Environmental management decision-making in certified hotels

Bonilla-Priego, MJ, Najera, JJ and Font, X (2011) Environmental management decision-making in certified hotels Journal of Sustainable Tourism, 19 (3). pp. 361-381.

Full text not available from this repository.

Abstract

This paper analyses environmental decision-making against two axes, motivations and decision-making processes, to understand the reasons for pro-environmental behaviour by the managements of Spanish Eco-management and Audit Scheme (EMAS)-certified hotels. Mixed methods were used to study perceptions of EMAS and reasons for being certified, with current and lapsed EMAS-certified firms triangulated against expert interviews and documentary evidence. Four groups of hotels were differentiated: Strategic hotels (22%) (with high levels of integrated environmental management), Followers (48%), Greenwashers (11%) and Laggers (19%) (with low levels of integrated environmental management). Most hotels were found to be internally driven in their purpose and ad hoc in their decision-making, with limited understanding of externally driven benefits and motivation for more systematic management systems. This questions the success of EMAS as both a continuous improvement management and as a market-based regulation tool for hotels. Few hotels overall related high environmental standards to the possibilities of gaining market advantage: most wished to avoid legal challenges. The paper also illustrates the ways in which hotels opportunistically switch certification systems to get what they see as a better deal.

Item Type:	Article
Subjects :	Sustainability
Authors :	Name Email ORCID Bonilla-Priego, MJ UNSPECIFIED UNSPECIFIED Najera, JJ UNSPECIFIED UNSPECIFIED Font, X x.font@surrey.ac.uk UNSPECIFIED
Date :	1 April 2011
Identification Number :	https://doi.org/10.1080/09669582.2010.530350
Copyright Disclaimer :	© 2011 Taylor & Francis
Uncontrolled Keywords :	Accommodation, Environmental management, Certification, Corporate environmentalism, Environmental reporting
Depositing User :	Symplectic Elements
Date Deposited :	16 May 2017 15:37
Last Modified :	18 May 2017 13:13
URI:	http://epubs.surrey.ac.uk/id/eprint/820841

Actions (login required)

View Item

Downloads