason for that. If you visit the Nile as a tourist or choose to be put off touring because of civic instability in Egypt, that is the business of the tour companies, and the Egyptian authorities as the country relies on tourism; but who provides the protection for the tourists? Surely the tour company is replying on the Egyptian government and police or the historic sites to do the securing. Who then is the audience of security professionals for this book? Because individual tourists are not security professionals; indeed, when on holiday people are quite the opposite; they want to put serious thoughts behind them; they are there to relax, and let others do the work and the worrying.
Hence it was welcome early on in Tarlowโs book that he admitted a precise definition is lacking. According to him, tourism practitioners are not sure who does what. Adding to the risk, travellers might not know the details of where they are, including the customs, language, and dangerous places. โFew travellers are professional travellers, but most con artists and thieves are highly adept at what they do.โ Tourists are easily victims; they are, to use the jargon, โsoft targetsโ. Tarlow admits that those working in tourism have traditionally avoided facing up to security for fear of frightening the tourists. Crimes and terror attacks do indeed put the visitors off for years. The reality after 9-11, Tarlow reports, is that tourists want to go where itโs safe.
This book, then, does pose questions to security people in tourist cities – which means much of the UK. Should they (and police) have special policies for tourists, even those not speaking English well? Should tourists be treated the same as locals, not only at the usual iconic venues such as the Tower of London, but in hotels, on buses and trains and at airports and in shops and restaurants, on university campuses for summer schools? Should tourists even be a category bothered about at all?! Where does security and safety of tourists end and good customer service begin? What can the tourism industry deliver, given that thereโs no such thing as 100 per cent security?
Some of the chapters are covered in other books; hotel security, risk and crisis management, and security in โpublic gathering placesโ for example. Some chapters are specific to tourism, such as cruise tourism security and safety issues (mass illness, terror risks from cruise liners as symbols of decadent western culture landing at Caribbean or South American ports). Tarlow is unable to give – cruise companies not saying much about – details of crime or violence against staff on cruises. Does a cruise have more or less crime than the equivalent thousand people would have on land? The book ends with four case studies from the Americas.
About the author: visit http://www.tourismandmore.com/people/peter-tarlow/
Tourism Security: Strategies for Effectively Managing Travel Risk and Safety, by Peter Tarlow. Published 2014, by Butterworth-Heinemann. ISBN: 9780 1241 15705. Online price ยฃ25.49, 312 pages. Visit www.elsevier.com.
