NATIONAL STRATEGIC DOCUMENTS FOR DEVELOPMENT BY 2020 AS THE DEVELOPMENT FACTORS IN EASTERN CROATIA: CASE STUDY OF RIVER CRUISING

Europe, as a single market in the global world, is formed as a new economic and political community of nations. The European Union is developing its strategic documents on the European level, giving countries general guidelines only. On the basis of these guidelines, each country develops its strategic documents and economic development policies in accordance with the national model of the economy. River cruising in Croatia is somewhat recognised by the state as a tourism product that may significantly contribute to the economic development of Eastern Croatia. River cruising occurs sporadically in national strategic development documents, such as the Tourism Development Strategy of the Republic of Croatia until 2020. The question that remains is: how do national strategic documents and strategic planning contribute to the development of river cruising? Given the strategic documents of the development of Europe and Croatia are documents, which are based on management by objectives, the hypothesis of this study is: national strategic development documents which relate to river cruising are a key factor in the development of river cruising in Eastern Croatia. The paper analysis the European strategic framework and assesses the effectiveness of the Croatian strategic documents, using the case of river cruise tourism. The research is based on the European and Croatian normative acts, statistical reports and strategic documents prepared on the different levels of government. The research method used in this paper is the critical analysis of the data gathered during the literature review.