Tourism Community Participation: From Community Empowerment to Community Sovereignty

The analysis on the power relationship among benefit groups of government, enterprise, and community residents in tourist district shows that community residents have been passively obtaining rights instead of being considered as the subjects of rights in tourism. In this study, we visited Li and Miao Nationality Autonomous Region in Baoting, Hainan Province for a site investigation. Using multidisciplinary integration of sovereignty theory in politics, participation theory in sociology, power-belonging theory in jurisprudence and game theory in economics, a new concept of community sovereignty, which based on the principles of survival, development, equality, and independence, was established. Thus, resolving conflicts during tourism development to achieve sustainable tourism development.