Title: Policy impacts on ethnic representation in tourism

Authors: Abby Liu

Addresses: Department of Recreation and Leisure Studies, Aletheia University, 70-11 Pei-Shi-Liao Matou, Tainan 721, Taiwan

Abstract: The advocacy of an equitable ethnic representation in development underpins the complex policy domain in which issues of ideology, cultural differences, capacity and social changes are dominant concerns. Malaysia represents a classical case. This study, through an examination of mainstream policies, deals with the adequacy of government actions toward the use of tourism as social engineering drive for alleviating ethnic disparities. Findings reveals |development orthodoxy| of preferential ethnic initiatives is questionable because of its divergence from Malaysia|s tourism iconography of multi-ethnicity and because of the government|s insensitivity and incongruity toward the treatment of ethnic diversity with respect to tourism.

Keywords: ethnicity; ethnic preferential policy; tourism policy; Malaysia; ethnic representation; ideology; cultural differences; capacity; social change; government actions; social engineering; ethnic disparities.

DOI: 10.1504/IJTP.2010.031600

International Journal of Tourism Policy, 2010 Vol.3 No.1, pp.16 - 32

Received: 06 Dec 2007
Accepted: 09 Dec 2008
Published online: 15 Feb 2010 *

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