Tourism Management Perspectives

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Tourism Management Perspectives
journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/tmp
Festival and event tourism research: Current and future perspectives
Jennifer Laing
Department of Management, Sport and Tourism, La Trobe University, Bundoora, VIC 3086, Australia
A R T I C L E I N F O
Keywords:
Festival
Event
Management
Sustainability
Serious leisure
Interdisciplinary
Postdisciplinary
A B S T R A C T
This opinion piece considers the future of research into festival and event tourism based on current gaps in the
literature and the author’s view of key directions that this research is likely to take. Six key areas are highlighted:
(1) overcoming the tendency for non-tourism related research on festivals and events to be under-researched, or
their links with tourism exaggerated; (2) the need to extend the theoretical foundations of management to
festival and event tourism; (3) gaps in sustainability research connected to festivals and events tourism; (4)
examining the ongoing relevance of and challenges for traditional festivals and events in a modern, digital age;
(5) the importance of understanding sub-cultures, social worlds and serious leisure; and (6) the potential to go
beyond disciplinary boundaries and even transcend them, through interdisciplinary and postdisciplinary approaches, as well as the need to explore new methodologies.
1. Introduction
There have been a number of articles written on the current state of
festival and event tourism research over the past few years, notably
Getz and Page (2016) and Wilson, Arshed, Shaw, and Pret (2017),
which provide an agenda or suggestions for future studies. It is not my
intention to duplicate the breadth of these articles. Instead, I wish to
highlight particular deficiencies or gaps in the literature that I feel represent opportunities for researchers and point the way towards the
future of festival and event tourism research.
2. Key directions for future research
2.1. Festivals and events (beyond) tourism?
Festival and events tourism research is still in a relatively nascent
stage, with research specifically about this context only appearing in
tourism-related journals around the late 1980s and early 1990s. The
first dedicated journal in the area, Event Management (previously
Festival Management and Event Tourism), began publishing articles in
1993, while in contrast, dedicated tourism journals commenced in the
early 1970s, giving them a 20 year head-start on those journals solely
focused on events. This opens up a great swathe of areas of research for
those working in the festivals and events field, but also potentially helps
to explain some of the gaps in the literature that still linger.
Many of the current crop of researchers in festivals and events
graduated from tourism schools or saw themselves primarily as tourism
academics, while the journals available to them, particularly the highranking ones or those with high impact scores, have, until relatively
recently, been largely tourism-focused. For example, based on the
Australian Business Deans’ Council list of journal rankings, the highest
ranked journal in events, Events Management, is ranked an A and there
are no A* ranked events journals, unlike their equivalents in tourism
such as Tourism Management, Journal of Travel Research or Annals of
Tourism Research. This may have contributed to a skewing of festivals
and events research towards a tourism focus or context.
Although not all festivals and events have a tourism connection or
tourism outcomes, researchers have often either concentrated on those
that had, or forced their research in some cases to make it fit a tourism
mould. This has led to potentially interesting forms of events being
under-researched because their links with tourism are tenuous or nonexistent. This is a contentious point to make in a tourism journal, but
my point is that while festivals and events may be a subset of tourism,
that is not the whole picture. All festivals and events are worthy of study
as a phenomenon, even those of a more prosaic nature, but their
tourism connections should not be exaggerated if they are not present.
One case in point is the product launch, a useful tool in marketing
that received worldwide press coverage recently in the form of the
unveiling of the new iPhone X. Apple’s senior vice-president of software
engineering struggled in front of a live audience to get the face recognition software to work – its stated point of competitive advantage.
They are an example of an industrial event, ‘staged with the primary
objective of selling goods and services’ (Frost & Laing, 2018, p. 2). They
have little connection to tourism in most instances. Vast sums are
sometimes spent on their staging, yet researchers, even in the marketing
sphere, seemingly have little interest in studying what these events aim
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tmp.2017.11.024
Received 30 September 2017; Accepted 27 November 2017
E-mail address: [email protected].
Tourism Management Perspectives 25 (2018) 165–168
2211-9736/ © 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
T
to do and whether they achieve their strategic objectives, particularly in
a world where face-to-face activities are increasingly under threat by
their online equivalents. As events journals become more highly
ranked, and events researchers feel more at liberty to move beyond
tourism-related research, we may see a reduction in the quantum of
festival and event tourism research in favour of studies that examine a
broad spectrum of different events.
2.2. The management of festivals and events
The common view about research into festival and event tourism,
often advanced in review articles and textbooks, is that it has focused
on operational issues to the exclusion of considerations of their social
dimension. Yet a review of the literature suggests that empirical research on the management, operation and governance of festivals and
events has been somewhat limited to date. A number of important
theoretical foundations of management have not found their way into
the festival and event tourism literature or have only been applied in a
limited way. One cogent example is the work on emotional labour –
involving the management by a service provider of their interactions
with service receivers in line with the expectations of their organisation
and their customers. This management of emotional display, which can
lead to emotions being faked and an emotional toll being exerted, appears to be highly relevant in the festivals and events context, given the
high-pressure environment, the preponderance of volunteer staff, and
the fact that encounters between staff and attendees form a vital part of
the quality of the festival or event-going experience. It is therefore
curious that emotional labour has not been used as a lens in order to
better understand the delivery and staging of events, as well as the
experience of being a volunteer or attending an event. Allied examples
of theoretical developments in the human resources management field
that could be usefully applied to festival and event tourism are the
concepts of burnout; workplace stress; conservation of resources; and
workplace commitment. There have been some recent studies that have
sought to explore some of these issues, but there is scope for more indepth studies across a variety of festivals and events of different sizes
and in diverse locations.
Other theoretical lenses drawn from other management sub-disciplines that might illuminate the study of festival and events tourism
include management innovation and creativity; social entrepreneurship; diversity management; team building and performance; group
dynamics; leadership styles, particularly participative leadership, given
the potential application to a volunteer-based structure; conflict management and resource constraints. Working with colleagues from
management sub-disciplines such as organisational behaviour, entrepreneurship, human resources management and strategic management might therefore lead to fruitful research partnerships, and the
fostering of multidisciplinary and postdisciplinary approaches, which is
discussed later in this article.
An example of a useful adaptation of a theory drawn from a business
discipline is the event portfolio, which borrows the word ‘portfolio’ from
finance in the sense of a risk reduction strategy of diversified assets but
has its own distinct meaning in an events context, referring to the
creation of a suite of festivals and/or events that can appeal to different
audiences and serve a variety of purposes (Ziakas, 2013). My sense is
that other researchers will start to see these types of approaches as a
way to advance events studies and develop its own body of theory, and
we may see other examples in the near future.
2.3. Sustainability
Research into the sustainability of festivals and events is relatively
well advanced, including studies of the impacts of festivals and events
on the sustainability of destinations and host communities; the planning
of sustainable festivals and events; motivations of attendees at green
events; attempts to use festivals and events to deliver sustainability
messages; and strategic objectives of festival and event organisers
linked to sustainability outcomes. This body of work encompasses the
gamut of environmental, social and economic sustainability, but there
are still gaps in research to be filled.
For example, the dearth of studies on the factors behind the failure
of festivals and events mirrors the situation with respect to tourist attractions, perhaps because examining success is considered to be a
sexier topic and easier to sell to funding bodies when grants are being
sought. We also need to understand in greater depth whether events
play a role in changing behaviour, not just environmental behaviour,
but perhaps the way we interact with and embrace difference, including
minorities, those with a disability and a variety of cultures, races, religions and sexual orientation. Another important area requiring exploration is the nexus between festival and event tourism and resilience,
both at an organisational level and from the perspective of attendees
and the local community; facilitating adaptation to an increasingly
volatile global environment.
2.4. Traditional events in a modern (digital) world
The practice of staging festivals and events has a long history, and
arguably extends back to prehistoric times. There are many examples of
traditional events that have survived into the 21st century, such as the
Hogmanay New Year celebrations in Scotland, the Palio horse race in
Italy and Japan’s Cherry Blossom festivals. Despite this, the festival and
event tourism literature has not examined as comprehensively as it
might the continued existence of these events in the modern world,
including their adaptation to change (or not) and their role in a dynamic world, both as a tourist product and within their local communities (Laing & Frost, 2015). These are important issues to explore,
particularly in an emerging digital environment where new media, including social media, holds sway and less activities than before occur
face-to-face. There are also issues with respect to the use of indigenous
and traditional culture and rituals within festivals and events, such as
authenticity, commodification and potential exploitation, as well as
their connection to more positive outcomes such as reconciliation and
capacity building; all of which require further study and analysis in a
variety of contexts.
This research should draw upon bodies of literature from other
disciplines such as history, sociology, anthropology, cultural studies
and psychology, to avoid reinventing the wheel and to deepen our
understanding of the genesis of modern events and their evolution over
time. There have been a number of valuable studies of events as a social
phenomenon, particularly festivals, by the likes of Falassi (1987) on the
ritual structure of events and Bakhtin (1965) on the origins of carnivals
and the carnivalesque, which few researchers in our field appear to
have read, and even fewer have engaged with in an in-depth manner in
their studies. A rich repository of knowledge in the social sciences exists
about festivals and events, which could help to underpin theory development and form the basis for advances in understanding that
transcend disciplines.
More recently, there have been moves to use theories drawn from
positive psychology such as happiness and well-being as a lens to examine events in terms of their potential contribution to the good life – a
life worth living (Filep, Volic, & Lee, 2015). While there are few empirical studies on this topic to date, it is likely that this research will
start to proliferate given the number of researchers now working in this
space, many of whom have been studying tourism from a positive
psychological perspective.
2.5. Sub-cultures, social worlds and serious leisure
There is a sub-genre of tourists who travel to engage in serious leisure, involving ‘the systematic pursuit of an amateur, hobbyist, or volunteer activity that is sufficiently substantial and interesting for the
participant to find a career there in the acquisition and expression of its
J. Laing Tourism Management Perspectives 25 (2018) 165–168
166
special skills and knowledge’ (Stebbins, 1992, p. 3). A number of these
participants achieve this through their attendance at and/or participation in events, where they can meet others sharing their interests and
passions, exchange ideas, improve their knowledge, understanding or
skills base and reinforce their sense of self. Some of these like-minded
individuals form what are known as sub-cultures or social worlds, both
terms that denote a group whose membership derives and reinforces
their identity from this association with others and who share common
values and norms. This may exclude others from joining and in some
cases, represent a form of deviant behaviour.
In a world where a burgeoning number of chat rooms, discussion
boards and social media sites connect those who share the same social
world or sub-culture, regardless of their geographical location; where
terrorism is perpetrated by bands of individuals operating collectively –
often facilitated online – by a common purpose; and where people are
searching for meaning and feeling isolated in a world that is increasingly replete with virtual encounters and superficial relationships; it is
more important than ever that we understand what drives the creation
and maintenance of a social world or sub-culture, and the role that
events play in this process. There has been some work carried out in this
space, particularly in the leisure and marketing literature, but more
could be done. Examples of the types of events that could be studied
include role-playing events such as cosplay; re-enactments; and events
drawing together fans in all their guises. Theoretical lenses that could
be useful in exploring these events include social inclusion (and its
reverse, social exclusion); social capital; identity and the sense of self;
and deviance.
2.6. Interdisciplinary/postdisciplinary approaches and methodological
advances
Like much tourism research in its early period, festival and events
tourism research at the current time does not tend to be interdisciplinary or postdisciplinary in its approach. While researchers may
borrow and extend theories and ideas drawn from other disciplines,
they mostly continue to operate within their disciplinary boundaries. In
contrast, interdisciplinary research is a more holistic or blended process, where disciplinary boundaries are blurred, while postdisciplinary
research goes even further, eradicating these disciplinary boundaries
entirely (Coles, Hall, & Duval, 2005).
In some countries such as Australia, researchers in festival and event
tourism are predominantly from business schools and this move towards disciplinary freedom may therefore be less encouraged or facilitated by the constraints of the environment within which they work.
This may help to explain the reluctance to explore other disciplinary
underpinnings. In other countries such as the United Kingdom, event
studies have their roots in faculties or departments within the social
sciences or the humanities. One might assume that research that goes
beyond disciplinary boundaries might be more common here, but as
yet, this has not broadly been the case. As event studies matures, this
might be the direction that it takes, perhaps led by researchers with the
confidence and desire to seek out research partners or teams from a
wider disciplinary background, or who hail from a less narrow field of
study.
This disciplinary emancipation may be accompanied by methodological advances. Similar to early tourism research, much events research thus far has been case-based and relatively descriptive, lacking
the theoretical rigour that we would expect from a more established
field of study. This is beginning to change, and this evolution will
continue as more researchers enter the field from a greater diversity of
backgrounds, and competition increases for publication, particularly in
the journals in the field. This may lead researchers to adopt less
common research paradigms, interpretive frameworks, methodological
approaches and methods of data collection and analysis. Examples
might include critical studies approaches, where the social, political
and cultural contexts are key to understanding; the adoption of a
postmodern paradigm, which does not privilege certain types of
knowledge or a pragmatic paradigm, which focuses on what is practical
and needed to achieve the research objectives; interpretive frameworks
based on feminist, queer, race or disabilities theories; or methodological approaches such as action research or symbolic interactionism.
Mixed methods approaches might provide greater flexibility for researchers involved in interdisciplinary or postdisciplinary studies.
An example of a novel methodological approach that has some
merit in its application to festival and event tourism is autoethnography,
where the researcher provides their own personal perspective on phenomena. It is still not widely accepted nor appreciated, with these
studies often characterised as personal narratives, heuristic inquiries,
autobiographies or life histories. Despite the challenges it presents for a
researcher, not least of which is a willingness to be open and honest,
and the need for an engaging and evocative writing style, it may potentially provide a deep and rich way to explore the meanings of festival and event tourism experiences from the perspective of those engaging in them, and to examine the sources of those meanings.
3. Discussion and conclusion
This article gives some pointers towards future directions in festival
and event tourism, as I see it, and reflects my hope that this body of
research will develop in ways that will bring theoretical contributions
and advances, as well as having practical implications for the planning
and staging of festivals and events. The societal importance of festivals
and events, chiefly from an economic and cultural standpoint, but also
environmental, given their potential as a tool to achieve behaviour
change and to deliver environmental messages, demands that research
keep pace with industry and community needs, but also that it explores
new territories, takes risks, is bold in its conception and execution, and
encourages collaboration across disciplines. In this way, we may find
new avenues to understand this enduring and widespread social phenomenon more profoundly.
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Dr Jennifer Laing is an Associate Professor at La Trobe
University, Australia. Her research interests include travel
narratives; the role of events in society; and tourism and the
media. Jennifer is a co-editor of the Routledge Advances in
Events Research series and has co-edited three books. She
has also co-authored five books: Books and Travel:
Inspiration, Quests and Transformation (Channel View:
2012); Commemorative Events: Memory, Identities, Conflict
(Routledge, 2013); Explorer Travellers and Adventure
Tourism (channel view, 2014); Imagining the American West
Through Film and Tourism (Routledge, 2015); and
Gastronomy, Tourism and the Media (channel view, 2016). In
2017, Jennifer was recognised as an emerging scholar of
distinction by the international academy for the study of tourism.
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