Spatio-Temporal Evolution and Driving Factors of Tourism Economic Resilience in the Yili River Valley

The tourism economy plays an essential role in supporting and driving tourism development. Therefore, studying its resilience is crucial for promoting sustainable and high-quality tourism development. The purpose of this study is to construct a tourism economic resilience evaluation index system and assess the tourism economic resilience of 10 counties and cities in the Ili River Valley from 2010 to 2019 using the entropy weight TOPSIS method. The results show that (1) the tourism economic resilience shows a “W”-shaped time-series dynamic development trend, especially a decline in 2012–2013 and 2015–2016; (2) the spatial pattern shows a non-equilibrium characteristic, with the northwestern part of the valley represented by Yining City showing a high level of resilience, and the central to southeastern counties and cities showing a lower level of resilience; (3) the spatio-temporal evolution steadily points to “northwest–southeast”, and there are five toughness convergence clubs, with obvious stability and neighborhood effects; (4) and the analysis of the driving factors shows that the number of employees in the tertiary industry, especially the input of high-quality talents, is crucial to improving the quality of services, strengthening the ability to withstand risks and the potential for development, and its impact is significant. These results provide an important reference for the formulation of tourism development strategies and promote the sustainable development of tourism.