Analysis of the conflicts between development preferences and spatial differences based on participatory mapping in the Honghe Hani Rice Terraces World Heritage Site, China

Abstract

The scientific identification and analysis of potential conflicts in the development preferences of heritage sites are important for not only clarifying the interests and demands of stakeholders toward heritage sites but also analyzing the harmony of human-environment interactions at heritage sites and alleviating the negative impact of development preferences on sustainable development of heritage sites. This study takes the Honghe Hani Rice Terraces World Heritage Site in southwest China as an example and, combined with the conceptual model of conflict potential, adopts participatory mapping and semi-structured interviews to investigate the tourism development attitudes toward and landscape value of the heritage site for three types of stakeholders, namely, local residents, tourists and scholars. The research results provide a perspective for revealing the underlying mechanisms of land use conflicts in the protection process of cultural landscape heritage and idea for the human-environment relationships in the context of cultural landscape heritage sites.