Promoting Heritage For A Sustainable Development: The Case Of Tourism In The Island Economies

This study explores the issue of development sustainability through differentiated tourism for Small Island Developing States (SIDS). We empirically test the hypothesis that the threshold we found in the relationship between tourism specialization (its share in GDP) and genuine savings (a measure of weak sustainability) relates to strategic differences in the development of tourism, including the mobilization of heritage resources, if available. We confirm the common view that heritage-based tourism is the right solution for a sustainable development in the SIDS highly relying on tourism activities. However, this strategy would undermine genuine savings in the SIDS weakly specialized in tourism, where alternative tourism strategies (e.g., mass tourism) would be more suitable for macroeconomic sustainability.