José-Carlos García-Rosell

Struggles over corporate social responsibility meanings in teaching practices: The case of hybrid problem-based learning:

Although experiential learning has been widely discussed in relation to the teaching of corporate social responsibility, the socially mediated and discursive nature of experiential learning approaches to corporate social responsibility has been either neglected or given only cursory coverage in the literature. Considering this gap, I problematise corporate social responsibility education within the axioms of managerialism, arguing that it should also allow business students to critically evaluate, analyse and question the basic premises underlying contemporary business practices. Using an action research approach, I explore the possibilities and challenges of using hybrid problem-based learning to help business students engage in critically reflexive processes and, thus, the social construction of corporate social responsibility meanings. Drawing on discourse analysis, I illustrate two central discursive patterns that characterise the struggle over corporate social responsibility meanings in a series of courses implemented in the business curriculum of a Nordic university between the years 2007 and 2010. The findings offer empirical support for several key arguments in the debate over corporate social responsibility education.

An integrative framework for sustainability evaluation in tourism: applying the framework to tourism product development in Finnish Lapland

The adoption of sustainable practices has become widespread in tourism and has led to the proliferation of sustainability evaluation tools. They focus mainly on measuring outcomes, making scientific expertise an essential part of evaluations. This study argues that involving stakeholders throughout the evaluation process is essential if evaluation is to play a role in promoting the necessary understanding of sustainability to address the ecological and social concerns within a tourism setting. Drawing upon multi-stakeholder thinking, ethics, the Bellagio Principles and action research, this paper introduces a theoretical and methodological framework for engaging tourism organisations in collaboration with stakeholders in planning and implementing sustainability evaluations. The application of the framework is illustrated using a study of tourism product development, involving a group of eight craft-based entrepreneurs and their stakeholders in Finnish Lapland. A focus is placed on using ethical theories to promote dialogue and critical reflection and to expose the plurality of moral orientations behind the multiple views of sustainable tourism. Through discourse analysis, four moral discourses, ethical egoism, utilitarianism, deontology and virtue ethics, are constructed and examined. The paper shows how each influences the various ways in which stakeholders perceive sustainable tourism and the practical outcomes of the process.

Co-Creating Places through Events: The Case of a Tourism Community Event in Finnish Lapland

Events can convey strong meanings for communities and they can be important builders of place identity (Getz, 2008). This chapter explores the relationship between a community event and the place where it is held. The empirical case discussed here is the Walpurgis Day celebration (Vappu in Finnish), which is organised annually by a community of domestic tourists and tourism workers in Pallas, a ski resort situated within a national park in Finnish Lapland, 200 kilometres above the Arctic Circle. There are no permanent residents in Pallas, however, the ski resort hosts approximately 100,000 tourists every year. Walpurgis Day is a carnival-style celebration usually held in the streets of Finnish towns and cities on 1st May. This one-day community event has been celebrated in Pallas for the last 20 years, originating from the desire of a group of tourists to regularly engage in Walpurgis Day festivities in the area. The event’s popularity and success has its roots in the voluntary activities of the community, and through the years, they have capitalised upon the non-profit, voluntary, and free-of-charge nature of the event. The celebration is inclusive in nature and welcomes all visitors to the resort.