10 Research tourism Amazon, education, research, ecotourism, ecology,

Box 7.10 Research tourism Amazon, education, research, ecotourism, ecology,

preservation Research, education and ecotourism trip Fourteen-day excursion in the Brazilian rainforest

Purpose: To experience, understand and explore conservation, research, education and ecotourism opportunities in the Brazilian Amazon.

13111 The trip will be guided by Hilton P. da Silva, MS, MD, a native from the Amazon Basin currently finishing his Ph.D. in Medical Anthropology / Public Health at the Ohio State University, and an expert in Amazon conservation and biodiversity. Other scholars and scientists from Brazil will join us along the trip.

Places to be visited include: •

The Ferreira Penna Research Station

A Native Caboclo settlement

Belem

The Museu Paraense Emilio Goeldi

Mosqueiro, a fresh water beach

Scenic airplane trip over Marajo Island

Brasilia Since this is a not-for-profit activity the trip’s price is only $2,890.00 (DBO) per person

for the entire fourteen day period.

Source: Email communication, 10 June 1996

ities of that part of the hemisphere, realities quite different from what was being

Rica, Nicaragua and Honduras to enable persons to see for themselves the real-

presented in the US media . . . More than 600 persons participated in [these] and . . . returned home with a new sense of solidarity with the people of that region, as well as a new understanding of the political realities . . . [W]hile efforts at persuading tour operators to be more sensitive toward the environ- ment and the peoples they are visiting are all important, it is more important that increasing numbers of tourists have a chance, as part of their travel experi- ence, to come to a real understanding of the social, economic, political, environ- mental realities of the places they are visiting so that they can become part of the solution to the environmental problems.

(Email communication, 1995) The word ‘realities’ echoes the discussion on reality and practicality earlier in this

chapter. As we have argued elsewhere, reality is, so to speak, in the eye of the beholder, and is open to social construction and interpretation, especially with regard to intan- gible, highly politicised notions such as sustainability, environment, development and

11111 even tourism.

208 • The industry

New tourism conferences

Conferences are a profit-oriented business in themselves and should rightly be consid- ered in a chapter examining the tourism industry. There is no better illustration of the way the ‘conference business’ has seized upon issues associated with new tourism than that of Belize in the early 1990s.

In July 1991 the Caribbean Eco-Tourism Conference was held in a hotel on the outskirts of Belize City. It was followed later that year by the First World Eco-Tourism Congress, then, from 27 April to 2 May 1992, also in Belize, by the First World Congress on Tourism and the Environment. As one conference participant wryly remarked, if you change the title slightly each time you can claim that they are all the ‘First’.

The 1992 conference registration fee ensured that only the professionals, the tour operators and those with their fares and fees paid for them were able to attend. Delegates heard two days of presentations and plenaries which allowed little or no opportunity for in-depth analysis. Questions were unrelated to each other and debate was minimal. The two days of fieldwork gave delegates the chance to trample through the pristine envi- ronments that they value so highly and to wrap themselves in sustainability and appro- priateness. It also helped to relieve them of some more of their money in favour of Belizean hotels. Indeed, some felt that it was worth asking whether filling hotel beds was in fact the whole point of the exercise. As one local business delegate put it, ‘I wish we could put on ten of these a year. We fill all the beds. We all do well out of it’ (author’s transcripts, 1992).

The major organisers of the conference were Bob Harvey, Diane Kelsay Harvey and the Belize Tourist Board. The former two, US citizens, went on to organise the Second World Congress on Tourism For the Environment in Venezuela (1993) and the Third World Congress in Puerto Rico (1994). All these conferences were run as profit-making enterprises and all were dominated by US participants, US interests and US groups. The spin-off for the Belize Tourist Board was the major publicity exercise that this repre- sented for the country.

The conference reflected many of the different facets of new forms of tourism to the Third World. Like many other Third World countries, Belize is extremely keen to attract international tourists; the international conservationist movement is eager to mould it into sustainable and exclusive shape; and the business community sees the possibility of increasing profits. In among all this enthusiasm, Belize seems to have dropped its trousers to reveal its natural resources and its still-beautiful environment to the up-and- coming ecotourism industry, with the hope that well-meaning conservationists can serve as the prophylactic to prevent potential environmental diseases.

The Adventure Travel Society Inc. (ATS) is another company whose major role involves the organising of seminars and an annual conference on adventure travel and ecotourism. In the company’s own words, ‘ATS is dedicated to promoting natural resource sustainability, economic viability and cultural integrity through the develop- ment of tourism . . . We are a professional corporation that provides tourism consulting, marketing seminars, and produces the Annual World Congress on Adventure Travel and Ecotourism’. They also offer what is described as their: ‘highly acclaimed seminar titled “Selling Adventure Travel” to travel agents, tour operators, travel writers, associations, retailers and government offices’ (all extracts from ATS brochures, 1996). In an article entitled ‘A Carry-on Up the Jungle’, Brian Wheeller describes the ATS’s 1993 World Congress on Ecotourism and Adventure Travel held in Manaus, Brazil:

Held at the five-star luxury Tropical Hotel – a veritable pleasure dome – this vast complex seemed just a trifle incongruous, a touch ironic, when one

The industry • 209

considers the ideals of ecotourism. An obvious criticism I know but one that speaks (yells) volumes of the hypocrisy of ecotourism. On second thought, maybe it was precisely in keeping with, and the perfect paradigm of, the real- ities of ecotourism – an altruistic, even noble, concept hijacked for commer- cial and material purposes . . . almost without exception [the papers] were delivered from an unequivocal pro ecotourism axis . . . just the familiar resort to suggested codes of conduct, restrictions of access and the dubious ‘quality product’ argument . . . It was the same old story of the ‘big sell’ of ecotourism, where the desire, and the very real opportunities, for short-term returns in the form of the green-backed dollar took precedence over the long-term consider- ations of a green environment, and sustainable social and cultural structures. To me this was the real agenda of the conference – how to increase/improve

13111 business in general and how in particular to develop commercial opportunities in ecotourism.

(Wheeller, 1994: 231–3) The Tourism Investigation and Monitoring Team (TIM-Team) based in Bangkok,

Thailand, has reported on the 1999 Adventure and Ecotourism conference in Chiang Mai, organised by the Pacific Asia Travel Association in conjunction with the Tourism Authority of Thailand. According to one lodge owner:

They packed delegates into seven large coaches that rushed in great speed through outlying villages, scattering the locals, sending dogs for cover, fright- ening children and shattering the tranquility they came to experience. They disembarked at a so-called ‘elephant nature park’ to watch these beautiful beasts, the country’s national symbol, stand on their heads, kick footballs and play tunes on mouth organs.

(TIM-Team, 2001) Conferences are of course an eminently suitable medium for the sharing and transfer of

ideas, debates and developments in the field of tourism. We are not arguing that they should not be held, nor that they should not be run as a business. Rather, we wish to point out a relatively recent trend in conference content linked to new forms of tourism and the notion of sustainability. It may be argued that such regular gatherings of inter- ested parties to discuss sustainability may serve as mass exercises in self-deception and

self-assurances that ‘we’ are getting there.

Furthermore, it is noticeable that in many cases the fact that the conferences are run as profit-making businesses is not fully acknowledged by the conference organisers. As the Belizean hotelier quoted above pointed out, the motive for conferences may be more to do with the attraction of extra tourists than with the sharing of ideas. In such cases, the conferences themselves are merely an extension of the conventional tourism busi- ness and should be recognised as such.

Conclusion

This chapter has examined tourism in the context of international trade and has contrasted the concepts of free trade and fair trade as they relate to the tourism industry. The ethical basis of fair trade in tourism was considered along with its links to sustain- ability. The question was raised of whether the tourism industry under conditions of either free trade or fair trade is likely to challenge or reinforce the unevenness and

11111 inequality of global development.

210 • The industry

The chapter also examined ways in which different branches of the tourism industry have adapted their operations to absorb the notion of sustainability. The techniques used in claiming sustainability of operations vary partly according to the size of operation, ranging from the vertically integrated TNCs to the small-scale lodges and service providers. Clearly, sustainability is no longer the exclusive claim of new forms of tourism. Techniques such as advertising, regulation, environmental auditing, ecola- belling, consultation, codes of conduct and management strategies are employed to ‘green’ the image of large- and small-scale operators and to sell the products of both mass and new forms of tourism.

A crucial question to be considered with all these techniques, concerns the extent to which they promote genuine change in practices or cosmetic change which serves as good publicity but which makes little effective difference. It has been suggested here that this will depend, at least in part, on the motive behind the operations. Where the profit maximisation motive externalises all other possible motives and factors, sustainability will most likely be re-defined to fit in with a business-as-usual approach. At the same time, the automatic assumption made by new forms of tourism that their operations are environmentally friendly and sustainable has also been brought into ques- tion.

The chapter has also briefly described and questioned the roles of a number of recent features of and employment possibilities associated with the tourism industry, especially those linked to the drive for sustainability and new forms of tourism to the Third World.

8 ‘Hosts’ and destinations: for what we are about to

receive . . .

13111 In 1963, Katherine Whitehorn in the UK Guardian wrote: ‘The only unspoilt village is the one no outsider has ever visited, not even you.’ While this is extreme in its denial of the dynamic element and benefits of social integration and acculturation, it makes the point about the effect of visitors and tourists on local communities. Nearly forty years on, there is a vast body of work that demonstrates that local communities in Third World countries reap few benefits from tourism because they have little control over the ways in which the industry is developed, they cannot match the financial resources available to external investors and their views are rarely heard. This chapter focuses on these local communities which receive tourists and looks at their levels of power, control and owner- ship of tourism.

In the chapter title the word ‘hosts’ is in inverted commas. This draws attention to the implication that there is a willingness on the part of those who receive guests and possibly even an assumption that they have a degree of control over tourist develop- ments in their community. As already discussed and as is well-documented elsewhere, it is not often the case that local people derive benefit sufficient to outweigh the dis- benefits of their community receiving tourists. Chapter 3, particularly, illustrated the uneven and unequal relationships of power within local communities. The terms ‘destination community’ and ‘visited population’ are used interchangeably rather than the word ‘host’, but ‘hosts’ is used in the title because, as will be seen in this chapter, there are examples of communities managing to take a degree of control of, and to exer- cise power over, the developments of tourism in their localities. Also throughout the chapter the term ‘local community’ is used somewhat loosely, reflecting its common usage which fails to acknowledge that the term is often contested, between different groups within the community for instance, and is often assumed to represent a homo- geneous population. As we shall see, this assumption is questionable and fails to acknow- ledge the heterogeneity and different interest groups within what are commonly referred to as ‘local communities’.

The body of this chapter examines the different levels at which local communities participate in tourism and the levels of ownership and control that they, and others, hold over the resources of the tourism industry. The relationships of power between local populations and the tourists, the governments, the industry, the NGOs and the suprana- tional institutions produce effects which reflect and promote the unequal development of visited populations and these other players in the activities of tourism. The differ- ences in the approaches taken in pursuit of community control and government control are also outlined.

The word ‘destinations’ is used in the chapter title because all too often the local communities visited by tourists are viewed precisely as that – places, to be collected, 11111

as if the people who live there are either irrelevant or at best incidental to the place.

212 • ‘Hosts’ and destinations

Alternatively, where ‘experiencing the local culture’ is considered to be important as part of the tourist experience, then the local people may be considered as objects or commodities. In no instances is this more so than in the case of organised tours to visit tribal peoples, a feature of the industry which is also discussed in this chapter. Pratt’s notion of transculturation and the ways in which cultural domination is transmitted from one group (the tourists) to another (the visited population) are then discussed. Throughout the chapter, we examine the demands made upon the visited populations that they be ‘authentic’.

Local participation in decision-making

The two words, ‘local’ and ‘participation’, are regularly used together to emphasise the need to include and involve local people; and it is this juxtaposition of the two words which implies, paradoxically, that it is local people who have so often been left out of the planning, decision-making and operation of tourist schemes. At various points in the ‘age of development’, however, participation and people-focused approaches have become axiomatic with development. 1

As discussed in Chapter 4, one of the criteria often agreed as essential to the condi- tions of sustainability and development in any ‘new’ tourist scheme is the participation of local people. For the most part there has been an overwhelming benevolence towards the process of participation and a once marginal activity has become mainstreamed in the work of many INGOs, multilateral (World Bank, 1996) and bilateral agencies. Indeed, the 1990s was the decade of participatory development. As Henkel and Stirrat argue, ‘It is now difficult to find a development project that does not . . . claim to adopt

a “participatory” approach involving “bottom-up” planning, acknowledging the impor- tance of “indigenous” knowledge and claiming to “empower” local people’ (2001: 168). And as Jules Pretty points out:

In recent years, there have been an increasing number of comparative studies of development projects showing that ‘participation’ is one of the critical components of success . . . As a result, the terms ‘people participation’ and ‘popular participation’ are now part of the normal language of many develop- ment agencies, including non-governmental organisations, government depart- ments and banks. It is such a fashion that almost everyone says that participation is part of their work.

(1995: 4) Moreover, Survival International has noted that ‘it has become fashionable for conser-

vationists to talk about “consulting” local people . . . This looks good on paper, but [is] hardly an adequate substitute for land ownership rights and self-determination’ (1996).

Through the evolution and development of Local Agenda 21, participation has become part of the apparatus of development, an inseparable process. The association of partic- ipation with ‘empowerment’ and ‘sustainability’ and the multi-beneficial direct and indi- rect impacts identified as arising from it have tended to place it on a pedestal.

Participation is not, however, without its critics (Cooke and Kothari, 2001; Desai, 1995; Rahnema, 1992). Cooke and Kothari (2001), for example, refer to participation as the ‘new tyranny’, a critical attack on much development practice some would argue, but also a critique which seeks to expose and understand the sanctity in which partici- pation is held, and the manner in which there are at times ‘evangelical promises of salva- tion’ (Henkel and Stirrat, 2001: 172); and there is a whiff of spiritualism in participatory

‘Hosts’ and destinations • 213

practices that mirrors the discourses of travel. As a powerful discourse, participation, it is argued, must be subjected to a critique and must be alive to the possibility that partic- ipation has ‘the potential for an unjustified exercise of power’ (Cooke and Kothari, 2001: 4). Thus, phrases such as ‘targeting local people’ and ‘eliciting community-based par- ticipation’ (Brandon, 1993: 136), and sentiments such as ‘environmentally sustainable development . . . rests on gaining local support for the project’ (Drake, 1991: 132), and ‘projects must provide direct benefits to local peoples’ (Epler Wood, 1991: 204) come from the perspective of the project planner, usually from the First World, as are all these examples. The planners are often associated with a major INGO (such as WWF, Conservation International and TIES as in these cases) or a supranational institution such as the World Bank (as in two of these cases) and all seek their own form of sustain- ability through their appropriate projects.

13111 It is not so much the good intentions or ethical and theoretical value that lie behind participation that are open to question, but rather, the often uncritical manner in which participation is conceptualised and practised that has drawn increasing attention. Commentators have pointed to the manner in which participatory exercises have been conducted and the way in which it has been subsumed into contemporary developmental practice – codified and ‘manualised’ as part of a technical activity.

Cleaver (1999, 2001) argues that a new faith in participation arises from three key tenets: that participation is inherently good, that good techniques can ensure success, and that considerations of structures of power (and politics) should be avoided. Before turning more directly to its application to tourism, we consider these points in turn.

As already noted in Chapter 3, commentators have already referenced the ‘spiritual whiff of righteousness’ in elements of the development discourse and participation is no different in this respect. Participation has been regarded as an inherently positive force for change and development. Henkel and Stirrat (2001: 177), for example, refer to Chambers’s ‘theology of development’ requiring practitioners to undergo an experi- ence ‘akin to that St Paul underwent on the road to Damascus’ (2001: 177), with Cleaver positing participation as an ‘act of faith in development’ (2001: 37). But far from the exercise of a value-free (perhaps ‘ecumenical’) approach Henkel and Stirrat suggest that what the ‘new orthodoxy boldly calls “empowerment”’ has special resonance in what Michel Foucault (1980) calls ‘subjection’, where the technical framework, approach and means of participation in participatory rural appraisal (PRA – see pp. 217–21) is preor- dained and fixed. Ultimately, critics argue, this form of participation drives participants to seeing and representing their world within the context of the PRA ‘expert’s’ vision. Or perhaps, local people are simply pragmatic and are able to off-load local knowledge into predetermined structures, but with the view to realising opportunities and resources from external programmes.

Second, and leading on from the inherently positive nature of participation, there has been an overwhelming belief that problems exist only in terms of the methods and tech- niques employed. But a number of critics have questioned the underlying methodology – that is, the philosophy of methods. Kothari (2001) argues that there is a number of tropes in participatory discourse expressed as dualisms that favour the South, the local community and participation over the North, the global community, government, and non-participation; the former are imbued with morality, the latter immorality. There is an underlying assumption that participation is a trip-switch to development. But as Cleaver questions, ‘Are we in danger of swinging from one untenable position (we know best) to an equally untenable and damaging one (they know best)?’ (2001: 47)

There is also an interesting parrellel to be drawn from the application of Goffman’s (1997) writings on the presentation of self in everyday life, to the staged authenticity 11111

thesis in tourism and the application of participation processes through techniques such

214 • ‘Hosts’ and destinations

as PRA. Kothari argues that PRA represents an act with participants performing distinct, ‘contrived’ roles and practitioners or facilitators acting as ‘stage managers or directors who guide, and attempt to delimit’ the performance of participants (2001: 148). In this way only partial or distorted representations of everyday lives are offered up or participants provide the information they believe is required to secure support and manipulate interpretations to serve their interests (Mosse, 2001); as Cooke suggests ‘participatory processes may lead a group to say what it is they think you and everyone else want to hear, rather than what they truly believe’ (2001: 111).

A further point of criticism is the degree to which participation manages to challenge the traditional top-down and mechanistic approach to development practice. As Mosse argues, rather than ‘local knowledge’ structuring and modifying development projects, formulaic project frameworks (such as widely used logical frameworks) relying on participatory planning techniques, in effect structure and articulate the local knowledge (2001: 24). As such there is increasing evidence that development practice is increas- ingly influenced by western managerialist thinking, especially human resource manage- ment (Taylor, 2001).

Third, and as Cleaver forcefully argues, an emphasis on perfecting method has inevitably resulted in a belief in problem solving through participation ‘rather than prob- lematization, critical engagement and class’ (2001: 53); and this belief in problem solving through participation fails to acknowledge the structures of power, both within so-called ‘communities’ and between these communities and outsiders conducting participatory exercises. This neutralisation of power structures and political priorities is also a noted limitation of the sustainable livelihood approach (Beall, 2002; Carney, 1998; Carney et al., 1999; Devas, 2002) to development, of which participation is a critical element. This aspect is especially significant within the overall context of this book, with its emphasis on uneven and unequal structures and relations of power.

The problems start with the notion of a community as the ‘“natural” social entity’ (Cleaver 2001: 44) and identifiable reality, and the manner in which the heterogeneity and unequal access to power is assumed away. There exists a further assumption that members of a community are willing and able to participate equally. This has been an enduring debate and problem within community development studies. The emphasis on solidarity in communities together with a closed and bounded conceptualisation of place, culture and community (Hall, 1995; Massey, 1991, 1993, 1995a) leads to the relegation and cognisance of conflict and exclusion in communities, and a failure to understand social and power structures that greatly influence the conduct and outcome of partici- patory processes.

As suggested above, however, a consideration of relationships of power and the discourse of participatory development also necessitates ‘an investigation of the motives and ideology of the “experts” who advocate such an approach’ (Hailey, 2001: 98), for as Hailey argues, ‘There is a suspicion that those “experts” who advocate participatory approaches to development appear to sit on some moral high ground and as such are immune to criticism’ (2001: 97). Most critically some commentators have argued that participatory discourse and practices must be understood within the broader context. Attempts ‘to obscure the relations of power and influence between elite interest and less powerful groups such as the “beneficiaries” of development projects in local communi- ties in developing countries’ (Taylor, 2001: 122) are indicators that this broader context is being ignored. In Taylor’s view, participation is simply not working, because it has been promoted by the powerful, and is largely cosmetic, but most ominously because ‘it is used as a “hegemonic” device to secure compliance to, and control by, existing power structures’ (Taylor, 2001: 137). As such then, participation simultaneously veils and legitimises existing structures of power.

‘Hosts’ and destinations • 215

While participation is a fundamental means of interaction and ‘development’, it is certainly not a panacea and does not automatically or necessarily lead to a change in the underlying structures of power. There are many well-documented examples of the relative lack of power held by local people in tourism developments in their locality – Brandon cites over fifty schemes, ‘many of [which] had initiated nature tourism activ- ities, but few of the benefits went to local people’ (1993: 135). (See also Johnston (1990), Wells and Brandon (1992) and West and Brechin (1991).) This exclusion of local people from involvement and decision-making in the operation and benefits of tourism can be seen in some of the examples cited in this chapter (see Box 8.1, for example) and else- where in this book.

Pretty’s typology of participation

13111 The principle of local participation may be easy to promote; the practice is more

complex, and clearly participation may be implemented in a number of different ways. Pretty has identified and described different types of participation as shown in Table

8.1, which offers a critique of each type. Local circumstances, the unequal distribution of power between local and other interest groups, and differing interpretations of the term ‘participation’ are reflected in Pretty’s typology of participation, which is just as applicable to the idea of ‘partner- ships’, another mantra of the current phase of development, as it is to the idea of partic- ipation. Pretty’s typology is especially helpful in developing an understanding of the factors which affect the development of tourism schemes in local communities, and the case studies illustrated in this chapter are referred to the typology.

The six types of participation range from passive participation, in which virtually all the power and control over the development or proposal lie with people or groups outside

Table 8.1 Pretty’s typology of participation Typology

Characteristics of each type

1 Passive People participate by being told what has been decided or has participation

already happened. Information being shared belongs only to external professionals

Process does not concede any share in decision-making, and

2 Participation by People participate by being consulted or by answering questions. consultation

professionals are under no obligation to take on board people’s views

3 Bought People participate in return for food, cash or other material participation

incentives. Local people have no stake in prolonging technologies or practices when the incentives end

4 Functional Participation seen by external agencies as a means to achieve participation

their goals, especially reduced costs. People participate by forming groups to meet predetermined objectives

5 Interactive People participate in joint analysis, development of action plans participation

and formation or strengthening of local groups or institutions. Learning methodologies used to seek multiple perspectives and groups determine how available resources are used

6 Self-mobilisation People participate by taking initiatives independently of external and connectedness institutions to change systems. They develop contacts with external institutions for resources and technical advice they need, but retain control over resource use

Sources: Pretty and Hine (1999); adapted from Pretty (1995)

216 • ‘Hosts’ and destinations

the local community, to self-mobilisation, in which the power and control over all aspects of the development rest squarely with the local community. The latter type does not rule out the involvement of external bodies or assistants or consultants, but they are present only as enablers rather than as directors and controllers of the development. The range of types allows for differing degrees of external involvement and local control, and reflects the power relationships between them. For local people, involvement in the decision-making process is a feature of only the interactive participation and self- mobilisation types, while in the functional participation type most of the major decisions have been made before they are taken to the local community. The only forms of local participation that are likely to break the existing patterns of power and unequal devel- opment are those which originate from within the local communities themselves. This chapter provides a few such examples, but even these illustrate the fact that local circum- stances always manage to complicate the best of intentions.

It would be easy here to make the prescriptive assumption that the greater the degree of local participation, the better (by whatever definition) the project. There are those, however, who might disagree with this assumption, especially, but not exclusively, those who represent a vested interest in a particular development project – the development agencies, governments, supranational institutions, or operators for instance. In these cases, some of the lesser types of participation might be considered preferable. It is precisely this point which emphasises the importance of the power relationships involved in any (tourist) development project, and the fact that Pretty’s typology reflects this underlines its value.

At this point, it is worth contrasting a number of examples of local participation in tourism developments in order to illustrate the manifestations and effects of different levels of involvement. We have attempted simply to describe the situations of each case study in the appropriate box and in the text to relate it to Pretty’s typology, which allows us to make a consideration of the power vested in each interest group and their relation to the local community.

Box 8.1 includes excerpts from an article by Phil Gunson on the large-scale Mundo Maya (Maya World) project which covers five southern Mexican states plus Guatemala, Belize, El Salvador and Honduras. It is described in Mundo Maya publicity material as ‘a ground-breaking tourism and regional development initiative . . . [which] seeks to improve the lot of area inhabitants with low-impact projects which give visitors the opportunity to explore the area’ (Mundo Maya Travel Guide, undated: 4). In 1991 the project initially received US$1 million from the European Commission to promote three kinds of tourism in each country: cultural tourism, coastal tourism and eco/adventure tourism. The project promotes infrastructural improvements, new hotel construction, archaeological projects and extensive international marketing through glossy brochures, in-flight magazines and travel trade shows.

As Box 8.1 makes clear, there appears to be little or no attempt to involve local communities in decision making. As the editor of Tourism Link (a journal of the Belize Tourism Industry Association) explained ‘full decision making powers for all Mundo Maya affairs lie in the hands of only five persons – basically the top public sector tourism officials of each country’ (1992: 4). The fact that this statement came as part of an article of complaint by private sector representatives about public sector control of the project underlines the irrelevance of local communities in this contest for power. According to Pretty’s typology, this example might be classified as passive participation.

Box 8.2 provides an account of a small-scale tourism scheme in a community of mostly Salvadoran exiles in Costa Rica. Although there has been a degree of external assistance in this case, the idea for the scheme arose from within the community itself and all the tourists’ activities are under the direct control of the community. Moreover,

‘Hosts’ and destinations • 217