Sustainable Development

Sustainable Development
Sust. Dev. 17, 220–232 (2009)

Published online 6 November 2008 in Wiley InterScience
(www.interscience.wiley.com) DOI: 10.1002/sd.384
Sustainable Tourism Development: How Do

Destination Stakeholders Perceive Sustainable
Urban Tourism?
Seldjan Timur1* and Donald Getz2
1
Department of Business Administration, Faculty of Business and Economics,
Eastern Mediterranean University, Famagusta, North Cyprus, Turkey
2
University of Queensland, School of Tourism, Brisbane, Australia
Haskayne School of Business, University of Calgary, Calgary, Alberta, Canada
University of Goteborg, Sweden
ABSTRACT
This paper examines the concept of sustainable tourism development in urban destina-
tions. Both qualitative and quantitative data are employed, from interviews and question-
naires undertaken in Victoria and Calgary, Canada, and San Francisco, USA. Respondents
representing the three clusters of the tourism industry, local government and the host
environment were examined on their interpretation of ‘sustainable tourism’, sustainability
goals and barriers to achieving sustainable tourism in urban destinations. Results revealed
important similarities and differences among key stakeholders, and particularly a lack of
appreciation for a triple bottom line approach among the tourism industry respondents.
Implications are discussed for building a more participative policy approach to sustainable
urban tourism development. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and ERP
Environment.
Received 23 August 2007; revised 8 May 2008; accepted 14 May 2008

Keywords: sustainable development; urban tourism; stakeholder engagement
Introduction
T
HERE IS A LARGE BODY OF LITERATURE ON SUSTAINABLE TOURISM. HOWEVER, ITS APPLICATION TO URBAN SETTINGS
is relatively new. The research on sustainable tourism has concentrated on natural environments and
protected areas, despite the fact that most of the world’s population lives in urban areas and the majority
of travel happens in cities (WTO statistics, 1999, cited by Dodds and Joppe, 2003). In Europe, urban
tourism encompasses 30% of the journeys and 20% of the overnight stays, ranking respectively second and third
among all types of tourist destination (Paskaleva-Shapira, 2003). Even though large cities are argued to be ‘the
most important type of tourist destinations’ (Law, 2002, p. 1) and tourism has become a significant component
* Correspondence to: Seldjan Timur, Ph.D., Assistant Professor in Management, Department of Business Administration, Faculty of Business
and Economics, Eastern Mediterranean University, Famagusta, North Cyprus, via Mersin 10, Turkey. E-mail: selcan.timur@emu.edu.tr
Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and ERP Environment
10991719, 2009, 4, Downloaded from https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/sd.384 by Bahauddin Zakariya University, Wiley Online Library on [12/10/2023]. See the Terms and Conditions (https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/terms-and-conditions) on Wiley Online Library for rules of use; OA articles are governed by the applicable Creative Commons License
Sustainable Tourism Development 221
of the economy in most of the large cities (Law, 2002), the notion of sustainability has been neglected in the
context of cities and urban areas (Hinch, 1996; Barke and Newton, 1995; Ashworth, 1992).
The market of urban tourism is rapidly expanding (Van der Borg, 1992; Law, 2002; Paskaleva-Shapira, 2003).
The favorable market conditions tempt many city planners to make tourism development an important part of
urban policy. Tourism not only represents a major economic activity and generator of income and employment
but also promotes social development through its impact on employment creation, income redistribution and
poverty alleviation. At the same time tourism development is a significant cause of several undesirable social,
cultural and environmental disturbances.
Cities have started to show some of the similar problems with tourism that have been identified in other envi-
ronments (Dodds and Joppe, 2003). The growth of tourism in urban destinations presents various challenges such
as protection of the environment, conservation of heritage, preservation of social fabric and cultural values and
maintenance of a desired quality of life for residents. Despite the argument that adoption of sustainable tourism
would reduce the tensions and friction created by the complex interactions between the tourism industry, visitors,
the environment and host communities (Stabler and Goodall, 1997; Bramwell and Lane, 1993; Craik, 1995;
Faulkner and Tideswell, 1997), there is very little research on urban sustainable tourism. Tourism relies on a range
of physical, ecological, social and cultural resources, and when it is unplanned or poorly managed, even in large
cities, it can seriously harm the resource base of the destination (WTTC et al., 1995). However, potential negative
outcomes should not keep cities from developing tourism. On the contrary, they should encourage a strategic
approach to the formulation of a sustainable tourism policy.
For a sustainable tourism development (STD) approach to be workable, partners from the tourism industry,
government and community, in other words groups and individuals with divergent interests, goals, values and
perspectives, need to be drawn into the process of tourism planning and development (WTO, 1993; Long, 1997).
Among the diverse partners of STD, reciprocal mistrust and a lack of understanding of each other’s interests and
needs exist, which complicates consensus building in STD (Paskaleva-Shapira, 2003).
The vital importance of stakeholders and stakeholder management within sustainable tourism policy develop-
ment has been well recognized in the pages of Sustainable Development. It has been stressed that a bottom-up
approach is necessary, involving capacity-building and a road-map for stakeholders (MacLeod and Todnem, 2007).
Stakeholders have to be empowered and work in partnership (Welford et al., 1999), while strong leadership and
assistance is required from various levels of government (Eligh et al., 2002). Bell and Morse (2004) referred to
experience in Malta in demonstrating the importance of involving all stakeholders in the establishment of sustain-
ability indicators, to ensure a feeling of ownership. Cuthill (2002) observed that at the community level relation-
ships between organizations and interest groups were often disorganized and haphazard. To facilitate community
empowerment, stakeholders have to be educated on sustainability and cooperative action has to be fostered. Clear
benefits of collaborative action have to be demonstrated to all stakeholders.
The main goal of this study is to uncover how STD is interpreted by various stakeholders in urban tourism
destinations. The views of respondents in three cities, representing stakeholders from the tourism industry, local
government and the host environment as to their perceptions regarding the meaning and goals of sustainable
urban tourism (SUT), and barriers to implementation of STD in urban destinations, are presented. In the follow-
ing sections of this paper, sustainable tourism is discussed first by examining its principles, stakeholders and
urban applications. The methodology section is followed by findings of the study. Then the study concludes by
drawing some implications for sustainable development policy-makers.
Sustainable Tourism
Tourism is a sociocultural and economic phenomenon with broad economic, social, cultural and environmental
consequences. Sustainable tourism has economic, ecological, and social and cultural sustainability dimensions.
Economic sustainability ensures that development is economically efficient and that resources are managed in
such a way that they can support future generations. Ecological sustainability is concerned with ensuring develop-
ment that is compatible with the maintenance of essential ecological processes, biological diversity and biological
resources. Social and cultural sustainability ensures that development increases people’s control over their lives,
Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and ERP Environment Sust. Dev. 17, 220–232 (2009)
DOI: 10.1002/sd
222 S. Timur and D. Getz
is compatible with the culture and values of people affected by it, and maintains and strengthens community
identity (WTTC et al., 1995).
Principles, Partners and Goals

Achieving sustainable tourism requires support of numerous and diverse parties involved: the tourism industry,
and a wide range of interest groups from public sector agencies to community groups in the destination (Long,
1997). The World Tourism Organization (WTO) identifies three significant partners for STD, namely the tourism
industry, environment supporters and community/local authority (WTO, 1993). The tourism industry provides
tourism facilities and services that create business opportunities, jobs, income and foreign exchange by providing
an array of tourism services. The industry wants long-term growth, profitability and new business opportunities.
The second partner is the basis for natural, cultural and built (man-made) resources that the industry is dependent
upon for attracting tourists. These stakeholders focus their efforts on balancing the type and extent of tourism
activity against the capacity of the resources available. Community refers to residents, property owners (who may
or may not be residents) and local government authorities. Government, which is the public sector tourism devel-
opment agent, is concerned with the optimum use of the resources where jobs are created and resources are
protected. The public sector has economic, social and ecological responsibilities in developing tourism at all levels
(WTO, 1993; Pearce, 1989; Page, 1995).
The economic reasons for developing tourism are to generate new employment, improve local regional develop-
ment, diversify the economy and increase income level and revenue from taxes (Pearce, 1989; Holden, 2000).
Protecting the well being and health of individuals and promoting cultural awareness of the destination are among
the sociocultural factors that induce the public sector to foster tourism development (Pearce, 1989). The govern-
ment also undertakes stewardship of the environment and tourism resources so that the agents of development
do not destroy the future basis for tourism development. The community includes both people who benefit from
and those who pay costs associated with tourism development. Their concerns will focus highly on quality of
life.
Even though each stakeholder group has different goals and interests regarding STD, there are some goals of
sustainability that they share (see Figure 1). For instance, community and the tourism industry share the common
goal of economic and sociocultural sustainability; economic and resource sustainability goals are shared between
tourism industry and environment supporters, and local residents, government bodies and environmental
supporters share sustainable resource use and protection goals (WTO, 1993; Moisey and McCool, 2001).
Figure 1 is a generic model showing that diverse stakeholders do share common goals regarding STD. It sug-
gests that sustainability can be reached only when stakeholder groups share goals (Moisey and McCool, 2001). It
also suggests that sustainability requires involvement of all relevant stakeholders from the three major clusters so
that a shared meaning and goals among destination stakeholders are achieved. Despite all the difficulties, securing
the participation of key stakeholders in sustainable tourism planning and development is important in achieving
sustainable destination development (Long, 1997).
Common goal of
economic and social Tourism industry Common goal
sustainability of economic
(business opportunities) and resource
sustainability
Sustainability
Environment
Local supporters
authorities Common goal of resource
use and protection
Figure 1. Sustainability goals of main stakeholder groups
DOI: 10.1002/sd
Sustainable Urban Tourism

The European project SUT Governance (a research project of Key Action 4 ‘City of tomorrow and cultural heritage’
of the Energy, Environment and Sustainable Development Program within the Fifth Framework Program of the
European Union), defines SUT as a ‘holistic, equitable, and future-oriented development strategy’ (Paskaleva-
Shapira, 2003, p. 3). SUT is viewed as consistent and continuous development strategy that ensures the balance
of the present benefits of tourism with the future opportunities of the host community. The study recognizes that
sustainable tourism, governance and overall community prosperity are interlinked and that these elements depend
on each other for successful long-term urban sustainable development. SUT is a policy option with community-
centered objectives that ‘must affect urban policy development, considering both the industry and community long
term progress and, account for both tourism product and its sustainability implications’ (Paskaleva-Shapira, 2003,
p. 3). The project also views SUT as a process of urban governing in which many individuals and institutions,
public and private, plan and manage the common affairs of the city.
Similarly, Van der Borg (1992) views SUT as a development strategy for city tourism development. The develop-
ment of urban tourism has to contribute to the well-being of both the local population and those directly interested:
the local tourist industry and the tourists (Van der Borg, 1992). He argues that development of urban tourism
should be an integral part of the development strategy of the city. According to him, policy for urban tourism is
concerned with sustainable tourism development, and for sustainable urban tourism development he suggests
policies that are related to product, price, distribution and promotion. In a way, he emphasizes a vision – strategic
approach – for marketing urban destinations. However, Pearce notes that tourism is ‘a part, sometimes not a very
explicit one, of broader urban policies or plans rather than a separate and distinct sectoral strategy’ (2001,
p. 333).
SUT is a strategic process through which conflicting or diverse interests may be accommodated. In this environ-
ment, it would be almost impossible to balance the needs of diverse stakeholders without understanding how each
partner perceives sustainable tourism. Accordingly, this study employs the framework shown in Figure 1 to
examine STD in urban destinations. This framework not only shows three major partners of STD but also cor-
responds to the sample groups used in the study. The main clusters and potential key stakeholders in each cluster
are presented in Figure 1.The tourism industry is composed of sub-sectors such as transportation, accommodation,
attractions (natural, cultural or built, which includes museums, shopping facilities, cultural or sports events, fes-
tivals, entertainment etc.), food and beverage, retail shops and travel trade (Goeldner et al., 2000). Additionally,
this group includes the city’s destination management organization (DMO), which is responsible for destination
marketing, promotion, planning and development.
The second key stakeholder group is the host environment of the destination, which is composed of both host
community and the resource base of the host destination (i.e. urban environment). The host community refers to
residents, community groups, local business organizations (e.g. chamber of commerce), associations (e.g. down-
town association) and local educational, financial or other institutions. The urban environment has built, natural
and cultural dimensions that play a major role in attracting visitors to urban destinations (Hinch, 1996). These
urban environment capitals require protection, conservation and enhancement. While the natural and built heri-
tage of urban destinations concerns preservation and enhancement, cultural resources require respect for the
wishes of the local community, local culture, traditional lifestyles and cultural diversity. Therefore, the resource
base of the host environment includes environment supporters, which are represented by the groups dedicated to
preserving, conserving and enhancing social, cultural and natural resources of the host environment. WTO (1993)
emphasizes the importance of involving the host community in the decision-making on planning, developing and
managing tourism: the quality of life of the host community is influenced by tourism development, and tourism
operations influence the natural, built or sociocultural resources of the host environment.
The final stakeholder group is the local authorities. The involvement of government agencies at all levels in STD
is especially crucial because they have responsibility for implementing policies and plans, enforcing regulations
and monitoring development.
DOI: 10.1002/sd
Stakeholders and Stakeholder Management within Sustainable Tourism
Stakeholder engagement and management in developing sustainable policies are critical elements within sustain-
able tourism. Choi and Sirakaya (2005) developed indicators for community tourism impacts within a sustain-
ability framework, employing the Delphi technique. The indicators cover political, social, ecological, economic,
technological and cultural dimensions. They argued that ‘The context of sustainable tourism is a highly political
one involving many stakeholders’ (p. 1277). Bell and Morse (2004) referred to experience in Malta in demonstrat-
ing the importance of involving all stakeholders in the establishment of sustainability indicators. Key questions
include the ownership of the indicator-formulation process and who uses the indicators. In the early stages of the
consultation process, stakeholders were not known and had to be identified through workshops. Key industry
stakeholders such as fishing and tourism had to be consulted, as well as issue-focused groups and official
bodies.
Eligh et al. (2002) argued that sustainable tourism needs to emphasize local action involving a number of stake-
holders. Ten principles were advanced, including parallel economic and environmental policy development, supply-
chain management and building on strong cohesion. Critical success factors, identified by experiences in Norway,
were identified: strong leadership within a participatory process, external funding, and the importance of consumer
demand and subsequent supplier revenue generation. Welford et al. (1999) examined the rhetoric of sustainable
tourism development, summarized the impacts of tourism and outlined an approach that covers both supply and
demand sides of the issues. A variety of stakeholders were discussed in the context of the ‘policy arena’. They
argued ‘If there is to be a move towards sustainable tourism therefore, there needs to be an alliance between all
the various stakeholders in a particular role for local co-ordination of efforts’ (Welford et al., 1999, p. 170). Supply-
side implementation efforts would have to include strong destination management policy and strategy, as well
as the empowerment of various groups in the community. Cooperation between local authorities and many
organizations is essential.
Macleod and Todnem (2007) described the development of a sustainable tourism strategy for Scotland, examin-
ing the policy context. The authors develop an implementation road map for stakeholders. They argue for employ-
ing a bottom-up, performance-based process that stresses practical benefits, rather than an emphasis on regulatory
conformance. Nevertheless, the leadership role of the Scottish Executive and top industry body VisitScotland were
deemed to be essential – especially in capacity building among the stakeholders through written guidance, practi-
cal support and case studies. It was also emphasized that tourism policy actors should link their objectives to those
of stakeholders in other policy fields, to achieve a more cohesive public policy environment.
Cuthill (2002) drew on a variety of experiences to conclude that sustainability initiatives should be implemented
through a collaborative approach at the local community level, with citizens and local government working together
in partnership. Stakeholder participation, he said, was often only tokenistic. Cuthill also observed that at the com-
munity level relationships between organizations and interest groups were often disorganized and haphazard. To
facilitate community empowerment, stakeholders have to be educated on sustainability and cooperative action has
to be fostered. Clear benefits of collaborative action include increased lobbying power, learning, sharing of skills,
and providing direction and support to individuals. At the macro level, stakeholder access to social structures that
represent power is an issue, constituting a major constraint to achieving sustainable communities.
Fredline et al. (2004) employed the ‘synthesis diagram’ as a tool for visually summarizing economic, environ-
mental and social impacts. Elkington (1999) argued for a triple-bottom-line (TBL) approach to development of
performance measures and reporting systems inclusive of economic, environmental and social indicators. Within
the sustainable tourism movement the TBL approach has been widely recommended, but often misunderstood or
poorly applied. Sub-sectors such as events have also been considered, for example in the work of Sherwood et al.
(2005) regarding event impact assessment. As noted by these authors, the environmental dimension in particular
has been neglected, while the prevailing discourse on tourism has ensured that economic impact assessment and
reporting has been predominant and well developed. Somewhere in the middle has been progress on social
indicators and impact evaluation methods.
Burns (2003) advocated a ‘third way’ to tourism planning that hopefully moderates the left–right political dis-
courses on tourism. Should the emphasis be on human or economic development? His starting point is recogni-
tion that traditional master planning of tourism rests on neo-liberal assumptions of economic development and
DOI: 10.1002/sd
often fails to improve the lives of residents or, indeed, marginalizes them further. On the other hand, an over-
emphasis on eco or alternative tourism might achieve too little in the way of employment or other benefits. The
‘third way’ adopts principles of social democracy and is to be more participatory and democratic. A hallmark of
this approach is the creation of ‘civil institutions’... ‘that will enable beneficial relationships between actors’ (p. 35).
Stakeholder identification and involvement are key components of the Burns model. He said (p. 38) ‘...an industry
built up through a stake-holding approach has a greater propensity for long term stability’. Such an approach
should aim to break down barriers between sectors and agencies, reduce antagonism and foster cooperation and
integrated planning. Moreover, rights must be accompanied by responsibilities.
Methodology
Calgary (Alberta, Canada), Victoria (British Columbia, Canada) and San Francisco (California, USA) were chosen
for empirical investigation. While a study of a single destination would be instructive, a comparison of three cities
with varying tourism infrastructures and different planning approaches yields more understanding. Identifying
similarities and differences facilitates the transfer of findings to other contexts (Antal et al., 1996). The City of
Calgary has neither a sustainable tourism development strategy nor a sustainable city plan to guide Calgary’s
tourism development. However, the city has substantial environmental programs developed by the environmental
management and community strategies departments at the City Hall. The City of Victoria was selected because
the annual report of Tourism Victoria indicated that the principles of sustainability were being applied in this urban
area. The primary reason for choosing San Francisco was the ‘Sustainability plan for the city of San Francisco’
(2002), which had been developed by the municipal government. In 1996, over 350 San Franciscans, community
activists and people representing many city government agencies, over 100 businesses, and academia gathered
in working groups and drafted a plan to achieve a sustainable society. In 1997, the goals and objectives of the
sustainability plan became policy of the City and County of San Francisco (www.sustainable-city.org).
The tourism literature has identified many goals for sustainable tourism development, and Paskaleva-Shapira
(2001), Hinch (1996) and Law (2002) adapted them to urban destination contexts. Since the meaning likely implies
different goals to many and diverse partners of STD, scales were constructed to discover each cluster’s goals for
SUT (see Table 1). The scales used in the questionnaire were developed in such a way that they included items
reflecting economic, environmental, sociocultural and experiential dimensions of sustainability that were signifi-
cant to urban areas (Joppe and Dodds, 2000; Hinch, 1996; Law, 2002). Respondents, using a five point Likert
scale (‘1’ being strongly disagree and ‘5’ strongly agree), indicated whether or not they agreed with these goals.
Economic Environmental Sociocultural Experiential

(community issues)
providing long term business maintaining and considering providing long term and well ensuring visitors’ experiences
profitability re-use of old buildings in paying employment are memorable
the downtown area opportunities
continuing to grow <city’s> preserving all of <city’s> ensuring residents have securing health and wellness
tourism industry remaining natural areas control over tourism of visitors
development decision-
making
ensuring <city’s> tourism restricting private car developing a sustainable providing strong motivators
marketing budget is movements by tourists to industry where all for visiting <city>
sustained and increased control air pollution and businesses practice green
congestion in <city> operations
Table 1. The dimensions of sustainable urban tourism goals
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Opposition to tourism planning, development, or policy formulation

Opposition to the principles of sustainable tourism planning, development or policy formulation
The costs of conducting tourism planning, development or policy formulation
The diversity of the tourism industry and the large number of actors
Various and conflicting interests of stakeholders
The complexity of tourism planning, development or policy formulation with a large number of government agencies involved
The seasonality of the tourism industry
Lack of government support
Lack of leadership
Lack of awareness
Lack of coordination
Table 2. Sustainable tourism barriers
In order to achieve a healthier understanding of SUT, this study examined the challenges of practicing STD or
barriers to the implementation of STD projects in cities. The barriers were initially identified by the interviewers
and then augmented with the literature (see Table 2). The respondents indicated whether or not they agreed with
the SUT barriers by using a five point Likert scale (‘1’ being strongly disagree and ‘5’ strongly agree).
Research Design
A two-stage research design was employed. The first aimed to obtain detailed input from selected interviews in
Calgary, Victoria and San Francisco regarding the meaning of sustainable tourism in urban destinations, and
major issues related to the development and implementation of sustainable tourism programs in urban destina-
tions. In this qualitative approach, data were collected by conducting face-to-face, in-depth interviews by using
open-ended questions (Veal, 1997). Interviews usually took 40–60 minutes. The interviews were audio taped,
transcribed verbatim and analyzed. The snowball sampling technique was employed to identify subjects with
relevant characteristics (Black, 1999; Berg, 2004).
Initial interviews were conducted among a sample selected from various urban tourism stakeholders who can
affect and are affected by practices of sustainable tourism. Consequently, the interview process started with the first-
level stakeholders such as the local DMOs, some hotel managers, major tourist attractions’ managers, conference
and convention centers’ managers and government agents responsible for tourism and/or economic development.
During the interviews, according to the basic strategy of snowballing, subjects were asked to identify other stake-
holders who were considered to have relevant characteristics and valuable information regarding the purposes of
the study (Black, 1999; Berg, 2004). Then, all the subjects who were nominated by the stakeholders at the first
level, but who were not among the first-level respondents, were gathered. These additional actors constituted the
second level in the data gathering. This sampling proceeds through several levels, in which new actors are nomi-
nated (Wasserman and Faust, 1993). Snowball sampling helped identify a more complete web of legitimate stake-
holders. The respondents included not only initial key stakeholders but also their referrals. When the saturation
point was reached, that is when no new names were provided by the interviewees, the interviewing process was
finalized. In total, 38 interviews were conducted in three cities. 15 were conducted in Calgary, 12 in Victoria
and 11 in San Francisco. Overall, 15 respondents represented industry, 10 were from local government and the
remaining 13 represented various community organizations or institutions.
In the second stage, a structured questionnaire was developed to collect comparable and quantifiable data in
three cities. The self-completion, mail-back questionnaire was developed to uncover goals of SUT and barriers to
implementing sustainable projects in urban destinations. The questionnaires were to be completed by the top
management, including chief executive officers or presidents of organizations, heads of the strategic business units
responsible for tourism planning, development and/or policy-making and selected members of the top manage-
ment teams in each business unit (including government authorities) who were involved in economic development
or strategy formulation activities.
DOI: 10.1002/sd
The sampling frame of each city was composed of the city directories, local government directories and listings
of local and provincial destination marketing organizations. The sampling frame for each city had lists for three
clusters: tourism industry, government and environment. In the host environment cluster, the sample included
community groups, local business organizations such as the chamber of commerce, downtown associations; local
educational, financial or charitable institutions; and organizations or groups that are dedicated to preserving and
conserving social, cultural and natural resources of the host destinations. Fifty questionnaires were sent to ran-
domly selected members of this cluster in each city. The lists for the government cluster included all agents rep-
resenting the government at various levels. The questionnaires were sent to all pertinent government agents: 10,
15 and 13 government agents, respectively, in Calgary, Victoria and San Francisco. The tourism industry cluster is
composed of sub-sectors such as transportation, accommodation, attractions (natural, cultural or built, which
includes parks and gardens, museums, galleries, historical sites, performing arts, shopping facilities, cultural or
sports events, festivals, entertainment etc.), food and beverage, tourism services (such as advertising agencies,
retail shops) and travel trade (such as special event and meeting planners, inbound tour operators). Additionally,
this group included the local and regional destination management and marketing organizations, industry asso-
ciation organizations such as hotel, motel and B&B associations and so on. A sample was drawn stratified by
industry sub-sectors and 130–140 questionnaires were mailed to the tourism industry cluster in each city.
The questionnaires were sent in 2003 to about 190 stakeholders in each city – a total of 578 in the three cities.
To increase the response rate, Dillman’s (1978) ‘total design method’ was applied. Two weeks after the question-
naires were mailed to the respondents, a reminder postcard was sent, followed by a re-mailing of the entire package
to those stakeholders that did not respond three weeks after the initial mailing.
A total of 188 surveys were returned. Seventy out of 190 (response rate of 37%), 65 out of 195 (33%) and 53 out
of 193 (27%) surveys were returned respectively from Calgary, Victoria and San Francisco. Fifteen of the returned
responses could not be used due to missing data and incomplete responses. After incomplete cases had been
eliminated, the final sample consisted of 70 questionnaires from Calgary, 62 questionnaires from Victoria and 41
questionnaires from San Francisco. The final sample size was 173, which indicates a 30% response rate.
Findings
The Meaning of SUT

The major stakeholder groups such as industry, local government and host environment perceived sustainable
urban tourism differently. There was hardly any consensus on whether the term implied sustaining visitor
volumes, conserving and protecting the resource base, or environmental regulation or restrictions. Most of the
interviewees from the three cities used the notion of sustainability in the context of economic vitality. For example,
respondents said ‘long lasting resources that can be maintained and expanded upon and creates ongoing oppor-
tunities for the community’ and ‘sustainable tourism is a combination of investment of capital facilities and the
money to market it’. Only 25% of the respondents interviewed were able to provide a definition of STD that included
all three basic dimensions. One respondent said: ‘Sustainable development for me is development of the com-
munity based on a number of things. One of them is managing growth appropriately, not stopping growth, but
managing it. Paying attention to the quality of life, paying attention to our environmental goal and equity. So basi-
cally three views. A lot of goes to develop the community that’s built for the future not for past or not built for
today. What it really looks at is not just the ecological site but also the equity and the quality of life’. Sustainable
tourism had different meanings to various stakeholder groups in each urban destination.
Underlying Dimensions of SUT Goals

STD has economic, environmental, sociocultural and experiential goals. To examine whether STD goals could be
regrouped to help determine the main goals of SUT, exploratory factor analysis was performed. To determine the
appropriateness of factor analysis, the Kaiser–Meyer–Olkin (KMO) measure of sampling adequacy and Barlett’s
test of sphericity were performed (Table 3). The value of KMO was 0.775, which was sufficient for further analysis.
DOI: 10.1002/sd
KMO and Bartlett’s Test
Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin Measure of Sampling Adequacy. .775

Bartlett’s Test of Sphericity Approx. Chi-Square 455.353
df 66
Sig. .000
Table 3. Tests to determine appropriateness of factor analysis
Rotated Component Matrixa
Component
1 2 3
G. Developing a sustainable industry where all businesses practice green operations. .805
E. Preserving all of (city’s) remaining natural areas. .723
K. Restricting private car movements by tourists to control air pollution and congestion .718
in (the city).
B. Maintaining and considering re-use of old buildings in the downtown area. .649
H. Ensuring residents have control over tourism development decision-making. .627
D. Providing long-term and well paying employment opportunities for the residents. .540
I. Securing health and wellness of visitors. .423 .379
F. Continuing to grow (city’s) tourism industry. .813
L. Providing strong motivators for visiting (the city). .801
C. Ensuring visitors’ experience are memorable. .566
A. Providing long-term business profitability. .872
J. Ensuring city’s tourism marketing budget is sustained and increased. .398 .476
Table 4. Rotated factor matrix

Extraction Method: Principal Component Analysis.
Rotation Method: Varimax with Kaiser Normalization.
a
Rotation converged in 5 iterations.
Factors Eigenvalues % of variance Cumulative Reliability Number of

explained variance (%) (Cronbach’s alpha) items
1 3.204 26.705 26.705 .7751 6

2 2.146 17.885 44.589 .6247 4
3 1.067 8.894 53.483 .3444 2
Table 5. Exploratory factor analysis for combined data (three cities)
The overall significance of the correlation matrix was 0.000, with a Barlett test of sphericity value of 455.35. Both
tests indicated that there was a significant correlation between the variables, and the use of factor analysis was
appropriate (Hair et al., 1998).
The results from the varimax-rotated factor matrix suggested three factors (Table 4). Factors with eigenvalues
equal to or greater than unity are reported in Table 5. Three factors based on the dimensions of the loaded goals
were termed ‘issue oriented development’ (Factor 1), ‘experience oriented development’ (Factor 2) and ‘industry
DOI: 10.1002/sd
Variables Factor 1 Factor 2 Factor 3
Issue oriented growth G. Developing a sustainable industry where all businesses 0.805 −0.110 0.081
practice green operations.
E. Preserving all of (city’s) remaining natural areas. 0.723 0.161 −0.238
K. Restricting private car movements by tourists to control air 0.718 −0.091 0.049
pollution and congestion in (the city).
B. Maintaining and considering re-use of old buildings in the 0.649 −0.230 0.124
downtown area.
H. Ensuring residents have control over tourism development 0.627 0.163 0.007
decision-making.
D. Providing long-term and well paying employment 0.540 0.285 0.164
opportunities for the residents.
Experience oriented F. Continuing to grow (city’s) tourism industry. 0.074 0.813 0.006
development L. Providing strong motivators for visiting (the city). −0.077 0.801 −0.034
C. Ensuring visitors’ experiences are satisfactory and −0.042 0.566 0.294
memorable.
I. Securing health and wellness of visitors. 0.423 0.379 0.268
Industry oriented growth A. Providing long-term business profitability. −0.018 0.024 0.872
J. Ensuring city’s tourism marketing budget is sustained and 0.217 0.398 0.476
increased.
Table 6. Rotated factor matrix for the three cities

Extraction method: principal component analysis.
Rotation method: Varimax with Kaiser normalization.
oriented growth’ (Factor 3), and are listed in Table 6. Factor loadings, which ranged from 0.38 to 0.81, indicate
significant correlations between the variables and the factors (Hair et al., 1998).
To test the reliability and internal consistency of each factor, the Cronbach’s alpha of each was determined. It
is generally suggested that an item having a coefficient alpha above 0.70 is acceptable for research, and that an
item having a coefficient alpha below 0.30 is unacceptable and therefore should be deleted from the research
(Churchill, 1979; Nunnally, 1978). The results (see Table 5) showed that the alpha coefficients ranged from 0.34
to 0.78 for the three factors. Two of the results were considered reliable, since 0.50 is the minimum value for
accepting the reliability test (Nunnally, 1967). Despite the relatively low Cronbach alpha reliability score, Factor 3
was not eliminated because the coefficient was slightly above the 0.30 acceptable limit and the low coefficient could
be related to the small number of items included in the factor. However, this factor will be interpreted very cau-
tiously. Factors and items were eliminated if they failed the following tests: (a) individual items must have a
minimum factor loading of 0.30 and (b) the anti-image correlation for each item must exceed 0.50.
The analysis determined that the goals of SUT can be grouped into three rather than four dimensions. The
environmental and sociocultural goals were combined in Factor 1; experiential and economic goals determined
the other two principal SUT goals. It was observed that the means of items reflecting experience oriented develop-
ment (Factor 2) and industry oriented growth (Factor 3) dimensions of sustainable tourism were higher than the
means of the issue oriented growth factor’s items. In fact, the descriptive statistics for 12 STD goals indicate that
only one goal received an overall mean of under three. So, the findings are not really a rejection of most goals,
merely a prioritizing. It should be emphasized that findings could also be related to the sampling bias.
If experience oriented development and industry oriented growth dimensions of SUT are considered to be
primary goals of the three cities, then issue oriented growth, which reflects social, environmental and cultural
goals of STD, could be considered as secondary. Giving more emphasis to goals that reflect experience oriented
development and industry oriented growth dimensions of STD is related to the increasing competition between
urban tourism destinations. Though urban destinations are concerned about the social, cultural and environmen-
tal issues of tourism development, in order to maintain their competitiveness, urban destinations focus on
DOI: 10.1002/sd
providing high quality visitor satisfaction so that an economically healthy tourism industry is sustained. However,
if tourism development is dominated by economic and experience oriented goals, establishment of balanced and
long term destination objectives will be difficult. Additionally, stakeholder groups that do not share the objectives
of a destination’s tourism development strategy will be reluctant to participate in the formulation of policy and
might create problems during implementation. From a sustainable development perspective, policy-makers should
promote a balanced tourism development where no one group of stakeholders benefits at the expense of others.
SUT Barriers
In terms of barriers to implementation of STD in urban destinations, respondents in each city agreed that the
‘complexity of tourism planning, development or policy formulation with large number of government agencies
involved’ was one of the top challenges facing urban tourism destinations (Table 7). Additionally, ‘lack of coordina-
tion’, which had received relatively high means by respondents of the three cities, was another barrier in the process
of implementation of STD projects. Respondents representing industry and host environment in three cities per-
ceived ‘various and conflicting interests of stakeholders’ and ‘lack of coordination’ to be the most important SUT
barriers.
The ANOVA results indicated that two barriers had significantly different means in three cities. The F statistic
for ‘diversity of tourism industry and the large number of actors’ is 6.254, and that for ‘various and conflicting
interests of stakeholder’ is 9.266, with a p value of less than 0.01. The means of these items in San Francisco
were significantly lower than those of both Victoria and Calgary.
In Calgary and Victoria, respondents assigned the highest mean to ‘various and conflicting interests of stake-
holders’ barrier. One could relate this finding to the various power levels of different stakeholders. Those with
more power could achieve what they want from STD and less powerful players’ interests could be neglected. In
San Francisco, this barrier had a lower mean. This might indicate that in San Francisco stakeholders with various
interests found a platform to voice their concerns and achieve their needs. In Calgary and Victoria the ‘diversity
of the tourism industry and the large number of actors involved in tourism planning, development or policy for-
mulation’ barrier also received high means. However, San Francisco respondents assigned a relatively low mean
to this barrier. This might indicate that in San Francisco a more diverse stakeholder group was involved in tourism
planning, development or policy formulation and the arrangement that they have might be working satisfactorily.
These facts indicate that San Francisco’s challenges to implementation of sustainable tourism were different from
Cities Stakeholders
Calgary Victoria San Francisco Industry Government Host environment

(n = 70) (n = 62) (n = 41) (n = 128) (n = 10) (n = 35)
The complexity of tourism with large

number of government agencies 3.9 3.9 3.9 4.0 3.3 3.9
involved
Various and conflicting interests of
4.0 4.0 3.4 4.0 3.8 4.0
stakeholders
Lack of coordination 3.9 3.8 3.7 3.9 3.9 3.7
Lack of government support 3.7 3.6 3.6 3.8 3.7 3.3
Lack of leadership 3.5 3.5 3.7 3.6 3.7 3.2
The diversity of tourism industry
3.7 3.8 3.2 3.6 3.0 3.9
and the large number of actors
Lack of awareness 3.6 3.3 3.4 3.6 3.6 3.2
Table 7. The mean scores* of STD barriers by cities and stakeholder groups
* On a five-point Likert scale.
DOI: 10.1002/sd
the other two cities’. Neither the diversity of the tourism industry nor conflicting interests of diverse stakeholders
got in the way of STD planning or policy-making.
Overall, the means of barriers in San Francisco were lower than those of Calgary and Victoria. The barriers
given the highest means by San Francisco respondents were ‘complexity of tourism and large number of govern-
ment agencies involved’, ‘lack of coordination’, ‘lack of leadership’ and ‘lack of government support’. This finding
might reflect their experience with their sustainable city plan initiative.
Calgary ,Victoria and San Francisco respondents also perceived that ‘complexity of tourism planning, develop-
ment or policy formulation with large number of government agencies involved’ and ‘lack of coordination’ were
the other important barriers to implementation of STD projects. The findings confirm Pearce’s (2001) point that
tourism has typically been one part of a more comprehensive urban policy. In addition to economic development
of the tourism sector, tourism development in cities has to consider and be in harmony with the environmental
or sociocultural dimensions of a sustainable city policy. Therefore, for SUT policy-making, what is needed is a
facilitator to organize and coordinate multiple and diverse stakeholders, and a leader to initiate and manage the
process.
Conclusion
Different stakeholder groups viewed sustainable urban tourism in either economic, environmental or sociocultural
terms. Having varied interpretations of SUT creates an environment in which collective acting or decision-making
would be difficult to attain. This is certainly indicative of a general lack of communication or formal discourse
among the stakeholders of the three clusters. This divergence will typically be one of the most important challenges
when attempting to formulate and implement STD policies for urban destinations. If concerns regarding economic
vitality of the tourism industry dominate tourism development that is focused on providing satisfactory experiences
for visitors, then other dimensions of sustainability such as protection of the natural environment, conservation
of cultural heritage, preservation of built urban environment or respect for cultural diversity might be neglected.
Policy-makers can no longer ignore various stakeholder concerns. On the contrary, they are challenged to create
a more participative model. There is a need for sustainability networks. The term ‘sustainability networks’ is used
to indicate the interactions of multiple and various stakeholders with different goals and varying degrees of inter-
est and power in STD. The interconnectedness of diverse stakeholders on sustainability dimensions can improve
the process of STD in urban destinations.
A coordinated, organized and managed stakeholder interaction could ease the difficulties of this process. A leader
to coordinate multiple and diverse stakeholders, to increase political support and to initiate the SUT process is
required, but it is unclear which organization is going to take the lead in increasing the communication and coop-
eration among the diverse group of stakeholders. According to Welford et al. (1999) and MacLeod and Todnem
(2007), it seems that the leadership will come from governments. Welford et al. (1999) stress use of the supply
chain as a powerful tool for STD. They not only argue that cooperation between organizations and local authorities
is needed for effective destination management, but also state that tourists have to be educated in order to bring
consumer pressure on the supply side.
More research has to be done to examine who can provide support to a diverse group of urban destination
stakeholders. Is there are a need for changing the roles of destination marketing/management organizations
(DMOs), moving them toward more of a coordinating and stakeholder based management model.
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Sust. Dev. 17, 220–232 (2009)

Sustainable Tourism Development: How Do

Received 23 August 2007; revised 8 May 2008; accepted 14 May 2008

Principles, Partners and Goals

Figure 1. Sustainability goals of main stakeholder groups

Sustainable Urban Tourism

Stakeholders and Stakeholder Management within Sustainable Tourism

Economic Environmental Sociocultural Experiential

Opposition to tourism planning, development, or policy formulation

Table 2. Sustainable tourism barriers

The Meaning of SUT

Underlying Dimensions of SUT Goals

KMO and Bartlett’s Test

Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin Measure of Sampling Adequacy. .775

Table 3. Tests to determine appropriateness of factor analysis

Rotated Component Matrixa

Table 4. Rotated factor matrix

Factors Eigenvalues % of variance Cumulative Reliability Number of

1 3.204 26.705 26.705 .7751 6

Table 5. Exploratory factor analysis for combined data (three cities)

Variables Factor 1 Factor 2 Factor 3

Table 6. Rotated factor matrix for the three cities

Calgary Victoria San Francisco Industry Government Host environment

The complexity of tourism with large

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