Catch me if you can: informal tourism employment of locals in scenic-oriented rural communities

ABSTRACT

The expansion of the tourism industry has generated a plethora of informal job opportunities. However, existing literature has not thoroughly explored the extensive involvement of local residents in rural areas in informal tourism employment. This study focuses on the Fujian Tulou villages in China and employs the fieldwork method to investigate the phenomenon of informal tourism employment among local residents in scenic-oriented rural communities. The findings indicate that the dearth of employment prospects in rural areas, coupled with China’s distinctive rural land ownership system and the support from the rural social network, are the primary drivers motivating locals to participate in informal tourism employment. Locals employ tactics such as camouflage, tacit collusion, lurking, and covert actions to engage in informal tourism employment while navigating the regulations imposed by scenic area management. In efforts to standardize management within scenic areas, both local governments and tourism management companies are implementing measures such as offering formal employment opportunities and profit-sharing arrangements to incentivize the regularization of local employment in the tourism sector.

KEYWORDS:

• Informal tourism employment
• rural tourism
• local residents
• Rural China
• qualitative methods

Acknowledgments

Special thanks to Feiyang Lin, a master’s student at Tianjin University, and Xiaobei Shao, a master’s student at Fujian Normal University, for their assistance during the field survey process.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Funding

The work was supported by The National Social Science Fund of China [No. 23BGL170].

Notes on contributors

Chengkun Huang

Chengkun Huang is a Ph.D. candidate at College of Tourism and Service Management, Nankai University, China. His research interests include rural tourism, rural employment and entrepreneurship.

Hong Xu

Hong Xu is the Professor at College of Tourism and Service Management, Nankai University, China. Her research interests include rural tourism and social entrepreneurship.

Hui Li

Hui Li is a Ph.D. candidate at College of Tourism and Service Management, Nankai University, China. Her research interests include rural tourism and host-guest interaction.