Philippine Tourism Act of 2009: tourism policy formulation analysis from Multiple Streams

Abstract

This paper aims to identify the broad factors that explain the formulation of the Philippine Tourism Act of 2009, a law that restructures the Philippine tourism industry. It uses Multiple Streams as a theoretical lens and relies on a content analysis of congressional records. Through these methods, the paper identifies three broad independent factors or streams, namely, problem stream, policy stream, and political stream, as significant in bringing tourism to the attention of policy-makers, including it in the policy agenda, and pushing it through to the final stages of the process. The study also finds the involvement in decision-making of multiple actors, with some more powerful than others. In addition, actors are observed to be cognizant of the rules of the game, particularly Philippine-style politics, in moving the process forward. The paper argues that the recognition of these broad factors, the convergence of the policy streams, the actions of a policy entrepreneur, as well as an understanding of the contextual conditions, may take tourism from the margins to the mainstream of policy-making.