The articles brought together in this special issue of the IIAS Newsletter are centered on the question of how people at the grassroots level in the Asia-Pacific region have responded to international tourism. In view of the widespread negative view of the potential impact of tourism on local cultures and societies, it is interesting that recently it has also been suggested that local people in popular tourist destinations should not be regarded simply as powerless victims of tourism, as many earlier studies have implied. Tourism world-wide is not infrequently characterized by situations in which the 'host' society has a great deal of control over tourism development, which enables local people to turn 'impacts' creatively into economic and cultural opportunities. In this special issue, too, the focus is on strategies that use the interest of tourists in local culture to strengthen local identity. After all, a striking characteristic of tourism is the way in which it promotes self-awareness, pride, self-confidence, and solidarity among people in host societies, as most of the contributions to this special issue demonstrate. 

By Heidi Dahles and Toon van Meijl 

The twelve abstracts following this introduction aim to take a look at what steps local people in the Asia-Pacific region have taken either to redirect external tourist developments in order to keep control of their own lives or to initiate tourism developments for their own benefit. The editors do not pretend to provide a representative overview of tourism in the region. Geographically the focus is on Southeast Asia, especially Indonesia, and the Pacific, in particular Australia and Papua New Guinea - with the exception of one contribution on Mongolia. In terms of academic disciplines, the approach is interdisciplinary; many scholars contributing to this special issue have established themselves in interdisciplinary academic fields, including anthropology and leisure and tourism studies. The issues addressed and the perspectives applied all revolve around four key-concepts that shed light on the way local people 'respond' to tourism by making use of it, i.e. ethnic identity, authenticity, sustainable development and entrepreneurship. Before elaborating these concepts, however, we present a brief outline of the Asia-Pacific region as an important tourist destination. 

The Asia-Pacific region as tourist destination
The Asia-Pacific is the world's fastest growing tourism area in terms of visitor arrivals. It has shown the strongest increase in the world market share, rising from 7.3 per cent in 1980 to 12.3 per cent in 1992, and tourist arrivals grew almost three-fold in the same period from 21 million to 58 million, representing an average growth rate of 8.9 per cent annually, which is higher than that in any other region of the world (Hailin Qu & Hanquin Qui Zhang 1998). The Asia-Pacific region is a popular destination area for visitors from other continents, particularly Australia, North America and Europe, while intra-Asian travel is also beginning to reach significant levels (Hall 1996) - although temporarily hampered by the economic crisis.

The rapid increase in tourist arrivals and income from international tourism have encouraged ASEAN (Association of Southeast Asian Nations) governments - except for Brunei - to label the tourism industry the most important foreign exchange earner and provider of employment. This applies in particular to Indonesia where - under the New Order government - the promotion and development of tourism was focused primarily on the role of tourism as a foreign exchange earner rather than on the development of outbound or domestic leisure travel (Hall 1996). As Hitchcock points out below, for a long time the image of Indonesia as a tourist destination has been associated with the island of Bali, that has gained a reputation as a superior sun, sand, surf, and sea area. In recent years, however, Bali has come to represent a major problem for Indonesian tourism planners, as the enormous growth in demand for hotel rooms has led not only to large-scale construction of new hotels but also to a proliferation of 'informal' economic activities.

The ways in which these petty entrepreneurs respond to the pressures emanating from fierce competition is discussed by De Jonge for Bali and by Timothy for another high-pressure tourist area, the city of Yogyakarta in Java. With what is now a more experienced and sophisticated tourism market, Indonesia has recently been adding value to its existing tourism product by diversifying into 'environmental' and 'heritage' tourism. A fine example of the former is the agritourism project in Central Java as presented by Telfer. With an example from Sulawesi Wall illustrates the Indonesian policy of 'regionalization', which aims at developing and promoting other areas in Indonesia as tourist destinations through the establishment of regional Tourism Development Corporations. The Indonesian government has been favourably inclined towards cultural tourism in particular. How this policy affects the life of villagers in a newly developed tourism area on the island of Lombok (Bali's closest neighbour) is discussed by Bras, while Schlehe shows how traditional religious and leisure activities merge with international tourism on a Javanese beach.

In global terms, tourism in the Pacific is minute. The region does not account for a significant percentage of the world's international tourism arrivals, while the majority of these are taken up by Australia and New Zealand, and by Fiji and Tahiti. In regional terms, however, tourism is a vital component of the economy and it is also a major employment provider for many of the countries in the region. In view of the predicament that faces many Pacific countries, tourism has been assigned an even more important role in the future. Although many Pacific islands appear to have competitive advantages in terms of tourism they generally lack the capital required to develop the necessary infrastructure and the required transport facilities adequately. For that reason, too, foreign investment is essential for the further development of international tourism in the region, which, in turn, will reinforce the economic dependence of Pacific states on foreign powers (Hall & Page 1996:3). Interestingly, in the paradoxical situation of political autonomy and economic dependence that has emerged over the past few decades, indigenous traditions and traditional forms of culture have acquired new meanings and values. Indigenous traditions are nowadays often revaluated, reconstituted, if not 're-invented', to support the search for a distinct cultural or national identity against the background of the increasing global influences (Keesing 1989; Linnekin & Poyer 1990, Van der Grijp & Van Meijl 1993). The implications of the recent view on the authentication and validation of contemporary cultural practices as traditional, however, have as yet scarcely been studied in the context of cultural tourism. In this issue Senft, Silverman, Timmer, and Venbrux analyse the implications of cultural tourism for local identities in the Pacific.

Ethnic identity
The issue of identity is omnipresent in discourses on tourism - not only in academically informed discourses on tourism, but also in discourses from inside the tourism 'system', i.e. the local participants - as the contributions by Bras, Schlehe, Senft, and Venbrux exemplify. Whether we look at Sasak people on the island of Lombok, Javanese people celebrating traditional events, Trobriand islanders, or the Tiwi people in Australia, the encounter with tourists has stimulated reflection about indigenous traditions and culture and has revitalized their arts, crafts, and rituals with which traditional culture can be visually and audibly expressed. What these local and ethnic groups are experiencing may be labelled, following MacCannell (1973), 'reconstructed ethnicity'. It is a strategy that aims, among other object, at maintaining and preserving ethnic forms for the entertainment of tourists. Reconstructed ethnicity and ethnic identity invariably involve the objectification and reification of ethnic images and are produced particularly during the process that engenders a global network of interaction. Ethnic groups begin to utilize their traditions, both as commodities to be sold to tourists, and as rhetorical weaponry in internal dealings (MacCannell 1992).

Authenticity
The emphasis on distinctive cultural identities in many non-Western societies generally meets the demand of Western tourists for authenticity. The pursuit of the exotic and the 'Other' has been termed a quest for authenticity by MacCannell (1973). With respect to tourism, the term carries two pejorative connotations: first, tourists rarely obtain access to 'authentic' cultural experiences, as a result of the commercialization of culture in tourist destinations; second, tourism tends to transform 'genuine' cultural traditions by turning them into commodities. As Hitchcock shows for Bali, however, local people do not necessarily conceptualize the changes coinciding with tourism and affecting their way of life in terms of cultural denigration. Nor do the Balinese seem to regard tourism as an enrichment of their culture. Instead, they indicate that tourism contributes to their village solidarity, while it also provides them with opportunities to practice their traditional performances. Tourism often provides the setting and the opportunity for people to reconsider their idiosyncratic manners of identification, and how they relate to the rest of the world. As Cohen (1988) argues, authenticity is a socially constructed concept, and its social connotation is, therefore, not given, but negotiable. Fine examples of these processes of negotiation of meaning are provided by Silverman and Timmer. Silverman demonstrates how a wide spectrum of tourist art produced by Papua New Guineans in the Eastern Iatmul village of Tambunum attests to the ability of local people to utilize tourism as a context in which to represent and even to create novel forms of tradition. Timmer argues that Huli men revive their tradition of bodily adornment, triggered off by its world-wide fame, in an attempt to pursue goals of self-determination. The fact that tourists take Huli body art as a sign that these people are unspoiled and authentic makes Huli wigmen a typical tourist attraction.

Sustainable development
Much has been written about the economic costs of tourism development: the leakage of foreign exchange because of the necessity to purchase foodstuffs, capital goods, and other items to support the tourism industry, and the repatriation of profits when multinational firms are involved. Other economic implications of tourism development that are frequently mentioned concern the acceleration of inflation because of increasing tourist expenditure, the displacement of labour and increasing dependence on a fickle industry, the loss of the best agricultural land to tourism, and the reduced access to reefs and shorelines for fishing (Hall 1996: 167). Government policies towards the local tourism sector vary widely, and there is no consensus regarding the ways in which tourism should be developed and the major objectives that this development should pursue.

Where state-bureaucracies expect tourism to contribute significantly to national development, tourism policy is directed towards large-scale investments in co-operation with transnational enterprises and project developers that inhibit the participation of local people. The result is that profits remain beyond the reach of local communities, while their residents are often denied access to resources, such as beaches, which they previously enjoyed. This has also been the case in Indonesia. However, more recently regional governments have been investigating the potential of tourism for sustainable developments, as Wall shows for Sulawesi. To counter environmental, social, and cultural problems that often emerge with tourism, scholars, planners, and policy makers are calling for new forms of tourism that consist of smaller-scale, dispersed, and low-density tourism developments located in and organized by communities (Brohman 1996). In Mongolia, as Weber points out, government-supported planning and programmes directed at educating and training local people in co-operation with foreign experts offer promising initiatives for a more sustainable development of tourism.

Local entrepreneurship
If tourism is to contribute to sustainable developments, the role of small and micro entrepreneurs in formal and informal economic arrangements becomes vital. The advantages of small-scale entrepreneurship in tourism are manifold. Small-scale activities are less disruptive and have more modest capital requirements that permit local participation. In addition, they are associated with higher multipliers and smaller leakages, leave control in local hands, and they are more likely to fit in with indigenous activities and land uses, as Telfer's study of an agritourism project in a fruit-growing region in Java exemplifies. Small-scale enterprises depend on ownership patterns which are in favour of local, often family-owned businesses rather than foreign-owned transnational companies. If local businesses benefit from tourism and opportunities exist for active resident involvement in the ownership and operation of facilities, local tolerance to tourism activities is significantly enhanced.

A good example is provided by Tiwi, Trobriand, Iatmul as well as Huli involvement in tourism as discussed by Venbrux, Senft, Silverman, and Timmer below. Their participation in tourism entails empowerment. As Timothy shows for street vendors in the city of Yogyakarta, their success in the souvenir trade engenders on organizational capacity among the small entrepreneurs themselves. The emerging local organizations act as a means of power in dealing with the local authorities. Small-scale operations can also respond more effectively to changes in the marketplace and fill gaps overlooked by larger, more bureaucratic organizations (Echtner 1995), as the contribution by De Jonge shows. Migrants from other islands of the Indonesian archipelago - in this case people from Raas, a tiny island between Madura and Java -, attracted by the economic opportunities offered by the Bali tourism sector and pushed into this sector because of the lack of economic opportunities at home, have successfully established themselves in street vending.

Heidi Dahles is Assistant Professor at the Department of Culture, Organisation, and Management, Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, De Boelelaan 1081, 1081 HV Amsterdam, The Netherlands, e-mail: This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it ; Toon van Meijl is Senior Research Fellow of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences at the Centre for Pacific and Asian Studies, University of Nijmegen, P.O. Box 9104, 6500 HE Nijmegen, The Netherlands, e-mail: This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it