One could quote tens of meetings held within large international organisations, such as the pastorals of tourism on the question of cultural tourism. It led to an ensemble of codes of practice and charters, regularly brought up to date.

But some of these organisations also encouraged the practical implementation of these resolutions in the form of topics, roads or transcontinental or European routes.

starting points

October 13 and 14, 1964, a working group of the Council of Europe entitled "Europe continues" wrote in the preamble to its report: "In order to give concrete form to its action, the Working Group directed its research towards awakening interest in main cultural places. Its three objectives were thus formulated:

• the awakening of European culture by voyages;
• the relationship between the cultural geography of Europe and the possibilities of establishing tourist networks;
• the tourist development of large hearths and crossroads of the civilisation of Europe.

Regulation for buses and tourists, Paris France 2002. Photo MTP

"The Working Group thus estimated that it would be appropriate to attach more considerable importance to cultural voyages, one of the best uses of leisure. Such voyages must indeed constitute not only the visual complement to and the illustration of a basic education acquired in school, but also a human experience and an occasion to develop personal sensitivity."

At a meeting held in Brussels on November 8 and 9, 1976, various cultural and tourist partners brought together by the ICOMOS signed the Charter of cultural tourism. Without quoting all its terms, one can consider the second paragraph of the first version: "Considered from the point of view of the quarter of a century to come, located in the context of the phenomena of expansion fraught with consequences confronting Humanity, Tourism seems one of the phenomena likely to exert on the environment of Man in general, on sites and monuments in particular, an extremely significant influence. To remain bearable, this influence must be carefully studied and form the object of a concerted and effective policy, on all levels. Without claiming to answer this need completely, the current approach, limited to cultural tourism, is believed to constitute a positive element of the necessary global solution." The most recent version rightly denounces the way in which thirty years of globalisation caused devastations and the extent to which, as in the European Landscape Convention, the respect and involvement of the "communities of reception and of local populations" are now requested, in a shared responsibility between the public and the private sector. Lastly, while insisting on the quality of the interpretation of the heritage and on the "broad redistribution of benefits", this Charter covers the two principal grounds where the conflicts of interest are: the ground of the media and that of the economy.

For a couple of years the ICOMOS also created a working group on the cultural routes; one of its most significant subdivisions now relates to South-Eastern Europe.

supply and demand - common policies

Finally, a study that the European Cultural Agency carried out in co-operation with the Council of Europe, UNESCO, and the European Union resulted in the "Declaration of Mallorca" (November 1995), one of whose principal recommendations is double: "To widen and diversify offer - To mobilise and educate demand". It summarises its recommendations in these terms: "In order for cultural tourism to fulfil the function that we assign to it, it has to include the ensemble of thematic sectors corresponding to the design and current dimensions of culture, a design which does not relate only to "the noble" heritage and arts and letters, paradigmatic illustration of "the cultivated" culture, but which extends to popular culture, mass culture and the anthropological sense of daily culture. This includes the ethnographic heritage, the practices and domestic aspects of the cultural experience, and especially linguistic diversity. This broad design of culture allows the widening and diversification of the offer of cultural tourism."

During the cultural decade, in particular through a research group co-ordinated by the Venice office of UNESCO, this Organisation considered the concept of durable tourism, in a joint enterprise with the University of Rotterdam, ICOMOS and the network AVEC. It sought to create a computerised decision-making system " Decision Support System" for people in charge of tourism in art cities.

The paradox of Paris-Beach 2002. Photo MTP

Finally, the World Tourism Organisation is regularly considering the question of the ethics of tourism and in 1997 it initiated a very interesting comparison of tourist policies of the European countries.

In this it is joined by the European Commission, which, after the 1992 year of tourism and the help it brought to rural tourism, in 1995 published a green book on destination Europe. Since the refusal in 1997 of certain European countries to consider a common policy for European countries, the Commission worked especially on the question of the effect of tourism on employment and on the importance of implementing new technologies in this sector. A Council Resolution on the future of European tourism dating from the beginning of 2002 invites the Commission, Member States and other actors from the tourist sector to: "To think on the means of reinforcing the position and image of Europe by relying on the diversity and attraction of the destinations it offers as well as on a way of ensuring a durable growth of European tourism in the future."

All these initiatives would certainly deserve to be better co-ordinated, but at least they let people in charge of tourism take responsibility.