Reinventing tourism: the Dubai phenomenon

Abstract

Purpose Dubai has been largely under-researched as a destination, particularly from a tourism perspective. Most current knowledge about the emirate tends to originate from broadcast media coverage, newspapers and business journals. Much of the recent academic research on the destination often positions Dubai in a broader development or management framework, resulting in what can be a narrow and largely western-oriented perspective that fails to highlight or identify many of the key issues underpinning its apparent success. Design/methodology/approach This research adopts an ethnographic approach based on the authors’ experiences in the destination and sets out to address this issue not only by presenting new information but also by analysing and explaining Dubai’s tourism development approach. Findings Some 40 years ago, Dubai was little more than a backwater tribal settlement, dependent on pearl fishing, trade and limited oil reserves. In 2018, it is now viewed as a futuristic city-state, rapidly expanding its global outreach and undertaking a range of high-profile development projects and acquisitions. The award of Expo 2020 has boosted government confidence in the sector with the Department of Tourism and Commerce Marketing planning to increase visitor numbers to 25 million by 2020 with an anticipated tripling of the associated economic benefit. However, despite its remarkable success, Dubai has been criticised for flying in the face of global sustainability trends and needs to think seriously about how it will manage the growth of its tourism industry. Originality/value Dubai has evolved to become one of the world’s leading tourism destinations, and it has done so despite our academic notions of sustainability, tourism planning, tourism resource requirements and demands for authenticity. This provides an opportunity for the authors to use Dubai as a vehicle through which to challenge these concepts and to move the established notions of “traditional” tourism thinking forward to acknowledge the value of alternative approaches to the creation of a tourism strategy.

Tourism policy and United Nations Sustainable Development Goal 16: peace and stability in the Middle East and North Africa

“…Despite recurrent periods of crisis, which have sometimes included armed conflict, many destinations have remained stable and tourism has become a feature of their Tourism and sustainable development development paths. The United Arab Emirates (UAE), for instance, has heavily invested in tourism to reduce their dependency on petrochemical production and to integrate their national economies into global circuits (Anthonisz and Mason, 2019;Hazbun, 2004;Morakabati, 2013). By 2030, destinations that feature high levels of political and civil unrest are predicted to account for almost 60% of international tourist arrivals, with many of those countries falling within the MENA region (Wendt, 2019).…”

Online Customer Reviews and Satisfaction with an Upscale Hotel: A Case Study of Atlantis, The Palm in Dubai

“…Dubai, the mysterious Arabian city, the intersection and trading hub of Europe, Africa, the Middle East, and Asia [1]. It has not just oil resources but also many tourism resources and attracts millions of travelers each year [2]. Statistics from the Dubai Annual Report 2019 showed 16.73 million visitors stayed overnight in Dubai in 2019.…”

“…During the COVID-19 pandemic period, with the dramatic decline of the international tourism market, Dubai still welcomed 5.51 million visitors [4]. It is a widely recognized fact that oil resources on the planet are limited; thus, the Dubai government is actively seeking new development sectors for its future, sustainable economic growth [2]. Tourism has become one of the major economic incomes for the local government in Dubai; according to the Dubai Annual Visitor Report 2019, the tourism sector contributed 11.5% in GDP by the end of the year 2019 [4].…”