Cultural Tourism Clusters: Social Capital, Relations with Institutions, and Radical Innovation

Radical innovation is a key factor for competitiveness in cultural tourism clusters. There is an open debate about the specific effect of relationships with cluster agents (bonding capital) on radical innovation due to redundancy of information and lock-in. This article aims to identify factors that...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published in:Journal of travel research 2019-05, Vol.58 (5), p.793-807
Main Authors: Martínez-Pérez, Ángela, Elche, Dioni, García-Villaverde, Pedro M., Parra-Requena, Gloria
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Cultural centers
Cultural heritage
Historic buildings & sites
Social capital
Tourism
Citations: Items that this one cites
Items that cite this one
Online Access:Get full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:Radical innovation is a key factor for competitiveness in cultural tourism clusters. There is an open debate about the specific effect of relationships with cluster agents (bonding capital) on radical innovation due to redundancy of information and lock-in. This article aims to identify factors that influence radical innovation in the context of cultural tourism clusters. The empirical study uses original data on 215 firms located in UNESCO World Heritage Cities in Spain. The findings show that relationships with firms outside a cluster (bridging capital) reinforce the positive effect of relationships with agents within a cluster on radical innovation. However, relationships with local institutions weaken this effect. Combining relationships with internal agents and external ones is suggested. This study also advocates a more active role for local institutions as bridging agents.
ISSN:0047-2875
1552-6763
DOI:10.1177/0047287518778147