University of Prince Edward Island, Canada

Rural Tourism Entrepreneurship: Tourism Industry and Rural Community Co-evolve During the Amenity Transition in Hocking Hills, Ohio

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Abstract

A robust entrepreneur-led rural tourism ecosystem is often regarded as a catalyst to stimulate economic growth in amenity rich but underdeveloped regions. Much research to date, however, has focused on developing a robust business or industry separate from the social–spatial evolution of the entrepreneurial ecosystem in rural communities. Entrepreneurs extend market mechanisms to traditionally nonmonetary environmental and social contexts of rural communities by commodifying their physical landscapes and social heritages. Moreover, an increasingly commodified rural landscape can coproduce both the tourism industry and rural community simultaneously. Therefore, by using Hocking Hills, Ohio, to analyze tourism entrepreneurs’ business strategies and corresponding ways of capitalizing on environmental resources, this research connects the long-standing paradigms of tourism development and community evolution. By doing so, this research also forges a new direction for interdisciplinary theoretical and empirical studies by focusing on building an entrepreneurial ecosystem within a rural community.

Biography

The focus of my research is the intrinsic contradiction created by sustainable entrepreneurs during the market environmentalism transition: why entrepreneurs use sustainable business strategies and sustainable technical innovation but often create mechanisms that could lead to their own systematic unsustainability. To achieve this aim, I create an interdisciplinary theoretical framework by bridging the disciplinary chasms at the systems level. I have conducted research funded by the United States National Science Foundation, United States Department of Agriculture Foundational and Applied Science Program, United States Department of Agriculture Federal-State Market Improvement Program, International Foundation for Science (SolePI), and Environmental Policy Initiative (SolePI).