Coordinating Relationships among destination stakeholders: evidence from Edinburgh (UK)

Tourism destination governance is a topic that has been attracting the interest of scholars in the tourism field due to the difficulties associated with the management of destinations that are characterized by high fragmentation. Nevertheless, there is a lack of studies addressing the topic of the stakeholder coordination that is needed so that all stakeholders work towards the development and promotion of the destination in a comprehensive and unique way. The present research aims to explore this somewhat neglected area of tourism research by studying how stakeholders working within a destination are coordinated. In order to achieve this aim, a case study approach on the city of Edinburgh in Scotland was applied. Two partnerships were studied: one was responsible for promoting the city as a place to live, invest, work and study, and the other was responsible for the city’s tourism development. Secondary data such as documents and reports from the two partnerships were analyzed and primary data were collected through twelve semi-structured interviews with people involved in one or both partnerships. The results show that coordination needs to be carried out by adopting several mechanisms that can be used in conjunction in order to complement each other.