Quantitative content analysis of codes of conduct for ecotourism in Japan

Abstract

Ecotourism is becoming an increasingly popular around the world, but negative consequences may result from inappropriate stakeholder behaviors with respect to it. Therefore, it is essential to manage ecotourism activities to ensure environmental conservation and future sustainable development. Codes of conduct are highly important voluntary means of managing ecotourism in Japan. This study explores the content of codes of conduct for ecotourism in Japan using quantitative content analysis. The means-end chain theory is adopted to investigate the attributes, the potential benefits, and the underlying values of ecotourism codes of conduct. The findings indicated that ecotourism codes of conduct in Japan sufficiently focus on the natural environment but ignore the economic aspects of ecotourism. Furthermore, the codes are mainly oriented toward tour guides and tourists while incompletely incorporate other key stakeholders, including local residents and tourism businesses. It is recommended that the design of codes of conduct can follow the pattern from “end” to “means”. These findings may provide guidance to support the modification and improvement of content of ecotourism codes of conduct in Japan and thereby promote ecotourism management.