Temporary resident evil? Managing diverse impacts of second-home tourism

Abstract

ABSTRACTSecond-home tourism is a popular form of tourism in many countries. Sweden has over 600,000 second homes and more than half of the population have access to such properties. Previous literature on second-home tourism indicates that it impacts local communities and municipalities in many different ways, ranging from public services and land-use planning to the housing market and the local economy. However, it has not been sufficiently investigated how, where and by which spatial patterns these impacts might come into effect. Previous research has mostly been in the form of case studies, making generalizations difficult. This paper examines whether a theorized heterogeneity of second-home landscapes transfers into actual spatial variance in the impacts of second-home tourism. The investigation is done through semi-structured interviews with officials from 20 Swedish municipalities, selected using a theoretical model and comprehensive quantitative data. Results reveal considerable variance between different locations and argues for more context-aware second-home research.