The Central Government's Role in Cultural Sustainability and Developing Tourism to Support Rural Economies: A Systematic Analysis

Tourism has become an essential sector in developed and developing nations, but cultural integrity must be preserved and protected to continue attracting tourists from across the globe. Thus, studying how to maintain cultural sustainability while simultaneously developing the tourism sector to attract international visitors is essential. The current study is a valuable addition to the cultural and tourism literature depicting the critical drivers that all developed and developing nations can consider for the growth of their tourism sector. The current study utilizes a systematic analysis approach to project the future role of the central government in sustaining cultural values and developing tourism to support the rural communities in Indonesia economically. The opinions of experts were gathered via interviews and a self-administered survey. The questionnaire was formulated based on the Cross-impact Direct Influence (CDI) matrix. Scenario Wizard software and MICMAC analysis were employed to analyze the data. The findings of the MICMAC analysis presented 13 key/important constructs with predominant roles in sustaining cultural values and developing the Indonesian tourism system in the future. In addition, the Scenario-Wizard Method identified 35 possible states of the critical constructs that were conceptualized in the second phase. The results revealed four scenarios with stronger consistencies. Scenario 1 was the most desirable and had appropriate features to preserve Indonesia's cultural sustainability while developing the tourism sector. Moreover, this study is novel in methodological terms applying future study analysis to bring valuable insights.