Community resourcefulness and partnerships in rural tourism

Abstract

Small enterprises play a vital role in the drive toward sustainable tourism and in the sector more broadly, and their importance is accentuated in rural contexts. Beyond entrepreneurial spirit, what are the critical success factors that allow them to flourish? This study links tourism entrepreneurship, rural development and multi-stakeholder partnerships to situate community resourcefulness as a key plank in the sustainable tourism discourse. The focus of this study is six islands that play host to the Setouchi Triennale, a large art tourism initiative in rural Japan organized to revitalize declining regions. Highly divergent outcomes between communities emerged, directing attention toward community resourcefulness, where collective action leverages agency and capacity to effect change from within. Findings show the emergence of “art businesses”, local social enterprises that function as both tourism and community assets and model sustainable development outcomes. Islands supporting such ventures reaped substantial community benefits, while islands without them struggled, their nascent tourism economies benefiting only tourists and commuter entrepreneurs. This study reveals the potential and the limitations of large-scale, multi-stakeholder tourism development initiatives that promote entrepreneurship in resource-constrained areas and highlights that community resourcefulness is the determining factor behind the success or failure in otherwise comparable communities.

Keywords:

• Rural Tourism
• Community Resourcefulness
• Multi-stakeholder Partnerships
• Social Enterprise
• Sustainable Islands
• Art Festival

Acknowledgements

Meng Qu was supported by the Hiroshima University TAOYAKA Program for creating a flexible, enduring, peaceful society, which is funded by the Program for Leading Graduate Schools at the Japanese Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (MEXT). A. D. McCormick was supported by a research scholarship from MEXT. Special thanks to Eri Motohashi for her invaluable support in the field. The authors also deeply appreciate the thoughtful and transformative suggestions provided by the JoST reviewers and editors.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Meng Qu

Meng Qu is a Teaching Fellow and PhD Candidate at the Graduate School of Integrated Arts and Sciences at Hiroshima University, and research director at Art Island Center, Japan. A member of Hiroshima University’s TAOYAKA Program for Leading Graduate Schools, he currently oversees an interdisciplinary research project on marginal island communities in the Seto Inland Sea region of Japan.

A. D. McCormick

A. D. McCormick is a MEXT Research Scholar of human geography at the Graduate School of Integrated Arts and Sciences at Hiroshima University and the managing director of Art Island Center.

Carolin Funck

Carolin Funck obtained her Ph.D from the Albert-Ludwigs University Freiburg (Germany). She is professor for human geography at Hiroshima University (Japan), Graduate School of Integrated Arts and Sciences. Her research focuses on the development of tourism in Japan, sustainable island tourism and the rejuvenation of mature tourist destinations. She is the author of “Tourismus und Peripherie in Japan” and co-author of “Japanese Tourism”.