Thrissur Pooram, a renowned temple festival in Kerala, serves as a living laboratory for sustainability, integrating cultural heritage, economic vibrancy and environmental responsibility. This study examines how the festival navigates socio-environmental challenges while preserving its rich traditions, with the objective of developing a contextualized framework for sustainability assessment and crisis management in large scale cultural events.
Using a qualitative case study approach, the research incorporates ethnographic observations, stakeholder interviews and document analysis to explore the interplay between sustainability practices, crisis management and cultural governance.
A key contribution is the study-derived Nano-Scale Assessment Model (NSAM), which categorizes sustainability dimensions into internal, external, interrelated and extraneous factors to assess festival sustainability holistically. By integrating Social-Ecological Systems (SES) Theory, the study highlights how traditional governance and participatory planning shape sustainability outcomes in high-intensity culturally embedded event settings.
Findings reveal an urgent need for improved crisis management, stakeholder collaboration and structured sustainability interventions to mitigate overcrowding, environmental strain, and economic vulnerabilities. The NSAM framework offers a replicable tool for a sustainability-driven governance mechanism in a similar festival context globally.
The study positions Thrissur Pooram as a replicable model for sustainable festival management, offering policy insights for event organizers, cultural policymakers and sustainability practitioners. It extends SES theory through the introduction of a layered, even specific analytical model, enabling a granular understanding of sustainability transition in a complex socio-cultural system.
