88371 - Tourism and Local Development

Learning outcomes

The purpose of the first part of this course is to enable students to rigorously apply appropriate evaluation and decision-making methodologies (e.g., Cost Effectiveness Analysis, Multi-Criteria Analysis, Threshold Analysis, Cost-Benefit Analysis) to sustainable development projects in the tourism sector. In particular, as regards evaluation methods where decisions have marginal impacts in a non-competitive market, theories and applications will be shown in case of tradable and non-tradable resources: in the sub-case of tradable resources, the concept of shadow exchange rate will be introduced; while in the sub-case of non-tradable resources, the concepts of willingness to pay and opportunity costs will be discussed. Evaluation methods where decisions have non-marginal impacts will also be presented. As regards evaluation methods where there is no market, both production approaches (e.g., response method, replacement cost, opportunity cost, preventive cost) and utility approaches (e.g., revealed preferences and stated preferences) will be discussed. Students will also be taught recent theories and applications of decision-making methods under uncertainty or risk, time spans, space interactions, indirect effects, and distributive effects.

Course contents

The purpose of this course is to present the main environmental ethics in terms of duties and rights in the relationships between humans and between humans and nature. The main sustainability paradigms (i.e., weak sustainability, a-growth, de-growth, strong sustainability, linear economy, circular economy) will be discussed in terms of the environmental ethics which characterize them. The main assessment and decision methodologies (i.e., Cost-Benefit Analysis, Multi-Criterion Analysis, Life-Cycle Assessment) will be presented in terms of the sustainability paradigms which typify them. The structure of this course can be summarized as follows:

• Environmental Ethics
• Environmental Sustainability
• Decisions about Environmental Investment Projects
  • Cost–Benefit Analysis for Decisions to Efficiency
  • Multi-criteria Analysis for Decisions to Equity
  • Life-Cycle Assessment for Decisions to Efficiency and Equity
• Environmental Ethics, Sustainability and Decisions in tourism contexts

Readings/Bibliography

Zagonari, F. (2022) Environmental Ethics, Sustainability and Decisions: Literature Problems and Suggested Solutions, Springer, Heidelberg

Zagonari, F. (2020) Environmental sustainability is not worth pursuing unless it is achieved for ethical reasons, Nature – Humanities and Social Sciences Communications

Zagonari, F. (2019) Multi-Criteria, Cost-Benefit, and Life-Cycle Analyses for Decision-Making to Support Responsible, Sustainable, and Alternative Tourism, Sustainability 11: 1038-1073

Teaching methods

Together with traditional academic lectures, workshops will be organized where each student will present an assigned scientific article from the recent literature, with a subsequent classroom discussion.

Assessment methods

Written examination, 90 minutes long and based on 3 open questions. Notes or other materials are not allowed.

Students can reject the grade obtained at the exam once. To this end, he/she must email a request to the instructor within the date set for registration. The instructor will confirm reception of the request within the same date.

Office hours

See the website of Fabio Zagonari