Ethics refers to the norms and collectively formed criteria created by a group of people for specific purposes. Ethics is the set of principles that guide a person or group's behaviour, setting the standards of good or bad, right, or wrong. In this section, the issue of ethics in the tourism sector is examined. Secondary sources were used while preparing the chapter. First of all, the place and importance of the tourism sector today and the tourism sector's ethical problems have been stated. The ethical principles determined by the World Tourism Organization were examined by saying that all stakeholders in the tourism sector should adopt and share ethical principles. By stating the problems caused by ethical violations, suggestions for solutions are presented. The necessity of eliminating ethical issues was expressed with the recommendations that set the groundwork for future research in this field. Finally, the general scope and results of the chapter are presented and discussed.
TopIntroduction
The existence of regulatory and supervisory rules for businesses increases the satisfaction of the employees by ensuring that the jobs in the business are carried out successfully. Employees' perceptions of justice within the organization are an important determinant of behavior within the organization (Güllüce, Bozkurt & Meriç, 2017: 40-45). The prerequisite for an institution's rules to be fair and effective is that the rules are required by all parties and the rules are accepted by all parties. For the rules to be understood and acceptable by the parties, all parties should be included in the process of creating the rules. These rules include acceptable and unacceptable (true and false) situations and behavior. Acceptable rules, that is, behaviors that include how a person can behave correctly and appropriately in a given situation, are ethical rules.
Modern businesses today have quite different features than those established under the influence of the industrial revolution. Modern businesses have become socially responsible institutions by abandoning them only to make profit and continue their lives (Akova & Çalık, 2008: 2). Social responsibility behaviors of businesses as well as their product quality and prices affect customers. Social responsibility event refers to achieving positive results for nature and humanity by applying ethical principles and values. Therefore, the phenomenon of ethics has been an important tool for businesses to survive and regulate their relations with the environment. The purpose of businesses should not only be to make a profit, but to make a common benefit that all humanity can benefit.
Ethics is a set of criteria and values created by a group of people for specific purposes. For this reason, we can come across different views on the scope and definition of ethics (Fennell & Malloy, 1999: 930). One of these views argues that ethics is the behavior and practices accepted and applied by all circles. According to another view, ethics is a set of behaviors that benefit individuals and communities. In this view, it is the determinant of ethical behavior that the results of behavior benefit people and society. In this way, although there are different opinions and thoughts, there are some generally accepted definitions. According to one of them, ethics refers to the values that require people to take a conscientious responsibility for what they do and make them feel happy if they are adopted and applied.
The main subject of ethics is that everyone performs their duties in the best way in the interests of humanity and does not harm anyone. Accordingly, there are ethical principles that are accepted and applied in all sectors. Ethical values, which set out a certain order for behaviors and direct people to perform their behavior in accordance with this order, do not only benefit from a certain segment but also the benefit of all people.
Since tourism is an interdisciplinary field, it is in contact with many disciplines. Therefore, there are many segments in tourism that pursue different interests (Arslan Kalay, Şahin & Meriç, 2018: 67). The fact that these segments are directed only to their interests may negatively affect other segments and the tourism movement (Aslan & Kozak, 2006: 51). Ethical behavior is a necessity for tourism activities to gain as much income as possible. In order to ensure ethical behavior in tourism, ethical principles must be known and adopted by all individuals and organizations operating in the field of tourism. It is an important issue to examine the decisions and behaviors in tourism within the scope of ethics.
Tourism is a service-oriented sector. In order to benefit from the service, the interaction must be established between the service provider and the person receiving the service (Eralp, 1983: 35). This feature brings the tourism sector to an important position in ethics. Thanks to tourism, many people who do not know each other can interact with each other. Ethics also covers this interaction in the tourism sector due to its aspect that covers and evaluates human behavior. For this reason, it is an important requirement to address the behaviors that may exist or occur in tourism in terms of ethics.
In this section, it is aimed to discuss the ethical conformity of existing rules and policies in tourism by considering the concept of ethics within the scope of tourism. First of all, the definition and history of the concept of tourism and ethics are presented in the background. Later, ethical violations in the tourism sector were specified and solutions and suggestions were presented. Finally, the general scope of the department is discussed by determining the opinions and thoughts about the future of ethics in tourism and suggestions about future research opportunities are presented.