Abstract
The territorial resource, by reactivating the local identity, and constituting the local action object, can be considered as a social construct that participates in the reconstruction and the specification of the destination which adds value and contributes to memorable tourism experience. The aim of this thesis is to understand the role and the place that local distinctiveness and authenticity play in the tourist experience. This thesis presents the peculiarity of being at the crossroads of the geography of tourism, of comprehensive sociology and of the territorial economy. The use of the multidisciplinary approach favors a cross-examination of local distinctiveness and authenticity and their place in the process of constructing territorial identity with the participation of various tourism stakeholders. Tourism experiences will be considered from both sides: supply side and demand side.Concerning theoretical insights, this thesis has clarified the concept of local distinctiveness by analyzing its relationship with authenticity and local or territorial identity in the logic of territorial development in relation to tourism. In addition, this study provides a conceptual framework of the notion of the destination's overall tourism experience by comparing the supply and demand perspectives. A framework of territorial governance analysis around the construction of identity based on the local distinctiveness brings a perspective of valorization of the specific territorial resource in tourism.Methodologically, this thesis proposes a measurement scale in the form of an identification grid with standardized methods to identify, identify and evaluate potential typical characters of a destination in order to figure out the most unique and distinctive attributes, which adds to the growing literature devoted to destination attributes.The empirical application through an in-depth case study of Dalat city, a mountain resort in the Central Highlands of Vietnam, founded in the colonial era, by mobilizing different data sources, has shown the role and the place of local distinctiveness and authenticity in destination tourist experiences. The analysis of the different strategies of valorization of the local distinctiveness in the process of construction of identity through the preservation and the intensification of the physical elements, the diversification of the human activities (including tourism) and the construction of the destination image through different historical periods of the city provides empirical evidences for the proposed conceptual framework concerning the territorial governance.