much discussed in sustainable tourism development research (Agrawal
2000; Archabald and Naughton-Treves 2001; Brohman 1996; Inskeep
1991; Prentice 1993; Ryan and Montgomery 1994; Simmons 1994; Straede
and Helles 2000). Usually, community participation focuses on
decisionmaking processes and the benefits of tourism development
(Gibson and Marks 1995; Timothy 1999; Tosun 2000). It is thought
that only when local communities are involved in decisionmaking,
can their benefits be ensured and their traditional lifestyles and values
respected (Gunn 1994; Lankford and Howard 1994; Linderberg and
Johnson 1997; Mitchell and Reid 2001; Sheldon and Abenoja 2001;
Timothy 1999; Wells 1996). This ideal, especially regarding the community
approach to decisionmaking, is rarely found in developing
countries. In many of these, however, and as seen in the Jiuzhaigou
Biosphere Reserve (JBR), community participation via employment
as workers or as small business operators, rather than participation
in the decisionmaking process, has been recognized to help local
people receive more than economic benefits (Tosun 2000).
In the present study, community participation in tourism development
in JBR, Sichuan Province, China, was assessed. While there is
not a standard method for assessing adequacy of community participation
levels, the study showed that there was minimal involvement in the
planning process and yet almost all of the residents within JBR had
received economic benefits from ecotourism, suggesting that this
development had substituted successfully for farming and hunting,
the traditional means of indigenous subsistence. The JBR administration
was seen to play an important role in organizing and managing
community participation in the process. Participation in decisionmaking
was only one of many ways to ensure that local people received benefits
from tourism, and not a final goal itself. Especially during initial
tourism development in China, natural resource management agencies,
like the nature reserve administration in JBR, have played an
important role in organizing the involvement of local communities
in natural resources utilization and ensuring that they receive the benefits
of ecotourism. The results of the present study suggest that the
modes of participation are related to resource property rights arrangements,
the stage of tourism development, as well as institutional and