Sustainable Tourism Law

THE PRINCIPLES OF TOURISM LAW AS A BASIS FOR SUSTAINABLE TOURISM 479 compilation technique. Despite such limitations, and without any of those works resorting to any degree of reflection, they contribute as a means to gather the laws dealing with the regulation of tourism activities. What is surprising is that they contend that there exists Tourism Law, a set of laws, regulations and agreements, both of a public and a private nature, related to the temporary migratory movement of people and the rendering of the tourism services they demand 11 . Nothing new was indicated in relation to what was posited in previous decades. In Spain, jurists interested in the matter started to discuss the difficulties presented by the regulation of tourism back in the 1970’s. They contended that tourism is not just a legal phenomenon, since it is also related to sociological, economic and political aspects. Also, their conceptual framework implicitly involves a two-fold direction: protecting tourists and protecting the tourism industry. Thus, two main points were posited. First, whether tourism, as a manifestation of the human desire to travel ought to be an object of legal consideration, and attention, or not, a topic that was certainly difficult to tackle for a normative theory. And, second, the traditional inquiry on whether there is truly a legal concept of tourism 12 . This last idea was debated in a limited manner. On the other hand, we find another perspective that approaches the study of the regulations of tourism. We refer to Consumption Law, which affirms that tourism is, by nature, heterogeneous, so it is not surprising that the laws governing it would also present that same characteristic. This heterogeneity can be observed in three levels: in relation to objects, to sources and to the nature of the law of tourism. The sharp edges of this heterogeneity are made up of consumption and the provision of services, since both are derived from tourism and are, thus, the result of a different consumption relationship, where specificity may not appear except by means of consumers, that is, tourists. This focal point concludes that there are relations that occur between tourism professionals, public authorities, society at large and travellers or visitors, both in their condition as people, and in their condition as consumers or users. In that sense, we can perceive a prime factor of heterogeneity in Tourism Law: it constitutes a cross-sectorial approach 11 For further information, see (LEON GÓMEZ, 2000). 12 Thus identified by (PÉREZ BONNIN, 1978) in an argument of certain clarity on the regulation of tourism in that decade.