• The Journal of the Korea Contents Association
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• v.18 no.1
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• pp.258-267
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• 2018

This study attempted to do a research on whether local festivals contributed to local economic vitalization in an empirical aspect focusing on Almedalen's case of Sweden has not been discussed in Korea. For this, by analyzing Gotland's sociocultural and economic aspects into 3 steps and evaluating them, the study tried to derive policy implications for benchmarking Almedalen in Korea in the future. As a result of analyzing the economic effect of Almedalen in Sweden into 3 steps, it was shown that in the analysis of resources in Step 1, Almedalen positively affected tourist allurement based on Gotland's beautiful natural landscape. In the evaluation of operation in Step 2, according to the result of examining an increase in population and stabilization with a valuation index related to the activation of local economy, Gotland was steadily seeing a new inflow of population, due to which it can be confirmed that local income increases as various jobs are being created. Finally, as a result of examining the improvement in local image in Step 3, it was shown that as diverse members from all walks of life participated in Gotland's festival, external communication became flexible and the opportunity of social participation increased, which positively affected local image. Based on the study results, the policy implications for benchmarking Almedalen, Sweden's local festival, are as follows: First, selecting an appropriate place for attracting the participation of various people is needed. Second, local festivals should be places for communication to exchange opinions, not specific institute-oriented unilateral provision of information. Third, while advancing local festivals for nonprofit, the efforts to make positive changes in local image are needed.