Between Change and Stability: Local Development, Tourist Offer and Local Values in Monferrato, Italy

Abstract

This article presents an ethnographic analysis of the perception of tourism in small, rural municipalities in Italian internal areas, by focusing on the UNESCO territory of Monferrato, in North-Western Italy. The paper looks at how communities consider tourism in relationship with the specificities of their land and the need of transforming it in order to create a functional tourist destination. In so doing, the paper answers to key questions concerning touristic development by pointing the relevance of the hierarchy of values of the communities in shaping the actual offer in services and goods, highlighting the conflicting expectations concerning developing a new, thriving economic and maintaining the local social stability.

Keywords

• tourism
• marginalization
• local development
• Italy
• UNESCO
• ethnography