Abstract

Objective: To investigate how cross-cultural consumer lifestyles influence rural tourism with the aim of evaluating the effectiveness of sharing economy knowledge partnerships (SEKPs) aimed at achieving UN’s Sustainable cities and communities goal (SDG 11) by transforming remote rural communities into sustainable tourism destinations in Indonesia.

Theoretical Framework: Draws on the concepts of consumer lifestyles, rural tourism, sharing economy, postcolonialism, cross-culturalism, sustainable cities and communities, to development a conceptual framework for the study.

Method: We adopt mixed research designs, involving questionnaire survey, observations, and semi-structured interviews between February-March 2022 in Indonesia. We asked participants about their willingness to collaborate to develop tourism in rural communities. The data collected was subjected to SPSS multiple regression and NVivo thematic content analysis.

Results and Discussion: We identified three factors influencing consumer lifestyles relating to UN’s SDG11: ‘collectivism’, ‘strategic orientation’, and ‘power-relationship’. We discussed these relational factors under seven thematic findings: ‘performance orientation’, ‘thinking strategically’, ‘anxiety tolerance’, ‘integrative relationship’, ‘gender balance’, ‘relational tendency’, and ‘market dynamism’.

Research Implications: The findings have implications for theory and practice in the field of sustainable tourism destination development, considering the urgency for achieving SDG11. Future research would include a wider range of stakeholders in Indonesia and other Southeast Asia countries to enhance the generalisability of the findings.

Originality/Value: The adoption of a Postcolonial lens and a Cross-cultural perspective help to clarify the concepts of consumer lifestyles, the role of SEKPs, and importance of achieving UN’s SDG11in the transformation of rural communities into sustainable tourism destinations in Palembang, Indonesia.

Keywords: cross-cultural lifestyles, sustainable cities and communities, sustainable rural tourism, Palembang Indonesia, Sustainable Development Goals (SDG).