Sports tourism does not have to be accompanied by crime: a case for the NFL Super Bowl

ABSTRACT

The Routine Activities Theory suggests that when there is the presence of a motivated offender, a suitable target, and the absence of a capable guardian, crime has the opportunity to occur. Large sporting events accompanied by massive tourists bring these ingredients of crime together. The purpose of this study is to find out whether the crime rates spike in the host cities during the high tourist month of the Super Bowl. Twenty-four months of crime rates on eight types of crimes were obtained for every American city that has hosted the Super Bowl. Panel Data Analysis is used to test the Hypotheses of this study. The findings do not show a spike in crime rates during the month of Super Bowl for any of the crimes examined in this study. It is in the economic interests of all stakeholders to provide a safe and secure venue free of crimes for sports tourists.

KEYWORDS:

• Super Bowl
• sports tourism
• crime
• Panel Data Analysis

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.