Sustainable Tourism Law

74 SUSTAINABLE TOURISM LAW American Frontier had reached the Pacific Ocean. Africa was almost all explored. European land was overexploited. Pollution was starting to poison air and land. All these events called for the first time the attention of scholars: the exploitation of nature could not continue without limits 69 . A new equilibrium had to be reached. In 1858 Wilson (1858) conducted a study on the drying up of the earth and the atmosphere 70 . And in the very same period the term “ecology” was used for the first time: the word ecology was coined by a German zoologist, Ernst Haeckel (1834 – 1919) 71 . In 1831, in America the idea of preserving natural sites for future generations took form. The American National Parks were funded and opened. In 1890 the Yosemite National Park was inaugurated. Ecology, protection of the environment, sustainability and the modern approach to economic activity In the XX century, ecology, environment and sustainability were still object of studies and academic discussions. Time was not mature for practical applications outside the fields of social sciences. After the horror and destruction of the SecondWorldWar, reconstruction was imperative. Ecology, pollution and the natural environment were not considered. But with the elapsing of time, the savage exploitation of nature and the environment began to be the object of concerns and debates. This happened in economic, in management, and, of course, at a certain moment, in tourism. This change of attitude started in the late ‘60s. In the ’80s it entered the academic lexicon. Private and public entities started to examine the effects of pollution in economy 72 and explore the concept of sustainability 73 . 69 Goes back to the 17 th century the naturalistic school, Well known is Mary SOMERVILLE, Physical Geography (2 vol.,) London, Jhon Murray Ed., 1849. 70 J. S. WILSON,. On the general and gradual desiccation of the earth and atmosphere , in Report of the Proceedings of the British Association for the Advancement of Science, Transactions . (1858), 155. 71 Ernst Haeckel coined the word “ecology””(to mean the study of living organisms in relation to one another and the inanimate environment)”. See Ecology , in Encyclopedia Britannica , page 197. 72 Kenneth BOULDING , The economics of the coming Spaceship Earth, in Environmental quality in a growing economy, H. Harriet Ed., Johns Hopkins University Press, Baltimore, 1966. Boulding is often seen as one of the founder for ecological economics. Boulding distinguish the “cowboy” economy and the “spaceship” economy. According to Boulding the Earth is a spaceship, with limits for both extraction and pollution, and in which “man must find his place in a cyclical ecological system which is capable of continuous reproduction of material form even though it cannot escape having inputs of energy”. 73 Paul DORIN BÂC, A history of the concept of sustainable development: literature review, in Annals of the University of Oradea, Economic Science Series , 2008, Vol. 17, page 581 and available in http://steconomice.uoradea. ro/anale/volume/2008/v2-economy-and-business-administration/101.pdf.