Botswana Cultural Heritage and Sustainable Tourism Development

Book excerpt: This book considers cultural heritage and the sustainable development of tourism from an African perspective, with Botswana as the main point of reference. Within the African context, Botswana is renowned for its abundance of cultural heritage and appeal to tourists. The collection reconciles the growing demand to commodify cultural heritages, the quest for cultural heritage preservation and management, and the focus on sustainable tourism development in Botswana. As such, the book is an appraisal of, and meditation on, the business-side of cultural heritage management and the value that cultural heritage resources have at a personal, local and national level. It is an exploration of the nature of Botswana’s cultural heritage, the politics and policies that underpin that heritage, the development of cultural heritage tourism as a sustainable business, the country’s cultural heritage experiences and products, and a confrontation of the hard questions about cultural heritage and the future. As an introductory text, the book gives tourists, tourism students and academics, as well as tourism entrepreneurs, policymakers, and practitioners a basis on which to make decisions.