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RESEARCH PRODUCT

Global warming and tourism: chronicles of apocalypse?

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PurposeGlobal warming is a huge challenge faced by the mankind in the twenty‐first century and beyond. The paradox of ecology lies in the pervasive attitude of lay people who overtly condemn pollution but do not alter their individual practices. Unfortunately, the scientific community has still not reached unanimous conclusions about the causes or impacts of global warming. To close this gap, the present paper aims to stimulate discussion in two main senses: the relationship between industry and global warming; and the role of tourism in the coming decades.Design/methodology/approachBased on reading and criticism of many works, this paper provides a conceptual framework for readers to understand social adjustment and adapting to climate change.FindingsMany sources blame the tourism industry as being one of the major contributors to global warming and want the industry to take proactive moves to help address this. The present analysis exerts considerable criticism over the existent literature that presents tourism as a vehicle towards mitigation of the greenhouse effect. Based on the theory of commons, the paradox of Giddens and the consuming life, the main thesis of this paper is that modernity has created a symbolic bubble that confers a certain security to viewers but transforms them in consumed objects.Originality/valueThe originality of this research lies in the assumption that global warming or climate change generates a paradox. As a form of cultural entertainment, ecology and global warming form (jointly to apocalypse theories of bottom days) a new way of enhancing the consumption, where tourism unfortunately does not seem to be an exception. The theatricalization of danger contributes to the creation of an underlying state of emergency that is seen but not recognized. As Hurricane Katrina and other disasters show, people only take a stance when the economic order is endangered. Global warming as a phenomenon was considered seriously only when international leaders envisaged the potential economic losses of its effects, and not before. Following this, the tragedy of commons, as Graham puts it, explains the reasons why well‐being can, under certain conditions, be a double‐edge sword.