Social and Cultural Negative Impacts of Tourism in Turkey

Advocates defines tourism as the activities of persons travelling to and staying in places outside their usual environment for not more than one consecutive year for leisure, business and other purposes not related to the exercise of an activity remunerated from within the place visited and also refers to the sector of the national economy with complex functions that unites a number of goods and services, offer for consumption to those people. (IFTTA) 2.2 Interaction between host and the guest Tourism is mostly interaction between two different cultures and international people. Tourists as the guests and local community as the hosts are affecting each other also the destination in negative or positive ways. (David Weaver, Laura Lawton-2002) The characteristics, aspects, attribution and the quality of residents are altered by consequences of the development process when a community becomes target destination for tourism. The success and the maximized benefit depend on the attraction and service quality. Therefore the hospitality and cooperation of local residents are required.

It is essential to comprehend host reactions and the elements that influence these attitudes in order to achieve the objective of positive, approvable and friendly support for tourism development. Residents’ assistance to tourism industry is modified, increase or decrease by the level of concern, socio-cultural preciousness, appreciable costs and benefits, of industry’s development. That is to say it is cited “since tourism relies heavily upon the goodwill of local residents, their support is essential for its development, successful operation and sustainability”. (Gürsoy, Uysal, Jurowski-2001) 2.2.1 Community perception and attitude “Heightened tension and community divisiveness can occur over tourism development, pitting tourism supporters against non-supporters. Also, tension between residents and tourists can occur. People will often feel stressed over the new, increasingly hectic community and personal pace of life.

They may claim the result is no better than before or perhaps even worse. Where culture is part of tourist attractions, over-amplification of cultural traits and creation of new cultural traits to satisfy tourist tastes may create a phony culture. Residents may experience a sense of exclusion and alienation over planning and development concerns.” (Glenn Kraig-2001) Residents can feel threatened that they are not in control of the tourism development and its’ impacts on society. When foreign business sources starts to take control on local development and investment, residents feel that the community is being abused. ( Glenn Kraig-2001) 2.2.2 Negative Impact of Tourism Social conflicts Displacement of residents for tourism development Crowding, noise, congestion Traditional deviation and denial, negative changes on values and customs Changes in individual behaviour, moral values, family values Materialization Crime, gambling, alcoholism, increased underage drinking, drugs, prostitution Tax and local service problems Employment based problems Dependency on tourism.

Some of the impacts need to be investigated further; Overcrowding and congestion, exceeding area capacity cause stress, mostly disruption between businesses interacting with tourism industry. “In Turkey; it is traditional to be hospitable and welcoming towards guests, when this is exploited by tour operators and excessive numbers, many feel their privacy and life style is invaded and become hostile or start seeing tourists purely as an element of economic gain.” ( Aylin Orbasli ‘ 2000) During the tourism process crime rates increase, illegal activities occur more in the destination. In the relaxed atmosphere, mostly in areas which is at the seaside excessive drinking, underage drinking problems happen mostly in areas which are at the seaside. 2.2.2.3 Tax and Local Service problems More taxation carried out to the property residents to expand local services. Due to the competition with tourist interest services forced out and relocated. Problems occur such as supply, water, power, fuel shortages.

2.2.2.4 Employment problems Local residents do not want to be a part of tourism sector and think the industry is unreliable because of companies do not employ their staff for full time. Most of the people work in the high season for 4 or 5 months which called high season. When the season is over their contract finishes and become unemployed. In addition to this new employment opportunity attracts people who are not locals which causes new socio-cultural problems. This new also creates a problem such as cheap labouring which damages the service quality and local support. (Cevat Tosun-2001) 2.2.2.5 Traditional values and customs problems The traditional and local values are used as marketing tools and strategies to help the revenue flow and maximise the influx of foreign currency. Cultural values used this way is being loses its authenticity and value. Progressive changes occur in communities’ values, beliefs. Overtime it may become difficult to rebuild this authenticity, traditions and values again. 2.3 Mass Tourism

2.3.1 Negative impact of mass tourism Mass tourism was mostly accepted by most countries in the late 1990’s before the tourism industry began searching for alternative types of tourism to have a bigger piece of economic benefit in the competition. In addition the types and variety of tourism products, there were new ideas expressed on how to minimise the costs and negative impacts of mass tourism have on harming the culture, socio-economic and environmental life. It is emphasized that mass tourism is a large scale type of tourism which has bigger negative impacts. However the demand was; alternative type is a small scaled type of tourism which is much more effective on cultural, historical, environmental and economic benefits on long terms.(Aydın-Boz-2007) 2.3.2 Serious social problems Leading hosts and tourists to new cultural exchange excitements, economical benefits also it may lead to decrease in moral values, invokes use of alcohol and drugs; increase crime rates, stress and tension in the community.

With the rapid development, human relations become commercialised in the community while social and cultural interactions start to lose their importance. In relatively small tourism destinations, crowd and rising population cause pollution and congestion especially in the summer season which is the high season limits the public places such as beaches, parks, gardens as well as local services from the residents. In result negative attitude towards tourists occurs. 2.4 Political and residential conflict in Turkey: In Turkey, decision-makers of the tourism industry are concealing the negative impact of tourism from local communities because of the excessive need of foreign currency; politicians are unaware or are simply ignoring the situation due to maximum gain of earnings. It is a vital mistake to uninform locals but to inform and co-operate with them and gain their support will bring the maximum performance and decrease the negative effects of tourism. (Cevat Tosun-2001) It is essential to identify the sources of negative problems that cause the impacts to analyze how they affect the cultural exchange between tourist and community.

It is simple just to name the problems which don’t give any solutions. Impacts can occur in two ways. First is destination factor and second is guest factor. (Glenn Kraig-2002) 2.5.1Destination factor Destination itself is a big part of the factor as looked as a whole. If categorisations are defined, those will be local carting capacity, travel circulation, management and strength of the host. 2.5.2Guest factor Tourists travel to a destination not only themselves they also bring their distinctive characteristics, socio-cultural differences and amount of the visitors. 3.0 Conclusion 4.0 Recommendations The development and investment needs a source for capital. Mostly, residents can’t provide this capital, which leads foreign sources to demonstrate this role and invest. This situation doesn’t give residents an active role in business. The solution to this dilemma is to give suitable missions and encourage hosts so that they can be a part of the industry. (Tosun-2001)

4.2 Make sustainable tourism strategies Additional attention should be shown to cultural, historical, social and political realities and tourism development should be treated as more rather than a technical engineering exercise, if this is done sustainable tourism development should increase equal opportunity throughout the country and decrease the absolute poverty rate in local tourist destinations 4.3 Measure-Plan-Manage 4.4Limit the carrying capacity It is important to keep the numbers and limits of the carrying capacity at a destination not to exceed and felt by the host community also it is important not to let these effects felt by tourists. The destination always takes in but can’t handle above limits. 4.5 Organise forums and surveys Authenticated, indorsed developments and plans should be confirmed, opinions of the residents and tourists should be collected with forums and surveys before the approval. 4.6 Alternate tourism products and destinations 4.7 Inform hosts and tourists Residents and tourists must be informed on social differences, cultural exchange and importance of tourism values which prevents crime, moral conflicts.