ArticlePDF Available

THE CHERNOBYL EXCLUSION ZONE AS A TOURIST ATTRACTION. REFLECTIONS ON THE TURISTIFICATION OF THE ZONE

Authors:
Magdalena Banaszkiewicz at Jagiellonian University
Magdalena Banaszkiewicz
Zygmunt Kruczek at University School of Physical Education in Kraków
Zygmunt Kruczek
Anna Duda at Jagiellonian University
Anna Duda
Download full-text PDFDownload full-text PDFDownload full-text PDF
Read full-text
Download citation

Abstract and Figures

Purpose. The aim of this article is to shed light on the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone (CEZ) as a site of cultural heritage and a tourist attraction. Moreover, it presents the recent development of tourism in Chernobyl and sketches the perspectives on the future of the CEZ. Method. To determine the character of the change process of the CEZ into a tourist attraction, the combination of content analysis and participant observation was used. Findings. The article, according to the authors’ knowledge, is the first in Poland to provide such a description of the development of tourism in the CEZ although, there have already been some publications considering this topic. Research and conclusion limitations. Exhaustive description of the problem complexity of of intersections between tourism development and cultural dissonances exceeds the possibilities of this article. Therefore, the case study of the CEZ needs further and broader exploration on the basis of statistical data as well as of data gathered by means of qualitative methods. Practical implications. The analysis provides potential avenues of enquiry adopting the perspective that the transformation of the dissonant heritage sites is caused to great measure by uncontrolled (or slightly controlled) tourism development. Simultaneously, it shows how a tourist may modify the image of the site and offer new, positive possibilities for local economic growth. Originality. For the first time in academic, this article scholarship raises the problem of the CEZ as a tourist attraction: it presents statistical data which prove the growing popularity of this site and describe the variety of tourist offer. Type of paper. The paper is based on the empirical research.
Figures - uploaded by Magdalena Banaszkiewicz
Author content
All figure content in this area was uploaded by Magdalena Banaszkiewicz
Content may be subject to copyright.
Folia Turistica_44_Banaszkiewicz, Kruczek, Duda_145-1
70.pdf
Content uploaded by Magdalena Banaszkiewicz
Author content
All content in this area was uploaded by Magdalena Banaszkiewicz on Jun 22, 2018
Content may be subject to copyright.
Folia Turistica_44_Banaszkiewicz, Kruczek, Duda_145-1
70.pdf
Content uploaded by Magdalena Banaszkiewicz
Author content
All content in this area was uploaded by Magdalena Banaszkiewicz on Mar 18, 2018
Content may be subject to copyright.
Folia Turistica_44_Banaszkiewicz, Kruczek, Duda_145-1
70.pdf
Content uploaded by Zygmunt Kruczek
Author content
All content in this area was uploaded by Zygmunt Kruczek on Mar 18, 2018
Content may be subject to copyright.
A preview of the PDF is not available
... After the disaster many self-settlers, scientists, looters, and illegal explorers have crossed its borders regularly. Even before the first official tours, the exclusion zone was a sought destination among the so-called urban explorers, who possibly have visited the exclusion zone a decade illegally before the first official tours have taken place (Banaszkiewicz, Kruczek & Duda, 2017, Stone, 2013. The first official tour into the Chernobyl exclusion zone took place in 1999 (Banaszkiewicz, Kruczek & Duda, 2017). ...
... Even before the first official tours, the exclusion zone was a sought destination among the so-called urban explorers, who possibly have visited the exclusion zone a decade illegally before the first official tours have taken place (Banaszkiewicz, Kruczek & Duda, 2017, Stone, 2013. The first official tour into the Chernobyl exclusion zone took place in 1999 (Banaszkiewicz, Kruczek & Duda, 2017). From the mid-90's onwards there began the establishment of certain administrative structures in order to deal with the visitors (Banaszkiewicz, Kruczek & Duda, 2017, Brunsden & Goatcher, 2011. ...
... The first official tour into the Chernobyl exclusion zone took place in 1999 (Banaszkiewicz, Kruczek & Duda, 2017). From the mid-90's onwards there began the establishment of certain administrative structures in order to deal with the visitors (Banaszkiewicz, Kruczek & Duda, 2017, Brunsden & Goatcher, 2011. The first governmental structure to take care of these activities was the International Information Cooperation and Development Agency 'ChernobylInterInform' and in the subsequent year several tour companies started to organize excursion into the zone in cooperation with the ChernobylInterInform. ...
Chernobyl Dreams A Study on the Role of Narrative Imagination in Consumption Experience
Thesis
  • Oct 2020
This study attempted to elucidate the narrative articulations as a product of context imagination in the Chernobyl exclusion zone as it was captured from the qualitative interviews and photographs of three different visitor categories. With the assistance of qualitative and phenomenological methods this study explores the ways in which the heritage and cultural meaning of the exclusion zone is imagined and articulated in tourism at Chernobyl. The chosen methodology with the assistance of the theoretical framework of this thesis, four experiential domains of consumption imagination, narrative, material, emotional and value, produced a thematic structure with three different themes that describe visitors’ narrative positions, narrative articulations, and performances regarding the heritage in the storyscape Chernobyl. These visitors’ performances were further condensed from the point of view of the contemporary storyscape dynamics, conformity, enactment, and contestation. Visitors imaginaries and performances coproduce the site and at the same time they entail fluid and even conflicting narrative articulations on the site and its cultural significance This study provided a more nuanced understanding of the different visitor categories in the exclusion zone and their group specific ways to articulate, imagine and coproduce the storyscape Chernobyl
View
... This paper seeks to continue earlier research on storytelling in dark tourism (Kužnik and Veble, 2018;Lennon, 2018;Tercia et al., 2022) through visitors' narrative engagement with a case study on the Chernobyl exclusion zone (CEZ), which has been in the process of gradual marketisation as an international tourism destination (Banaszkiewicz et al., 2017). Therefore, a study conducted from the perspective of international visitors themselves is timely. ...
... Today, the area designated as the "exclusion zone" is the size of a Luxembourg state. Along with the process of touristification and gradual marketisation (Banaszkiewicz et al., 2017;Stone, 2013), which can be reflected in the increase in the number of visitors alongside the construction of visitor infrastructure such as accommodation places, visitors' centres and sanitation facilities, there are intentions on the part of tourism industry stakeholders to attach the CEZ to UNESCO's world heritage list. Thus, the zone would join the category of UNESCO's nuclear cultural heritage along with the Genbaku Monument in Hiroshima and the infamous nuclear testing site at the Bikini atoll. ...
Chernobyl dreams: investigating visitors’ storytelling in the Chernobyl exclusion zone
Article
Full-text available
  • Dec 2022
Purpose Little is known about the overall meaning of the Chernobyl exclusion zone (CEZ) from the visitors’ point of view. Conceptualizing the zone as a storyscape and its narratives as intangible heritage resources, this study aims to investigate the visitors’ engagement with these resources and the resulting articulations from the engagements as translated into verbal and visual storytelling. Design/methodology/approach Participant observation and participant generated images in combination with in-depth interviews with different types of tourists were conducted. This paper uses the photographs chosen by the interviewees themselves as a photo essay to explore the evocation of stories through narrative engagement. Findings Through participant-oriented research, this study identified three dominant storytelling themes through which visitors focus their understanding of the CEZ. Visitors’ narrative engagements and visual storytelling co-produce the site and entail fluid and even conflicting narrative articulations about the CEZ and its cultural significance. Research limitations/implications The discoveries of this study stem from a unique developing heritage site. This study provided a more nuanced understanding of the different visitor categories in the CEZ and their group-specific ways to articulate, imagine and co-produce the storyscape of Chernobyl. Originality/value Gaining insight into the verbal and visual storytelling of tourists will contribute to the discussion of narrative consumption of different consumption profiles in tourism sites in addition to the mediation and construction of entangled memory spaces.
View
... While many previous studies look at social and natural effects of Chernobyl (Medvedev, 1991;Mould, 2000;Mycio, 2006;Read, 1996;Sekuła, 2014;Siwiński, 1989;Zhukova, 2016), there are still few publications exploring tourism in the CEZ. Most of these studies concern the visuality of the abandoned space marked by tragedy (Brucker, 2014), the process of the Zone's tourism development (Banaszkiewicz, 2023;Banaszkiewicz et al., 2017;Duda, 2020), as well as the specificity of the tourist experience of abandoned places undergoing the process of ruination (Dobraszczyk, 2010;Duda, 2023;Stone, 2013). In the case of Fukushima, similarly, many studies investigate Fukushima's catastrophe, focusing on its impact on society, politics and the health of its inhabitants. ...
Nuclear accident sites and tourism: a comparative analysis of the Chernobyl and Fukushima exclusion zones
Article
  • Jan 2025
This article aims to explore similarities and differences in the relationship between nuclear accident sites and tourism through a comparative study of two culturally different exclusion zones, namely Chernobyl (Ukraine) and Fukushima (Japan). Although the causes of the nuclear catastrophe were different, today it is possible to confirm some similarities in the transition and recovery process between these contaminated and abandoned sites. A range of grassroots initiatives lead to movements that try to look at nuclear accident sites from a new perspective. These activities include the ones that are planned and conducted to develop the sites as tourist destinations. In addition, in the context of war in Ukraine, the article shows, through the Stone’s darkest-lightest indicator, how the narration of the places of cultural dissonances changes with the changing geopolitical reality. In order to achieve the aim of this paper, a comparative analysis was conducted referring to qualitative data collected in the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone and secondary data on both Chernobyl and Fukushima exclusion zones. The following interviews with tourists, participatory observation and collected online sources of these two post-catastrophe sites have first and foremost provided a better understanding of the cultural dissonances emerging in these spaces.
View
... Thanks to tourism, which was not officially allowed until 2011, it started returning to life (Banaszkiewicz et al., 2017). The progressive ruin of buildings in Pripyat attracted people from all over the world (Nieszczerzewska, 2016). ...
Tourist photography and heritage. The case of the abandoned city of Pripyat
Article
  • Jan 2023
The aim of this article is to present photography as an effective method for exploring abandoned heritage sites. The example of Pripyat – a city a few kilometres away from the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant – will show the attitude of tourists towards a place which today is of undoubted cultural and historical value, but which is also an abandoned place. By means of semiotic and hermeneutic analysis of the photographs taken by tourists, a picture of Pripyat will be outlined, which has started to function anew in the cultural space thanks to, among others, tourist representations. A tourist’s gaze on Pripyat was analysed through the lens of four categories: must-see places, tourist performativity behaviours, the acts and ruin photos. In addition, the article outlines the direct relationship between the tourist imagination, photography, and heritage. Through tourist photography, the heritage is ‘reframed’ and domesticated. Photography also takes an active part in the process of making heritage by fragmenting the world and often putting them into a completely new context and narration and an example is abandoned Pripyat.
View
... The topic of tourism activity in the post-Chornobyl areas is gradually becoming the subject of scientific interest. The, so far, few publications in this area focus for example on the issues of touristification of the post-Chornobyl area and identifying its development potential (Dobraszczyk, 2010;Goatcher and Brunsden, 2011;Stone, 2013;Banaszkiewicz et al., 2017;Kruczek, 2017;Bakota et al., 2018Bakota et al., , 2020, the multifunctionality of Chornobyl tourism, with its predominant character concerning dark tourism (Yankovska and Hannam, 2014;Romanova, 2018Romanova, , 2020, or the motivation behind expeditions to the post-Chornobyl territories (Kleshcheva, 2021;Urbonavicius, 2021). ...
Post-Chornobyl Areas as a Tourist Destination
Conference Paper
Full-text available
  • Dec 2021
The aim of the study is to present the attractiveness of the post-Chornobyl area as a tourist destination in the context of the basic motives for taking a trip to this zone. It includes a short description of areas referred to as post-Chornobyl areas, covering a total of over 600,000 hectares within Ukraine and Belarus, paying attention to their different formal and legal status regulating the possibilities of tourist use. It also contains information concerning the development of tourist traffic in the studied zone, taking into consideration both organized trips (study visits) as well as illegal trips (Chornobyl stalking). The exponential nature of the dynamics concerning the number of visitors to the post-Chornobyl areas in the period 2000-2020 has been emphasized. Furthermore, the results of a pilot survey aimed at identifying the tourist motivation of people undertaking trips to the Chornobyl zone have been presented. It has been found that the main motive for tourists to undertake Chornobyl expeditions consists in cognitive interest resulting from the unusual character of the specific locations, combined with inborn human curiosity and natural attraction to adventure. The important role of media-related factors, related mainly to computer games and the film industry, has also been indicated.
View
View
View
Kłopotliwe dziedzictwo w turystycznym kontekście. Opolscy przewodnicy i ich strategie narracji o tym, co nieobojętne społecznie
Article
  • Mar 2024
The article aims to show the dissonant heritage of Opole from the perspective of tourist guides. Its first section shows the dissonant heritage in relation to tourism, especially cultural tourism, heritage tourism and dark tourism. The role of the tourist guide in constructing narratives about difficult heritage is then considered. Empirically, the article endeavours to identify the elements of Opole’s dissonant heritage discerned by tourist guides, and the ways of telling tourists about them. Ten qualitative interviews were conducted with Opole guides. Analysis of the narratives reveals that the dissonant heritage of Opole is perceived by the guides from several perspectives. This primarily means their own, entangled in the social characteristics of the guide (e.g. national identity), in the context of the specificity of the group that the guide is showing round, and in the context of their reactions to the guide’s stories or sites visited.
View
Sprawiedliwie – co to znaczy? Transformacja energetyczna w Polsce na tle społeczno-przestrzennych konsekwencji nieukończonej elektrowni jądrowej „Żarnowiec”
Article
Full-text available
  • Dec 2023
The energy transition process towards renewable and low-emission energy sources is becoming an increasingly prevailing issue discussed at both local and supra-local levels. It also includes the development of a nuclear power plant in Poland. Therefore, it is crucial to trace the consequences of an unfinished nuclear investment, known today as the ‘Żarnowiec’ power plant. The effects of this failed investment are felt by the former residents of the areas occupied by the power plant infrastructure. The spatial and social issues of a just energy transition are considered in the case study of the history of the ‘Żarnowiec’ power plant and experiences of the displaced inhabitants. The main part of the research was based on qualitative analysis in the context of the grounded theory. The effects of them investment on the displaced locals were shown by tracing the unfinished power plant’s history, the researched area’s current state, and an extensive social analysis with interviews. The study draws attention to the need to involve the local community in planning decisions. It also shows that opinions and expectations of local actors are of utmost importance in the just energy transition process because they are the ones who are directly and permanently affected by the investments undertaken or by the decisions to abandon them. The identified development challenges are consistent with the premises of a just energy transition – a concept that is clear in today’s EU policy.
View
On a risk of inhalation exposure during visits in Chernobyl exclusion zone
Article
  • Oct 2022
  • J ENVIRON RADIOACTIV
In recent years Chernobyl exclusion zone has become a very popular tourist destination. Many people visiting power plant, Pripyat city or surrounding villages use different types of personal dosimeters to control external exposure, however very small group of tourist have opportunity to control internal contamination of respiratory tract using dedicated, high sensitive whole body counters. In this study 11 anti-dust masks collected from CEZ visitors and filters from one military MP-5 mask were analyzed using alpha, beta and gamma spectrometry to determine doses from actinides and fission products which can be inhaled without proper protective equipment. Results showed, that average effective dose from inhalation of contaminated aerosol in case of single-day trip (avoided due to use of mask) was 1.3 μSv per person, which is much smaller than potential effective dose after exploration of highly contaminated areas like Jupiter complex, where combined dose from all measured nuclides collected on MP-5 mask filter was 1.4 mSv.
View
Imaginary, tourism
Chapter
Full-text available
  • Jan 2014
View
Difficult heritage: Negotiating the Nazi past in Nuremberg and beyond
Book
Full-text available
  • Jan 2008
How does a city and a nation deal with a legacy of perpetrating atrocity? How are contemporary identities negotiated and shaped in the face of concrete reminders of a past that most wish they did not have? Difficult Heritage focuses on the case of Nuremberg - a city whose name is indelibly linked with Nazism - to explore these questions and their implications. Using an original in-depth research, using archival, interview and ethnographic sources, it provides not only fascinating new material and perspectives, but also more general original theorizing of the relationship between heritage, identity and material culture. The book looks at how Nuremberg has dealt with its Nazi past post-1945. It focuses especially, but not exclusively, on the city's architectural heritage, in particular, the former Nazi party rally grounds, on which the Nuremburg rallies were staged. The book draws on original sources, such as city council debates and interviews, to chart a lively picture of debate, action and inaction in relation to this site and significant others, in Nuremberg and elsewhere. In doing so, Difficult Heritage seeks to highlight changes over time in the ways in which the Nazi past has been dealt with in Germany, and the underlying cultural assumptions, motivations and sources of friction involved. Whilst referencing wider debates and giving examples of what was happening elsewhere in Germany and beyond, Difficult Heritage provides a rich in-depth account of this most fascinating of cases. It also engages in comparative reflection on developments underway elsewhere in order to contextualize what was happening in Nuremberg and to show similarities to and differences from the ways in which other 'difficult heritages' have been dealt with elsewhere. By doing so, the author offers an informed perspective on ways of dealing with difficult heritage, today and in the future, discussing innovative museological, educational and artistic practice.
View
View
View
View
View
View
View
The Social Impact of the Chernobyl Disaster
Book
  • Jan 1988
This book focuses on the broader ramifications of the Chernobyl disaster,such as the impact upon the environment, agriculture, health, the media and the arts. The author feels that there is much information not yet available about the accident, and he says the Soviet Government has essentially developed an official line that is patently untrue. Many of the key mistakes and short comings that figured prominently in the accident and that the Soviets have been reluctant to publicize are highlighted. The part that what might be termed the Soviet system played in the accident and events following the accident is explored. This is not limited just to the incompetence of the plant operators when the accident occurred but is extended to the system that placed unqualified operators on the staff of a nuclear power plant, produced the defective reactor design, was responsible for the poor quality of the initial construction, etc. The author contends that the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) did not really press the Soviets for complete truthful reports because it was not expedient to do so as the Chernobyl accident threatened the global nuclear industry of which IAEA is a part.
View
View