This book explores the concept, techniques and implications of establishing stakeholder collaboration in sustainable tourism. The importance of involving a wide range of stakeholders in tourism planning and management is increasingly recognised. This reflects a move to less top-down, more decentralised and more inclusive forms of governance in tourism and in other policy fields. Twenty-two leading researchers and practitioners from around the world contribute their views and expertise to this pioneering volume. Case studies examining key issues are drawn from Europe, North and South America, Australia and the Arctic. Section 1 examines the processes, patterns and typologies involved. Specific concerns addressed include stakeholder interaction and negotiation, boundary issues in regional and international partnerships and stages of collaborative development. Section 2 evaluates the effects of politics and power on the practice of collaboration. Specific topics here include the changing roles of the state in tourism governance, regime theory and tourism, the public sector and partnership development and partnerships in a post socialist context. Section 3 looks at emerging thinking and approaches, sums up key issues affecting collaborative tourism planning and suggests future research directions. The book will be invaluable for final year undergraduate tourism students, for postgraduate students in tourism, environmental studies or planning and of interest to tourism planners, managers and consultants.
Tourism Collaboration and Partnerships
Politics, Practice and Sustainability
By Bill Bramwell, Bernard LaneMultilingual Matters
Copyright © 2000 Bill Bramwell, Bernard Lane and the authors of individual chapters
All rights reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-873150-79-5Contents
Preface, v,
The Contributors, vi,
Introduction,
1 Collaboration and Partnerships in Tourism Planning Bill Bramwell and Bernard Lane, 1,
Section 1: Processes and Patterns,
2 Cross-Border Partnership in Tourism Resource Management: International Parks along the US-Canada Border Dallen J. Timothy, 20,
3 Interest Based Formulation of Tourism Policy for Environmentally Sensitive Destinations J.R. Brent Ritchie, 44,
4 Collaboration on Tourism Policy Making: Environmental and Commercial Sustainability on Bonaire, NA Steven Parker, 78,
5 The World Wide Fund for Nature Arctic Tourism Project Peter Mason, Margaret Johnston and Dave Twynam, 98,
6 An Australian Research Partnership Between Industry, Universities and Government: The Cooperative Research Centre for Sustainable Tourism Terry De Lacy and Madeleine Boyd, 117,
7 Developing a Typology of Sustainable Tourism Partnerships Steve Selin, 129,
Section 2: Politics and Practice,
8 Rethinking Collaboration and Partnership: A Public Policy Perspective C. Michael Hall, 143,
9 Community Roundtables for Tourism-related Conflicts: The Dialectics of Consensus and Process Structures Tazim Jamal and Donald Getz, 159,
10 Tourism Development Regimes in the Inner City Fringe: The Case of Discover Islington, London Philip Long, 183,
11 Is There a Tourism Partnership Life Cycle? Alison Caffyn, 200,
12 Developing Partnership Approaches to Tourism in Central and Eastern Europe Lesley Roberts and Fiona Simpson, 230,
Section 3: Emerging Approaches,
13 Collaborative Tourism Planning as Adaptive Experiments in Emergent Tourism Settings Maureen G. Reed, 247,
14 Stakeholder Assessment and Collaborative Tourism Planning: The Case of Brazil's Costa Dourada Project L. Medeiros de Araujo and Bill Bramwell, 272,
15 Collaboration and Cultural Consent: Refocusing Sustainable Tourism Mike Robinson, 295,
16 An Evolutionary Interpretation of the Role of Collaborative Partnerships in Sustainable Tourism Pascal Tremblay, 314,
Conclusion,
17 Collaborative Tourism Planning: Issues and Future Directions Bill Bramwell and Bernard Lane, 333,
Index, 342,
CHAPTER 1
Collaboration and Partnerships in Tourism Planning
Bill Bramwell Centre for Tourism, Sheffield Hallam University, UK
Bernard Lane Rural Tourism Unit, University of Bristol, UK
Introduction
Tourism, like so many modern industries, is essentially an assembly process. In few situations does one company or organisation control all the components, or all the stages and decision-making processes in the creation and delivery of the tourism product. Vertical integration is not a hallmark of most tourism operations. Equally, horizontal integration is relatively rare: single ownership of all the airlines, hotels or other forms of tourism product is unusual, even in one region.
The diffuse and fragmented nature of tourism development has long been recognised. Ways of overcoming the problems caused by fragmentation have also been long sought. Over the last fifty years, local tourism associations have promoted intra-industry cooperation, and national tourism offices have represented the enterprises of their country to the market (Pearce,1992). Internationally, groupings such as the Pacific Asia Travel Association (PATA) and the World Travel and Tourism Council (WTTC) typify cross-border tourism alliances.
Few or even none of the above is, however, a collaborative arrangement or partnership in the sense discussed in this book. The term partnership is used here to describe regular, cross-sectoral interactions between parties based on at least some agreed rules or norms, intended to address a common issue or to achieve a specific policy goal or goals. All the collaborative arrangements examined in this collection of papers are concerned with issues or policies that go beyond basic tourism questions, and have broader economic, social and environmental dimensions. The cross-sectoral reference is important: partnerships that seek to create sustainable tourism need to be holistic in outlook. A focus on cross-sectoral interactions also rules out the examination here of simplistic marketing groups or trading alliances.
Conceptual Background
The importance of involving diverse stakeholders in tourism planning and management is receiving growing recognition. This has led to increasing attention being directed to the use of collaborative arrangements or partnerships that bring together a range of interests in order to develop and sometimes also implement tourism policies. Collaborative arrangements for tourism planning involve face-to-face interactions between stakeholders who may be in the public, semi-public, private or voluntary sectors, including pressure and interest groups. Stakeholder collaboration has the potential to lead to dialogue, negotiation and the building of mutually acceptable proposals about how tourism should be developed. Partnerships involved in tourism planning usually bring together interests in the same destination but in different sectors, or else parties in different destinations but with mutual interests in one issue or related issues.
A key reason for the growing interest in partnerships in tourism development is the belief that tourist destination areas and organisations may be able to gain competitive advantage by bringing together the knowledge, expertise, capital and other resources of several stakeholders (Kotler et al., 1993). Some commentators also contend that decisions about tourism development should not be left to a few politicians, government officials or tourism entrepreneurs, suggesting that a wide range of stakeholders should have opportunities to participate in decision-making that affects their interests. These commentators claim that the broadly based ownership of tourism policies can bring democratic empowerment and equity, operational advantages, and an enhanced tourism product (Jamal and Getz, 1995; Joppe, 1996; Murphy, 1985; Timothy, 1999).
Partnership approaches to tourism planning are now widely endorsed by government and public agencies in many developed countries. The UK government's tourism policy document, Tomorrow's Tourism, includes a commitment to 'encourage tourism management partnerships between local authorities, tourism operators and local communities' (DCMS, 1999:53). Within the UK context, Charlton and Essex (1996:178) have noted that 'A striking feature of the contemporary tourism landscape is the wealth of collaborative initiatives and partnerships'. Across the Atlantic, Selin and Chavez (1995: 844-5) suggest that 'While tourism organizations have always been involved in partnerships to a certain degree, recent economic, political, and social forces in the United States and elsewhere, have combined to make partnerships an explicit priority of these agencies'. Beyond the English-speaking world, the concept of the partnership approach is also beginning to make headway. Spain's new tourism policy document, Spain: A Sustainable Tourism, speaks of 'the incorporation of long-term considerations and the integration of the environmental factor, along with the participation of all parties...
