Contribution short abstract

The study examines touristification in Gröden, showing how housing pressures and tourism monocultures generate local discontent. Drawing on policy analysis and interviews, we offer empirical insight into deeper-seated power imbalances and economic inequalities shaping Alpine tourism destinations.

Contribution long abstract

Tourism has long been promoted as a means to revitalize the economies of peripheral rural areas, generating employment and income diversification amid agricultural decline. The touristification of mountain regions has accordingly capitalized on their rich natural environments and transformed the socio-economic fabric into prestigious tourism destinations. This research builds upon the burgeoning political ecology literature by critically engaging with rural tourism development in mountain destinations, enriching the current state of the debate with empirical insights from Gröden in South Tyrol. The case study highlights how touristification in the Alpine valley is generating growing discontent, which emerges in response to intensifying housing market pressures and widening disparities in access and affordability. Our qualitative empirical fieldwork, built on regional policy analyses and interviews, reveals how contested negotiations over tourism development often feature "scapegoat topics" that deflect attention from deeper structural issues, such as power imbalances, economic inequality, and extractive tourism practices. The key tensions identified relate to the elitization of housing markets, a growing reliance on a tourism monoculture that accelerates outmigration, and still nascent but increasingly responsive policy efforts. Touristification and valley development is thus showing to legitimize and benefit some interests, whilst marginalizing and dismissing others. Overall, the study confirms and deepens current understandings of how and why tourism has become a highly polarized affair, and scrutinizes how governance arrangements, power asymmetries, and development ideologies shape rural touristification.