Ethical travel decisions - Travel agents and human rights

This paper explores the ethics of selling tourism products for destinations that have known major human rights issues. The study uses the moral intensity framework to analyze the ethical decision making of New Zealand travel agents. Qualitative interviews reveal support for all aspects of the framework. In particular, agents' judgements are strongly influenced by their perceptions of how their decisions impact upon their clients. In contrast, uncertainty surrounds the probability and magnitude of consequences of their decisions for destination communities. Strong social, cultural, legal, and economic links between the agent and the more proximate stakeholders mean that ethical decisions commonly favor these stakeholders.