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1 – 3 of 3Silvia Baiocco and Paola M.A. Paniccia
This paper aims to better understand how business model innovation (BMI) occurs in the context of sustainable entrepreneurship, emphasizing the dialectical nature of…
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to better understand how business model innovation (BMI) occurs in the context of sustainable entrepreneurship, emphasizing the dialectical nature of entrepreneurial relationships. To do so, key interdependencies and reciprocal influences between internal/firm-specific and external/environmental factors underlying BMI for sustainability are analysed through co-evolutionary lenses.
Design/methodology/approach
A co-evolutionary framework is developed and applied to a longitudinal business model (BM) analysis of 15 Italian widespread hotels, which creatively use historic villages at risk of abandonment to establish their hotels.
Findings
Largely influenced by the interplay between internal and external factors, BMI of widespread hotels occurs through multilevel co-adaptations, which are recognised as virtuous by all stakeholders involved. Effective variations of the BM value elements are selected resulting in circular economy practices, which are retained for successful BMI, radical (first) and incremental (thereafter). Knowledge of specific local and multi-local conditions, time awareness and a future-oriented temporal perspective, by both entrepreneurs and policymakers, favour this dynamic.
Practical implications
Developing targeted policies and practices based on increased organisational knowledge supported by indicators can help in selecting and retaining successful variations of BMs appropriately in/with time with positive effects on firms' performance and sustainable development.
Originality/value
This study provides a novel co-evolutionary framework that explicitly links sustainable entrepreneurship and BM concepts in the accommodation sector. It further proposes a dynamic and holistic explanation of BMI for sustainability from which the crucial roles of the time-knowledge binomial and circular practices emerge.
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Silvia Baiocco, Luna Leoni and Paola Maria Anna Paniccia
This paper aims to enhance understanding of how sustainable entrepreneurship (SE) contributes to sustainable development in the tourism sector. To do so, specific factors that act…
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to enhance understanding of how sustainable entrepreneurship (SE) contributes to sustainable development in the tourism sector. To do so, specific factors that act as enablers or inhibitors of SE are identified according to a co-evolutionary lens.
Design/methodology/approach
A co-evolutionary explanation of the firm? Environment relationship is adopted to undertake a qualitative empirical study of the Castelli Romani tourism destination (Italy), via 23 semi-structured interviews according to a narrative approach.
Findings
The paper demonstrates that entrepreneurs play a crucial role in sustainable development but cannot act in isolation. In fact, according to the co-evolutionary approach, they influence and are influenced by 20 factors. Accordingly, SE can be conceptualised as resulting from effective co-evolutionary interactions between micro (i.e. entrepreneurs and their firm), meso (i.e. the destination where tourism firms are based) and macro (i.e. the wider socio-economic and natural system) levels.
Practical implications
Several actions are suggested to entrepreneurs and policymakers to help achieve specific sustainable development goals. These actions focus on: (1) training courses, (2) investments in technologies, (3) creation of innovative business models, (4) exploitation of cultural and natural resources, (5) community involvement and (6) multi-level partnerships.
Originality/value
This is the first study that adopts a co-evolutionary lens to investigate the influencing factors of SE in tourism, shedding light on the effects of their dynamic interdependence. Thus, it provides a more nuanced SE conceptualisation that takes a holistic and dynamic view of sustainability.
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Harald Pechlaner and Natalie Olbrich
A primary urban destination can be accessed through its regional periphery. Thus, while a city centre may be the primary attraction, by approaching it from and through the…
Abstract
A primary urban destination can be accessed through its regional periphery. Thus, while a city centre may be the primary attraction, by approaching it from and through the periphery, suburbs can become part of the place and marginalised people as part of the destination from a more holistic perspective. Tourists who are more attuned to the various layers of the transformation of a destination may be more attentive visitors and might empathise and engage with the lives and survival of others when given an opportunity to reflect on other elements of the destination beyond the central area. As part of a field trip to Rome, the Chair of Tourism of the Catholic University Eichstätt-Ingolstadt explored the inequalities at the periphery of Rome as a destination with undergraduate students from the Faculty of Mathematics and Geography. The results show that a holistic impression and deep understanding of a destination can only be gained by visiting both: its centre and its periphery. Moreover, the centre and periphery of a destination can then be compared in terms of, for example, poor or rich, well kept or unkempt, or native or migrant. However, these comparisons should not be used to look at poverty or similar factors, but to develop an awareness of differences and to look behind the typical tourist zones of a destination. In this case, we suggest that tourist routes can be key in providing a more holistic experience in an historic city.
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