Sustainability-oriented Innovation in Smart Tourism

Book excerpt: This book combines research on technology-driven and social-driven innovation in tourism destinations and the multifaceted concept of sustainability, providing an integrative understanding of the nexus between smartness and sustainability within destinations. It engages theoretically and empirically with the research question of how, and to what extent, smart technologies drive tourism innovation focussed on sustainability. Although innovation and technology are widely considered the way to sustainable tourism growth, further studies need to size the role of technology and critically address modalities, challenges, opportunities and pitfalls of technology deployment in rebalancing tourism disequilibria within local systems. Local, national, and supranational policymakers’ attention to technology investments, the widening technological frontiers, and the enthusiasm for new technological opportunities to build, manage, and market destinations suggest the relevance of this research agenda. This book provides scholars, postgraduate students, and practitioners with conceptual and empirical insights into smart solutions and innovative destination models for multi-stakeholder engagement to manage and address tourism impacts and imbalances. The book outlines scenarios of sustainability-oriented innovation, encompassing and intertwining technological, social, human, and cultural co-drivers as the necessary conditions for smart technologies to enhance sustainable destinations effectively and improve human wellbeing and societal development.