Regenerative Development Approaches Involving Tourism: Insights Derived from Place

With the rise of questioning whether it is acceptable for capitalism and economic growth to drive tourism development, alternative development approaches are emerging. This paper draws insights from two research projects investigating tourism’s contributions to developing healthy urban social-ecological systems. In recent years, a surge of interest by tourism scholars has driven increased publications about the approach commonly referred to as “regenerative tourism”. Two research designs that used qualitative case studies were applied and analysed using a post-development lens. Critical findings from both studies centre urban places in the analysis and consider the applicability of a regenerative (tourism) development approach for transforming the health of urban places. This paper challenges the notion that “tourism is primarily an economic phenomenon” and argues that in alignment with the regenerative development lineage, tourism as a tool for development must be designed from place rather than economies.