Tourism as an opportunity to effectively counteract marginalisation. The case of the Italian national strategy for inner areas

Remote rural areas are often rich in natural and landscape assets, which are in turn used as the main focus of tourism development strategies aiming at reverting their decline. However, mono-functional strategies hardly manage to achieve this goal, as in order to restore those structural conditions that are essential to liveability and local development it is necessary to engage in a more comprehensive approach. Acknowledging this challenge, the paper reflects on the possibility to include tourism within multi-level development strategies aimed at tackling marginalisation, drawing on the case of the Italian National Strategy for Inner Areas. More in detail, the authors analyse how the latter enables the integration of tourism-related actions into more comprehensive, place-based development strategies that act upon the peculiarities of the territories they focus on through a mix of top-down and bottom-up logics.

[1]  Vanessa Assumma,et al.  Planning sustainable tourism in UNESCO wine regions: the case of the Langhe-Roero and Monferrato area , 2022, European Spatial Research and Policy.

[2]  Babu George,et al.  Interdependence and complementarity between rural development and rural tourism: a bibliometric analysis , 2022, Rural Society.

[3]  G. Cotella,et al.  Rural Accessibility in European Regions , 2021, Rural Accessibility in European Regions.

[4]  G. Cotella,et al.  Multi-level regional development governance: A European typology , 2021, European Spatial Research and Policy.

[5]  Ying Wang,et al.  Rural tourism: A systematic literature review on definitions and challenges , 2021, Journal of Hospitality and Tourism Management.

[6]  E. Vitale Brovarone.  Accessibility and mobility in peripheral areas: a national place-based policy , 2021, European Planning Studies.

[7]  J. Elbe,et al.  Spatial Concentration of Tourism – a Case of Urban Supremacy , 2020, Tourism Planning & Development.

[8]  F. Roxas,et al.  Mapping stakeholders’ roles in governing sustainable tourism destinations , 2020 .

[9]  G. Cotella.  How Europe hits home? The impact of European Union policies on territorial governance and spatial planning , 2020 .

[10]  G. Cotella,et al.  Rethinking urbanisation after COVID-19: what role for the EU cohesion policy? , 2020 .

[11]  G. Urso.  Metropolisation and the challenge of rural-urban dichotomies , 2020, Urban Geography.

[12]  G. Cotella,et al.  Improving Rural Accessibility: A Multilayer Approach , 2020, Sustainability.

[13]  G. Cotella,et al.  Spatial planning and territorial governance in Southern Europe between economic crisis and austerity policies , 2020 .

[14]  Carolin Funck,et al.  Tourism’s Contribution to an Equal Income Distribution: Perspectives from Local Enterprises , 2019, Tourism Planning & Development.

[15]  P. Küpper,et al.  Rural regeneration strategies for declining regions: trade-off between novelty and practicability , 2018 .

[16]  Jan Amcoff,et al.  Tourism’s localised population effect in the rural areas of Sweden , 2018 .

[17]  N. Gallent,et al.  Rural Second Homes in Europe: Examining Housing Supply and Planning Control , 2017 .

[18]  G. Urso.  Polycentric Development Policies: A Reflection on the Italian “National Strategy for Inner Areas”☆ , 2016 .

[19]  A. Lepore,et al.  State intervention and economic growth in Southern Italy: the rise and fall of the ‘Cassa per il Mezzogiorno’ (1950–1986) , 2016 .

[20]  C. Rogerson,et al.  Heritage tourism in the global South: Development impacts of the Cradle of Humankind World Heritage Site, South Africa , 2016 .

[21]  Jesse Heley,et al.  Governing beyond the metropolis: Placing the rural in city-region development , 2015 .

[22]  M. Rofe.  Considering the Limits of Rural Place Making Opportunities: Rural Dystopias and Dark Tourism , 2013 .

[23]  Patrick Brouder.  Tourism Development Against the Odds: The Tenacity of Tourism in Rural Areas , 2012 .

[24]  Doris Schmallegger,et al.  Is tourism just another staple? A new perspective on tourism in remote regions , 2010 .

[25]  G. Dematteis.  Polycentric urban regions in the Alpine space , 2009 .

[26]  J. Saarinen,et al.  Sustainable Tourism Planning and Regional Development in Peripheries: A Nordic View , 2009 .

[27]  B. Ilbery,et al.  Conceptualizing Integrated Rural Tourism , 2007 .

[28]  J. F. Rye.  Rural Youths' Images of the Rural. , 2006 .

[29]  A. Jones,et al.  Foreword , 1967, British Journal of Cancer.

[30]  E. Chiodo,et al.  Tourism transition in peripheral rural areas: Theories, issues and strategies , 2018 .

[31]  B. King.  The Economics of Tourism Destinations , 2006 .

[32]  Donald Getz,et al.  COLLABORATION THEORY AND COMMUNITY TOURISM PLANNING , 1995 .

[33]  B. Bramwell.  Rural tourism and sustainable rural tourism , 1994 .

[34]  X. Greffe,et al.  Is rural tourism a lever for economic and social development , 1994 .