Abstract
Cultural tourism is the subset of tourism concerned with countries or regions’ culture, religions, history of the people and their lifestyle in their geographical areas, art, architecture and rural elements which have shaped their way of life. According to the European Union, tourism, especially cultural tourism has become recognized as an important agent of economic and social change in Europe. Cultural tourism market in Europe has become increasingly competitive. A growing number of cities and regions in the EU have based their tourism development strategies on the promotion of cultural heritage attractions. The present study was designed in five parts to determine the evaluation of Iran cultural tourism in Jolfa Region based on the EU tourism policies. The first part investigates conceptual framework of cultural tourism. Then, the significance of the European Union cultural tourism and their policies is elucidated. The later parts present that Jolfa Region the northern border of Iran which is introduced as a Free Trade Zone will be verified due to the cultural tourism potential based on the region’s historical architecture and events, landscape values and economic potential. Finally, this paper brings some suggestions in line with European countries’ experiences to improve Iran’s cultural tourism such as establishing its own cultural rout or pilgrimage way, maritime tourism, religious tour and traditional music festival.
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- 1.
It could be looked at the article of Tighe (1986) “The Arts/Tourism Partnership” to see the previous scopes of cultural tourism.
- 2.
Tourism merited the attention of legislators for the first time in Maastricht Treaty (1992) with article 3 “measures in the spheres of energy, civil protection and tourism” in 1992. Lisbon Treaty (2007) enacts tourism with article 2E “The Union shall have competence to carry out actions to support, coordinate or supplement the actions of the Member States. The areas of such action shall, at European level, be: … (d) tourism …” and Article 176 B “1. The Union shall complement the action of the Member States in the tourism sector, in particular by promoting the competitiveness of Union undertakings in that sector. To that end, Union action shall be aimed at: (a) encouraging the creation of a favourable environment for the development of undertakings in this sector; (b) promoting cooperation between the Member States, particularly by the exchange of good practice. 2. The European Parliament and the Council, acting in accordance with the ordinary legislative procedure, shall establish specific measures to complement actions within the Member States to achieve the objectives referred to in this Article, excluding any harmonisation of the laws and regulations of the Member States”.
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Mikaeili, M., Aytuğ, H.K. (2019). Evaluation of Iran’s Cultural Tourism Potential from the European Union Perspective: Jolfa Region. In: Stankov, U., Boemi, SN., Attia, S., Kostopoulou, S., Mohareb, N. (eds) Cultural Sustainable Tourism. Advances in Science, Technology & Innovation. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-10804-5_12
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