This study applies an adapted approach of the traditional view on local participation in tourism development. First, the study mainly focuses on exploring the patterns behind participation instead of the reasons for participation. Second, a case is chosen that transcends the interest in researching participation in developing countries. Third, the study focuses on non-tourism related residents, an under-researched group of stakeholders. It is thus investigated how non-tourism related residents face the process of participation in tourism development and what the main barriers and drivers are in this regard. To discuss this issue, the study takes a closer look at the case of Bad Reichenhall, an Alpine Destination in Germany. 15 qualitative interviews are conducted with non-tourism related residents and further evaluated through a qualitative content analysis. The results underline that tourism represents a public domain that concerns all stakeholders of a destination. The typology derived throughout the study reflects the heterogeneity of non-tourism related residents, coming up with four types of non-tourism related residents facing participation in tourism development rather differently. Various barriers and drivers are revealed that impact non-tourism related residents from both a personal and general point of view. Non-tourism related residents turn out as a promising and important target group in the discourse of stakeholder participation in tourism development.

Cultural routes are today a widespread phenomenon throughout the Industrialized Countries (IC) and have become more and more prominent as a tool for tourism development in recent years (Flognfeldt, 2005:37; Meyer, 2004:5). For countries in the Southern Caucasus, who profit from their bridging position between Europe and Asia, the planned revival of the Ancient Silk Road (ASR) in form of the New Silk Road (NSR) offers substantial potentials for economic diversification by means of tourism as a catalyzing industry. On the case of Azerbaijan, this study analyzes the potential to trigger regional economic diversification within the existing national destination-system in a framework of route development. To this end, the methodological approach builds upon a mix of qualitative and quantitative methods to diagnose the current degree of cluster maturity in the system, following the question of how Azerbaijan as a system of regional destination can access the transnational route system of the NSR.