Abstract
What are the processes behind efforts for more sustainable mountain destinations in the German Alps and what are the views of different tourism stakeholders on these processes? The research deals both with threats pushing the agenda of sustainable development (such as climate change and depletion of resources), indicators of sustainable tourism (to measure the scope of change), as well as cross-border cooperation and stakeholder engagement in the German Alps. The data was collected through 30 interviews with individuals dealing with tourism development and sustainable tourism development in the German Alps. The findings suggest that a holistic approach and collection and dissemination of data and knowledge on sustainability are the basis for developing sustainable mountain tourism. Implementation and monitoring should focus on specific flagship sustainable tourism products, as well as on a destination in a broader sense and the sustainable tourism market. Three themes emerged as important for implementation of sustainable tourism in the German Alps: indicators of sustainable tourism, cross-border cooperation and stakeholder engagement.
Highlights
The focus of the research was identifying different measures, different styles and approaches to the challenges of sustainability in order to promote different destination governance modes and support policy innovation through a diffusion of best practices in the German Alps
What are the processes behind efforts for more sustainable mountain destinations in the German Alps and what are the views of different tourism stakeholders on these processes? The research deals both with threats pushing the agenda of sustainable development, indicators of sustainable tourism, as well as cross-border cooperation and stakeholder engagement in the German Alps
The findings suggest that a holistic approach and collection and dissemination of data and knowledge on sustainability are the basis for developing sustainable mountain tourism
Summary
The focus of the research was identifying different measures, different styles and approaches to the challenges of sustainability in order to promote different destination governance modes and support policy innovation through a diffusion of best practices in the German Alps. In this sense, Hall [1] sees governance and change frameworks as prerequisites for policy learning and change in general. The main objective of the research follows the recommendations of Diaz and Rodriguez, namely, that future studies in sustainable tourism should focus on stakeholders’ views of sustainable tourism in different types of destinations using a qualitative methodology [2]. Accentuating only one aspect (economic growth with solely quantitative measures) is one of the main contemporary obstacles to making tourism more sustainable and enabling qualitative destination development [9,10]
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