CC BY
25
UDC327
DOI: 10.24411/1995-0411-2020-10303
Alexandra ^ KHATKEVICH
Lomonosov Moscow State University; Scientific-Educational Center "Professional" (Moscow, Russia)
Development Director; e-mail: [email protected]
YOUTH TOURISM AS AN INSTRUMENT OF PUBLIC AND CITIZEN DIPLOMACY: RUSSIAN AND FOREIGN EXPERIENCE
Abstract. Public diplomacy and citizen diplomacy are the trends of modern international relations. These are complex phenomena with a quite wide range of instruments. This article illustrates the relationship among youth tourism, public and citizen diplomacy, explores the intersection of the theoretical foundations of these phenomena, reveals their place in the conceptual and practical dimension of the foreign policy of Russia and several foreign countries. The article summarizes the experience in implementing projects related to various types of youth tourism, classifies such initiatives and systematizes information about them. As a result, the author made an attempt to identify the role of such projects in public and citizen diplomacy, to construct a conceptual model that demonstrates the mechanism of interaction between these phenomena, to evaluate the effectiveness and prospects of youth tourism in the context of public and citizen diplomacy.
Keywords: youth tourism, tourist industry, public diplomacy, citizen diplomacy, youth diplomacy, soft power.
Citation: Khatkevich, A. А. (2020). Youth tourism as an instrument of public and citizen diplomacy: Russian and foreign experience. Service and Tourism: Current Challenges, 14(3), 39-46. doi: 10.24411/19950411-2020-10303.
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Received 1 July 2020 No potential conflict of interest was reported by Accepted 28 August 2020_the author(s)._
© 2020 the Author(s)
This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY-SA 4.0). To view a copy of this license, visit https://creativecommons. org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/
УДК 327
DOI: 10.24411/1995-0411-2020-10303
ХАТКЕВИЧ Александра Анатольевна
Московский государственный университет имени М.В. Ломоносова; Научно-просветительский центр «Профессионал» (Москва, РФ); директор по развитию; e-mail: [email protected]
МОЛОДЁЖНЫЙ ТУРИЗМ КАК ИНСТРУМЕНТ ПУБЛИЧНОЙ И ГРАЖДАНСКОЙ ДИПЛОМАТИИ: РОССИЙСКИЙ И ЗАРУБЕЖНЫЙ ОПЫТ
Публичная дипломатия и гражданская дипломатия являются трендами современных международных отношений. Это комплексные явления с достаточно широким набором инструментов. В данной статье иллюстрируется связь между молодёжным туризмом, публичной дипломатией и гражданской дипломатией, исследуются аспекты пересечения теоретических оснований этих явлений, изучается их место в концептуальном и практическом измерении внешней политики России и нескольких зарубежных государств. В ходе работы был обобщён опыт реализации проектов, связанных с различными типами молодёжного туризма, была составлена классификация такого рода инициатив, систематизирована информация о них. В результате автором была предпринята попытка выявить роль таких проектов роль в осуществлении публичной и гражданской дипломатии, сконструировать концептуальную модель, демонстрирующую механизм взаимодействия данных явлений, оценить эффективность и перспективы развития молодёжного туризма в контексте публичной и гражданской дипломатии.
Ключевые слова: молодёжный туризм, индустрия туризма, публичная дипломатия, гражданская дипломатия, молодёжная дипломатия, мягкая сила.
Для цитирования: Хаткевич А.А. Молодёжный туризм как инструмент публичной и гражданской дипломатии: российский и зарубежный опыт // Современные проблемы сервиса и туризма. 2020. Т.14. №3. С. 39-46. DOI: 10.24411/1995-0411-2020-10303.
Дата поступления в редакцию: 1 июля 2020 г. Дата утверждения в печать: 27 августа 2020 г.
Introduction
A distinctive feature of modern international relations and world politics is in variety of actors and methods. This is a reason for appearance of new types of diplomacy with different specific instruments.
Soft power and smart power as a combination of soft and hard power strategies are two contemporary trends. As for youth tourism, nowadays many states and international organizations tend to focus on youth policy. The issue of this article is quite relevant due to these factors.
The of study is youth tourism, the subject of study is its significance for public diplomacy and citizen diplomacy. Novelty of the research is related with such a formulation of the research question. There are Russian and foreign studies devoted to youth tourism (Typologies of youth tourism by T. Demeter and G. Bratucu, Youth Tourism: Impacts on places from a consumer perspective by E. Blomgren and S. Ljungstrom), public diplomacy (Public relations and public diplomacy: Conceptual covergenc-es by B.H. Signitzer and T. Coombs) and citizen diplomacy (Breaking Barriers through Adventure Based Citizen Diplomacy by T. Woodward, Citizen Diplomacy in a Changing World by J. McDonald) separately. Nevertheless, there are not researches that consider these phenomena as interacting elements. Furthermore, in this article, there is an original classification of Russian and foreign projects which are related with youth tourism and impact on public and citizen diplomacy functioning.
The purpose of the article is to construct a conceptual model that demonstrates the mechanism of interaction between youth tourism, public diplomacy and citizen diplomacy. The objectives are:
• to study theoretical foundations of youth tourism, public diplomacy and citizen diplomacy;
• to figure out what points of intersection they have;
• to analyze Russian and foreign documents connected with tourism and foreign policy;
• to consider some projects that refer concurrently to youth tourism, public diplomacy and citizen diplomacy;
• to classify these instances;
• to create case studies of historic examples of similar mechanism functioning;
• to undertake SWOT-analysis of youth tourism in the context of public and citizen diplomacy.
The methods of this research are analysis, synthesis, systematization, generalization, classification, document analysis, case study, SWOT-analysis.
The phenomenon of youth tourism
Youth tourism is a crucial aspect of domestic and international tourism. Researchers ascertain that, according to statistics, "in the 1990's, it represented 15% of the tourism market, with it increasing to 20% in the last decade" within global tourism [18]. Importance and success of these sphere are noted by The World Tourism Organization (UNWTO). This organization's studies state that "young people rarely refrain from traveling because of political unrest, diseases and natural disasters and natural disaster", "young people are pioneers who open new interesting territories", "young travelers not only receive cultural benefits from travel, but also contribute to the development of places they visit" [18]. Key reasons of youth tourism popularity growth are "the growing range of individuals who might be considered to fall within the bounds of the 'youth' market", "increased participation in higher education, falling levels of youth unemployment and increased travel budgets through parental contributions, savings and combining work and travel" [12]. Additionally, current youth tourist market situation is related with "the rise of budget" or "low cost airlines" [12]. Experts stress that basic young travellers' motivation is "to explore other cultures, followed by experiencing excitement" [12].
It was often mentioned that nowadays travellers who are "between 15-29 years old" represent "two different market segmentations", Generation Y and Generation Z [6], according to Strauss — Howe generational theory. So-called millennials are "frequent, deal-driven travellers with a wide variety of interest" and the young tourists from the second group are "open minded, technologically cunning and budget orientated with the goal to complete a bucket list" [6].
R. Schonhammer considers "three forms of juvenile tourism: travel with the family; organized youth tourism; and, finally, unorganized youth tourism" [13]. This researcher concludes young European people "independently traveling through the European network of youth hostels and railways constitute, as described above, an international peer group that provides a feeling offamiliari-ty among a world of strangers", they "find this fascinating" [13].
G. Richards and J. Wilson remark that "young backpackers and other travellers often congregate in specific 'enclaves' which serve as the physical and psychological refuelling points for the modern global nomad" [12]. Many researchers distinguish terms tourist, traveller and backpacker. In the context of youth tourism, term backpacker has narrower sense than others. Backpacking means "the activity of travelling while carrying your clothes and other things that you need in a backpack, usually not spending very much money and staying in places that are not expensive"1. There is no doubt that this type of tourism is quite popular with young people.
We proceed to deal with another types of tourism which are linked with youth community and to study classification by T. Demeter and G. Bratucu (Dept. of Economic Sciences and Business Administration, Transilvania University of Bra§ov, Romania). The definition of educational tourism vary wide, and within this article it means student's activity connected with educational exchanges. Its purpose is "to improve the education process, to enrich the educational experiences by providing scholarships abroad, tourist packages that include camps, excursions, language classes for any level of knowledge, including training on certain fields <...> or on categories of interest" [8]. Volunteer tourism "has its roots in the early 20th century, when a Swiss businessman Pierre Ceresole, horrified by the aftermath of the First World War, established Service Civil International (SCI) as an organisation of volunteers that provided relief to those in need" [8]. Volunteer tourism "is often performed in developing countries by Western youth", that
1 Backpacking. Cambridge dictionary. URL: https://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/eng-lish/backpacking (Accessed on 13.06.2020).
is why "there will be inherent cross-cultural issues in the tourist experience" [16]. Work programmes provide young people with possibility to be "hired at a company in the host country" [8]. Cultural exchange usually takes place "between students, artist, and athletes, in addition to many other types of individuals and professionals who express interested in it", "between two or more different countries who are trying to promote the same, if not similar, understandings" [8]. Sport tourism is "travel which involves either observing or participating in a sporting event staying apart from their usual environment" [8]. Adventure tourism is "a type of tourism, involving exploration or travel with perceived (and possibly actual) risk, and potentially requiring specialized skills and physical exertion" [8]. The main feature of leisure tourism is in its "recreational" nature [8].
Thus, classifications of tourism in general sense and youth tourism are quite similar. In addition to types of youth tourism, which classification presented above consists of, we emphasize importance and relevance of scientific tourism and congress tourism which is close to business tourism, but it differs from it in many ways. Congress youth tourism is related with thematic and cross-cutting youth forums, summits, festivals. Participants can be not employed but interested in some spheres of activity.
All in all, youth tourism is complex concept that accumulates different thematic types of tourism. Nowadays there is a tendency of youth tourism popularity increase. Theoretical foundations of public diplomacy
Public diplomacy is one of the most significant elements of soft power conception. It is a tool of soft power. The term public diplomacy was offered in 1965 by Edmund Gullion [4]. This concept was improved by Joseph Nye, the creator of soft power conception. Nye categorized three dimensions of public diplomacy. Firstly, it is "daily communications, which involves explaining the context of domestic and foreign policy decisions" [11]. Secondly, actors of public diplomacy deal with "strategic communication, which develops a set of simple themes much as a political or advertising campaign does" [11]. Thirdly, it is worth to mention "the development of
lasting relationships with key individuals over many years through scholarships, exchanges, training, seminars, conferences, and access to media channels" [11].
Public diplomacy and nation branding are quite close, they have many common characteristics. However, there are essential differences. As an example, some experts state that "public diplomacy is rooted in conflicts" while nation branding is possible in "peaceful political environment" [15]. Besides, public diplomacy is linked with public relations [14].
Some researchers distinguish "two complementary communication frameworks" two theorize public diplomacy field. The first one is "information framework" that "focuses on the design and dissemination of messages to advance political objectives". The "relational framework" is connected with "education and cultural exchange programs, cultural institutes and cultural relations" [19].
Public diplomacy, therefore, is linked with tourism. So-called "daily communications" which aim is to explain "the context of domestic and foreign policy decisions" [11] can be supported through such channel as tourism, including youth tourism. What is more, exchanges which are the basis of educational, cultural, congress youth tourism act as one of public diplomacy pillars. A theoretical reflection on citizen diplomacy
Citizen diplomacy is a type of diplomacy which implies constructing "individual and collective global fluency" when "individuals from around the world have the ability to share information and ideas instantaneously and work together to resolve common challenges"2. Citizen Diplomacy by James Marshall can be considered as one of the first steps in citizen diplomacy theoretical reflection process. The author mentions such slogan as "open covenants openly arrived at" [9]. John McDonald describes citizen diplomacy as a "person to person, small group to small group", "dynamic", "risk-taking", "imaginative" interaction which "gets things done that governments are either afraid to do or don't want to have to do" [10]. Citizen diplomacy
2 Understanding Citizen Diplomacy. URL: https://www.centerforcitizendiplomacy.
org/about-us/understanding/ 15.06.2020).
(Accessed
is "broadly defined as the bringing together of professional, opinion leaders or other currently or potentially influential individuals from communities in conflict, without official representative status, to work together to understand better the dynamics underlying the conflict and how its transformation from violence (potential violence) to a collaborative process or peace building and sustainable development might be promoted" [7].
In the United States of America, for instance, citizen diplomacy conception is related with Multi-Track Diplomacy system. Sometimes citizen diplomacy is associated with so-called Track Two Diplomacy which is related with non-governmental sector. The authors of the conception supplement Track Two with "the role of business", "people exchanges", "training, education and research in the field of peacebuilding", "people power, or peace activism", "religion", "money" [12].
Citizen diplomats sometimes use such methods of official diplomacy as official visits, high-level negotiations, bilateral and multilateral agreements. There are also some special methods. For example, unofficial visits, congresses, conferences, participation in the work of international organizations with deliberative vote, solidarity actions, protest actions take place [3]. Several of these event types can be attributed to business tourism, in particular, to youth business tourism. Many representatives of youth community take part in the international youth forums, summits, conferences, including those which are initiated by regional and transregional organizations.
It needs to be mentioned "the lack of standardized measurement methods" of citizen diplomacy mechanisms' effectiveness is a challenge for researchers caused by "variety of citizen diplomacy programs" which have "different missions, ranging from language study to cultural exchange to economic development" [5]. The most remarkable vectors of citizen diplomacy, according to some researches, are "High School Exchange Programs", "Postsecondary Exchange and Study Abroad Programs", "International Volunteer Programs", "Professional and Leadership Exchange Programs" [5]. So, we can see that this activity directions can pretend to be ways of
on
citizen diplomacy realization. Moreover, they can be considered as aspects of youth educational and volunteer tourism.
So, citizen diplomacy conceptual framework coincides with youth tourism conceptual framework. They have a few intersection points. This state of affairs allows us to reason about common context of youth tourism and citizen diplomacy existence and development.
Youth tourism in the context of Russian public and citizen diplomacy
In this article, there are presented results of document analysis and case studies devoted to issue of youth tourism as an instrument of Russian public and citizen diplomacy. As an example, consider Tourism development strategy in Russia until 2035. Within the text of this document, youth tourism is defined as an activity of people in the age from 18 to 35. One of the priorities, according to this document, is to promote tourist culture among youth. Sections connected with business and scientific tourism are also included into the strategy. In Foreign Policy Concept of the Russian Federation soft power "tools offered by civil society, as well as various methods and technologies - from information and communication, to humanitarian and other types" are characterized as useful "addition to traditional methods of diplomacy"3.
A notable historic case appears in article Breaking Barriers through Adventure Based Citizen Diplomacy (1991) by Ted Woodward. The author mentions Samantha Smith Peace Program which "hosted many young Soviets" [17]. Samantha Smith's case is a unique phenomenon in the history of international relations and diplomacy. It is a brilliant illustration of the connection between citizen diplomacy, public diplomacy and tourism. Letter sent in 1982 by Samantha Smith, American school student from Maine, to Yuri Andropov, leader of the Soviet Union, caused a great resonance as an example of citizen diplomacy. Fact that Andropov decided to invite Samantha to the
3 Foreign Policy Concept of the Russian Federation (approved by President of the Russian Federation Vladimir Putin on November 30, 2016). URL: https://www.mid.ru/foreign_policy/offi-cial_documents/-/asset_publisher/CptICkB6BZ29/ content/id/2542248?p_p_id = 101_INSTANCE_Cp-tICkB6BZ29&_101_INSTANCE_CptICkB6BZ29_ languageId=en_GB (Accessed on 17.06.2020).
Soviet Union can be can be interpreted as an act of public diplomacy because the aim of this step was to demonstrate peaceful intentions of the USSR, and to inform foreign audience of Soviet people's lifestyle, values and mentality. Samantha visited Moscow, Leningrad, Artek camp. The world's media spotlight was on this trip. Then Samantha Smith Foundation founded in honor of "America's youngest ambassador for peace" organized "visits for children, mainly between the ages of 11 and 16, to and from the Soviet Union and its successor states"4. It is an instance of citizen diplomacy project because it was initiated by non-governmental non-profit organization.
Modern Russian experience in these sphere can be divided into several groups of examples. The first group consists of international events for talented youth, for instance, Management Forum Altai. Points of Growth, Youth Forum Eurasia Global, Youth Forum Baltic Artek. Such platforms of communication are organized by state and non-governmental actors. Young people from Russia, from near and far abroad who are involved into these events have an opportunity to visit different Russian areas and to be acquainted with their authentic culture. Some of these areas are attractive tourist destinations (Altai Krai, Kaliningrad Region), but others are not so popular (Orenburg Region). All these examples refer both to congress and cultural tourism.
The second group is connected with youth formats of international organization's meetings and other important international events. Two BRICS Youth Energy Agency Summits were held in MGIMO University (Moscow, Russia), BRICS Youth Summit - 2015 was held in Kazan and Moscow. Forums of Young Leaders of the BRICS and SCO countries was held in Ufa (2015) and Stavropol (2019). Moscow hosted Forum of Young Leaders of the Eurasian Economic Union. St. Petersburg International Economic Forum and Krasnoyarsk Economic Forum also have youth sections. These instances can be interpreted as parts of congress and cultural tourism too because of cultural programme within such events.
The third group comprises participating of foreign volunteers in various large-scale
4 The Samantha Smith Foundation. URL: https://www.samanthasmith.info/index.php/foun-dation/foundation (Accessed on 17.06.2020).
events hosting by Russia. Prime examples of such events are Spasskaya Tower festival, the 19th World Festival of Youth and Students (Sochi, 2017), the XXII Olympic Winter Games (Sochi, 2014), the 2018 FIFA World Cup, XXVII Summer Universiade (Kazan, 2013), XXIX Winter Universiade (Krasnoyarsk, 2019).
The fourth group is devoted to educational youth tourism. In Russia, there annual summer schools, workshops take place. Russian language summer schools are popular. They are regularly organized by Immanuel Kant Baltic Federal University, Kazan Federal University, Siberian Federal University, Novosibirsk State University, Tomsk Polytechnic University, Lobachevsky State University of Nizhni Novgorod, ITMO University.
The fifth group is represented by instances of scientific youth tourism. In this case we mean international conferences, round-table discussions for students and young scientists. Many of them presuppose an excursion program for foreigners.
So, this is an overall picture of Russian youth inbound tourism market segments. All of them tend to set mechanism of soft power in motion. They actualize soft power potential of the country expressed in its daily political practice and values, culture, science and education.
The connection between youth tourism and public and citizen diplomacy in some countries' foreign policies
As for foreign experience of application of youth tourism in the sphere of public diplomacy and citizen diplomacy, European case is noteworthy. International Youth Hostel Federation was founded in 1932 in Amsterdam, and primarily European countries joined it [2]. International Student Travel Confederation was founded in 1949. Its establishing was initiated by United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO). International Student Idenity Card (ISIC) was founded in 1955. It can be assumed that these projects aimed an creation of useful network for youth travel in some degree laid the groundwork for European integration. Eurotrain Association also tend to offer discounts for students within European space [2]. So, it can be concluded that contemporary spirit of unity Europe partly owe its origin to instruments of public
and citizen diplomacy, in particular the above youth tourism programs.
Hallyu tourism is a remarkable phenomenon of Asian youth tourism market. It is a part of so-called Korean wave [1]. This specific kind of tourism is related with promoting Korean popular culture abroad and within excursions for inbound tourists. The main target group in this case is youth.
In the text of U.S. National Travel & Tourism Strategy (Task Force on Travel & Competitiveness), there is a provision that "international visitors have a positive experience in America", tourism acts as "an essential component" of U.S. public diplomacy and foreign policy"5.
As well as Russia, foreign countries host forums for gifted young people, young leaders, youth discussion platforms within summits of regional and transregional international organizations, scientific conferences, summer schools, university exchange programs. The mechanisms of inbound youth tourism impact on public and citizen diplomacy success are similar enough in Russia and abroad.
Conclusion In conclusion, it needs to evaluate prospects of youth tourism in the context of public diplomacy and citizen diplomacy. The results of the SWOT-analysis are presented in the Table 1.
Table 1. SWOT-analysis of youth tourism in the context of public diplomacy and citizen diplomacy
Strengths - Successful experience - Deeply-rooted character Opportunities - Establishing governmental or non-governmental structures responsible for youth tourism in countries throughout the world - Creating specific roots for different target groups within young foreigners
Weaknesses - Weak conceptualization at the state level - Insufficient level of theoritization which cause lack of described functioning models Threats - Force majeure - Border closures connected with force majeure circumstances
Taking into consideration the above-mentioned, we can construct a certain conceptual
5 National Travel & Tourism Strategy (Task Force on Travel & Competitiveness). URL: https://travel. trade.gov/pdf/national-travel-and-tourism-strate-gy.pdf (Accessed on 17.06.2020).
model. Inbound youth tourism can be divided into types different types. Some of these types are related with culture heritage of country, its education system, science, congress activity translating political and social values. These points are the resources of soft power which is usually realized through public diplomacy and
citizen diplomacy. The actors of public diplomacy and citizen diplomacy are state and non-governmental structures, non-profit organizations and business sector. Tourist business is undoubtedly involved in these processes. So, youth tourism acts as a tool to implement public diplomacy, citizen diplomacy and youth diplomacy.
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