Introduction: Innovation and the Future of Tourism

The Future of Tourism is really a misnomer. If the concept were to be strictly, narrowly understood, it would imply an almost impossible introspective task of primarily considering the endogenous main variables of tourism activity in destinations worldwide… and then, their autonomous progress over time, somehow disregarding global scenarios, trends and paradigm shifts. Much more adequate and interesting seems to explore the subject from a high watchtower, observing and analysing Tourism in the Future, i.e., the role of tourism in the future of our civilization, including its resilience to withstand short-term shocks and its capacity for evolutionary adaptation. Not an easy exercise in any case, delving into alternative scenarios in a time horizon of 10–20 years.