Paesaggio e turismo culturale. Verso scenari di valorizzazione dei sistemi insediativi storici della Sardegna

It is a common opinion that the greater consequences of tourism are related to the physical environment deterioration, through the developer plans on the coasts, the pollution or the consumption of natural resources. Actually, the phenomenon presents much more complex issues that, also in the field to cultural heritage, affect many disciplinary sectors, such as economics, sociology, psychology, and so on. Thus, the general objective of the research is the study and development of sustainable tourism models that can favour the protection and enhancement of the historic landscape, through the study of the Sardinian case. This case study is representative of all those peripheral areas that see tourism as a potential factor for economic development, but which have difficulty in promotion of effective tourism models. The objects of the research are landscape and tourism. The former, according to its modern concept, is the object that better represent the cultural heritage in a holistic, dynamic and relative perspective. Tourism, because of its nature, is a multidisciplinary phenomenon that needs to be faced according the point of view of different research fields, in order to understand all the dynamics that interact between heritage and tourism. In order to synthetize these complex and multidisciplinary notions, and to integrate the different disciplinary approaches, the research reinterprets the Rieglian analysis of values. Riegl’s values are, as we will see, both a theoretical basis and a fundamental component for the methodology. Three main tasks constitute the methodology. The first one aims to contribute to the construction of knowledge in the field of historic conservation and, at the same time, to build up a set of information which is useful for the next methodological steps. It is based on the concept of land as a palimpsest, thus the goal is to read the landscape through its historic layers, and understand two of the three components of landscape, the holistic and dynamic ones. The second methodology is based on the analysis of values, and it aims to deepen the third component of landscape, related to its individual perception as perceived by different people. On the basis of the latter step results and on the heritage classification, the research can finally intervene on intensity and diversity of historic systems and suggest the corresponding guidelines for the protection and enhancement of cultural heritage: a low diversity index should bring policies toward an enhancement strategy, a medium index to reinforcement measures and, finally, a high index to a maintenance approach. Obviously, measures must be evaluated case by case, but the methods could represent an important support tool for the decision-making process. All this course of the research aims to lead to an antifragile and ‘good’ tourism, that means that touristic models have to favour a diversified cultural offer, to share activities between locals and visitors, to not create a fashionable and global-style destination, to develop territorial rather than touristic policies (thus accessible both to locals and tourists), to integrate strategies with local economic structures and activities. So, the work ends up with the exposition of a few touristic opportunities that could foster these aspects, in order to integrate the results of the methodological approach. In conclusion, the work is a contribution to the field of historic conservation referring to the issue of tourism and its influence for cultural heritage. The aim was to develop ideas, measures, strategies in order not to preserve in a passive or static way landscape and heritage, but to consciously guide the process of transformation due to the impact of the touristic sector, avoiding as much as possible the negative effects and favouring, at the same time, the positive factors.