From Individual Initiatives to Destination Management Exploring Governance Pathways for Child-Oriented, Place-Based Sustainability Learning in Tehran
Author
Zeinali, Masume
Term
4. term
Education
Publication year
2026
Abstract
This thesis explores how child-oriented, place-based sustainability learning can be more systematically integrated into destination management in Tehran, Iran. It takes as its starting point existing activities such as museum workshops, guided routes and outdoor experiences, which allow children to learn about the city’s cultural, historical and environmental characteristics through direct engagement rather than classroom teaching alone. The study examines whether these initiatives are linked by any overarching destination-level framework and whether the knowledge they generate is shared and retained across organisations. Using destination governance and stakeholder collaboration as the main analytical lens, and drawing on the concepts of learning tourism destinations, children as destination stakeholders and place-based learning, the thesis adopts a qualitative single-case design informed by critical realism and an abductive research logic. The empirical basis consists of ten semi-structured interviews with professional actors (P1–P10), analysed through reflexive thematic analysis, with publicly available programme information used as contextual material. The analysis indicates that child-oriented initiatives in Tehran arise from diverse motivations, including cultural transmission, making museums more accessible, fostering environmental awareness and delivering municipal public services, and that organisers often do not label them as tourism or sustainability projects. Their implementation and continuation depend on institutional support, staff time, professional expertise and informal relationships, and ongoing activity is not equivalent to institutionalised organisational capacity. Project-level cooperation does occur, but practitioners outside established tourism networks – such as independent environmental educators and smaller museums – report limited visibility, and knowledge from individual programmes rarely travels beyond their original developers. Participants favour an enabling mode of coordination in which public institutions connect existing actors while specialist organisations retain control over educational design. The thesis proposes that systematic integration is best understood as a set of interdependent conditions: recognition of relevant stakeholders, accessible and facilitative coordination, organisational continuity, shared yet pluralistic educational objectives, and mechanisms for knowledge exchange. These are presented as provisional governance pathways rather than a tested model, and the findings concern professional intentions and perspectives rather than children’s actual learning outcomes. Overall, the study offers a context-specific, exploratory account of how educational practice and destination governance can be linked in a large city where child-oriented learning activities already exist in a fragmented form.
Denne speciales undersøger, hvordan børneorienteret, stedbaseret bæredygtighedslæring kan integreres mere systematisk i destination management i Teheran, Iran. Udgangspunktet er eksisterende aktiviteter som museumsworkshops, guidede ruter og udendørs oplevelser, der giver børn mulighed for at lære om byens kulturelle, historiske og miljømæssige kendetegn gennem direkte erfaring frem for ren klasseundervisning. Specialet fokuserer på, om sådanne initiativer er forbundet gennem en overordnet destinationsramme, og om den viden, der opstår i projekterne, deles og fastholdes på tværs af organisationer. Med udgangspunkt i destination governance og interessentsamarbejde, suppleret af begreberne lærende turismedestination, børn som destinationsinteressenter og stedbaseret læring, gennemføres et kvalitativt single-case studie informeret af kritisk realisme og abduktiv logik. Empirien består af ti semistrukturerede interview med professionelle aktører (P1–P10), analyseret gennem refleksiv tematisk analyse med offentligt tilgængelige programbeskrivelser som kontekst. Analysen viser, at børneorienterede initiativer i Teheran opstår ud fra forskellige motivationer – bl.a. kulturel formidling, øget tilgængelighed til museer, miljøbevidsthed og kommunalt servicetilbud – og at de ofte ikke benævnes som turisme- eller bæredygtighedsprojekter af de ansvarlige. Gennemførelse og fortsættelse afhænger af institutionel støtte, medarbejderressourcer, faglig ekspertise og uformelle relationer, og vedvarende drift er ikke det samme som forankret organisatorisk kapacitet. Der findes samarbejde på projektniveau, men aktører uden for etablerede turismenetværk – som uafhængige miljøundervisere og mindre museer – oplever begrænset synlighed, og viden fra enkeltprogrammer spredes sjældent ud over de personer, der har udviklet dem. Deltagerne foretrækker en faciliterende koordination, hvor offentlige institutioner skaber forbindelser mellem eksisterende aktører, mens fagorganisationer bevarer kontrol over det pædagogiske design. Specialet foreslår at forstå systematisk integration som et sæt indbyrdes forbundne betingelser: anerkendelse af relevante interessenter, tilgængelig og understøttende koordination, organisatorisk kontinuitet, fælles men pluralistiske læringsmål samt mekanismer for vidensudveksling. Disse præsenteres som foreløbige styringsveje snarere end en afprøvet model, og undersøgelsen omhandler de professionelles intentioner og perspektiver snarere end børns faktiske læringsudbytte. Specialet bidrager med en kontekstspecifik, eksplorativ analyse af, hvordan uddannelsespraksis og destination governance kan forbindes i en storby, hvor børneorienterede læringsaktiviteter allerede findes i fragmenteret form.
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