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Abstract
Sustainable tourism quality control tools (ST-QCTs) are voluntary mechanisms essential for translating sustainable tourism concepts into practice. Recent scholarship, synthesizing the extant literature, revealed a complex ‘multiverse’ of 15 ST-QCT types and seven critical variability parameters. Our empirical investigation of this multiverse in the diversified, year-round destination of Park City, USA, involving 27 semi-structured interviews with business informants representing three sectors, revealed another 11 ST-QCT types and the two additional critical variability parameters of formality (formal-to-informal) and dependence (dependent-to-independent). The results, indicating multiple alternative ST-QCT pathways with idiosyncratic merit at the operational scale, provide incipient evidence of a transition from conventional, standardized ‘Fordist’ modes of sustainable tourism practice to ‘post-Fordist’ modes conferring greater flexibility and customization.
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No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).
Additional information
Notes on contributors
Laura Lesar
Dr. Laura Lesar is an Assistant Professor at the University of Hawaii, Mānoa. Her research interests include sustainable tourism, sustainable tourism quality control tools (ST-QCTs), and certification programs.
David Weaver
Dr. David Weaver is Visiting Professor at Dongbei University of Finance and Economics. He specializes in sustainable tourism and has over 150 academic publications.
Sarah Gardiner
Dr. Sarah Gardiner is an Associate Professor at Griffith University. Her research interests include tourism innovation and youth and adventure travel.