Tourism and the city: opportunity for regeneration

Urban tourism is in full expansion due to world-wide urbanisation and internationalisation of our societies. New economic impulse created by investments in urban regeneration, and improving the quality of life, produces different consequences. This paper tries to examines the benefits and costs which tourism has on host environments, economies and societies and analyses the strategic conditions which can assist cities to revitalise their territory, through a coherent tourism policy. An Italian case study, Genoa is used to illustrate some of these impact issues. Genoa, after a deep crisis, has regained a new identity and its role in the Italian economic and social system. The paper provides a critical approach of how places of cultural significance are transformed into places of consumption by investigating the relationship between culture as a resource for identity and culture as an economic resource.