The discourse about pathways of sustainability
transitions is dominated by two opposing approaches. On the one hand, the
transition studies literature follows a green growth efficiency-driven approach
and argues that technological innovations will pave the way to more sustainable
modes of living. On the other hand, postcapitalist scholars reject the
efficiency paradigm and advocate an alternative, sufficiency-driven turn to
sustainability characterized by degrowth-oriented downscaling and rightsizing.

This habilitation
thesis contributes to this field of research and investigates how transitions
towards more sustainable paths can be initiated and fostered. It focuses on
tourism in rural regions that have been growing intensely in recent years and
are characterized by mass tourism causing ecological and socio-cultural
pressure. The thesis thus analyses what influence particularly tourists and
tourism businesses have on the production of rural space regarding
sustainability and rural tourism resilience and what role rural regions may
generally play in sustainability transition processes.

The study
recognizes that tourists and tourism businesses have a strong influence on the
production of rural space while their sustainability orientations are
heterogeneous. Rural tourism resilience and sustainable change are challenged
by the growing popularity of rural tourism and the still dominantly
growth-oriented rural tourism sector. Future rural development paths will be
positioned within a spectrum of green growth-oriented mass tourism on the one
hand and degrowth-oriented tourism on the other hand. With respect to shared
responsibilities of urban and rural regions, this thesis pleads for financial
compensation as a degrowth-oriented incentive for those rural tourism regions
that are willing to follow a concept of reduced use of economic resources for
the sake of greater ecological and socio-cultural goals that are of value for
our societies on different geographical scales.