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The paper aims to propose a method of identifying and evaluating leadership potential of stakeholders in emerging tourist destinations and to verify this method in three Polish destinations. Developing destinations miss well-established networking structures and management experiences. The greatest impact on their success is made by the most active stakeholders who are able to pool and mobilise partners and coordinate their efforts to realise common goals.

The research is based on a stakeholders’ potential analysis and the network approach. To identify destination leadership, the method – adapted from an axiological analysis of regional development participants – is used and verified in rural, coastal and mountain destinations in Poland. An in-depth analysis of stakeholders representing the public, private and non-profit sectors is conducted to assess their leadership potential. Ultimately, 183 interviews were conducted.

Based on literature review, five dimensions of destination leadership were identified, namely, networking capability, analytical abilities, impact capability, economic potential and legitimacy. In emerging destinations, the most influential stakeholders are characterised by strong impact, analytical leadership capabilities and legitimacy.

The paper provides insights into destination leadership discussion and research. The limited number of verification cases and limited qualitative data analysis could be seen as its limitation.

Emerging destinations have incomplete leadership. An imbalanced structure of destination leadership may have serious consequences on stability and development of destinations; it also affects the process of identification of potential leaders.

The paper is original because it proposes an innovative method of identifying destination leadership, especially in emerging destinations.

This paper aims to depict the evolution of the relationship between tourism and the night-time economy (NTE) from 1946 to 2095.

This paper enables the feedback loop concept rooted in general system theory to identify positive and negative feedback loops between tourism and the NTE. The study is based on selective literature on the topic.

The paper recognises the volatility of positive and negative loops in the past and the dominance of positive feedback loops in the future. This paper also identifies the primary triggers of the feedback loops as technological, economic, environmental, political, social and market.

Selective literature review and abstracting from the impact of other industries on the recognised feedback loops are the main limitations of the study.

The development of both tourism and the NTE should be considered and planned just through the prism of their feedback loops.

The feedback loop concept is proposed to explain the general logic of dynamics of the relationship between tourism and the NTE.

The purpose of this paper is to discuss the rise and the future of urban leisure format (ULF), i.e. local seasonal short-lived and repeatable small-scale place-time-based staging urban leisure experiences which become the focus of recreation and tourism development in many cities. It aims to analyse the structure of the ULF by identifying its main features and also to propose the future developments of the concept.

The study is based on the experience economy principles. It develops the models for structured experiences/experienscape by adding the analogy with television programme formats to propose the general logic of constructing, organising and packetizing urban leisure experiences that are multiplied effectively to other urban time-spaces.

The ULF’s future potential lies in its ability to adopt local components, i.e. people and urban resources, to global trends using a structured experiences/experience logic which makes the ULF formattable, i.e. with the capacity to get informally standardised, then repeated and adapted to other cities’ contexts.

The paper provides a conceptual framework for formatting the leisure events and places under the framework of the structured experience, will be carefully adapted to the micro-local level, i.e. community activities sphere. The ULF is a theoretical concept and needs empirical research to verify its validity.

The ULF provides urban managers with a framework for replicating, multiplying and adapting urban leisure events and sites within the structured experiences (SE) designing framework.

The study contributes to the scientific discussion on the experience economy by introducing the ULF concept which can be adapted to various urban conditions.

The purpose of this paper is twofold: first, to analyze the phenomenon of urban tourism hypertrophy (UTH) in the context of the process of tourism-related social conflicts formation; and second, to discuss the extent to which destination management organizations (DMOs) are prepared to take responsibilities and actions undertaken in this process.

The paper adopts conflict management (CM) theory as a framework for discussing UTH within the city context. The paper then analyzes the empirical example of social conflict in Kraków (Poland) to assess the predispositions of key institutions engaged in destination governance to lead CM process triggered by UTH. The Circle of Conflict approach proposed by C. Moore (The Mediation Process: Practical Strategies for Resolving Conflict, Jossey Bass, San Francisco, CA, 2014) is utilized as the main application method.

The study shows that DMO is the most appropriate entity to deal with UTH as a conflict manager; however, it has insufficient resources to fulfill all requirements relating to that role. Therefore, the range of responsibilities and roles of the contemporary DMOs should be completed with CM as the permanent task during UTH crisis.

The example study was based on interviews carried out with a limited number of informants. Also, the contextual nature of the research as well as specific destination governance structure in Kraków blurred the picture of DMOs predispositions to leading the CM process.

The study supports urban DMO managers by suggesting a tool of diagnosis and intervention in UTH-induced conflicts. Thus, it makes fulfilling the mediator role a destination governance task.

CM brings agreement among parties as to the understanding of the nature of conflict, which forms the basis for quick and mutually agreed actions, according to sustainable development principles.

The paper proposes an alternative approach to mitigate UTH-related problems in cities by adopting the CM framework which emphasizes the universal nature of conflict causes and proposes adequate tools for undertaking actions by DMOs.

This study aims to investigate the human resources management of regional tourism organizations (RTOs) in Poland as a condition for organization effectiveness and presents a model of RTO operation in destination management organizations for improved effectiveness.

The study was of qualitative nature because of the scope of the examined features and analyses of RTO effectiveness (here in relation to human resources). The research involved the following stages: desk research of secondary sources, pilot diagnostic survey and diagnostic survey proper, qualitative and statistical analyses. First, an analysis of secondary sources regarding conditions of RTO operation effectiveness took place. Next, a questionnaire was used to collect empirical data from 137 respondents from the same 13 group types, in equal numbers from each organization in the entire population of 16 RTOs.

The research identified 197 organizational effectiveness variables, in four feature groups: the effectiveness of statutory and economic objectives, stakeholders’ benefits from cooperating with RTOs and general characteristics of RTO operation effectiveness. The findings suggest that the characteristics of RTO employees influence organizational effectiveness, especially from the perspective of the organization’s stakeholders. There is a need for strong support for RTO employee structures as a measure to raise organization effectiveness.

Specific human resources practices are identified for the effectiveness of non-enterprise organizations (employee character and structure) that constitute an essential component of the management system at regional and national levels. New directions for RTO operations are also proposed.

The study fills a substantial and identified knowledge gap in assessing organization effectiveness level against the quality characteristics of RTO human resources. The analysis allowed the creation of a multidimensional and universal model of RTO effectiveness investigation, which facilitates comparative analysis of organizations despite their strong diversity. It can be implemented in assessing the effectiveness of other non-enterprise organizations in the context of tourism.