Abstract

AbstrAct: Benchmarking could be defined as the systematic process of identifying, com-paring and learning from the best practices or successful experiences of a particular sector in diverse geographical areas by disaggregating and analysing in an orderly manner the set of factors that condition their success. The outcome of this process helps improve key proc-esses of a sector or adapt those practices that after a long search have been proven successful, to other areas. This study has gathered, in an orderly and synthetic manner, diverse successful experiences that guarantee a sustainable model for tourism from a social, environmental and economic point of view. These experiences fall under four types of tourism: cultural or herit-age tourism, urban tourism, language learning tourism and rural tourism. In total, over forty success stories were analysed, ten per type, in twelve different European countries: Italy, France,