Introduction

What shapes people's relations to particular places? Do “outsider” and “insider” relate to the same places differently? The present study examines differences between locals' and tourists' sense of place in the context of a Swiss Alpine landscape.

The continual socioeconomic, political, and technological developments in the region of the Swiss Alps transform its landscapes. These transformations can change people's relationships to Alpine landscapes and lead to conflicts if the social meanings attributed to the landscapes are affected (Greider and Garkovich 1994; Muir 2003). This is because cultural landscapes, unlike objective and undifferentiated spaces, can be regarded as places, and are thus constituted and perceived by the meanings people attribute to them (Tuan 1974). In other words, landscapes are socially constructed in the context of particular actions, meanings and physical attributes (Muir 1999; Low and Lawrence-Zúñiga 2003; Morin 2003) and are thus the provisional result of social processes and individual experiences. However, different socio-cultural groups produce elements of the natural environment differently. Because of their distinct “lifeworlds” (Lebenswelten), they may attribute diverse meanings to the same spatial setting (Greider 1993). Thus, people establish different relations to places, depending on their cultural values, interests and individual experiences.

In recent decades, social scientists have developed a variety of concepts to describe people–place relations. Tuan (1974), a geographer, and Steele (1981), an environmental psychologist, introduced the broadest of these concepts, “sense of place,” which amalgamates in its definition the meanings, attachment, and satisfaction an individual or group associates with a particular place (Stedman 2003). We understand this as an umbrella concept encompassing place relations as diverse as ‘at homeness’ (Seamon 1979), ‘place attachment’ (Altman and Low 1992), ‘place dependence’ (Williams et al 1992), ‘place identity’ (Prohansky et al 1983; Twigger-Ross and Uzzel 1996), or ‘regionalization’ (Backhaus and Müller 2006).

Recreation and tourism have become dominant agents of change in landscape development in rural regions of the Western world (Butler et al 1998; van der Vaart 2003; Palang et al 2005). This is also true for the region of the Swiss Alps (Wiesmann 1988; Siegrist 1998; Hunziker 2000). Thus, the place relations of residents and their needs and aims play a fundamental role in the context of development of the Alpine landscape, as well as the place relations of tourists. As they have a background of socialization and existence distinct from the locals, tourists have an “outsider's” view and therefore may perceive and value landscapes differently (Stremlow 1998). Such differences in evaluation of landscape and landscape change by different socio-cultural groups have been confirmed by survey studies using photo-visualization techniques (Hunziker 2000). To avoid landscape conflicts and enhance sustainable landscape development complying with tourists' and locals' requirements, the sense of place of members of both groups must be understood and evaluated with respect to differential meanings (Ewert and Stewart 2004).

Recent review papers on emotional relationships with places point out a research gap in empirical studies addressing tourist–place relations—in contrast to a variety of studies on local people's place relations (Stokowski 2002; Manzo 2003). A few studies exist, mainly in the field of leisure sciences, that examine tourist–place relations with the concept of sense of place (Hummon 1992; Hay 1998; Stedman 2003). These studies elucidate that for tourists, visited places can be as deeply meaningful as for locals, notably as symbols of important experiences or because of the places' restorative value. But empirical studies focus mostly on defining the constituents of sense of place, or on the strength of place relations. Stedman's (2003) quantitative study in northern Wisconsin demonstrates that sense of place is not just based on social constructions, but also on some material reality, ie on concrete landscape characteristics. Hay (1998) found in a survey study on Banks Peninsula, New Zealand, that the sense of place of local Maori people is deeply rooted, whereas the sense of place of tourists is rather superficial, due to different residential status and thus different ancestral and cultural connections. Still, no studies have examined the contents and conditions of sense of place, particularly with regard to group differences. Empirical knowledge of differences in sense of place between the 2 main interest groups with respect to Alpine landscape development, locals and tourists, is especially poor.

We hypothesize that due to the distinct social, cultural, and economic backgrounds of locals and tourists, resulting in a different evaluation of landscape developments, there are differences in the ways they construct place, symbols that are meaningful to them, and thus their sense of place.

Therefore, the following questions arise: are there differences in the ways locals and tourists relate to place and, if so, how do they come about? Which characteristics of place are significant for which group? Which landscape meanings do the groups share and which not? What underlies these variations? What do these differences mean with regard to future landscape development? We try to answer these questions by presenting an empirical interview study conducted in the Alpine village of Alvaneu in Central Grisons, southeastern Switzerland. Alvaneu is a small village where landscape-oriented tourism, focusing on local natural and cultural characteristics, is becoming an increasingly important economic sector.

Methods

The study is based on semi-structured interviews, a method appropriate for inductively examining people's views regarding a phenomenon (Berg 2001). The interview questions were grouped in 3 sets. The respondents were asked to describe (1) the peculiarities of the village, (2) their relationship with the place in general, and (3) the relevant local landscape changes.

The interviews were conducted between March 2003 and September 2004 in the Swiss Alpine village of Alvaneu (Figure 1; Table 1). The sample consisted of 24 persons, selected according to the Theoretical Sampling approach (Glaser and Strauss 1998). The objective of this procedure is not to get statistical representativeness, but to maximize the variability of opinions and perspectives expressed. The main variables according to which members of the 2 groups (locals and tourists) were selected were age, professional background, gender, and place of residence. Further selection criteria applied to tourists were the frequency and duration of visits (Table 2).

The contents of the transliterated interviews of 1–2 hours' duration were analyzed using the Grounded Theory approach according to Glaser and Strauss (1998), with different steps of thematic coding as described by Flick (1995:206–211). The first step involved thorough reading of every single interview text and assigning appropriate thematic codes to short passages (open coding). These open codes were then assigned to broader categories that were important within the scope of research. In a second step, a coding manual was made, consisting of central “axial” categories representing the C-coding family (causes, contexts, consequences, conditions) suggested by Böhm (2000). Every single interview was then coded using this manual, with the aim of detecting key categories and their relations with other categories (axial coding). The final step comprised further examination of the interview texts, with the aim of clarifying existing key categories and their relations to other central categories (selective coding).

Findings

Discussion and conclusion

This case study shows that both locals and tourists possess a similarly differentiated sense of place regarding the village of Alvaneu. Members of both groups willingly, and usually quite emotionally, talked about their personal relation to the place. Interestingly, the key categories identified as relevant for sense of place are also much the same for both locals and tourists. However, the distribution and significance of the key categories in the models vary considerably between the 2 groups.

Locals' sense of place is primarily shaped by aspects in everyday life: occupation, property, and, most important, social relationships, which together form their affiliation. Furthermore, their sense of place is strongly associated with memories of childhood and youth.

In the case of the tourists, sense of place is above all shaped by the esthetics and characteristics of the place, which they experience in the context of leisure activities. Hence, the activities through which places are experienced have the biggest impact on people's sense of place. Thus, while the sense of place of locals is mostly associated with society and existence, individual aspects matter above all to the tourists.

Furthermore, the 3-pole model reveals that even the same place characteristics were more closely associated with existential and societal meanings by the locals and with individual meanings by the tourists. This is especially true for the landscape categories. In particular, they show fundamental differences between the locals' and tourists' understandings of landscape: for locals landscape is predominantly social and existential; for tourists, it is mainly individual.

For the locals it is important that the landscape of their place be clearly distinguished from those of other tourist resorts in the region which, according to them, have “destroyed” their landscapes with infrastructure-oriented tourism. On the other hand, they do not want a landscape where development stagnates and makes them “live in an open-air museum.” Hence, they endorse tourism development, but not at nature's expense. They want a “soft” tourism which does not destroy the typical characteristics of the local landscape.

To the tourists, the intact landscape gives a feeling of “being away from home.” They are looking for nostalgia and authenticity, a “safe and sound world.” Since they do not want the place's landscape to lose these distinctive qualities, they regard any economic development very critically, as it could impair what they perceive as the “authentic character” of the landscape.

Thus, while the locals desire appropriate economic development of their place, the tourists prefer conservation of their hideaway as it is. This reveals a central dynamic of mutual construction of the place by locals and tourists: due to their dependence on tourism, the locals are forced to integrate the ideas and needs of tourists into their vision of appropriate local development, in particular the need for an authentic landscape. They also stage and market these local characteristics, which comply with the tourists' ideals of an Alpine place. Consequently, the tourists perceive exactly those features of the place as “typical” or “authentic” that have been staged as such by the locals for the purpose of economic development—and are opposed to further development.

Conclusions

From these findings we draw the following main conclusion regarding our initially formulated hypothesis: variations in the evaluation of landscape development between residents and non-residents can be ascribed to their distinct sense of place, which is in turn due to the different meanings they attribute to the same place characteristics. Thus, the distinct residential status of locals and tourists does not necessarily result in a different depth of sense of place, as Hay (1998) postulates. Our findings rather indicate that while the strength and manifoldness of the sense of place of these 2 groups is comparable, it is the place meanings shaping their sense of place that differ vitally. Furthermore, we found that basically the same local landscape characteristics contribute to both locals' and tourists' sense of place. Thus, our findings also support the assertion of Stedman (2003) that physical environmental features matter a great deal to constructed place meanings.

Even if the conclusions drawn from this study are based on research in one particular study area, they may be transferred to other Alpine places with similar geographic and socioeconomic characteristics. These primarily encompass the decline of agriculture and the emergence of nature-oriented tourism as an important new economic sector and a cultivated landscape that still includes elements of the traditional cultural landscape.

Thus, striking a balance between appropriate economic development desired by the locals and the preservation of the cultural characteristics and authenticity sought by tourists is the challenge for sustainable landscape development that aims to meet the needs and aims of both groups. To reach this goal, more research is needed. According to our findings, in particular, a better understanding of tourists' nostalgic search for vestiges of the past might help in finding better solutions. Addressing questions such as: “What is the motivation for this search? How significant is it in the context of their demands on recreation and restoration?” would be very relevant and fruitful.