The Effects of the Tourism Industries in Asheville, NC and Greenville, SC

Abstract A perceived place-identity impact study of the tourism industries on local communities are identified and examined using a mixed-qualitative method study in the cases of Asheville, North Carolina and Greenville, South Carolina. There are organizations and individuals in Asheville and Greenville advocating for an expansion of the urban tourism and others advocating to keep the economies and consumption local. Despite resistance in Asheville, leading companies in the tourism industry have persisted in development. Data was collected through surveying, interviewing, participant observation, as well as document and spatial analysis. The analysis shows that there is misalignment in the sense-of-place conveyed by the actors in the system including the tourists, residents, local government, and tourism professionals in both cities.

Actor-Network theory is used to bring light to the interactions between human and non-human actors within the system to gauge the equality of the interactions. In the case of Asheville, the state government regulates many of the other actors through hotel occupancy tax laws. Hotels are a critical non-human actor in the system. The purpose of this study is to define how sustainable the tourism system in each city is by determining who benefits from tourism and who is unsatisfied with the impacts of the industry. The study found that the tourism industries in Asheville and Greenville both must slow the rate of development to allow for more sustainable outcomes that are promoted by all actors. Specific attention must be placed on community needs.

Keywords: Place-Identity, Sense of Place, Sustainability, Tourism, Actor-Network Theory, Asheville, Greenville, Local