International Tourism Crisis Analysis

Beeton (2001) says “ Crisis occurs at all levels of tourism operations with varying degree of severity, from much publicized environmental economic and political disasters through to internally generated crisis such as accidents and sudden illness”.

Crisis can negatively image to the reputation of an destination. Having the knowledge of this, yet a very little research has been conducted on this matter in the tourism industry. Like I mentioned earlier there has is no research based on Maldives although this is one of the most fragile countries in the world. Henderson (1999) states that “National Tourist Organizations with their responsibility for general destination marketing, research and development have an important role to play in the

But this is an incorrect assumption, which usually fails organizations in creating a communication strategic plan. Coombs (1999) also mentions that Crisis relies in the hand of stakeholders. If stakeholders believe there is an ongoing crisis than there is a crisis although the company denies it or if the company might have not realized it. Any event that gives the perception of a crisis to stakeholders is automatically a crisis. A automobile company Audi was informing there customers that there was nothing wrong in the transitional from neutral, with sudden acceleration resulted with injuries and deaths. Transparency of companies when communicating with their stakeholders does guarantee the reputation and the trust of stakeholders both primary and secondary stakeholders. Primary stakeholders consist of employees, investors, customers, suppliers, and the government. Secondary stakeholders include people who are affected or affect by the actions of the organization such as media, competitors and activist groups. There are also referred as influencers (Coombs,

Did they have any knowledge or have they had seen any signs and ignorance will be categorized under intention.

(3) Responsibility - This refers to the percentage of blame that should be attributed to the organization of a crisis. For instance If the company believes that they have no fault or if they are partly responsible it is best to build a case for the real intended party who actually is at fault. It is more effective to say we are not responsible, but “we know who is” rather than saying “we did not do it”

Therefore crisis communication needs to be standby at all times for any possible treat’s, with good honesty to defend interpretations of stakeholders and to make sure they build a case for why they are not responsible if they are not, and if they are to be ready with no further delay in slowing down the recovery stage. This will help maintain both primary and secondary stakeholders, keep up to the expectation of the stakeholders and maintain reputation of the