Resumo: The Rural Community of Tourism (TRC) represents an alternative form to reduce the economic, social and environmental gap to which the garifuna people of the municipality of La Ceiba, in northern Honduras, have historically been subjected; however, the absence of clear policies and limited community participation in a common agenda have impeded these communities from achieving the competitiveness of this tourism product and despite having a rich heritage, the TRC continues to be seen as an embryonic resource that does not manage to take advantage of it. The objective of this work is based on offering a critical look at the role of local associativity to promote community opportunities for the garifuna ethnic group. Making use of the phenomenological method of the qualitative approach, focus groups and workshops were carried out to develop this research whose results reflect a high prevalence of external institutions that work permanently in these territories, so then, factors suchas low associativity, little sense of community and the scant training of the local population result in unsuccessful ways to promote rural community of Tourism.
