Providing fun in the ‘world of tourism’: servicing backpackers in Indonesia

Service sector work is a special arena for the formation of gendered subjects because its workers are both service providers and part of the consumed product in the sense that they have to deliver a ‘quality’ product and have the ‘right attitude’ toward customers. Based on repeated qualitative fieldwork, including in-depth interviews with tourism workers in a backpacker tourism enclave in Yogyakarta, Indonesia, this article explores the ways in which tourism work and tourism workers are constructed as gendered subjects. Although women and men might have the same work tasks within tourism, they are positioned differently, and it is not unusual for women to be seen as having a hidden agenda that is assumed to involve sex work. Men are constructed as the norm to which women are compared and consequently perceived as deviating from. Between men and women working in tourism and the western backpackers on which tourism workers depend in order to sustain their livelihoods, relations of class, gender and colonial stereotypes come into play. Tourism workers consider themselves to be seen as providers of fun, which means that they are able to meet the needs of the tourists, whatever those needs might be.     

Performance and visitors’ perception of authenticity in eco-cultural tourism

ABSTRACT

With the increasing commodification of cultural heritage induced by tourism development, the perception of a ‘real’ travel experience often depends on what is defined as authentic, original and local. Visitors are becoming increasingly concerned about the authenticity of eco-cultural tourism practices when they visit culturally and environmentally remote regions. The purpose of this study is to examine the role performance plays in visitors' perception of authenticity of eco-cultural tourism experiences. Various theoretical foundations and aspects of visitors' perceptions of authenticity in cultural heritage tourism are considered. A grounded theory approach based on in-depth semi-structured interviews with several categories of visitors including 25 clients from two eco-tours in South and Central Kazakhstan and 29 Free Independent Travellers (FITs) was adopted to identify visitors' perception of authenticity of various aspects of their tourism experiences and the attributes of the visitors' performative aspects of their travels. Results reveal that the performative aspects contributing to the perceived authenticity of the visitors' eco-cultural experiences are spontaneous, existential and reciprocal relationships with their hosts in intimate tourism encounters. The findings contribute to literature regarding authenticity and cultural heritage tourism by exploring new directions in which to apply the concept of authenticity in eco-cultural tourism experiences and by theorising the link between performance-based touristic space and the perception of authenticity. This space becomes a basis for interaction and social exchange within the host–guest relationship.     

Transnationalism,Transgovernmentalism and Canada–US Relations in the Twenty-first Century

This article assesses the contemporary dynamics of transnationalism in Canada–US relations as the interaction of three key factors: market-driven or “bottom-up” economic integration, sectoral differentiation embedded in transgovernmental relations, and societal (or cultural) transnationalism. It also notes the disruptive and potentially transformative effects of transnational and transgovernmental forces beyond North America which are becoming increasingly central to the calculations of policymakers and major interest groups in both countries. It concludes that transnationalism is a multidimensional phenomenon that appears more likely to facilitate mutual accommodation between the US and its North American neighbors embedded within broader national and international policy streams than to build a broad North American consensus on policy harmonization for the foreseeable future.     

Performing postcolonial identities at the United Nations’ climate negotiations

This study aims to understand how postcolonial identities were performed in the negotiations that led to the new climate agreement signed in Paris in December 2015. Based on interviews, the analysis of documents and participant observation of the negotiations it was possible to identify the legal, economic and scientific discourses mobilised by both global North and South countries. In all three discourses, it was possible to identify a systematic effort of the Northern parties to unmake the identity of Southern parties as ‘developing countries’ as a way to erase the ontological difference between emerging and established industrialised economies. At the same time, in the context of the convention Southern parties reaffirmed their identities as ‘developing countries’ and demanded from the North a strong commitment to tackle climate change and the transfer of more financial resources to the South. In this process, it was also possible to identify an inversion of the position usually taken by mainstream and critical postcolonial scholars that see the deconstruction of categories such as ‘developing countries’ as key for the emancipation of the global South. Finally, this invites postocolonial scholars to look more closely at how postcolonial identities are being instrumentalised, discursively and politically.     

Triangulating the borderless world: geographies of power in the Indonesia–Malaysia–Singapore Growth Triangle

This paper argues that the Indonesia–Malaysia–Singapore Growth Triangle makes manifest the complex geographies of power that subvert efforts to read cross-border regionalization as a straightforward geographical corollary of 'globalization'. As such, the region needs to be examined not simply as a complementary transborder assemblage of land, labour and capital, but rather as a palimpsest in which the imagined geographies of cross-border development and the economic geographies of their uneven spatial fixing on the ground are mediated by complex cultural and political geographies. We seek to unpack these by triangulating how the geographies of capital (including its uneven development and its links to the geo-economics of intra-regional competition), land (including post-colonial relations across the region, the geopolitics of land reclamation and the enclaved landscapes of tourism) and labour (including the divergent itineraries of migrant workers) overlay and complicate one another in the region. By charting these complex triangulations of space and place, we seek to problematize narratives of the Growth Triangle as an exemplary embodiment of the 'borderless world'.     

旅游社区治理多主体共生模式研究——基于青海省两个典型社区实例

旅游社区治理与多元主体之间的相互关系密切相关,多元主体和谐共生是旅游社区治理的关键所在。本文基于共生理论,选择青海省两个典型社区为案例地,将当地政府、社区居民、游客和旅游相关企业作为研究对象,从定量评估的角度分析了不同主体之间的共生关系和模式,通过构建不同主体之间的理论模式,力求把旅游社区治理主体间的关系研究从\"消极或积极\"的态度研究转向各主体\"共赢关系\"的格局研究视角。研究结果显示：不同旅游社区治理主体之间：①均存在正向共生关系;②相互影响程度是有差异的;③共生关联的紧密程度有别;④不同旅游社区的政府、居民、企业和游客等共生主体相互之间均属于正向共生模式。其中,湟中县塔尔寺景区为核心的旅游社区是CRGT非对称互惠共生模式;互助土族故土园景区为核心的旅游社区是RGCT对称互惠共生模式。     

Tourism geography research in China: institutional perspectives on community tourism development

The explosive growth of tourism in China since the 1980s has generated attendant interest in tourism research in the country, among researchers both in the mainland and outside. The dialogue between the two communities (domestic and international researchers) is also growing, but is as yet still limited, with insufficient contributions from Chinese mainland tourism researchers to the international academic world. China provides a rich field for examining the cultural, social and institutional context in which tourism develops. Recent studies of village-based community tourism development in China, with an emphasis on institutional perspectives, provide some insight on the dynamic and complex changes of rural communities along with tourism development. In general, these papers show that village participation in decision making is growing, although examples of disempowerment are as rife as those of growing empowerment. Contested resources are one of the most influential factors in this struggle, along with the rapid growth of tourism that the country has experienced since the 1980s. The papers in this special collection also demonstrate the distinct character of domestic tourism research in China, which engages the rich body of literature published in Chinese, but is generally less connected to broader international debates in the predominantly Anglo-American English publishing realm.     

旅游规划管治问题及其对策研究

在对管治、旅游规划管治、管治理念应用和旅游规划管治主体确立等一系列问题进行界定和讨论的基础上,对旅游管治主体如政府、开发商、规划单位、旅游规划评审、社区及管治对策存在的主要问题进行了分析。指出旅游开发商应公开参与项目的招投标管理、注意充分保障社区利益、切实按旅游规划方案建设。对旅游规划单位,应建立注册旅游规划师职业认证制度和旅游规划单位跟踪负责制度。对旅游规划评审机构,应完善评审组织结构、加强评审过程中的管治。对于社区,应完善社区教育体系、加强社区参与、实现社区利益公平分配。     

旅游社区研究的若干基本问题

旅游社区问题近年来逐渐成为研究的热点,但是一些基本概念,如"旅游社区"、"社区旅游"等概念还没有明确的界定.此外,社区参与旅游发展方面也出现了令人困惑的现象,即作为"主人"的社区却往往是"弱势群体".本文就这些问题作初步研究.     

China in Fiji: displacing traditional players?

A widely held perception in Oceania is that China has taken the opportunity of Western sanctions against Fiji's military-led regime to expand its influence in Fiji. Observers and media in the region were alarmed by the sudden increase of China's pledged aid to Fiji shortly after the 2006 military takeover. They are concerned that China has a well-calculated strategy of displacing traditional Western players in Fiji, most notably Australia and New Zealand. Such concern is not well founded. While China does have multiple interests, including strategic interests, in Fiji, there is no clear evidence to suggest that China aims to displace the traditional players there. China's growing influence in Fiji is part of China's global rise. Both Australia and New Zealand are committed to Fiji and the South Pacific as a whole. Given its substantial interests in Australia and New Zealand, it is not in China's interest to increase its influence in Fiji at the cost of its relations with these two traditional players.     

治理模式分异对旅游地发展的影响机制研究——阳朔遇龙河景区个案分析

如何实现有效治理是旅游目的地可持续发展中的重要议题。以阳朔遇龙河景区为个案,归纳其治理模式空间分异的类型与特征,解读不同模式对旅游发展的影响效应,发现：①村企共治模式中,各治理主体形成互助依赖的伙伴关系,资本互补、信任互惠、层级协同、信息对称、相互监督,能够兼顾效益、秩序与公平,游客满意度最高,呈现良性可持续发展态势;②社区主导模式中,治理主体权力失衡、信息不对称、短期工具理性、监管机制难以发挥持续实效,导致旅游秩序最差,游客满意度最低,不利于长远可持续发展;③政府主导模式中,政府公司治理能力不足,缺乏有效激励机制,导致商业效益较差,未能实现资源最优配置。     

PPT战略与背包旅游--以滇西北为例

贫困问题是世界性的难题。云南省作为我国旅游资源最为丰富的省份之一,同时也是全国贫困县最多的省份,其贫困地区的分布与旅游资源的分布基本一致,是中国旅游资源丰富与经济极度贫困对照鲜明的代表性地区。笔者根据在滇西北高原上逾期一个月的背包和徒步旅游的实地调研,以虎跳峡徒步旅游路线为案例,指出通过背包旅游对贫困地区进行开发,实施PPT战略,是适合贫困人口发展与创建和谐社区的必然选择。