Terrorism and International Tourism: The Case of Germany

Abstract

Summary We analyse how German tourists react to unanticipated shocks that alter their risk perception of selected tourism destinations. Using a difference-in-difference strategy which flexibly accounts for macroeconomic conditions and also addresses potential problems of serial correlation, we isolate significant effects of the 9/11 (2001) terrorist attacks, as well as for the attacks in Egypt (1997), Tunisia (2002), Morocco (2003) and Indonesia (2003). These terror attacks impacted especially on Islamic countries all over the world, indicating a transmission mechanism driven by ethnic and religious proximity. At the same time, tourism into Islamic countries was temporarily substituted by tourism to (south) European countries.

The influence of terrorism in tourism arrivals: A longitudinal approach in a Mediterranean country

“…Tourists choose destinations perceived as safer instead of places they see as potential terrorist targets, as stated in previous studies (e.g. Ahlfeldt et al, 2015;Araña & León, 2008;Bonham et al, 2006;Drakos & Kutan, 2003;Enders et al, 1992;Enders & Sandler, 1991;Gu & Martin, 1992;Neumayer, 2004;Neumayer & Plümper, 2016;Yaya, 2009). Secondly, it was possible to confirm the existence of a one-year consumer short memory effect.…”

“…A study dealing with the reactions of German tourists to unanticipated shocks and the respective impacts on risk perception and tourism destination selection analyzed several terrorism episodes: 9/11 (2001), Egypt (1997), Tunisia (2002), Morocco (2003) and Indonesia (2003). The findings proved that those shocks heavily affected Islamic countries and provided a temporary substitution effect in favor of (Southern) European countries (Ahlfeldt, Franke, & Maennig, 2015). Neumayer and Plümper (2016) apply a model to explain tourists' arrivals using a lagged dependent variable and other lagged independent variables representing terrorist attacks proxies.…”

The tourism-led terrorism hypothesis – evidence from Italy, Spain, UK, Germany and Turkey

“…In addition to the fact that each country has its own distinctiveness, the influence of terrorism varies, depending on whether it is a rich, large and diversified economy, or a small, poor and more specialized economy (Bandyopadhyay et al, 2015). The major difference from the already mentioned (Goldman & Neubauer-Shani, 2017) research is seen in the fact that this work did not separate domestic and international terrorism (Ahlfeldt et al, 2015;Buigut & Amendah, 2016), but it used aggregate terrorism incidents. The reason for this is that the image of a safe destination builds on an overall stability in the country, not just the influence of domestic or international terrorism (Arana & León, 2008;Johnny & Jordan, 2007).…”

“…To illustrate, it takes 13 months for tourism to recover from a terrorist attack, while it takes 21 months to recover from a disease, 24 months to recover from an environmental disaster and 27 months to recover from political unrest (Zillman, 2015). In their research of tourism and terrorism, scholars applied a qualitative (Fuchs et al, 2013;Korstanje & Clayton, 2012;Morakabati & Kapuscinski, 2016;Paraskevas & Arendell, 2007;Wolff & Larsen, 2014) and a quantitative approach (Ahlfeldt et al, 2015;Buigut & Amendah, 2016;Enders & Sandler, 1991;Fielding & Shortland, 2011;Masinde et al, 2016;Raza & Jawaid, 2013).…”

“…The partial interaction effects of political instability and terrorism showed that political instability has a negative impact on tourism at higher terrorism risk levels, but the impact of terrorism provides some opposite results at a low and high level of political instability. Ahlfeldt et al, (2015) analysed how German tourists react to unanticipated shocks that alter their risk perception of selected tourism destinations. Authors used a difference-in-difference approach to examine changes in tourism behaviour following 9/11 (2001), terror attacks in Egypt (1997), Tunisia (2002), Morocco (2003) and Indonesia (2003).…”