Summers of war. Affective volunteer tourism to former war sites in Europe

Abstract

An important aspect of contemporary volunteer tourism is generated by the possibility of having personal, emotional and affective encounters and experiences. Volunteer summer camps on former war sites, organized by the German Action Reconciliation Service for Peace (ARSP), can be regarded as an expression of a contemporary form of tourism, which consists of the development of a personal, affective, and immersive approach to learning and volunteering on former war sites. A performative approach to studying emotion is applied, and helps to locate and understand the social, cultural, and political components that instigate the desire for affective volunteer tourism. For this study, 26 semi-structured in-depth interviews have been conducted with participants of ARSP volunteer summer camps that focused on conserving and maintaining former war sites in Italy, Lithuania, and France. The results indicate that volunteers expect war themed summer camps to be impactful (in terms of work) and emotional (in terms of personal experiences). Yet, the sought-after impact and emotion are not always found, which gives rise to contradictory feelings and tensions. Feelings of guilt about unmet expectations have caused volunteers to re-evaluate their motives and look for different ways to make the summer camps meaningful to them. Participants were encouraged to critically reflect, on this form of volunteer tourism in particular, and on societal debates about war and volunteer tourism in general.

Only Time Will Tell: Unraveling the Temporal Effect of Negative Affective Encounters in Diaspora Tourism

“…For instance, dark tourists would engage more deeply with the dark historical discourses of death, suffering, and atrocities, although some of their encounters were uncomfortable and painful (Oren, Poria, and Reichel 2022; Yan et al 2016; Zheng et al 2020). Visiting disaster sites (Martini and Buda 2019) and attending volunteer tourism (Driessen 2022; Gius 2017) and pilgrimage trips (Yousaf 2021) will usually evoke challenging and complex feelings (e.g., love and hate, anger and forgiveness, guilt and gratefulness, sadness and appreciation, shame, and reconciliation), but the tourists could also gain a much richer understanding of the local history and themselves by constantly coping with the “pains of others” and/or “pains of self.” Other evidence was provided about how negative affect or emotions could lead to positive consequences (Riediger, Wrzus, and Wagner 2014) for both tourism destinations and individuals. For instance, a sense of guilt and sadness may facilitate pro-social behaviors (Baumeister et al 2007); feelings of sadness, anger, and fear can facilitate pro-environmental behaviors among consumers (Juvan and Dolnicar 2014).…”