Empowerment of Local Stakeholders for Participation in Sustainable Tourism Development with Mediating Role of Perceived Tourism Effects

The present study was conducted to examine the effects of local tourism stakeholders' empowerment on their contribution to sustainable tourism development through the mediating role of the perceived environmental effects of tourism programs and projects in Asara. This study examined the affecting and affected variables through descriptive-analytic method and a questionnaire. The results showed a positive and significant relationship between the local stakeholders' empowerment with the effects of economic tourism (0.63), socio-cultural effects of tourism (0.50), and ecological-environmental effects of tourism development (0.70). Additionally, the relationship between the perceived socio-cultural effects on participation in sustainable tourism development was confirmed with a path coefficient of 0.566 and t value of 3.207. However, the relationship between perceived environmental-ecological and economic effects of tourism projects with the participation of local stakeholders in tourism development was not confirmed. In other words, the implementation of tourism programs and projects in an environment, ecological and economic effects were unable to align local community participation. The results also showed that the empowerment of local stakeholders indirectly and with the mediating role of perceived socio-cultural effects from tourism programs and projects on their participation in tourism development only had a positive and significant impact on this aspect.