Moving the amenity migration literature forward: Understanding community-level factors associated with positive outcomes after amenity-driven change

- The amenity migration literature lacks studies providing deeper knowledge of the factors that can lead to positive development.
- Particularly lacking are studies examining community-level processes that can help address amenity-migration-driven impacts.
- Attitudes and perceptions towards change and migrants are key for positive post-amenity-migration development.
- These attitudes and perceptions are largely linked to historical events associated with past resource usage and management.
- Such attitudes and perceptions affect interactional behaviors between locals and migrants, affecting local development.

The amenity migration literature has been growing for close to four decades, paying specific emphasis to the causes and consequences of this phenomenon, characterizing and understanding the amenity migrants, and contrasting them to their counterparts. While these major topics have provided key contributions to the understanding of amenity migration, the literature lacks deeper knowledge of the factors that can lead to positive outcomes after such phenomenon. Particularly lacking are studies examining community-level processes that can help find ways to address the impacts associated with amenity migration. This study intends to move the literature on amenity migration forward by examining community-level factors associated with positive responses to the challenges posed by this phenomenon. By comparing two Costa Rican communities experiencing amenity migration, we respond to the question: What community factors lead to positive outcomes after experiencing amenity migration? The study found that the way the community feels about change and migrants, migrants' perceived roles in the local economy, the relation between locals and migrants, and the existence/establishment of community development efforts are critical factors for positive outcomes.