Microsoft Word 2007 ichrie conference Proceedings Final-Final 06-06-07. doc

LITERATURE REVIEW 
Tourism destination competitiveness is a dynamic concept. It has its own characteristics and needs to be 
examined from different approaches (Ritchie and Crouch, 2003; Dwyer and Kim, 2003; Hudson, Ritchie, and 
Timur, 2004). Existing tourism literature has attempted to define and measure destination competitiveness in various 
aspects, such as price competitiveness, sustainable tourism development, regional positioning, tourism enterprise 
development, and marketing (Enright and Newton, 2004, 2005; Dwyer et al., 1999, 2000, 2004; Ritchie and Crouch, 
2003; Hudson et al., 2004; Uysal et al., 2000; Go and Govers, 2000; Melian-Ganzales and Garcia-Falcon, 2003; 
Mihalic, 2000; Yoon, 2002).
In this study, destination competitiveness is defined as the destination’s ability to create and provide value-
added products and quality experience which are important to tourists while sustaining its resources and maintaining 
market position relative to competitors (Dwyer and Kim, 2003; Hassan, 2000). Specifically, destination 
competitiveness is examined from the tourists’ perspective. It refers to the tourists’ perception of the destination’s 
ability and superiority in its performance with regard to offering quality tourism experience competitively.
Similarly, the concept 
tourism experience
has been used implicitly in meaning and examined from a variety 
of approaches within the academic literature (Jennings, 2006). Researchers have different perspectives in examining 
the nature of tourism/tourist experiences. Many studies have attempted to chronologically and temporally examine 
the term following Clawson and Knetsch’s (1966) five-phase model of the recreation experience (Killion, 1992; 
Craig-Smith and French, 1994). The model involves five distinct and yet interacting phases: (1) an anticipation 

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