Are in‐migrant proprietors driving or enhancing cultural heritage tourism in transitioning resource‐dependent communities? The case of Trinity, Newfoundland and Labrador.

Insufficient social, human, and economic capital may prevent economic transition in resource‐dependent regions. Attraction of in‐migrants with new perspectives and financial means may overcome this constraint and facilitate path creation in alternative industries. This paper seeks to determine if in‐migrant proprietors initiate, or augment, cultural heritage tourism in transitioning rural regions. Trinity, Newfoundland and Labrador, is the setting for this study. Located on the Bonavista Peninsula, this former mercantile centre was once a hub in the historic Atlantic cod fishery, and today is one of the province's premier tourist destinations. To ascertain in‐migrants’ role in this transition, we contacted members of the business community and posed questions to reveal their characteristics, proprietorship routes, and tourism activities. Using a critical realism perspective, we identify trends (i.e., demi‐regularities) in the information gathered, compare these empirical regularities to extant literature (i.e., abduction), and draw on documentation, and key informant interviews, to identify responsible conditions and generative mechanisms (i.e., retroduction). We find that counterurbanite proprietors are enhancing, rather than driving, an existing tourism trajectory, a situation we attribute to the earlier actions of civic‐minded incomers, and local residents. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]