Analysis of tourism stakeholders´ perceptions of tourism development in the Oulu region

Abstract

Tourism development is considered as a tool for regional development due to its economic impacts and as an opportunity to revitalise the regions which have suffered a decrease in certain industries. Thus, previous studies consider tourism as a replacement for those industries and a source of employment. Furthermore, previous studies discuss that tourism has been considered by decision-makers as a way to improve economic diversity and as a source of increased tax revenues for the regions.

Previous studies have investigated the power of different tourism stakeholders and revealed that power impacts tourism development practices, distribution of resources, and the directions of development. However, while the previous studies have investigated power dynamics among tourism stakeholders and the motivations for tourism development, there seems to remain a gap in knowledge of stakeholders´ perceptions and evaluations of tourism development and determining the roles of stakeholders. Thus, to address the gap the main research question of this study is how the tourism stakeholders see tourism development in Oulu. Secondly, the aim is to investigate and create knowledge of the roles of stakeholders in tourism decision-making and development.

The empirical data of the study was collected via semi-structured online interviews in Teams targeting a variety of stakeholders in the region. The interviews were conducted with 2 participants from the DMO and a local entrepreneur.The collected data was analysed with thematic analysis to gain knowledge of the influential stakeholders and their impacts on the development and the stakeholder´s considerations of tourism as a regional development tool.

The analysis revealed a strong presence of DMO as a stakeholder in Oulu. The role of the local city and local companies were perceived to be improved. The data suggests increased cooperation and communication between stakeholders and product development. The development was seen partly as unfinished mainly due to decision-making challenges,a lack of cooperation between the stakeholders and a lack of agenda in tourism development. The data set of this Thesis remained small which should be considered when evaluating the further research or generalisability of the results.