Destinations International publishes new guide to strengthen relationships with the local community in tourism
Destinations International, the global association bringing together destination management organizations, tourist boards, and convention bureaus, published on April 7, 2026, a new handbook titled
The Destination Professional’s Guide to Community Engagement. It is a document that offers tourism leaders a practical framework for building trust with local residents, better aligning tourism development with community priorities, and more clearly demonstrating the real impact of tourism on the everyday lives of residents. The guide does not focus on classic destination promotion, but rather on the question of how to make tourism more sustainable in the long term, more socially acceptable, and more politically resilient at a time when the expectations of citizens, local authorities, and the business sector are increasingly high. By publishing this document, Destinations International sends a clear message that a destination’s success is no longer measured only by the number of arrivals, overnight stays, and visitor spending, but also by how much the local community trusts tourism institutions and sees benefits from tourism development.
The guide arrives at a time when, at the global level as well, it is being increasingly emphasized that sustainable tourism must take into account economic, social, and environmental impacts, as well as the needs of visitors, industry, and the communities that live in destinations. It is precisely the relationship with local residents that has become one of the key issues of modern tourism management, especially in environments facing the pressure of growth, changes in the labor market, debates about quality of life, and increasingly demanding expectations regarding the transparency of public decisions. Destinations International therefore positions the new guide as a tool for everyday work, not merely as a theoretical overview of trends, emphasizing that trust is built systematically, through organizational changes, communication, and measurable results.
Tourism organizations are no longer just destination promoters
In the organization’s official announcement, it is stated that destination organizations have significantly expanded their role in recent years. Instead of focusing exclusively on marketing and attracting visitors, they are now increasingly acting as intermediaries between local government, residents, the cultural sector, entrepreneurs, and visitors. Such a change is not accidental. According to the guide itself, modern destination leaders are becoming storytellers of local identity, partnership coordinators, and stewards of place, that is, actors who must take into account how tourism affects the community from within, and not only how the destination is presented outwardly.
This shift from the “place promotion” model to the “place relationship management” model is important also because in many countries pressure is growing to justify public money and institutional capacities in tourism through concrete social impact. If residents do not feel the benefits of tourism, if no one involves them in decisions, or if they see tourism as a source of crowds, rising prices, and pressure on space, local community support begins to weaken. In such circumstances, neither marketing campaigns, nor major events, nor traffic growth in themselves are sufficient anymore. That is precisely why the new guide starts from the assumption that
community engagement, that is, active and structured work with the local community, has become an integral part of destination management, and not an additional public relations activity.
Six concrete strategies for strengthening trust
The central part of the handbook consists of six operational strategies that tourism organizations should apply regardless of the size of the destination or the budget. The first concerns clearly defining what community engagement means within the organization itself. In other words, the guide warns that it is not enough to declaratively emphasize concern for residents if there is no shared understanding within teams of goals, responsibilities, and ways of working. The second strategy emphasizes the need to clearly explain to residents and public officials the role of tourism in the local economy and quality of life. This includes the use of data, but also understandable communication, because social support is harder to build if tourism is presented exclusively through abstract numbers.
The third strategy is aimed at strengthening residents’ pride through stories about local identity, culture, and the people who make the destination recognizable. In this way, tourism is not viewed only as an economic activity, but also as a platform for affirming the community. The fourth strategy deals with negative perceptions and indifference, which is especially sensitive in environments where residents believe that tourism decisions are made without them or that only certain sectors benefit. The guide therefore advocates directly listening to complaints, open dialogue, and consistent communication, instead of a defensive approach in which institutions merely react to crises.
The fifth strategy refers to incorporating socially beneficial work into tourism events and initiatives. According to the handbook’s logic, this means that events are not measured only by the number of participants or media visibility, but also by visible benefits for the local environment. The sixth strategy emphasizes the need to measure success through clear and meaningful indicators that encompass trust, inclusion, and real impact. This element is particularly important because it shows that community engagement should not be reduced to symbolic consultations or one-off campaigns, but to a system that can be monitored, corrected, and publicly explained.
A document based on research and the work of an expert group
Destinations International states that the guide was created on the basis of the findings of the
2025 DestinationNEXT Futures Study and the work of a special expert group called the Community Connection Professional Task Force. This is an important fact because it gives the document both a research and practical foundation. Namely, the DestinationNEXT Futures Study for 2025 showed that destination management organizations are in a period of deep transformation. According to that study, 84 percent of organizations are actively involved in destination development, and not only in its promotion, while at the same time the need is growing for new funding models, strengthening resilience, and adopting broader success criteria, including resident sentiment, social well-being, inclusiveness, and sustainability.
Such research starting points flow directly into the new guide. Instead of viewing the community as an audience to whom already-made decisions need to be explained, the document starts from the premise that residents are active participants in destination identity. Their attitudes, stories, and level of pride, as stated on the guide’s page, influence the visitor experience every day. When residents are informed, included, and respected, their willingness also grows to support development, participate in local initiatives, advocate for projects, and act as authentic ambassadors of the place. Otherwise, the destination risks tourism development becoming politically sensitive and socially contested.
Why the issue of relationships with residents has become crucial
Behind the publication of this guide lies a broader change in international tourism policy. UN Tourism defines sustainable tourism as development that fully takes into account present and future economic, social, and environmental impacts, as well as the needs of visitors, industry, the environment, and host communities. In other words, the local community can no longer be seen as a passive backdrop to the tourism product. It is precisely the residents who carry the destination’s identity, share space with visitors, bear or mitigate the pressures of tourism, and ultimately decide whether they will support the direction of development.
Because of this, both professional and institutional circles are increasingly speaking about trust as the new currency of tourism management. Issues such as access to housing, infrastructure strain, the balance between commercialization and preserving local character, and the distribution of tourism benefits are no longer marginal topics. They determine the political sustainability of tourism strategies. In this context, Destinations International presents its new guide not as an ideological document, but as an operational tool for organizations that must prove that tourism can serve the community, and not only the market. This is particularly important in the period following a series of global disruptions, when many destinations are simultaneously seeking growth, resilience, and social legitimacy.
Emphasis on transparency, dialogue, and measurable results
In official statements accompanying the publication of the guide, Destinations International President and CEO Don Welsh said that the role of destination organizations continues to evolve and that community engagement is no longer optional. The co-chairs of the expert group, Jennifer Christie of Visit Loudoun and Tony Snell Rodriguez of Visit Milwaukee, further emphasize that real work with the community requires listening, cooperation, accountability, a shared language, and clear metrics. Such wording is not merely a communication message. It points to a change in standards in the sector, where organizations are increasingly expected to show how and why certain decisions contribute to local priorities, and not only to tourism visibility.
It is particularly interesting that the guide places strong emphasis on transparency. In practice, this means that organizations should not speak with the community only when they need support for a project or when they are responding to criticism, but continuously, through open information, explanation of priorities, and the inclusion of different groups. Transparency in this sense is not only the public release of data, but also the willingness to acknowledge where tensions, unequal perceptions of benefits, or legitimate concerns exist. Such an approach may be more demanding than classic promotional communication, but in the long term it reduces the risk of mistrust and conflict.
What the guide could mean for destinations of different sizes
One of the more important messages of the document is that the recommendations can be adapted to destinations of different sizes and budgets. This means that the guide is not intended only for large urban centers or internationally known tourism brands. On the contrary, many smaller destinations can create a competitive advantage דווקא through a closer relationship with residents, especially if they base tourism development on authentic culture, local stories, and quality cooperation between the public and private sectors. In such environments, community engagement can also be more effective because the social networks of relationships are denser and the consequences of decisions are more visible.
At the same time, for larger destinations the guide can serve as a framework for reducing the gap between large tourism systems and the everyday needs of residents. Where tourism is a strong generator of income, measuring social impact is precisely what is crucial for maintaining legitimacy. If the benefits of tourism are not communicated clearly or are not distributed visibly enough, there is more room for political conflicts and negative perceptions. Through the new document, Destinations International is therefore actually suggesting that the future of destination management will depend not only on market competitiveness, but also on the ability to show the local community the meaning, benefit, and limits of tourism growth.
From a handbook to a broader change in the tourism industry
The new guide fits into the broader work program of Destinations International, which in recent years has increasingly linked tourism with social impact, inclusiveness, local identity, and the long-term resilience of destinations. On the organization’s official website, the social impact of tourism is defined as a measurable and lasting contribution to communities, economies, and the environment through responsible and inclusive tourism strategies. Within this framework, community engagement is not a secondary topic, but one of the fundamental issues of destination management in the 21st century.
The publication of
The Destination Professional’s Guide to Community Engagement therefore goes beyond the format of an ordinary professional handbook. It shows that at the top of the international destination sector, a model is being accepted ever more clearly in which the local resident is not an obstacle to development, but its key partner and a measure of success. At a time when tourism is facing the pressures of growth, climate and social challenges, and increasingly sharp questions about who that growth really benefits, a document like this can serve as a signal that the industry is trying to move toward a more responsible and more convincing language of action. Whether the guide will come to life in practice will depend on the willingness of organizations to turn the recommendations into real processes, to conduct the conversation with the community even when it is uncomfortable, and to measure results not only through traffic, but also through the level of trust they succeed in building.
Sources:- Destinations International – official announcement about the release of the guide, publication date, key statements, and six strategic directions- Destinations International – guide page with a description of its purpose, goals, and operational areas of application- Destinations International – summary of the DestinationNEXT Futures Study 2025 on which the guide is partly based- Destinations International – explanation of the concept of the social impact of tourism within the organization’s work- UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs – definition of sustainable tourism and its connection with the needs of host communities- UN Tourism – principles of sustainable tourism development and the balance of economic, social, and environmental impacts
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