Is the World Heritage just a title for tourism?

Abstract

World Heritage inscription denotes recognition of cultural and natural properties that have outstanding universal value. This paper contributes to the debate on the tourism impact of WH inscription with prefectural city data from China. The difference-in-differences framework shows that WH inscription does not promote tourism in terms of tourism revenue and tourist arrivals, which is consistent under various robustness checks. Heterogeneity analysis finds a negative effect of World Heritage inscription on domestic tourism revenue in the developed eastern region, over time, and for World Cultural Heritages, caused by the inscription to properties involving multiple cities. The empirical results suggest that World Heritage inscription in China plays more roles in protecting inscribed properties than developing tourism from them.