Introduction

Abstract

Sustainability and resilience are complex ideas and their relationship can be conceptualized and applied in multiple ways. This book approaches these concepts as interwoven processes that work with change in socio-ecological system contexts. Although there are some key differences between the concepts, for example, in respect to spatial and temporal scales, resilience is understood here as an integral part of sustainability thinking. Sustainable development has become a paradigm, although a troubled one, in various policy and planning discourses and models. In a report, Revisiting Sustainable Development, the United Nations Research Institute for Social Development (UNRISD, 2015) refers to the great policy success of sustainability in development discussions. The report states that “virtually all development actors and organizations, and the public at large, have bought into the narrative of sustainable development” (Utting, 2015, p. 1). Similarly, in the context of tourism studies the idea of sustainability is often seen as “one of the great success stories of tourism research and knowledge transfer” (Hall, 2011, p. 649), making tourism and related studies highly policy relevant issues in development discussions.