Who is writing this, and on what terms.

Why this document exists

Most research on tourism is published without the author saying clearly who they are, what they stand to gain, or what they cannot reasonably claim to know. That silence does not protect neutrality — it just hides the conditions under which the work was made.

This project is about Levi, Lapland, and the future of a place I have chosen to make my home. I run a commercial business in this space. I am not a native speaker of Finnish. I am not a member of the Sámi community. I moved to Lapland in 2024. Each of those facts shapes what I can credibly say, what I should not say at all, and what I need to do to make this work honest.

This document sets out, in plain language:

• Who I am and why I am writing this
• What I cannot credibly claim to be
• My relationship to Sámi cultural sovereignty
• The commercial relationship between this research and the business I am building
• What I commit to, in writing, before any of this is published or sold against

Methodology questions — how the research is conducted, how AI is used, how citations are verified, how translation is handled — are addressed in a separate document, Research Methodology. The two are linked but distinct. This file is about ethics; the other is about practice.

If anything I publish on this site appears to contradict what I commit to here, that is a fair criticism and I would expect to be held to it.

Who I am

My name is Colin. I have a BSc (Hons) in Hospitality Business Development. My undergraduate dissertation was on corporate social responsibility in hospitality. After graduating I managed restaurants, rebranded and relaunched one, and then spent time in the French Alps working as a chef and concierge in high-end private chalets — small-scale hospitality where the relationship between guest and host is the entire product.

For nearly a decade I have run a digital agency in the United Kingdom. The agency builds websites and digital strategy for businesses that depend on direct customer relationships rather than platform intermediaries. That commercial perspective shapes the analytical lens of this project: I read tourism platforms the way I read any other intermediated digital market.

In 2024 my family and I moved to Finnish Lapland. We came for the nature, the quiet, the seasons, and the chance to raise our children somewhere that still feels — to use a phrase that carries more weight here than tourism marketing has earned — raw. Since arriving I have spent considerable time trying to understand what makes this place feel the way it does, and what is happening to it.

This project began as a personal question and became a research one: how can a destination like Levi grow as an international tourism centre without losing the qualities that drew people here in the first place?

I am not approaching this as a detached observer. I have skin in this. My children are growing up here. My business will operate here. The honest version of this work has to start from that fact, not pretend otherwise.

What I am not

I want to be precise about what I cannot credibly claim to be.

I am not a Finn. I do not speak Finnish well enough to read primary tourism strategy documents in their original language without translation support. I do not have the cultural fluency that comes from being raised here. The methodology I use to work around the language gap is set out in the Research Methodology file. The methodology helps. It does not eliminate the gap.

I am not Sámi. I have no claim on Sámi cultural heritage and no authority to speak about Sámi tourism, Sámi land rights, or the relationship between Sámi communities and the Finnish state. Where these subjects intersect with my research, I will reference them, cite Sámi voices and Sámi-led organisations, and decline to substitute my own framing.

I am not a tourism academic. I read academic literature, I cite it, and I aim to meet a serious standard of analysis — but I do not hold a doctorate in this field and am not affiliated with the University of Lapland or the Multidimensional Tourism Institute. Where my readings of academic work are wrong or partial, I would welcome correction, especially from those who have spent careers on these questions.

I am not neutral. I have a position. The position is that destinations like Levi face real and growing pressure from platform dominance, externally controlled capital, and standardised mass tourism, and that local-first, direct-booking, ownership-conscious alternatives deserve more attention than they currently receive. That is an argument, not a finding. I will mark the difference where it matters.

Sámi cultural sovereignty

This project is not about Sámi tourism. It is about the broader Lapland tourism economy, of which Sámi land, Sámi culture, and Sámi labour are part — but not the part I have the standing to speak on.

Where the research touches Sámi-related subjects — reindeer herding as a tourism product, Sámi imagery in destination marketing, the use of cultural symbols by non-Sámi operators, the history of Sámi land and tourism development — I commit to:

• Citing Sámi authors, Sámi-led organisations, and Sámi sources rather than substituting my own analysis
• Linking to the Sámi Tourism Code of Ethics and similar frameworks where relevant, and not paraphrasing them in ways that soften their authority
• Declining to score, audit, or rank Sámi providers within the Authenticity Audit framework unless invited to and structured by Sámi participants
• Removing or amending any content that Sámi readers identify as overstepping, with public acknowledgement of the change

If there is a credible Sámi-led tourism research initiative or framework, the work of this project is to direct readers toward it, not to compete with it.

I recognise that an outsider publishing a framework called the Authenticity Audit in a region where authenticity has been commodified, contested, and damaged in specifically Sámi terms is a sensitive act. I take that seriously. The framework will be designed, published, and revised with that sensitivity built in, not added on.

The commercial relationship

This research lives at future.levifinland.com. A separate commercial booking site, levifinland.com, is in development. The relationship between the two is the most important conflict of interest in this project and I want to name it directly rather than wait for it to be named for me.

The structure is this:

• future.levifinland.com publishes the research, the evidence base, the case studies, the timeline, and the Authenticity Audit framework. It is the diagnosis: what is happening to Levi and Lapland, why it matters, and what would have to change.
• levifinland.com, when it launches, is intended to be one practical answer to that diagnosis: a direct-booking, locally-curated, audit-passing alternative built against the standards the research argues for.

This sequence is deliberate. The research must stand on its own before the commercial site exists. Otherwise the research is marketing for the commercial site, and the commercial site is the reason the research reached its conclusions. Both halves collapse under that suspicion.

To prevent that collapse I commit, in writing and publicly, to the following:

• The research will be published before the commercial site accepts its first paid direct booking. No exceptions.
• The commercial site will be audited against the Authenticity Audit framework, and the scores will be published on this site, before launch. Including any criteria it currently fails. An audit you pass on every measure is not an audit.
• The audit will be re-run and re-published annually. Including in years when the scores get worse. Pre-committed now, while the incentives are clean.
• External review of the audit scores. I will not be the sole scorer of my own business. Whoever scores it will be named.
• Editorial independence of the research. Findings on future.levifinland.com will not be softened, withdrawn, or reframed because of commercial pressure from levifinland.com partnerships, suppliers, or my own business interests. If I cannot honour this, I will close the research site rather than let it be quietly compromised.
• A removal commitment. If applying the Authenticity Audit honestly to my own commercial site requires me to remove a profitable service or end a partnership, I will do so and document it.
• A correction policy. Any reader — local resident, provider, academic, Sámi community member, official — who identifies an error of fact, translation, or judgement in the research can submit a correction. Substantive corrections will be made publicly, dated, and credited.

These are not vague ethical aspirations. They are the conditions under which I am willing to publish this work. If they prove unworkable I will revise them publicly, not silently.

I also have a secondary commercial interest worth disclosing: my UK digital agency, Booked Wild, references some of the values and goals that shape this project. The agency does not stand to benefit directly from the research findings, but it is part of the broader commercial context within which I work, and naming it here is part of being honest about that.

What I will not do

For clarity:

• I will not speak on behalf of communities I am not part of.
• I will not romanticise authenticity without evidence.
• I will not use the research to disguise commercial intent.
• I will not reverse-engineer research findings to support a commercial offer.
• I will not name and shame individual local providers in ways that damage their livelihoods without right of reply and a clear public-interest justification.
• I will not claim Finnish or Sámi cultural authority I do not have.
• I will not suppress findings inconvenient to my own business.

What I do not yet know

This document is version one. Several things are not yet resolved.

• The right Finnish-language collaborator has not yet been found.
• The Sámi consultation process is not yet structured.
• The Authenticity Audit framework is in draft, not final.
• The external review process for the audit has not yet been agreed.
• The legal and editorial separation between the research site and the commercial site has not yet been formalised in writing.

I would rather publish those gaps openly than wait until the document looks complete. Anyone reading this who has expertise to contribute on any of the above is invited to be in touch. The project is better with more hands on it.

Right of reply

If you are mentioned, cited, critiqued, or otherwise affected by anything published on future.levifinland.com, you have a standing right of reply. I will publish substantive responses, name you (with consent), and amend the original where you have shown me wrong.

This is the standard a serious project should hold itself to. Holding myself to it before anyone asks is the only way I know to make the work credible.

This document will be revised publicly. The version history will be visible. Author: Colin Harrison, Levi, Finland. Contact: colin@levifinland.com See also: Research Methodology, Verification Log.