Current State and Prospects of Dark Tourism Flows Organization in Ukraine

Abstract

The development of scientific foundations of dark tourism by Ukrainian scientists is only at its start. The paper analyzes the scientific and practical significance of grief tourism for the formation of the entire tourism industry of Ukraine. The main destinations of disaster tourism in Ukraine, including world famous Ukrainian Chornobyl’, are described. Also, much attention is paid to the description of the thanatourism objects in Lviv, since Lviv is the most visited by foreign tourists from the neighboring countries and the world. The development strategy of grief tourism in Ukraine has several important features that the article focuses on: popularization of such a type of tourism by developing new tourist routes that include such sites, and also by conducting administrative events concerning the revival, renewal, protection, conservation and popularization of such objects. Catastrophe tourism will be developing only when some mental stereotypes of the population concerning the dark tourism objects as negative ones are overcome, and the opinion about such objects as the ones that are important to honour the memory about the killed is formed. One of the reasons why this type of tourism is underdeveloped is that the population is poorly informed about the existence and conditions of such places. The findings of the study help to create the development strategy of thanatourism in Ukraine in the context of the European integration processes, and grief tourism gives the possibility to establish social and cultural relations with the EU member states.