People, Place, Values: Living Lab as Social Innovation Processes for Tourism Communities

Abstract

Tourism is well known to transform space and place, especially through commodification of space and culture Destination in peripheral areas are facing major transformation. Three main challenges can be identified: workforce and demographic challenges, technological challenges and climate change adaptation challenges. Neoliberal discourses and policies will suggest technological innovation, good governance and competitive destination management to face those challenges. Based on our action researches, we take exception from those discourses, suggesting that a living lab as a social innovation process offer the potential of different responses to those challenges than the business as usual neoliberal discourses especially in refocusing the innovation agenda on people, place and use values instead of profit and exchange values. Indeed, our researches reintroduce fundamental issues of tourism as a base on encounter and sharing of space, in place, through people. The exchange value and profit not being at the core of the innovation process.

Keywords: Living Lab; Social Innovation; Climate change; Technology; People-Place-Values.