The restructuring of the Montreal tourism industry: A sectoral analysis.

摘要

Despite its growing importance in industrialized nations, the service sector has received relatively little attention from economic geographers in recent debates over the nature and significance of the current processes of change affecting contemporary capitalism. This lack of attention means that we have little detailed knowledge about how the various industries that comprise the service sector are restructuring their operations and how these processes, in turn, influence broader economic change. This thesis goes some way toward redressing this imbalance by studying the evolving structure of two key sectors of the Montreal tourism industry--hotels and travel agencies.;I begin with an overview of past attempts to understand the changing role of the service sector in developed economies. Despite their weaknesses new political economy frameworks are shown to perhaps provide the best starting point for the development of a more 'services informed' approach to understanding current economic change.;In an attempt to highlight the strengths and weaknesses of applying such approaches to the study of services I first review their ability to explain and predict changes currently taking place in the tourism industry as a whole. This is followed by a discussion of the empirical findings of the thesis based on 103 interviews with managers and owners of Montreal hotels and travel agencies. I focus on the following key areas: the evolving competitive environment, changes in corporate organization, the adoption of new technologies and shifts in labour use. (Abstract shortened by UMI.)