Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
CO-OPERATIVE AND INTEGRATED CONTROL SYSTEMS
In a typical planning process, stakeholders are consulted minimally, near the end of the
process, and often via formal public meetings. 'The plan that results under these
conditions tends to be a prescriptive statement by the professionals rather than an
agreement among the various parties'; by contrast, an interactive style 'assumes that
better decisions result from open, participative processes' (Lang 1988, in Wight
1998:87). An integrative planning approach to tourism planning and management at all
levels (from the regional plan to individual resort projects) would assist in the distribution
of the benefits and costs of tourism development more equitably, while focusing on
improved relationships and understanding between stakeholders may also assist in
agreement on planning directions and goals. However, co-operation alone will not foster
commitment to sustainable development without the incentive of increased mutual
benefits.
One of the most important aspects of co-operative and integrated control systems is
the selection of indicators of sustainability. The role of an indicator is to make complex
systems understandable. An effective indicator or set of indicators helps a destination,
community or organisation determine where it is, where it is going and how far it is from
chosen goals. Sustainability indicators provide a measure of the long-term viability of a
destination or community based on the degree to which its economic, environmental and
social systems are efficient and integrated (Gill and Williams 1994; Hall 1999). However,
indicators are useful only in the context of appropriately framed questions (Hall and
McArthur 1998). In choosing indicators, one must have a clear understanding of planning
goals and objectives. For example, a typology of indicators might include
• economic, environmental and social indicators (measuring changes in the state of the
economy, environment and society)
• sustainability indicators (measuring distance between that change and a sustainable state
of the environment)
• sustainable development indicators (measuring progress to the broader goal of
sustainable development in a national context).
There has been a tendency to pick indicators that are easiest to measure and reflect most
visible change; therefore important concerns from a holistic perspective of tourism
development, such as the social and cultural impacts of tourism, may be dropped. In
addition, appropriate indicators may not be selected because organisations might not want
to be held accountable for the results of evaluations (Hall and McArthur 1998).
According to Wight (1998), indicators to reflect desired conditions and use should ideally
• be directly observable
• be relatively easy to measure
• reflect understanding that some change is normal, particularly in ecological systems,
and be sensitive to changing use conditions
• reflect appropriate scales (spatial and temporal)
• have ecological, not just institutional or administrative boundaries
• encompass relevant structural, functional and compositional attributes of the ecosystem
• include social, cultural, economic and ecological components
