After all, both before and since the COVID-19 pandemic, an increasing number of destinations across Europe - urban and rural - have experienced tourism ‘burnout’ and occasional backlashes (some high profile) from local communities; a complex situation from which it is difficult to recover. Alert to these issues and keen to develop a whole-organisation approach to the topic, Fáilte Ireland commissioned TOPOSOPHY to help them to build and share their internal knowledge and plan the way ahead.
Ireland’s national tourism development agency, Fáilte Ireland, plays a leading role in strategy building, research and product development for destinations across the country. Its approach to all these activities is to ensure that tourism is developed through a balanced approach between the needs of Visitors, Industry, Communities and the Environment, or VICE.
Fáilte Ireland was keen to ensure that its approach to addressing the ‘C’ of VICE is robust, authentic and is engineered towards effecting real change for destinations in Ireland; whether that’s through strengthening local participation in decision making about tourism, or boosting the contribution that tourism investment can make to the quality of life of local people. This reflects broader shifts and trends that we’ve reflected in reports such as Redefining Success: How DMOs can Drive Social and Community Wellbeing.
Develop a clear understanding of the role of community engagement in sustainable tourism development.
Explore and refine the organisation’s strategic role in improving the social sustainability of tourism in Ireland.
Explore where Fáilte Ireland’s Directorates could achieve the greatest impact across multiple work streams.
Learn from best practices in community engagement through inspiring global benchmarks.
Develop recommendations on integrating community engagement practices throughout the organisation’s departments.
During the course of two full-day workshops held in October and November 2024, working alongside Gary Breen, Fáilte Ireland’s Strategy Lead for this programme, we guided senior leaders from Fáilte Ireland’s various directorates through the main issues and trends related to social sustainability, towards a shared understanding and agreement on what should be the main priorities for the organisation in the future.
The first workshop focused on setting the broader context for effective community engagement through the lens of social sustainability, aligning to UNTourism’s definition that sustainable tourism should “take full account of its current and future economic, social and environmental impacts, addressing the needs of visitors, the industry, the environment and host communities". TOPOSOPHY outlined the key issues and terminology related to social sustainability and discussed the importance of engaging residents in conversations around tourism development, management and promotion. We also highlighted specific reasons why there is greater scrutiny on tourism amongst local communities today.
In addition to this, TOPOSOPHY outlined current trends (demand-side and supply-side) and showcased international best practice in how to maximise the role of community engagement in sustainable tourism development. We then also spotlighted common challenges facing destination development, management and marketing organisations across the UK and Ireland in relation to social sustainability.
The second workshop then explored how Fáilte Ireland can maximise the positive and lasting impact of community engagement specifically, and how guiding principles could be potentially integrated across Fáilte Ireland’s operations in the future.
Together, we also reviewed and agreed on a series of guiding principles for effective community engagement and concluded with a presentation on tools and techniques for community engagement as well as a discussion about how Fáilte Ireland can take this discussion forward and integrate these guiding principles at national and regional level.
Trend mapping on social sustainability in tourism.
International benchmarking on community engagement.
Interactive discussions on optimising community involvement in decision making and experience delivery.
Practical tools and tips on community engagement.
Key takeaways and recommendations.
The workshops resulted in an internal report to help Fáilte Ireland’s senior management team assess how to integrate community engagement more effectively into the organisation’s work programmes in the coming 1-2 years, and how it should be reflected in the organisation’s corporate strategy.
