From resources to resourcefulness practices: How community agency shapes divergent rural community development in heritage tourism

Divergent development outcomes among rural communities within the same heritage tourism destination arise not from differences in resource endowments but from variations in community agency and resourcefulness practices. A comparative ethnographic study of three villages in Kaiping Diaolou and Villages, a UNESCO World Heritage site in China, identified three distinct configurations of resourcefulness: market-driven centralization, resilience-driven decentralization, and externally constrained agency. These configurations, shaped by internal power architectures, translate shared structural conditions into divergent developmental trajectories. The study advances Entrepreneurial Resourcefulness (ER) theory by highlighting the role of practice-level mechanisms in shaping community development, offering insights into how resource-constrained communities navigate heritage tourism challenges.

Zhang, L., Hao, X., & Qiu, C. (2026). From resources to resourcefulness practices: How community agency shapes divergent rural community development in heritage tourism. Tourist Studies. https://doi.org/10.1177/14687976261481336