Societal values and local responses to appropriate livelihoods, fairness and decisionmaking involvement in ecotourism: Chiang Rai, Thailand

Abstract

This paper examines local responses to ecotourism within the broader context of societal values. It acknowledges a strong contextual dimension to understanding those responses, and supports that with in-depth research on three villages in Chiang Rai in northern Thailand. The paper finds that land ownership is a central issue: those without land are those who consider alternative livelihoods to agriculture. Tourism, rather than a development option denied to under-privileged or unconnected members of society, appears to be a key development option for those without land. An uncontested view was expressed that benefits from tourism should be individually received by those involved rather by the community. Involvement in tourism decision-making was low and only desired by those directly involved, as a means of potentially increasing their personal incomes. For those stakeholders, involvement is dependent on village leaders and the representation that local tourism entrepreneurs and workers have through those leaders (based on shared ethnicity). These findings question an understanding within the tourism development literature that situates host communities as empowered through tourism, and adds to increasing criticism of aspects of community--based tourism.

Governance and local participation in ecotourism: community-level ecotourism stakeholders in Chiang Rai province, Thailand

“…This suggests that generic models or approaches to CBT cannot be applied to achieve empowerment or address inequalities in communities (such as those directed at specific genders or ethnic groups), namely because CBT will be operating within a climate where issues of empowerment or inequality are engendered or embedded within local contexts. The influence of social structures, we argue, should not be dismissed in that involvement in tourism may be recognised to entail choices that are, at least, to some extent governed or constrained by wider social forces and structural inequalities that affect capacity for participation (Palmer and Chuamuangphan, 2017).…”

Promoting Participation in Local Natural Resource Management through Ecological Cultural Tourism: Case Study in Vam Nao Reservoir Area, An Giang Province, Vietnam

“…Against a too easy rhetoric of ecotourism, we find that local communities are well placed to benefit from and develop ecological cultural tourism if supported, but this needs promotion and further awareness to guard against opportunism. In this circumstance, a kind of ecotouristic cultural romanticism may occlude ‘social relations and situations that bring specific local (environmental and cultural) resources into existence and to the attention of the ecotourist’ (Palmer and Chuamuangphan, 2017: 122). Such attention was evident in tourists’ responses which implied a somewhat negative evaluation, a kind of disgruntled criticism that we identify as a consequence of an absence of articulated cultural connection between the cultural values of An Giang and current ecotourism and tourism practices in general.…”

“…In the study of tourism, as well as in tourism policy, the move towards varieties of ecotourism has slowly gained hegemony in several regional states. For example, ‘in the 1990s, Thailand’s Tourism Authority began to promote the country’s cultural and natural diversity’ (Tantinipankul et al, 2017: 161) and Palmer and Chuamuangphan report that ‘researchers and governments are now putting increased emphasis on the need to ensure that ecotourism promotes sustainable development’ (Palmer and Chuamuangphan, 2017: 120). Contrary to the situation of neglect and disregard reported by Reid (2003) there is now significant attention in policy to local stakeholders and ‘community-based approaches’ in tourism and resource management (Tantinipankul et al, 2017: 161, citing Thailand’s Tourism Strategy Plan for 2012–2017 and the 11th National Economic and Social Development Plan).…”

Equity in tourism development: procedural (in)justice and distributive justice in Mongolia, East Asia

“…Yet, there is a danger in attempting to make assumptions about local views on equity and fairness and there remains scope for increased local level, qualitative approaches to investigations of equity in tourism development, particularly in an Asian context. In their focus on Thailand, Southeast Asia, Palmer and Chuamuangphan (2017) have argued that notions of fairness and equity, in relation to the distribution of tourism benefits, need to be recognized to be reflective of local, geographical contexts and societal mores. There remains a lack of understanding of local reactions to development processes and outcomes and the concepts of procedural justice and distributive justice from the perspective of community.…”