Ana PASTOR ALCARAZ , Universitat Rovira i virgili, Spain
Marc FUSTER UGUET, Universitat d'Alacant, Spain
The last decade has witnessed a number of significant transformations in Barcelona's governance related to the city's evolution as a tourist capital and the emerging challenges. Different moments of change, notably political turns and social-environmental crises, have prompted adaptations in the structure of municipal governance of tourism. Most notably, the irruption of the need for a smart tourism planning model has garnered attention from policymakers.
In this article, we investigate the tangible consequences that the tactic political shifts may have had on the implementation of a smart tourism agenda. Looking on the one hand at the documents of the different governing bodies and on the other hand at the results perceived by the actors involved in the tourism ecosystem along a time perspective covering the period from the 2008 financial crisis to actuality, we build the hypothesis that smart solutions have not been negotiated and disseminated thoroughly among the key stakeholders in the local tourism ecosystem, leading to a lack of alignment between what is proposed and what is actually developed.
Our empirical work methodology consists of a content analysis of 30 in-depth interviews carried out with key representatives of Barcelona’s private and public agencies, dissecting positionings and perceptions. Through this, we aim at demonstrating that the paradigm shift in tourism planning orientations that took place in Barcelona in the last years has not been paralleled by an equal commitment towards a smarter and more inclusive destination: the Smart City and sustainable tourism remain two largely separate domains, fleshed out through different agencies and stakeholder alliances.
Mots clés : Governance|Smart tourism|Destination management|Urban Tourism|Tourism planning
A104847AP