Factors that influence community-based tourism (CBT) in developing and developed countries

Many community-based tourism (CBT) initiatives around the world have failed to deliver expected benefits because of unfavorable conditions involving a variety of entwined social, cultural, economic, and political factors. Because of different economic, legislative, and political conditions, factors that facilitate and inhibit CBT are believed to be different in developing and developed nations. A directed content analysis of CBT case studies in 48 developing countries and 37 developed countries show that some of these differences vary in being advantageous or disadvantageous for either developing or developed nations. Furthermore, many case studies do not address factors and themes essential for tourism development because of the lack of a clear CBT framework guiding their research and a lack of integration of external conditions in the analysis. In general, collective land and tourism initiative ownership can provide certain advantages to communities in developing countries when it gives them control over land, tourism and natural resources, independence in decision-making, participative management and wider distribution of benefits.