Tourism research after the COVID-19 outbreak: Insights for more sustainable, local and smart cities

Abstract

Search ScienceDirect Outline Highlights Abstract Keywords 1. Introduction 2. General framework: COVID-19 and a call for more sustainable, smart, and local cities 3. Materials and methods: a bibliometric study 4. Results 5. Rebuilding the future of cities and tourism development: knowledge domains and challenges after the COVID-19 outbreak 6. Discussion 7. Conclusions Declaration of Competing Interest Acknowledgements References Figures (8) Fig. 1. Representation of a strategic diagram Fig. 2. Strategic diagram of the period December 2019 to March 2021 based on… Fig. 3. Main thematic networks exploring effects of COVID-19 on tourism industry Fig. 4. Thematic networks evaluating interactions between COVID-19 and sustainability… Fig. 5. Thematic networks assessing effects of COVID-19 on technology in the tourism… Fig. 6. Thematic networks revealing effects of COVID-19 on consumer behavior in the… Tables (3) Table 1 Table 2 Table 3 Elsevier Sustainable Cities and Society Volume 73, October 2021, 103126 Sustainable Cities and Society Tourism research after the COVID-19 outbreak: Insights for more sustainable, local and smart cities Author links open overlay panelLuis-AlbertoCasado-ArandaaJuanSánchez-FernándezbAna-BelénBastidas-Manzanoc https://doi.org/10.1016/j.scs.2021.103126Get rights and content Under a Creative Commons licenseopen access Highlights • A bibliometric analysis of publications on COVID-19 and tourism development.

• Evaluation of 1303 articles between 1 December 2019 to 31 March 2021.

• The co-citation analysis reveals the most promising clusters, subtopics and outlets.

• The article identifies the challenges of future tourism managers and city planners.

• It reflects the greater importance of a more sustainable, smart and technological cities management.

Abstract This paper presents the results of a bibliometric analysis of academic research dealing with COVID-19 in the area of city destination development from 1 December 2019 to 31 March 2021. Particularly, by means of SciMAT software, it identifies, quantifies, and visually displays the main research clusters, thematic structure and emerging trends that city and tourism planners will face in the new normal. The search revealed that social media and smart tourism are the themes with the greatest potential; sustainable cities, local destination development, changes in tourist behavior, and tourists’ risk perception are underdeveloped streams with enormous relevance and growth in the new normal. Research on the effects of COVID-19 on citizen health and its economic impact on the tourism industry and cities are intersectional and highly developed topics, although of little relevance. The current study also identifies the challenges of destination research for planners and proposes future research directions. Consequently, this paper contributes to the existing literature on COVID-19 and sustainable cities, as it develops a critical examination of the extant research and points out the research gaps that must be filled by future studies.