Transformative Change: Resilience and Sustainable Development for Communities

This article addresses the transformative role that tourism might play in developing economies. The main emphasis is on investment in sustainable community-based tourism as a way to alleviate poverty and improve livelihoods. Communities are representing sustainable and rooted social life while at the same time as a form of social structure, which can foster both social change and secure social coherence. We seek to explore whether the resilience perspective brings something new to discussions about tourism development and community, since earlier discussions have touched on subjects resembling “resilience”. By analyzing resilience in a community perspective, we argue that it might constrain the analytical use of the community concept. It seems to be just another tendency to move towards policy processes that are based on global (agendas) for how to construct resilience. These processes represent a top-down approach, limiting the notion of community rather than unfolding the proximities and distance embedded in community logics.