Abstract
War can have an instant and far-reaching negative effect on the image of a country. Gilboa (2006) discusses how a country involved in a prolonged violent conflict will acquire an undesirable, hard image that has to be softened. To try and achieve this an increasing number of governments have, or are considering including events as part of their post-conflict recovery strategy. This paper focused on Northern Ireland and how it has strategically used major events as a policy tool to help remove stereotypical images of its troubled past. It also highlighted the risks of using events in a post-conflict environment. The authors recommended that if a government of a post-conflict country does decide to invest in events for reimaging purposes, it must do so with caution and make sure those involved in organising events have a crisis communication plan in place for each event.
Original language | English |
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Pages (from-to) | 264-279 |
Number of pages | 15 |
Journal | Journal of Policy Research in Tourism, Leisure and Events |
Volume | 9 |
Issue number | 3 |
Early online date | 21 Apr 2017 |
DOIs | |
Publication status | Published (in print/issue) - 12 Jun 2017 |
Keywords
- Reimaging
- War
- Events
- Northern Ireland
- Stereotypes