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Research seminar

Mechanisms behind the acceptance of physical impact on nature from nature-based events

While tourism continues to impact our planet in the Anthropocene, we persist with intensive travel. Tourism activities in nature are especially significant because the physical reality of these places depends on protection, extending from soil erosion to disturbances of wildlife.

Few other activities impact on nature as nature-based events, which are open-air gatherings centred on social interaction, often combined with physical activities such as trail running or mountain biking.

In this seminar, I examine what fosters the acceptance of physical impacts on nature based on three years of qualitative research involving four actor groups — event organisers, participants, government representatives and local actors — conducted in the mountainous region of Jämtland, Sweden. Sweden provides a particularly interesting context, as spending time in natural areas is deeply embedded in the culture, yet recent years have seen a shift towards sportification of outdoor activities, where results and records increasingly dominate.

This analysis is framed through a post-development perspective, typically applied to the so-called developing world, which offers insights into what shapes the acceptance of others. I identify five socio-cultural mechanisms — scale, growth, ownership, responsibility, and limits — that demonstrate how actors include or exclude the physical impacts of nature in their social environments.

Actors accept these impacts when the events become part of their identity. However, when events exist independently, outside others’ spheres of influence, the physical impacts on nature are less likely to be accepted. Compared to independent tourists, events represent manageable activities that can be guided towards acceptance.

The seminar is organised by the Knowledge Environment Sustainable Tourism (KEST).

Short Bio

Axel Eriksson recently defended his Doctoral thesis “Acceptance of environmental impacts from event tourism” at Mid Sweden University. His work has been on nature-based events in Sweden to understand actors’ perceptions of different forms of environmental impacts. He is also interested in lifestyle migration and digital nomadism and has currently been awarded to conduct research in Hokkaido, Japan. Axel works with qualitative methods to understand the interaction between tourists and local populations by implementing novel theories in different contexts.