Decommodifying grassroots struggle against a neoliberal tourism agenda: Imagining a local, just and sustainable ecotourism

© 2016 selection and editorial matter, Jan Mosedale; individual chapters, the contributors. It is not surprising that an advanced welfare state such as Sweden has significantly decommodified social policies and also demonstrates some of the community based ideals and best local practices of an ethical and socially just ecotourism. The areas covered by Swedish certification include animal welfare, waste and resource management, use of local goods and services and use of fuel-efficient and sustainable transport alternatives. There are also limitations on the capacities of local economies and communities to resist, challenge and in some cases robustly respond to the imperatives of neoliberalism. Alternative ecotourism development is not the same as alternative social development because the tourist/client is dependent on highly unregulated market forces to sustain tourism (Salole, 2007). The impact of market principles on small-scale tour operators and hosts cannot be ignored in the drive for profits. Nonetheless, global capitalism has a way of delivering paradoxical movements to the modes of profit making, competition amongst economic interest and production that reflect the neoliberal agenda. Our arguments here suggest that there is some dynamic for a countermovement from local operators and hosts to such economic globalization in order to drive forward decommodified agendas in ecotourism

Best Practice Interpretation Research for Sustainable Tourism

This article outlines the development of a framework that enables the classification of different interpretation research so that it can be linked to management needs in protected areas. The developed framework has been linked to selected case studies, thus enabling this research to be systematically placed in a protected area management context. A real life context for interpretation research is important if park managers are to take new knowledge of interpretation and apply it to their operational practices

Tourism as an interpretive and mediating influence: A review of the authority of guidebooks in protected areas

© 2009 Cognizant Comm. Corp. This short review seeks to present the outcomes of a study that examined the potential effectiveness of guidebooks as a form of interpretation in reducing environmental impacts in a national park. In it, Wearing and Whenman provide a review based on information gained from interviews with 29 trekkers undertaking the Overland Track in Tasmania, Australia. Results from the interviews where correlated with the literature and indicate that trekkers are more likely to use guidebooks at the planning stage of a trek in order to make decisions about what area to visit, what equipment to take, transport, and accommodation. The guidebooks used by trekkers in this inquiry were found to have only a small amount of information on minimal impact messages and such messages were found to be poorly structured. As a result, guidebooks were found to have little influence in mediating responsible environmental behavior in protected areas. The study recommends that well-structured minimal impact messages be incorporated into guidebooks using the Elaboration Likelihood Model of attitude change and persuasion to direct the process. Readers of Tourism Analysis are encouraged to reflect upon how the guidebooks available in their own tourism/tourist arenas strongly influence or undersuspectingly mediate what is there

The Politics of Consensus: An Exploration of the Cloughjordan Ecovillage, Ireland

Ecovillages have grown in number around the world since the early 1990s. This growth appears to be largely due to the contested nature of post/modernity and the desire to establish a more simple, meaningful and sustainable lifestyle that is centered on community. The end of the 1990s represented the high tide of neo-liberalism in most advance liberal democracies. Ten years later, and the global economy still demonstrates signs that modes of capitalism have intensified and spread under the influence of global and state orchestrated markets, giving rise to a search for alternatives that might provide other mechanisms for organizing our lives. Cloughjordan Ecovillage is used to examine how governance through a consensus-based decision-making approach works as an alternative in this circumstance. Generally, intentional communities are organized around egalitarian principles and therefore commonly embrace the ideology of consensus. The primary research question guiding this study wasDoes consensus work in the governance of alternative lifestyles? The preliminary findings of this case study suggests that in spite of the impressive nature of the built infrastructure at this site, the community continues to struggle with consensus-based decision-making as a form of self-organization and governance

Introduction-Beyond Experiences that Make a Difference

International Volunteer Tourism: Integrating Travellers and Communitie

Community Development in Volunteer Tourism Destinations

Description International Volunteer Tourism: Integrating Travellers and Communitie

Exploring community sustainability potential in nature based tourism: The far south coast nature tourism and recreation plan

Often nature tourism development is viewed as a path to changing the economic industry base, security, and by implication towards creating community sustainability in rural areas. This paper argues that a sole focus on economic growth is too narrow a representation of the linkages between the tourism industry and host communities. It asserts that community sustainability is better seen as an integrating, encompassing concern for the cultural, social, economic and environmental sustainability potential of the community in a particular locality. The objectives of the 2004 Far South Coast Nature Tourism and Recreation Plan are presented as a means of illustrating the challenge in developing a sustainable future for Australian rural communities

Stakeholder Collaboration in a Prospective World Heritage Area: The case of the Kokoda and the Owen Stanley Ranges

The process of listing a World Heritage Area in developing countries is often much more complex than in the West. Often all stakeholders are not taken into consideration. This paper presents a case study of Kokoda and the Owen Stanley Ranges, currently a tentative World Heritage site, to show the complexities in stakeholder collaboration and attribution in the process of World Heritage designation. Six key stakeholders were identified in the study. Upon examination of four attributes of stakeholders: power; legitimacy; urgency; and proximity, it was found that all stakeholders in this case study have a high legitimacy in the listing process however only the local community holds high levels of power, urgency and proximity. Additionally it was found that several stakeholders, like the private sector, have too many weak relationships with other stakeholders, resulting in a lack of communication. These findings present the first step in understanding how it might be possible to improve the listing process of World Heritage Sites in developing countries through effective stakeholder collaboration