Multi-Attributive Social Embeddedness in Cultural Tourism Development: A Case of the Osing Community in Indonesia

Abstract

A vast development of the rural tourism induces social transformations and economic enhancement. The tourism activities suggest the transformation process of how social attributes of the actors work in the social network. It is exemplified in Banyuwangi, in which the cultural festival, as the main tourism attraction in Osing Community, is manifested in the social embeddedness of the tourism actors. This article aims to explain the complexity of social embeddedness in tourism and further analyze the typology and processes of social embeddedness among tourism actors. This study employed a qualitative approach with a case study design through in-depth interviews with 29 tourism actors and semi-participatory observations. The cultural tourism activities were constructed by multiple embeddedness typologies, namely relational and structural, institutional, political, and spatial embeddedness which affect actors' rationality into more complex social actions. The process of social embeddedness was framed by social norm reference and social networks among tourism actors to sustain the tourism business and strengthen Osing ethnic identity. This study allowed for a better understanding of the complexity of embeddedness that occurs in cultural tourism in a rural setting, which is against, yet completes the original ideas of social embeddedness theory in an urban industrial context.