The seven sins of hunting tourism

Abstract

In a review of situational pressures on tourists, we identify seven sins or risk zones that induce moral disengagement and allow for behaviour that would be considered unethical by the same people when not on holiday. The context of hunting tourism reveals the following sins act cumulatively on the hunting tourist: “The Pay Effect”, “The Tourist Bubble”, “Last Chance Tourism”, “The Bucket List”, “When in Rome”, “The False Display”, and “The Saviour”. Identifying these sins and the way hunting tourists draw from them to neutralize eco-guilt are argued to be a first step on the call to set standards and practices within consumptive wildlife tourism consistent with the Precautionary Principle in tourism planning.

Highlights

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  Hunting tourism is inadvertently set up to induce moral disengagement among clients.

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  ‘Tourists behaving badly’ use various tropes to rationalize their conduct.

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  When in Rome, the Tourist Bubble and the Bucket List are some of these tropes.

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  A saviour narrative ‘kill 'em to save 'em’ neutralizes hunting tourists' eco-guilt.

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  The role of hunting tourism in the acceptance of hunting broadly is problematized.