۱٫ Introduction

۲٫ Mediators and moderators of successful tourism initiatives

۳٫ Conclusions

References

This article argues for the need of studying to which extent certain psycho-social features characterizing the cultural profile of the communities involved in tourism activities on cultural routes (like the community culture of openness, social distance, community traditionalism and institutional traditionalism, the ability to take risks, ethnic (in)tolerance, the level of intergroup trust or intergroup prejudice etc.) act as mediators or moderators of the impact of traditional cultural heritage on the successful implementation of tourism activities within the communities, the development and tourism performance output indicators and the willingness to collaborate with other traditional communities along the cultural itinerary axis.

Introduction

The objective of this paper argues for the need of studying to which extent certain psycho-social features characterizing the cultural profile of the communities involved in tourism activities along cultural routes (or in tourism projects in general), act as mediators or moderators of the impact of traditional cultural heritage on the implementation of tourism activities within the community and success outputs. In order to construct our central argument, in the first section the paper describes the practical context and research background from which stemmed the respective hypothesis, followed in the second one, by the discussion, based on the existing support in the literature, of the pertinence of the partial moderation or mediation effect proposed for the most relevant variables underlying the issues presented under section one. The paper also highlights the necessity of elaborating quantitative, structured and transparent assessment instruments for the cultural heritage (cultural representativeness, authenticity, etc.) of the thematic route candidate localities in order to transparently and unequivocally support the decisions of inclusion/non-inclusion of certain localities on these routes and, by doing so, to eliminate later resentfulness and sabotage during the integration and the process of providing the tourism services. The conclusions deliver a round-up of the arguments supporting the necessity of studying the implications of the communities` psycho-social variables in the efficiency of implementing tourism activities as they resulted from this research endeavor.