Risk and Safety Challenges for Religious Tourism and Events

Travellers today face many challenges from risk and safety issues. Focusing in particular on risk and safety issues faced by visitors to holy sites, this book looks at the unique challenges raised, where annual religious festivals are commemorated with mass gatherings lasting for days and large crowds require detailed disaster management plans. Beginning with a general section on risk management, covering areas such as disaster management, terrorism, crime and security, the book then delves deeper into specific issues and challenges. It reviews important topics such as understanding the behaviour of crowds, how to perform a risk assessment for a sacred space, and travelling in what some would regard as an increasingly hostile world. Examining critically all risk and safety challenges in this area of management, the book: - Includes a full section of global case studies, as well as discussion questions for each chapter, encouraging readers to translate theory into good practice. - Offers critical thinking on risk, vulnerability and long-term development for mass gatherings. - Covers the importance of disaster management practices and offers practical advice for ensuring attendees' safety. Mitigating risk at mass gathering events and festivals is an area that still needs further research, but this book brings together current thought and provides a valuable reference for those studying religion, tourism and events, as well as event organizers, emergency and hospital services, and local authorities.

is editor in chief of International Journal of Safety and Security in Tourism (UP Argentina) and International Journal of Cyber Warfare and Terrorism (IGI-GlobalUS). Besides being Senior Researcher in the Department of Economics at University of Palermo, Argentina, he is a global affiliate of the Tourism Crisis Management Institute (University of Florida, US), the Centre for Ethnicity and Racism Studies (University of Leeds), The Forge (University of Lancaster and University of Leeds UK) and The International Society for Philosophers, hosted in Sheffield UK. With more than 700 published papers and 25 books, Korstanje was awarded as Outstanding Reviewer 2012, International Journal of Disaster Resilience in the Built Environment, University of Salford, UK; Outstanding Reviewer 2013, Journal of Place Management and Development, Institute of Place, Manchester Metropolitan University, UK and Reviewer Certificate of Acknowledgement 2014, International Journal of Contemporary Hospitality Management (IJCHM), University of Central Florida, US. Now he co-edits almost 10 specialized journals in such themes as human rights, mobility, tourism and terrorism. Korstanje is subject to biographical records for Marquis Who's Who in the World since 2009. He has been nominated for 5 honorary doctorates for his contribution in the study of the effects of terrorism in tourism. In 2015 he was awarded Visiting Research Fellow at the School of Sociology and Social Policy, University of Leeds, UK and the University of La Habana, Cuba. In 2017 he was elected as Foreign Faculty Member of AMIT, Mexican Academy in the study of Tourism, which is the most prominent institution dedicated to tourism research in Mexico. Now he works as an editorial advisory board member of Cambridge Scholar Publishing UK and IGI Global US.

Dr Razaq Raj is Principal Lecturer for Research and Enterprise in Leeds Business School. He is an internationally renowned academic with extensive experience in teaching, research, leadership and Managements in the UK, Malta, Portugal, Spain, Italy, Germany, China, Japan and South Korea. He is an Honorary Professor University of Vitez, Bosnia. He has published work on strategic management, economic and financial impacts, cultural festivals and sustainable tourism and religious tourism. He has both organised international conferences and delivered keynote speeches. He has published books on Religious Tourism and Pilgrimage Management and Events Management. He is founding co-editor of the Journal Religious Tourism and Pilgrimage and Series Editor, CABI Religious Tourism and Pilgrimage Book Series and Tourism and Society Book Series.

Alan Clarke currently works at the University of Pannonia, in Hungary and has had a significant role in establishing the English versions of the full undergraduate and Masters programmes. He has a wide range of research and consultancy experience in tourism planning, strategy and sustainable development. He has published widely in sustainable tourism, cultural heritage, community festivals and events, religious tourism and semiotic understandings of these developments. His current research focuses on aspects of governance and stakeholder involvement. He has adopted the Balaton and its cultures as a favourite place, warmed by the sun, refreshed by the waters and challenged to know more about the wines of the region.

Kevin Griffin is the Senior Lecturer in Tourism in the School of Hospitality Management and Tourism at Technological University Dublin. Kevin Griffin is the chairperson of the Institute for Religious Tourism and Pilgrimage which organises an annual conferences and manages a number of publication projects. He is also Editor-in-Chief for the TU Dublin published International Journal of Religious Tourism and Pilgrimage which is internationally recognised and ranked with SCOPUS and many other agencies. He is also Series Editor for the Religious Tourism and Pilgrimage Book Series. In more recent times Kevin has established two other international Open Access Journals for which he is also Editor-in-Chief: The International Journal of Tour Guiding Research and the International Journal of Islands Research.