Sustainable Tourism Governance and Community Participation: Environmental and Cultural Policy Lessons from Murree, Pakistan

Abstract

The Role of Local Communities in Promoting Sustainable Tourism Development and Its Impact on Environmental Conservation and Cultural Preservation it explores the role of local communities in achieving sustainable tourism development in Murree, Pakistan. The main aim of the study is to examine the impact of local communities in tourism development and to evaluate the effects of their involvement in economic sustainability, environmental protection and the preservation of socio-cultural values. The quantitative research approach was used with a descriptive research design. Structured questionnaires were used to collect primary data from the locals of Murree. Using SPSS software, a total of 74 valid responses were analyzed. Descriptive statistics, Pearson correlation and multi linear regression method were used to test the relationship between the community participation and sustainability dimensions. The findings show that tourism is traditionally considered to be economically beneficial; however, the involvement of the community does not have a statistically significant impact on economic sustainability. On the other hand, community participation has strong and statistically significant positive correlation with environmental sustainability and socio-cultural sustainability, which indicates that active local involvement enhances environmental conservation, ecofriendly practices, cultural preservation, and social integration. The Study concludes that economic growth is not enough to support sustainable tourism in Murree. The researcher suggests enhancing the community engagement by involving them in decision-making, capacity building, environmental Initiative, and policies that guarantee fair economic inclusion of the locals.

Keywords: Sustainable Tourism, Socio cultural sustainability, Local community, Environmental, Community based tourism.