Marine-tourism development on a small island in Indonesia: blessing or curse?

ABSTRACT

Indonesia is a popular tourist destination. Tourism creates jobs and generates revenue but can have negative impacts on culture, society and human rights. This study of one island community in Indonesia explores the relationship between the growth of tourism and the impacts on a local community. A quantitative survey, combined with in-depth interviews, examined perceptions of residents to tourism development. Residents perceived that tourism created jobs and improved access to goods and services. However, tourism has reduced social cohesion and decreased adherence to traditional customs. Conflict between the private sector and residents over ownership and access have also caused violence.

KEYWORDS:

• Conflict
• fishery
• Indonesia
• small island
• tourism
• community-based tourism
• livelihoods
• community development
• job creation
• land rights

Acknowledgements

We want to express our gratitude to research assistants and interviewees. We also want to express our gratitude to Directorate of Higher Education, Ministry of Research and Higher Education, Republic of Indonesia, which provide research grant through Bogor Agricultural University, and provide Rilus A. Kinseng with sabbatical leave to work on an earlier draft of this manuscript.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Funding

This article was written with financial support through the Research and Community Service Institute (Lembaga Penelitian dan Pengabdian pada Masyarakat) of Bogor Agricultural University, 2016.