Adaptive Collaborative Governance for Sustainable Rural Tourism: Evidence from Ciamis Regency, Indonesia

Sustainable rural tourism has emerged as a strategic approach to achieving inclusive economic growth, community empowerment, and environmental sustainability in emerging economies. Despite its potential, rural tourism development is often constrained by fragmented governance structures, unequal stakeholder participation, limited institutional capacity, and the increasing complexity of managing diverse interests across public, private, community, and civil society actors. Existing governance approaches tend to emphasize collaboration but frequently overlook the need for adaptability in responding to dynamic social, economic, and environmental changes. This study introduces an Adaptive Collaborative Governance (ACG) framework as an innovative approach to managing multi-stakeholder complexity in sustainable rural tourism. Drawing upon collaborative governance and adaptive management theories, the framework emphasizes the integration of stakeholder engagement, institutional flexibility, shared leadership, continuous learning, and adaptive decision-making. The study employs a qualitative conceptual approach through an extensive review of governance, tourism, and sustainability literature to identify the key mechanisms that enable effective collaboration under conditions of uncertainty and change. The findings suggest that sustainable rural tourism is more likely to be achieved when governance systems move beyond static coordination mechanisms and adopt adaptive processes that facilitate collective learning, trust-building, conflict resolution, and timely policy adjustments. The proposed framework highlights the importance of feedback loops and stakeholder co-creation in strengthening governance resilience and improving destination sustainability outcomes. The novelty of this study lies in its integration of collaborative governance and adaptive management into a unified framework specifically designed for rural tourism development in emerging economies. Unlike conventional governance models that focus primarily on stakeholder coordination, the ACG framework emphasizes adaptive capacity as a critical dimension of governance effectiveness. This study contributes to the literature by offering a new theoretical perspective and a practical governance model that can assist policymakers, local governments, community organizations, and tourism practitioners in addressing stakeholder complexity while promoting long-term sustainability and resilience in rural tourism destinations.

Public Administration, Public Policy

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