By the turn of the twentieth century all the main characteristics of modern tourism were evident in embryo.
Changes in mental attitudes towards pleasure seeking, the recognised value of travel for education, increase in material wealth coupled with social prestige, a growing need to find relief for working routine, improvements in passenger transport systems-all these factors produced a fertile ground for the development of excursion traffic on a large scale.
Early Decades of Twentieth Century:
Pleasure travel continued to expand in the beginning of the century. However, up to the first quarter of the twentieth century travel including pleasure travel was essentially a luxury commodity within the reach of privileged sections of the society having both free time and considerable purchasing power.
The pleasure tourism had by now assumed a class and a charm of its own associated as it was with elegant luxurious hotels, Pullman coaches, and prestigious nostalgic long distance trains, such as the ‘Orient Express’ and the ‘Blue Riband’ and transatlantic liners like the ‘Queen Mary’.
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However, as stated earlier, only the few privileged could manage to indulge and afford such luxury. During this time also there appeared a number of associations, which enrolled members from among the embryonic middle and working classes and organised excursions, holiday camps, family rest and holiday homes for them.
This class of people had emerged as a result of increasing prosperity due to industrialization and urbanization. Not many people, however, benefited from such activities at that time.
World War-I:
World War I was responsible for a temporary halt to tourist movements. Tourism has always flourished in peace as it is a peace time activity. As such the war saw a considerable decline in tourist travel not only within Europe but also all over the world.
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However, soon after the war, travel soon reached pre-war peak levels, and within the next three to five years, greatly exceeded them. Early post-war period also brought in its wake prosperity coupled with large scale migration, and this period increased the demand for international travel.
Gradual development of the mass communication system like the radio and the press played an important role in increasing travel by way of widening knowledge and interest of a large number of people about other countries.
The post-war period also brought about attitudinal changes which were destined to influence the volume and nature of tourism. For example, the war was responsible for breaking down international barriers, resulting in the fostering of an ideal optimistic, peaceful internationalism-just the climate in which tourism is likely to flourish the most.
Post-World War-I Era:
Post-war era also saw a rise in the standard of living of working and middle classes in America and certain other countries in Europe. Soon after the war tourists began to appear in countries where tourism had been practically unknown a few years earlier.
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The major tourist countries enjoyed an unprecedented boom in the twenties. In the year 1929 there were nearly one and a half million visitors to Switzerland, over one million to Italy and about two million to Austria. France; Spain and Great Britain also received a considerable number of visitors.
Private Motor Vehicles:
The unprecedented boom in tourist movements in the twenties, especially in Europe and America, can be directly linked to the introduction of the private motor car. The motorized private and public road transport and the improved road conditions led to a tremendous growth of travel.
The invention of the private motor car and coach received its first great impetus in the ten years which preceded World War I. The motor car revolutionary’s holiday habits of the Europeans and Americans.
It became increasingly important in the pursuit of leisure and tourism. The provision of good motor roads and the road services were important factors in the development of both domestic and international tourism.
Introduction of Paid Holidays:
The concept of modern tourism emerged along with the introduction of holiday with pay. It was in the last quarter of the nineteenth century that increasing attention was paid to the desirability of holiday with pay and at least of cheap holidays for working class people.
This group had still largely failed to benefit from the new opportunities offered by rail travel. During this period a few factories gave paid holidays to their workers in some countries in the West.
The introduction of annual paid holidays is very largely of English origin and this had important repercussions on the development of mass tourism. The annual paid holiday was established during the inter-war years as a reality for a considerable part of the working population.
By the year 1939, in UK, some eleven million people were covered by the Holidays with Pay Act (1938).
Introduction of paid holiday had led to great mobility of the population, created new industries, resulted in the creation and growth of many towns of distinctive function and broadened the horizons of millions of people.
In fact, the introduction of paid holidays can truly be associated with the development of modern mass tourism
Trade Unions and Paid Holidays:
Modern tourism really of under way in the year 1936 when, at the instigation of its trade union representatives, the International Labour Organisation (ILO) adopted the first convention that was to support serious movements to promote paid holiday and, in turn, tourism.
That convention on paid holidays was an innovation well ahead of time, when only fourteen countries, mostly European, had enacted general legislation on paid holidays. Soon afterwards tourism experienced an extraordinary growth.
Paid holidays are now established all over the world, and in most countries a minimum duration of one to three weeks is specified either by law or by collective agreements, between the employer and the workers.
Longer Holiday Trend:
The right to paid holidays has universal recognition now. The trend is to grant longer holiday periods. The employers have realized that the paid holidays have not adversely affected industrial production.
The legal minimum in many countries at present is three weeks. Some countries have even gone beyond this and grant four weeks of paid holiday. Today it is recognised that in Western Europe the fifth week, even from the standpoint of output, may also be regarded as a productive investment.
Sweden has recently enacted legislation introducing this additional week of paid holidays. Worldwide, more than 500 million wage-earners are entitled to paid holidays.
Out of this number roughly half are in Europe, little less than 30 per cent in the Americas, and the rest in Asia and the Pacific. Presently the main potential for tourism markets is made up of wage-earners and their families.
As a result of economic and social changes due to further industrialization the world over and the rationalization of the tertiary sector; the number of wage earners in the world is bound to grow at a much faster rate than before.
This concept of paid holidays which originated with the advent of industrial action in the West has given modern tourism a tremendous boost.
Second World War:
The encouraging trend in tourism witnessed during the post world War period however, received a great setback as the Second World War intervened. As stated earlier, tourism and holiday- making on global as well as national scale is a manifestation of prosperity and peace.
It can occur on a large scale where a great majority of people enjoy prosperity and security. It is quite sensitive to world economic and political conditions. The Second World War, like World War I, brought in economic destruction and political instability-the two major deterrents to the growth of travel and tourism.
Post-Second World War Period:
The post-Second World War period brought in a rapid development of tourism. As the world began to settle down after the years of readjustments immediately after the war ended in the year 1945, there was remarkably rapid increase in both domestic as well as international tourism.
The United Nations reported that in the ten-year period between 1955 and 1965, the number of tourist arrivals in some sixty-five countries increased threefold from 51 million to over 157 million. This trend in the growth of international tourism continued till the mid-1960s.
It continued to be determined by the living standards in the developed countries. The widespread introduction of the holiday with pay to a large majority of people during this period was yet another important factor responsible for growth of tourist traffic. In the year 1976, there were nearly 220 million international tourist arrivals in the world.
This was an increase of more than 90 per cent over the year 1965. This was a period of intensive economic and technological development in most industrialized countries which had earlier suffered a great deal as a result of war.
Most of the developing countries during this period were also able to benefit from the growing trend in the developed countries to engage in tourism.
Tourism Economy:
Tourism and its development are closely interrelated to consumer s purchasing power on the one hand and peace and prosperity on the other. Any domestic or international economic fluctuations or political disturbances result in a temporary setback.
Tourism received a setback in the year 1974, when the world economy was seriously affected by the great energy crisis which occurred at the end of 1973. As a result of the energy crisis there occurred inflation which was responsible for lower purchasing power which in its wake had brought in a steep fall in tourist movements.
Tourism like all other sectors of production and consumption suffered the economic consequences of that crisis. As a result of efforts made by governments of industrialized and developing countries to keep inflation within acceptable limits, the tourism activity received a boost once again in the principal generating countries.
As a consequence, there was a resumption of international travel. Total international tourist arrivals in the year 1975 amounted to about 213 million. The international tourist arrivals in 1976 were estimated at between 218 and 222 million.
According to most recent estimates produced by the Secretariat General, World Tourism Organisation, international tourist arrivals in 2000 were estimated at 710 million.
The principal generating as well as receiving areas for international tourism continues to be Europe and North America accounting for 70 per cent and 20 per cent respectively of international tourist arrivals.
Air Transport:
The late twentieth century period can thus be termed as a period which is responsible for introducing a phenomenon called mass tourism’.
Although the enormous expansion of tourism has taken place primarily in the advanced industrialized countries, where tourism has become a part of the lifestyle and consumption pattern, it has also shown its might in the developing countries as well.
The key role of air transport has been a major factor in the growth of international tourism, especially in respect of long distance and inter-continental travel.
Although commercial travel was introduced even before the Second World-War, air transport for the masses has essentially been a post-Second World War phenomenon. The principal period of growth, however, has been post ‘ 1950’.
With the tremendous increase in speed, safety and comfort provided by the new civil aircrafts like Douglas DC-6s and DC-7s and Super-constellations, there was a noticeable increase in the long distance international as well as intra-regional tourism.
In the year 1952 the two-class travel introduced was made possible by the larger capacity of new aircrafts. The increase in the aircraft capacity was also responsible for lower air fares. The steady fall in the cost of flying also resulted in the increased traffic across the Atlantic.
This period also saw the first attempt to introduce a ‘package holiday’ around air transport which subsequently became the model for most of the present day’s global tourism.
Jet Technology and Tourism:
The most dramatic event which introduced an entirely new dimension of speed, comfort and efficiency to air transport and brought mass travel to its present level was the advent of the jet travel in the year 1958.
As a result of the entry of advanced jet aircraft in the civil aviation industry, air travel from the year 1960 onwards grew tremendously. Great advances have been made in the aircraft jet technology with the introduction of newer and sophisticated planes with emphasis on comfort, luxury, speed and safety.
New wide-body jets such as Boeing 747, the McDonnell Douglas DC 10, the Airbus A 300, the Lockheed Tri-Star L-1011 and the latest all-computerized ‘fly by wire’ Airbus A 320 are all part of the response to the requirements of the ever-growing travel market.
Added to all this technical brilliance of the supersonic aircraft like the Concorde and the Tupelo 144 have added glamour to the passenger aircraft industry. It will not be out of place to mention here that the international tourism as we know it today has been largely shaped by air travel.
Introduction of inclusive tours’ is yet another decisive development during this period responsible for mass tourism. In all ‘inclusive tours’ travelers are carried on charter flights at rates substantially below those of normal scheduled services.