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Laws, regulations, and policies, including specific intergovernmental visa agreements, exert significant influences on people’s mobility and cross-border travels. Such forces are powerful in shaping the emerging Asian tourism market. This chapter provides a critical review and analysis of the laws and regulations that have shaped Chinese outbound tourism. It first reviews the evolution of China’s policies and government attitude toward outbound tourism. The three tourism administration regulations promulgated by the State Council are then reviewed and their implications for outbound tourism are discussed. The Tourism Law enacted in 2013 is reviewed and discussed separately due to its significance and supreme power in China’s legal system. Finally, the chapter discusses the impact of intergovernmental visa facilitation arrangements on Chinese outbound tourism.

This introductory chapter defines and notes the development of tourism out of Asia as a new force in global human communication. The complexities and some efficiencies in defining Asia are reviewed. The chapter considers dispersal patterns from a number of Asian countries and notes the chief destinations as provided by current statistical counts. Key issues arising from attempts to interpret these data are noted. The importance of out of Asia tourists is confirmed through the material presented. The visibility of Asian tourists is considered and the subtleties of recognizing intra-Asian differences are noted. Some select theoretical approaches focussing on societies in contact are introduced. These theories offer pathways to bring academic and managerial insights to this evolving phenomenon.

This chapter reviews the institutional seasonality phenomenon in Asian outbound tourism. Eight key Asian countries were selected for investigation. Secondary data and archives from official tourism authorities and government reports are used as the information sources for the holiday systems and the celebrations for the cultural festivals. Four categories of holidays shaping the outbound seasonality patterns (universal holidays based on Gregorian calendar, Chinese culture-based holidays, religious festivals, and school holidays) are identified across the eight countries. Particular observances for those key cultural and religious holidays are highlighted. The opportunities and challenges for destination managers and tourism businesses to capitalize on and support peak outbound Asian seasonality are discussed.

The purpose of this paper is to explore what attracts individuals to live in a South East Asian city. It uses a boundaryless career approach that is interested in how people cross-traditional career boundaries, including those related to country and location barriers. Going beyond an individual and organizational view, a more extensive model of location decisions is developed that incorporates broad macro-factor career drivers.

A large-scale qualitative study explored individual, organizational, political, economic, socio-cultural, technological, ecological, legal, natural and general drivers to live in the city. The authors interviewed 43 individuals who had moved to the city from abroad, were born in the city and still lived there or who were born in the city but had moved to another foreign city.

Many macro-contextual factors – i.e. day-to-day regulatory stability and transparency, economic growth, friendliness and meritocracy, safety and a good, clean environment – were seen as attractive by all three groups. People who had left the city raised some specific criticism regarding the vibrancy, freedom and creativity of thought.

The study focused on highly skilled individuals who most often had experience in living in different cities to get more reflective views. However, this restricted the generalizability. The findings nuance the understanding of boundaryless careers.

The research expands the normally used attraction factors and develops a broader framework of city attractiveness drivers. The emerging picture can be used by the city administration to manage its global attractiveness while increasing non-regulatory “stickiness” to retain talent.

The research has social implications with respect to cross-border boundaryless careers and talent acquisition, management and retention strategies.

The research expands the macro-contextual discussion and goes beyond the dominant focus on individuals and organizations when investigating boundaryless careers. The study uses an innovative method as it does not only interview foreign expatriates but also two further, more neglected groups: local citizens and individuals who had left the city. It develops an extended model of boundaryless location drivers and develops some exemplary propositions.

This paper aims to identify the changes of researched destinations along with the Approved Destination Status scheme to investigate the development of research problems, and to track the changes of research topics in the context of the development of China’s outbound tourism. The research methods and applied theories are also identified and analyzed.

Three large databases, namely, ScienceDirect, EBSCOhost and Google Scholar, were selected to search for published articles (i.e. 107 empirical articles and 15 review/policy articles) related to China’s outbound tourism. Thereafter, the retrieved articles were categorized and analyzed. Finally, a theoretical framework was provided for future studies on China’s outbound tourism.

The major findings indicated that the main topics related to China’s outbound tourism included market segmentation, travel motivation and travel behavior. One or two theories are generally applied to investigate a certain topic. The most common research methods are interviews and a questionnaire survey.

Future studies are suggested to apply more theories to investigate one topic. A single theory can also be applied to investigate different topics. Adopting different and innovative research methods, such as online interaction observation, can also be considered.

This study contributes to the literature through an in-depth qualitative assessment of China’s outbound tourism literature, comparing researched destinations with the Approved Destination Status policies, and reviewing articles based on research.

This paper aims to explore the rationale for the theme issue question “Services management and the growing number of Asian travellers – what needs re-thinking?” and profile the theme issue.

This paper explains the approach taken to investigate and respond to aspects of the theme issue question and the specific contribution of each article in the theme issue collection.

This paper identifies a number of action points arising from the theme issue which are discussed in the final article: Conclusion: What needs re-thinking in services management in the dawning age of Asian travellers?

There are very few articles that address the implications of rapidly growing outbound Asian travel for services management; so, this theme issue provides a significant step forward, with implications for both academics and practitioners.

The purpose of this paper is to report the findings of an exploratory research paper undertaken in Auckland, New Zealand which focused on the Approved Destination Status (ADS) inbound tour operators’ understanding of the Chinese market and their strategies for developing Auckland as a sustainable destination.

Semi-structured interviews were conducted with ten managers out of the 25 registered ADS inbound tour operators. The qualitative responses were coded and analysed using pattern identification and categorisation of emergent themes.

The findings profile New Zealand ADS inbound operators, summarise their knowledge of the Chinese market in terms of visitor expectations and characteristics, present the operator’s perceptions of Qualmark quality accreditation scheme and ADS Code of Conduct, and demonstrate the quality management initiatives they have developed in addition to addressing the issues within the Chinese market operation.

The study provides implications for destination marketers and tour operators in terms of the sustainable operation of the growing Chinese market.

The purpose of this paper is to profile the Worldwide Hospitality and Tourism Themes (WHATT) theme issue “Services management and the growing number of Asian travellers: what needs re-thinking?” with reference to the experiences of the theme editor and the theme issue outcomes from countries within and beyond Asia.

The paper uses structured questions to enable the theme editor to reflect on the rationale for the theme issue question, the starting point, the selection of the writing team and material and the editorial process.

This paper reports on research and discussions between academics and practitioners about an issue faced by many countries with established hospitality, tourism and travel industries. Specifically, what are the adjustments needed to mirror the radically changing demographic landscape of inbound tourism – now characterized by more affluent and mobile Asian visitors?

This paper builds on the outcomes of an international conference on “Managing and Delivering Services in the Asian Century”, and offers a response to the changes needed to better serve Asian travellers.

It provides guidelines for destinations, hospitality organizations and travel operators that have traditionally relied on European and American source markets to help them re-think their service delivery process, management and operations.

This study focuses on the Indonesian seniors’ motivation in terms of travelling to a destination abroad. Using the push–pull motivation constructs and recognising the role of culture in influencing travel behaviour, the purpose of this study is to develop a better understanding of the underlying factors that explain why Indonesian seniors travel to and select an international destination.

A questionnaire-based survey was completed to collect data from 246 Indonesian seniors aged 55 years and over who had travelled overseas. Factor analysis was applied to reduce the total of 34 push and pull travel motivation items into new underlying factors. Informal interviews were also undertaken to support the analysis.

Personal development, relaxation and relationship enhancement appeared to be the three factors that internally pushed the seniors to travel abroad. Meanwhile, facilities and hygiene, destination familiarity, value for money and destination proximity, local attractions and supporting travel facilities were found to be the factors that pulled the seniors to select an international destination they would like to visit. The emergence of relationship enhancement, destination familiarity and value for money and destination proximity factors were evident that the unique aspect of Indonesian cultural values could shape the motivation of Indonesian seniors to go travelling.

Although studies on senior travel motivation are abundant, empirical research studies that focus on examining Indonesian senior travel behaviour are still rare. This study therefore serves as one of the first attempts to examine the behaviour of Indonesian seniors when undertaking outbound travel trip. Based on the study’s findings, practical recommendations were offered to tourism stakeholders involved in tailoring a specific tourism product and services for the Indonesian senior tourist market.