Antecedents of Trust and Collaboration within the Context of Cultural Route Tourism

This research aims to provide a basis for understanding stakeholder collaboration in a context of cultural route tourism (CRT) and further for guiding regional tourism planning practice in CRT related areas. In order to do this, trust is adopted as an important factor that can reduce uncertainty (Bouncken, 2000) and ‘lubricate stakeholders’ collaboration’ (Putnam, Leonardi, & Nanetti, 1993, p. 171). A conceptual framework of antecedents of trust based on Mayer, Davis and Schoorman’s (1995) is developed, which aims to test the main research question: How does trust affect the collaboration between stakeholders within a CRT context? The existing literature concerning trust focuses on interpersonal trust from a dyadic perspective, where the trustor and trustee are the two engaged parties. Dyadic trust, is a fundamental basis for all types of trust (Whitener, Brodt, Korsgaard, & Werner, 1998), and is based on a rational choice model of behaviour (Burt & Knez, 2006, p. 229). However, it has limitations on dealing with social situations where social and environmental factors might exert trust pairs. The conceptual framework developed in this research is an extended model of trust based on stakeholder and collaboration theories. From a stakeholder theory, the issues of identification and salience are highlighted and then applied to identify the research subject(s) – the relevant stakeholders in CRT (Mitchell, Agle, & Wood, 1997). Collaboration theory provides the determinants of successful collaboration (Blumenberg, 2002). Trust is then highlighted as prominent factor that joints stakeholders through their collaboration. Based on the analysis of dyadic mechanism of trust, the propensity to trust, trustee’s trustworthiness, and social identity are then examined as the major antecedents of trust in a CRT context. The objective of this research is to apply a trust-collaboration model in a CRT context. An interpretive social science paradigm and a case study using qualitative data collection are adopted. Dali and Lijiang, covering a section of the Tea Horse Route (THR), are selected as the case area in which to conduct semi-structured interview. All the evidence was recorded, transcribed and analysed with use of Nvivo software. The results indicate that collaboration among micro tourism enterprises is a prominent phenomenon along the THR, where stakeholders are connected and facilitated their collaboration by trust relationships. The trustor’s propensity to trust provides a general willingness of a trustor, which is the prerequisite of trust formulation. Trustee’s trustworthiness can be examined from their ability, benevolence, integrity, and social identity. Social identity is a new antecedent of trust that is identified by this research and supported by the evidence, which can be accessed both from a trustor and trustee perspective, and an important facilitator towards stakeholders’ collaboration. The proposed extended conceptual framework is confirmed to be applicable in a CRT context, specifically in a regional planning area. It provides a framework for further research of stakeholder collaboration and regional tourism planning in a large scale of a cultural route context. However, the data obtained by the researcher are only from a sector of a THR context in a tourism development stage. As a result, the conceptual framework should be considered for further testing and evaluation