Tourism Encounters in the City: Spatial and Social Interactions Between Mainland Chinese Visitors and Residents in Hong Kong

Abstract

Greater global mobility and the information boom will lead to higher levels of urban tourism demand. Encounters with people and engagements in space become the central part of urban tourism. The impacts of these encounters on the attitudes and mutual understanding between visitors and residents are not as simple as many thinks. This dissertation adds to the existing body of knowledge in several ways. It reveals the spatial heterogeneity of tourism encounters, the meaning of geographical contexts for tourism encounters, the impacts of tourism encounters on the attitudes and mutual understanding, and the role of geographical context and social distance in these impacts. The findings of this dissertation also have several practical and policy implications. Urban planners could select, develop and market ‘alternative’ and relatively unknown tourism facilities in less crowded suburban areas to spread the flow of visitors and possibly generate better quality of social interactions between visitors and residents across the city. A more effective strategy for dispersal would therefore be to brand subcentres for specific market segments. Policymakers could introduce some preferential policies to promote mutual understanding by increasing focused interactions for both visitors and residents but decreasing co-presence for residents. Yet the beneficial effects of tourism should not be overstated. A large initial social distance between the two populations will hamper the intensity and quality of the interactions, precluding their positive effects on mutual understanding.