Evaluating volunteer tourism: has it made a difference?

The impact of volunteer tourism on local communities: A managerial perspective

“…In order to refute the conceptualization of voluntourism as an oxymoron (the union of two totally opposite words), it is necessary to rethink what a volunteer tourist is, the positive and negative predisposition towards the term tourism, and about reinterpreting the consequences of linking tourism and volunteer activities in certain destinations. As Wearing, Young, and Everingham () suggest, voluntourism should be reframed. In addition, tourists should be aware and become active participants in these discussions.…”

Northern Lights Instead of Workers’ Rights: Volunteer Working Tourists in Finnish Lapland

“…Volunteer tourists are commonly seen as persons who travel to a particular destination to accept work without payment while simultaneously experiencing conventional elements of travel, and do so because of causes, personal beliefs, or interests (Wearing 2001). It is also often seen as a kind of tourism in which tourists pay to partake in humanitarian or conservation related projects (Mostafanezhad 2014).…”

“…A good amount of studies has been done on volunteer tourists/tourism, usually examining motivations of volunteers (Broad 2003;Brown & Lehto 2005;McGehee & Andereck 2008;Mustonen 2007). Volunteer tourists have also been divided into categories of volunteer-minded versus vacationminded practitioners (Brown & Lehto 2005;Mustonen 2007;Wearing 2001). Studies also have examined the benefits of volunteer tourism for both tourist and host enclaves (Broad 2003;Brown & Morrison 2003;Clifton & Benson 2006;Ellis 2003;Gunderson 2005;McGehee & Santos 2005;Uriely et al 2003;Wearing 2001Wearing , 2002Wearing et al 2008), as well as negative impacts of the phenomena (Guttentag 2010).…”

“…Volunteer tourists have also been divided into categories of volunteer-minded versus vacationminded practitioners (Brown & Lehto 2005;Mustonen 2007;Wearing 2001). Studies also have examined the benefits of volunteer tourism for both tourist and host enclaves (Broad 2003;Brown & Morrison 2003;Clifton & Benson 2006;Ellis 2003;Gunderson 2005;McGehee & Santos 2005;Uriely et al 2003;Wearing 2001Wearing , 2002Wearing et al 2008), as well as negative impacts of the phenomena (Guttentag 2010). Research has also been done on volunteer tourists in northern Norway, near Lapland, about the creation of noncommodified volunteer experiences (Jaeger & Olsen 2016).…”

Leisure as an agent of social change: special issue introduction

“…At the conference, delegates considered how leisure is not just a driver of social change, but importantly how leisure activities and organizations are adapting to social change. Several special conference streams were included, targeting key areas of the literature such as arts and leisure (Maxwell et al 2015); disability and leisure (Darcy, Maxwell, and Green 2016;Stumbo, Wang, and Pegg 2011); health and leisure (Wiltshire, Fullagar, and Stevinson 2018); humans, animals, and leisure (Young and Carr 2018); leisure management (Tower and Zimmermann 2016); sport for development (Sherry, Schulenkorf, and Chalip 2015) and tourism (Wearing, Young, and Everingham 2017). In addition, three highly respected speakers: Simon Darcy, Tess Kay, and Can Seng Ooi, offered a perspective on leisure and social change from each of their discipline areas (i.e.…”