Tourism and community empowerment at Gunung Leuser National Park, Indonesia

In a tourism context, scholars have noted that sustainable tourism can be achieved if local communities are empowered, thus having some level of control over the development process and if they share equitably in the tourism benefits. However, research about community empowerment in the tourism context, particularly in developing countries, indicates that, in general, the benefits are not shared equally within communities for many reasons. This study aims to explore to what degree tourism is empowering two rural communities in Indonesia. The method used in answering the question is a case study and a mix-methods approach. The case studies chosen were two villages that have different approaches in the planning process (top-down and bottom-up). The qualitative approach used is a participatory observation to explore the community’s context. The quantitative approach (a household survey) assessed the extent to which residents of these rural villages experience empowerment at an individual and community level, and the factors influencing empowerment outcomes. The survey results show that the different planning processes in these villages have not resulted in significant differences in empowerment on most measures. At Namo Sialang village, with a bottom-up approach to tourism planning, where the community has significant control over tourism development in their village, the surveys showed some evidence of greater empowerment across all dimensions (economic, psychological, social, and political). However, these differences were not as substantial as might be expected. In essence, this study suggests that expecting community empowerment in and through tourism development may not be entirely appropriate in this context. This may be because the concept does not take enough account of cultural factors and issues arising from political and geographical peripherality in the delivery of empowerment outcomes through tourism.


Introduction
In the tourism context, community empowerment is considered as an essential prerequisite for achieving sustainable tourism development [1], [2], [3], [4], [5], [6], [7], [8]. In general, empowerment can be delineated as means enhancing an individual's or a community's capacity to make choices and transform those choices into desired actions leading to desired outcomes. The research in community empowerment, particularly in tourism literature, suggests that, while community members experience several economic, social, psychological, and political benefits, those benefits are not shared equally within the community (e.g., between genders, between core and peripheral locations) [9],[10], [11], [12], [13], [14]. Tourism scholars have noted that the sustainable tourism goal and community empowerment must go hand in hand [2], [3], [4], [5], [6], [8]. The combination ensures that local communities are involved in -and have some meaningful level of control over -the kind of ICEFC2019 IOP Conf. Series: Earth and Environmental Science 528 (2020) 012001 IOP Publishing doi:10.1088/1755-1315/528/1/012001 2 tourism that develops locally; that they are aware of the opportunities tourism brings, and can share equitably in the continuing benefits [9], [15]. Empowerment is one of the 12 sustainable tourism agenda that aims to increase local control of the decision-making and/or planning process for tourism development [16]. Tourism is increasingly seen as a development tool for many developing countries to resolve the matters they face and play many roles, including empowering individuals and communities [10], [15], [17].
A critical thread in discussions about sustainable tourism and empowerment is community participation or involvement. The scholars have stated that one factor that prevents community participation is the top-down approach to decision-making or planning process, whereby decision-making power rests with government or stakeholders with 'official' status, leaving little role for local communities [1], [12], [18]. In some cases, planning is controlled by 'outsiders' (e.g., government officials) who might see the community as 'an object' of development. Furthermore, they design programs based on 'what the outside stakeholders can do' rather than 'what the community needs' [18]. The unequal power between external stakeholders and the local community in decision-making often limits the community's ability to gain tourism benefits, thereby further inhibiting community empowerment [9], [12], [15], [18].
The recognition of top-down approach limitations to tourism planning has led to calls in the development literature for a bottom-up approach [1], [18]. This approach involves community participation in tourism development and encourages the community to have more prominent control of their future by becoming involved in the planning process [1]. The approach proposes a way for local communities to have control over developments in their area to reduce the negative impacts and to increase benefits from the development to improve tourism planning will result in greater empowerment, to date, there is limited empirical supporting evidence [1]. The research suggested a set of challenges facing communities in developing countries in achieving empowerment outcomes. The challenges, including a lack of education and weak institutional structures [21], factors that have suggested, are crucial to achieving community empowerment [3], [22], [23]. These challenges raise the question of whether the empowerment concept is appropriate for developing countries.
The most commonly used framework to measure the empowerment outcomes is Scheyvens (1999) framework. The framework was developed to provide an instrument to define the effectiveness of tourism initiatives in terms of their impacts on local communities [4]. The framework has four dimensions: economic, psychological, social, and political empowerment. Economic empowerment refers to community access to economic opportunities and benefits resulted from tourism development that is equitably distributed in the community [4]. Psychological empowerment refers to tourism's potential "to increase residents' pride and self-esteem from the feelings associated with visitors traveling to one's community to experience the unique natural and cultural features the community has to offer" [4], [8]. Social empowerment refers to the tourism ability to heighten community interactions and/or collaboration and, by extension, community cohesion, well-being, resilience, social capital, and solidarity [4], [7]. Lastly, political empowerment is about a community's ability to control the direction, type, and level of tourism development in their area [4], [8]. In Indonesia, there is very limited literature on tourism and community empowerment. These studies have suggested that, in this country, tourism does have the potential to empower a community [6], [26]. Therefore, there is a need to study to what extent tourism could empower the community in Indonesia. This research offers critical insights from Indonesia on to what degree the tourism development outcomes are empowering two rural communities. By selecting two case studies with different approaches to tourism planning (top-down and bottom-up), it might be possible to explore how the differences in approach influence the community empowerment levels.

Research site and materials
The research was conducted in two villages, Perkebunan Bukit Lawang (PBL) and Namo Sialang (NS), in North Sumatra province, adjacent to Gunung Leuser National Park (GLNP). The case studies were selected after consideration of theoretical aspects (i.e., the uniqueness of places and the potential contribution to current knowledge). Based on the study's objectives, the case studies were selected to show the differences in the tourism development process to assess how this could affect the outcome of community empowerment. These two villages have several similarities such as located adjacent to GLNP and under the same district (Langkat District); use the park's resources as a tourist attraction and the basis of tourist activities; has three different types of hamlets (plantation hamlets, tourism hamlets, and ordinary hamlets); visited mostly international tourists (recorded); and consist of three community groups (i.e., tourism community, plantation community groups, and ordinary community).
Concerning the potential contribution to current knowledge, the two selected areas have differences in the process of tourism development. The villages are differences in terms of the tourism planning process (top-down versus bottom-up approach) and the management type. Tourism activities in PBL are managed by the tourist guide association (HPI/ITGA), and the planning process is done by the central government, through GLNP manager. While Tangkahan, NS village is managed and organized by the local community through Lembaga Pariwisata Tagkahan (LPT). Tangkahan has been recognized as a destination by national and/or international institutions as having successfully engaged the city in tourism development. PBL started the tourism development since 1973, while tourism at NS started since 2001.

Method
This research used a case study and a mixed-methods approach. The case study approach is extensively used in tourism research [27]. The approach is considered valid in tourism research [Hoaglin, Light, McPeek, Mosteller, and Stoto, 1982, as cited in 27] since it allows the researcher to gain insights that could determine the reasons for the success or failure of certain innovations in certain contexts and settings. The quantitative approach (i.e., a household survey/questionnaire) is appropriate to define the degree of empowerment as perceived by local residents. Qualitative methods employed in this study are participatory observation.

Household survey
The survey was designed to identify each community's demographic characteristics, their involvement in the tourism industry and planning process, and the benefits they felt, and their community had gained from tourism. The statements to gain this information is based on Scheyvens' framework. Several instruments were used as a basis to design questionnaires for this research, starting with empowerment framework defined by Scheyvens [4], Scheyvens [20] to provide a mechanism to measure the ecotourism initiatives impacts on local communities; the World Bank guideline [24]; Boley and McGehee [7], [8]. The questionnaires were modified to suit the Indonesian social and cultural context. The modifications including reduced the number of the questions by deleting those  [4], Scheyvens [20] framework, and simplified some wording. The questions used still represent Scheyvens [4], Scheyvens [20] community empowerment framework.
The questionnaire consists of five sections. Section one asked whether the respondents were born in the village, how long they have lived in the village, and how many members live in their household. Section two asked about the respondents and the involvement of their family in the tourism industry and tourism development or planning, and whether their involvement is benefited them. Section three consisted of closed-end questions in the form of statements on a 7 point Likert scale. The third section explored the community empowerment level using four indicators empowerment: economic (six questions), psychological (nine questions), social (four questions), and political empowerment (four questions). The fourth section asked about their understanding of the term 'community empowerment.' The final section gathered respondent demographic characteristics (age, gender, main occupation, education, and ethnicity).
The household survey was hand-distributed to households and interviewer-completed. The researcher used a cluster sampling method to select the participants for the survey to ensure the sa mple was taken from all the different hamlets in each village, and the sampled households were selecte d proportionally from each hamlet. The participants' sample size was calculated using the Research Advisors (2006) Table. The total number of samples required from PBL was 263 households, and from NS was 278. The confidence level of the sample was 95% and a margin of error of 5%. The number of households in each hamlet was counted based on the existing households found at each hamlet, rather than from documentation. This process was used because there was a substantial difference between the number of households officially present and the number in reality. There is a hamlet in NS, for example, that's no longer inhabited, and another is just half occupied.

Participatory and field observations
The researcher also performed participatory and field observations to observe community and tourism activities in the research setting and familiarize herself with the village environment and its tourist amenities, services, facilities, and attractions. The information gained from participatory observation was used to verify and complement the survey with data obtained from other sources. The researcher, through passive participatory observation, attended and listened to conversations at meetings, events, and training activities, attended by the local community and tourism organizations. The aim of attending community meetings was to understand how the community makes decisions about tourism development aspects, the degree of their involvement in the decision-making process, and to gain insights into the community way of life, attitudes, and interactions. Besides attending the meetings, the researcher also took part in everyday community activities. The researcher conducted informal conversations with residents during these activities about their perceptions of tourism and the benefits resulting from tourism development. By doing so, the researcher could experience the normal, routine activities that collectively shape daily life practices that may escape participants ' discursive attention [28].

Document analysis
Analysis of the document was carried out to obtain the necessary background and historical/contextual information for the study. The documentary analysis informed the entire research process.

Analysis
The questionnaire survey data were analyzed for quantitative data using descriptive statistical analysis (frequency distribution, cross-tabulation), and chi-square analysis using SPSS statistical kit [23]. The household survey responses to open-ended questions were entered into an Excel file and analyzed in the same manner as the qualitative data. A frequency distribution is used to analyse how each variable is distributed [29]. The scale category was simplified into three categories, i.e., agree, neutral, and disagree, to facilitate the analysis, particularly for the community empowerment indicators. The next calculations (chi-square test), however, still used 7-scale values. The next step in ICEFC2019 IOP Conf. Series: Earth and Environmental Science 528 (2020) 012001 IOP Publishing doi:10.1088/1755-1315/528/1/012001 5 the quantitative analysis was to cross-tabulate the relationships between two or more variables that were pursued. Cross-tabulation is used in this study to identify the relationships between the respondent's characteristics with the indicators of community empowerment dimensions. Chi-square analysis checks the significance of the relationship between variables [29].
Concerning qualitative data, the notes from participatory and field observation were analyzed to identify themes, patterns, or ideas, from both existing theories and new issues that were emerging from the observations-supported fieldwork. The data were coded manually by using open coding to identify the themes and ideas. Open coding involves dividing data into parts by the researcher looking for similarities and differences within and across interviews. The researcher used the topics and questions asked to organize the analysis [30], first described and analyzed the findings of the two communities before conducting a comparative analysis to generate similarities and differences, which led to the key conclusions of this study. As the interviews were conducted in Indonesian, all recorded data were transcribed in Indonesian verbatim and then were translated into English.

Community involvement in the tourism industry and tourism planning
The survey shows that the respondents' proportion in PBL who are involved in the tourism industry and decision-making process is higher than in NS (40.7% cf. 19.4% and 12.2% cf. 9%). In terms of tourism planning, the context showed that tourism development in both case study areas had different approaches to community involvement in tourism development. PBL was more of a "top-down" approach, in which the central government had the power to plan tourism. NS was developed based on an initiative from the local community or a "bottom-up" approach. It is somewhat surprising that a smaller proportion of NS respondents report being involved in tourism planning (i.e., attending discussions or meetings regarding tourism development in their village) than the PBL respondents. Mostly came from the surrounding tourism hamlet or hamlets. Villagers from the plantation hamlet or hamlets far from the tourism hamlet were less likely to become involved.

Involvement in the tourism industry
Mostly those involved in the tourism industry, particularly guides. Those not involved in tourism industry participated in the planning

Origin
Local and non-local and All locals That may be linked to the meeting process. In PBL, those invited to meetings or discussions are members of the tourism organization (HPI), which number about 250 people. Apart from the HPI members, the stakeholders (e.g., GLNP manager) sometimes also invite other members of the tourism industry (e.g., hotel or restaurant owner). While at NS, those invited to the meetings are representative of the community (e.g., informal leaders, head of hamlets). The number that is invited to the meeting at NS is, therefore, lower than in PBL. Table 1 presents a comparison of the characteristics of the respondents involved in tourism planning between PBL and NS. The table shows that age was not a determining factor in tourism planning involvement as those involved were of all ages.
As for the tourism industry, there are no significant differences in the characteristics of those  (Table 2) in each community. The result showed that older people were less likely to be employed in the industry. This might be due to the type of tourism that the area offer. Both destinations offer tourism focused on nature, where strength is needed for most employment. For that reason, older people are more likely not to be interested (pers. comm. local community). In addition, those who involve in NS are all from the local community, while at PBL, some of them are non-locals. The nature of tourism history might be an explanation for that difference. The development of tourism at PBL has been developed for over 40 years, whereas at NS village, it has been for less than 17 years. Therefore, the development of tourism is still relatively small in scale. Education does not seem to be a factor affecting the opportunities of the community to work in tourism. The results show that in both villages, any person, even those with no qualifications, can work in tourism. While education does not seem to be a determining factor in tourism planning, however, it could still influence the desire to be involved in tourism planning. With regard to ethnicity, the table shows that in both villages, Karonese males dominate the tourism industry and the planning process. The result of ethnicity is quite surprising, particularly for PBL, as that ethnic group is the smallest in the village. The Javanese community is the highest in PBL and the second largest in NS, but the proportion of those involve in tourism is much smaller.
The result indicates that, in both villages, their peripherality could influence the opportunities of the communities to become involved in the process of tourism planning/decision-making and the tourism industry. The table shows that, in both villages, those living near the core area (tourism hamlet) are more likely to get involved than those living a distance from the tourism hamlet. This means that geographical factors might affect community opportunities or intentions to work in tourism or decision-making processes, while people might be moving to those regions primarily because of a desire to work in the tourism sector.
As for the origin, at PBL, those registered in other villages were more likely to work in tourism than the locals. At NS, all respondents involved in tourism were local people. History of tourism development (i.e., the diversion from a natural disaster), a lack of capital and regulation tend to be factors that cause this outcome. At PBL, because of a flash flood, many local people lost their assets, and they did not have the resource to restore their tourism businesses. That situation leaves non-locals people with more capital to rebuild the tourism businesses in the village. Moreover, there is no specific regulation regulating who can or cannot be involved in the tourism industry in the village. While at NS, there is an LPT policy that those who can work in the tourism industry are only those registered in the village of NS or Sei Serdang (the villages that initiated Tangkahan tourism development).

A comparison of community empowerment between PBL and NS
In general, the results show that as a result of tourism development, NS respondents have a greater sense of community empowerment in all dimensions.

Economic Empowerment
In both villages, tourism development showed a sign of economic empowerment at the community level but not at the individual level. Percentage of PBL village respondent who feels that their income from tourism to pay their bill income and makes them have choices to spend their money is higher than NS village (44.5% cf. 25% and 30.8%cf. 17.6%). In the community level, the community at both villages feel that tourism can bring benefit to the wider community (58.2% and 69.8%). Although for PBL residents, the benefit for the community is unclear since there is no proof of improvement in public facilities. Public facilities (e.g., road, mosque) have been improved, but the funds have come from the plantation company or the central government (pers. comm. local residents and village government). While at NS village, there is some evidence in the improvement of public facilities (e.g., English Club for children, road, and bridge) that come from the benefit-sharing of tourism revenue. The majority of the respondents, at both villages, felt that tourism profit goes mostly to other people or groups (i.e., local elite, government agencies), and only a few people or families who benefit financially from tourism in their village.
The results indicated that profit-sharing could enhance the sense of community empowerment, particularly at the community level. The research result also suggested several limiting factors of community empowerment. Those factors are community culture, lack of encouraging regulation, lack of trust between community and stakeholder; mismatch of training material given; type of occupation available; asymmetry of information distribution, and lack of skill and network.

Psychological Empowerment
In psychological dimensions, the study indicated that the NS village community felt more psychologically empowered than the PBL community did. In both villages, tourism development appears to make the community feel special about their resources, especially natural resources, and encourage them to share their traditional knowledge. NS village has a higher percentage of those who are proud of their culture, have the intention to seek out further education and training opportunities (81.3%cf. 22.8% and 19.8% cf. 9.5%). In fact, most of NS village respondents feel proud of their culture. However, those who feel that their culture and way of life are inferior and feel that tourism restricts their access to natural resources also higher than PBL (2.5%cf. 0.4% and 38.5%cf. 1.2%). However, the percentage of those who feel disappointed with tourism development is higher at PBL than NS village (38%cf. 22.6%). Tourism at both villages could not improve community confidence in finding local employment, which in turn makes the community do not have much interest in seeking further education and training opportunities.
Tourism development at both villages did not increase community confidence in finding local jobs as community intentions to pursue more education, and training opportunities seemed to be declining. The lack of confidence in finding local employment can be induced by information distribution concerning job opportunities and the recruitment processes, which seemed to be affected by the communities' culture. In both communities, information is distributed to those who have close relationships with those who become the source of information; the closest friend or relatives, for example. Asymmetry of information thus constrains the broader community from accessing relevant tourism-related information. For those who want to recruit new workers usually give preference to their family and closest friends with the recruiting process, this further restricts the opportunities for those who have no family or friends working in the area.

Social empowerment.
The development of tourism in both villages does not seem to be able to increase community cohesion as it can not provide ways to involve individuals in their community. The lack of opportunity for an individual to involve in the community afterward caused the lack of sense of community cohesion, particularly in the wider community. As stated by Maruyama and Woosnam [31], Maruyama and Woosnam [32], social empowerment will occur when community exposure to each other through events related to tourism and need to work together to make their tourism business successful. The percentage of NS village respondents who say that tourism makes them feel connected to their community and give ways to get involved in their community is higher than PBL village (24.5% cf. 14.4% and 24.1% cf. 16.3%). NS village respondents who want to work with others to ensure their success are higher than PBL (38.5%cf. 22.4%). PBL village does, however, have a higher percentage of those who feel the increase of conflict resulted from tourism development than at NS (44.9% cf. 30.6%).
NS village respondent who feels that tourism restrict their access to natural resources is higher than PBL village. In a tourism form that uses natural resources as its main attraction, Scheyvens [4] argued that economic empowerment or disempowerment can also refer to the access of the local community to productive resources in an area now targeted by tourism; for example, the establishment of protected areas often reduces access to agricultural land. Dependency on natural resources also could influence community sense toward psychological empowerment. Tourism development in both villages does not limit access to the most community to natural resources. Based on an informal conversation with the respondent, this is because most communities do not depend on natural resources since their livelihood, mostly farmer or plantation company employees. As argued by Besculides et al. [33] that economic dependency on tourism resources could influence the resident's perception of and attitudes towards tourism.
The research result indicated several enabling factors for social empowerment, such as knowledge and motivation. Knowledge encouraged people to work together to ensure its success, besides those who got benefit from it. It is because they have awareness about the potential of benefit that can be created from tourism development. Therefore, knowledge, arguably, is an enabling factor for the community to feel empowered in the social dimension, particularly to enhance their support for sustainable tourism development. Related to motivation, activities, in a tourism context, exist in the community were mainly to serve tourists; therefore, the connection occurs in those who involve in the tourism industry.
Several factors that might inhibit social empowerment are community culture, lack of economic benefit, and lack of reliance on tourism development. In this case, the norms applied and the kinship element are community culture that seems to restrict the wider community's ability to become socially empowered. Kinship could limit social empowerment since the community more likely to have individualistic thinking or seek to protect its own interests rather than the wider community [13]. While for norms, gender role in the community often restricts the opportunity for women to involve and interact with others as their role is within their household.

Political empowerment
The results showed that respondents in the NS village felt more empowered in political terms than in the PBL village. There are more people at NS village who feel that they can voice their opinions about tourism development at their village than PBL village (39.9% cf. 24%), feel that their needs and interest are considered in the tourism development process (21.2%:6.5%) and ask questions regarding tourism development process in their village (38.1%cf. 22.8%). While there are more respondents for PBL village who believe the decision-maker ignore their opinion than NS village (21.2% cf. 6.5%). Tourism at NS village gives more people, including those who do not involve in the tourism industry, the opportunity to voice their opinion and ask a question about tourism development in their area. While at PBL village, the opportunity tends to be limited to those involved in the tourism industry. Several limiting factors for political empowerment identified from this research are lack of sound regulation, planning process mechanism, institutional structure, community culture, and lack of engagement with tourism development.

The connection between community empowerment dimensions
There was, in some cases, a connection between the dimensions of empowerment, in which one dimension could be more prominent than the other [7], [8]. This study shows little evidence regarding the relationships between community empowerment dimensions. Psychological and social empowerment seems to be linked to economic empowerment. The revenue from tourism (economic empowerment) ICEFC2019 IOP Conf. Series: Earth and Environmental Science 528 (2020) 012001 IOP Publishing doi:10.1088/1755-1315/528/1/012001 9 at PBL, for example, promotes and helps community members to send their children to pursue higher education levels (psychological empowerment). This finding is similar to Botswana, where several women deferred their formal educational opportunities to their offspring and thus motivated both girls and boys in the next generation [34]. Improvements in the quality of life of the families and the willingness to provide their children with education indicate an 'enhanced agency' of empowerment [35]. At NS, psychological empowerment is related to social and economic empowerment. Increased pride and self-esteem appeared to encourage the community to work together to ensure success, particularly in maintaining natural resources and safety and security in the area for tourists. At PBL, there is no proof of this connection. In PBL, although most respondents still feel special because of their natural resources, there is no evidence to guarantee their success, however. For example, there is no partnership to ensure that their tourism services are sustainable. It can be seen from the crowded conditions of the river and the tourism area, which resulted in negative environmental impacts.

Enabling factors for community empowerment in tourism development
Several factors could improve the outcome of community empowerment, such as: 1) Involvement in tourism development, either in the industry or the planning/decision-making, and knowledge. Involvement in tourism development, either in the industry or in decision-making, offers the community more opportunities to get empowerment resources (e.g., information, knowledge) through meetings and interactions with other stakeholders (e.g., government, NGOs, tourists).

2) Social interaction
Social interaction with outsiders (e.g., visitors and NGOs who came to the area) helps community members to get more resources from outsiders (e.g., information and knowledge), and that enhances their psychological empowerment (e.g., increased community pride about their resources and sharing traditional knowledge). These interactions could also increase opportunities for these communities' to build networks with outsiders. As suggested by Cole [14], being able to connect with outsiders can also bring a community with its status and prestige. Networking is essential in increasing opportunities for tourism to gain more profits. At PBL, other people, apart from guides, received higher profits from those with international links or networks. At NS, tourism revenue goes mostly to the members of LPT who have networks with external stakeholders (e.g., central government and NGOs). By having a network, community members have more opportunities to promote their businesses to the wider world through those networks and gain more skills and knowledge to enhance their opportunities to benefit from tourism development.

3) Skill and knowledge
Skill and knowledge are considered crucial factors for community empowerment in all dimensions, both at the individual and at the community level, through formal or informal education (e.g., training). For example, in the economic dimension at an individual level, English skills and knowledge could enable people to make more tourism profits (e.g., at PBL, a guide who can speak English charges higher fees than those who can't speak English). Knowledge and education, at the community level, can provide people with greater access to information, and this sometimes improves their ability to see alternative options [24] and/or intangible benefits from tourism apart from tangible benefits such as income [4]. Knowledge could also encourage people to work together to ensure success (social empowerment) because they are more aware of the potential benefits that tourism can offer. As regards political empowerment, knowledge increases awareness of people's right to participate in the development process and gives them the skills to do so.

Limiting factors of community empowerment in tourism development
The results suggest that several factors could restrict the empowerment of the community, including:

1) Peripherality
The geographical factor (peripheral characteristic) affects the wider community from gaining benefits from tourism or the distribution of tourism benefits to the wider community [35]. Both villages are relatively peripheral (distant) from the province's capital city and have a wide geographic spread of hamlets within them, meaning that some hamlets are closer to the center (the tourism center), and others are more isolated. The results show that those who live in the hamlets nearest to the tourism center are more likely to benefit from tourism in terms of both personal and community benefits. These findings indicate that people are less likely to feel empowered by it when they are geographically peripheral to a tourism center.

2) Community culture
Community culture is a factor that restricts the empowerment of the community overall its dimensions. For example, kinship can limit social empowerment since the community is more likely to have individualistic thinking or is directed at protecting the interests of itself and its close relatives, rather than the wider community [13]. Furthermore, community perceptions associated with gender roles in the community often limit women's opportunities to involve and interact with others as their role is within their homes. The results suggest that community culture can affect the way in which a community distributes tourism-related information, with some villagers receiving more than others. As suggested by Kosack and Fung [36], a lack of transparency with or the provision of information to the public can, for example, inhibit political empowerment.
In both communities, the community culture also tends to exclude certain community groups (e.g., women, and certain ethnicities) from tourism involvement. This condition limits their chances for tourism development to become economically empowered. This result is similar to Dolezal [13] finding that community culture in Bali, Indonesia, limits some community groups from engaging in tourism, and Cole [14] studies in Ngadha, Indonesia, which identified that culture could inhibit the empowerment of women in tourism developments.

3) Elite domination
Elite domination or 'power over' by the tourism organization appears to restrict the wider community's involvement in tourism and benefits from tourism development. These results agree with [35], who found that 'power over' might inhibit community empowerment. Furthermore, while the previous section has suggested that benefit-sharing could increase community empowerment, particularly in the economic dimension, the findings also indicate that elite domination could affect unequal benefitsharing from tourism development. A lack of a system for the fair distribution of tourism's local benefits also results in certain individuals -the community's elite -obtaining such benefits [9], [11], [15].

4) Type of occupations in the area
The results show that the type of jobs available will affect the perceptions of community empowerment resulting from tourism by the communities. The job opportunities in both villages are mostly low-skilled, low-wage jobs that limit the opportunities for the communities to gain greater empowerment, especially at the individual level. These results were similar to those of Walpole and Goodwin [37] and Wilkinson and Pratiwi [12], who found that a local community was more likely to be filled with low-skilled, low-paid jobs, reducing their chances of earning more tourism revenues. Tourism-related types of occupation available may also be related to the type of tourism in that area. Because this tourism is focused on natural attractions, the jobs available are linked to natural resources that favor men over women at times.

5) Lack of financial capital.
The literature has acknowledged that a lack of resources often prevents the empowerment of the population. This research strengthens this argument. The results suggest that a lack of capital provided more opportunities for non-locals to build tourism businesses, as there was not enough capital in the local community. This could limit the opportunity the community has to involve in tourism. Another factor inhibiting the community from gaining tourism benefits is the lack of regulations that support it.  11 For example, a lack of regulations relating to ' plantation villages ' caused the wider community not to benefit from the revenue from tourism.

Conclusion
Community empowerment is a concept which contains two main ideas: empowerment as an outcome (a person or group is empowered) and empowerment as a process (of empowering groups or individuals). Realizing community empowerment, however, and achieving the expected outcomes is not simple. Based on the two case study communities, the results suggest that a bottom-up approach to tourism planning is not a guarantee of community empowerment. To achieve that, various aspects of social, cultural, political, and environmental conditions are involved, which appear to make it difficult to achieve in developing countries. Community empowerment is commonly used in tourism development at the community level. However, the idea is often tested by one-shot case studies concentrating on the outcome rather than the process. This study has used qualitative and quantitative social research methods to analyze and compare the outcomes of community empowerment in two Indonesian communities where tourism was built with different planning approaches.
The significant findings of this research suggested that several future research areas expand our understanding of community empowerment through tourism development in developing countries. In the tourism context, peripherality has been shown to affect the processes and outcomes (in all dimensions) of community empowerment, particularly in a developing country. These findings of this study contribute to a better understanding of the impact of tourism on community empowerment in peripheral areas, a subject which has received little attention from scholars [19]. This study was carried out in a developing country with peripheral characteristics, both geographically and politically, which are characteristics present in most developing countries. Therefore, to obtain a deeper understanding of the suitability of community empowerment in a developing country, the factors found in this study (e.g., community culture, peripherality) need to be discussed in more depth.