Participatory Destination Governance and other Pipe Dreams

Abstract

: Over the last 50 years, scientific research on destination governance has initiated various models focusing on its participatory aspects, such as collaborative and community-based governance. Implementation of these concepts, however, is still lacking, even though the overtourism discussion has emphasized the importance of residents’ consent regarding local tourism development. This paper shifts the perspective from academic concepts to the actual needs and opinions of host communities, in this case Munich, Germany. To collect in-depth data on the perceptions of local residents, and subsequently analyze if and how they wanted to participate in tourism governance, we used a qualitative, mixed-methods approach including focus groups and photo elicitation. The empirical results show that residents are not very interested in actively engaging in what scholars call “tourism governance” for two reasons: first, they do not see the need for it; second, they do not see any personal benefit. This reinforces the idea that the approach to creating participatory concepts of destination governance must change if communities are to ultimately achieve sustainable tourism development.