Borders of Conflict as Tourist Attractions

Abstract

Border regions are often broadly connected with geopolitical disputes. While the potential for actual danger in frontier regions has little allure for most tourists, the excitement of visiting a politically controversial area appeals to many others. Many borders are integral parts of geopolitical tensions, conflict, and war, while most wars in recent years have had borders and contested national territory at the heart of the dispute. Borders of conflict as tourist attractions is connected to several familiar phenomena in tourism development, including dark tourism, war and battlefield tourism, danger zone tourism, heritage tourism, and political tourism. The author describes and analyzes the salient characteristics linking conflict areas and tourism attractions, as well as providing some insights and theories about the subject from the literature. The author includes references to the characteristics of tourism attractions in conflict areas and their classification according to their timeframe—present vs. past—in other words, border tourism attractions of present conflicts (such as the borders of North and South Korea, or Israel and Syria) versus conflict heritage sites of a past dispute that has become a heritage tourist attraction (e.g., the Iron Curtain borders in Europe).