Recently questions of a sector, or entity’s, ‘social licence to operate’ has been brought into consideration across a number of productive sectors (agriculture, fisheries, tourism) and resource management actions (bio-protection and bio-security, water use etc.). Broadly speaking a social license has been defined as existing when a project has the ongoing approval within the local community, other stakeholders, and broad social acceptance. In turn social licence needs to be earnt, monitored and retained.
As the tourism industry has grown in size and scope similar questions are now being asked about its community acceptance and limits to growth. The goal of the Doctoral scholarship is to address these questions and determine a framework for understanding tourism’s social licence to operate with particular reference to the New Zealand context.
The purpose of this scholarship is to support research to provide a theoretically informed understanding of tourism’s social licence to operate in New Zealand. The practical outcomes of this research will inform monitoring and management frameworks for the tourism sector. A secondary purpose is to build human capacity development for tourism policy and management.
To address these goals, the Tourism Industry New Zealand Trust and Lincoln University have agreed to jointly fund and support the research programme.
One scholarship will be offered to a student studying for, and new to, the Doctoral (PhD) qualification at Lincoln University in the Department of Tourism, Sport and Society. The value of the scholarship will be $25,500 emolument per year for each of three years, plus the amount equivalent to the New Zealand students’ tuition fees (currently $7300) per annum for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy at Lincoln University for the same period. The tuition fee is paid annually by way of a credit to the scholar’s fees account. Limited operational funds are also provided.