Sustainable Tourism in Europe

Nowadays, Europe represents about half of the global tourism exchange, it is assumed that it is more concerned about tourism industry than other continents; especially, those cities which are known to be among the most attractive touristic destinations. The main focus of this thesis is on a sample of 312 selected cities and their individual ways of shifting to a more sustainable tourism development. A study was created to examine and analyze the existence and the efficiency of particular strategies for sustainable tourism development. It investigated the three fundamental dimensions of sustainable tourism development, namely economic, environmental and social. It should also assess the efforts and actions to promote sustainable tourism which have been made by the municipal governments of the studied cities. For this reason, a grading system was developed in order to rank the investigated cities and to present the most successful one with regard to the establishment and promotion of sustainable tourism. Subsequently and on the basis of their desingned strategies and their realization of their set goals, the investigated European cities are categorised and evaluated according to the three aspects of sustainable tourism development.