PhD in Law, Society and Tourism

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Justification of the title

Tourism in Spain has established itself as one of the most important sectors from an economic and social point of view. It can be said that, in the context of social sciences, it is an object of interdisciplinary knowledge that concerns a set of activities carried out by both private companies and public institutions. As a field of research, its dimension in socioeconomic development and in the effects on the territory is relevant, through its capacity to value different existing resources (natural, cultural, social) and through different actions and projects it can convert or transform a resource into a tourist product.
Furthermore, as an economic activity, it demands and consumes public and private resources.
Interdisciplinarity has determined that the study of tourism has been approached from different scientific perspectives that range from the measurement of its effects on economic systems, through the planning and management of the territory to the analysis of markets and demand behavior, and with special emphasis on business management, service marketing, the cultural and psychosocial components of the phenomenon, the standards and the legal framework that regulate the activity, the application of ICTs and data analysis, among other plural dimensions that make up the object of scientific knowledge.

The justification for this Doctoral Programme is based on two fundamental aspects: first, the need to train researchers in various areas of tourism and, second, refers to the fact that the Programme is made up of research teams with a long tradition of networking with other national and international research groups, and has the support of basic institutions/entities for research in Tourism.

Likewise, the infrastructure available to universities (as demonstrated by the established groups that use them) and the public and private funding that has been and is being obtained justifies the creation of the programme.
The research lines of the program are supported by work teams, with a long history of research in their respective fields of study, being stable research groups, which carry out their research activity in the proposing universities and in others, as well as in national and foreign entities.
The lines of research developed have obtained notable results in terms of scientific production, applicability and relevance in the area of tourism. These research groups have extensive experience in directing doctoral theses published in JCR journals (see chapter six).

The research capacity is supported by human capital, excellence in research, public or private funding obtained and in force in calls for proposals from the National R&D+i Plan, Excellence Projects of the Junta de Andalucía, and other public and private projects. This has resulted in numerous publications in the JCR in the top positions in each area.
The ULL includes the following research groups:

• ReinvenTUR: Observatory of Tourism Renewal, created in 2009. It is an interdisciplinary research group (Geography, Architecture, Sociology, Economics, Business, Anthropology). It is mainly dedicated to the analysis of the impact of policies, programs, plans and renovation projects (physical, functional, business model, organizational model, forms of segmentation, marketing channels, etc.) of public and private spaces in tourist areas. It manages the Observatory of Tourism Renewal.
• Information system for measuring the impacts of tourism at a local scale. This research group focuses its efforts on measuring the impacts that tourism generates at a local scale.
• Data Intelligence and Sustainability in Islands. The group focuses on the analysis of waste generation and management in island territories, including environmental impacts on the territory to assess the impact of tourism activity on waste generation and on the entire water cycle in island territories; contribute to intelligent decision-making in waste management and the entire water cycle; and develop controlled experiments that improve the evaluation and design of environmental policies in contexts of incomplete and asymmetric information in waste and water management.
• Employment, training and human resources in tourism. In recent years, this research group has focused its attention on the analysis of job offers in the tourism sector, all as a mechanism for approaching the occupational profiles, skills and educational levels required by the tourism industry. On the other hand, the study of the advantages and difficulties involved in accessing large amounts of data and information currently provided by the Internet is of methodological interest.

We would like to highlight the importance of the University Institute for Social Research and Tourism of the ULL and the CajaCanarias-Ashotel Chair of Tourism. Both entities play a fundamental role as promoters and drivers of research projects, R&D&I contracts (transfer of basic and applied social research) and postgraduate and specialisation teaching.

Likewise, this doctoral program is integrated into the ULL's R&D&I strategy, which includes the development of the Tricontinental Atlantic Campus (CEI-CANARIAS) (International Campus of Excellence), a space of excellence that must be, from 2015, an Atlantic reference in Europe as a receiving axis and catalyst for talent.