The following RGS-IBG 2026 London Call for Papers might be of interest to GLTRG members:

Justice in tourism geographies

Convenors: Anna de Jong, University of Glasgow, UK; Michael Humbracht, University of Glasgow, UK; Cristina Figueroa Domecq, Rey Jaun Carlos, Spain

Format: In-person paper sessions

Sponsored by the Geographies of Leisure and Tourism Research Group

Session Abstract:

Despite a long-held concern with issues of justice within geography, in recent years we have witnessed a growing recognition that justice is a core concern among tourism geographers (cf. Paddison & Hall, 2022; Tomassini & Lamond, 2023; Wan et. al., 2024). And yet, despite its high usage, there is often limited direct discussion from tourism geographers regarding the substance of justice. Geographers, including those working in tourism studies, have often been hesitant to articulate what they mean by ‘justice,’ concerned that doing so imposes a normative ideal of fairness. Instead, they tend to favour practice-based, pluriversal, ‘bottom-up’ understandings of justice (Barnett, 2016); a move that constructs a universal/pluriversal binary.

In the past decade, however, geographers have cautioned that there is a requirement to openly discuss the substance of justice, to consider the specificities of claims in relation to another, avoid extreme relativism whereby all claims to justice are equally valid without grounds for critique, and steer clear of any reductions in the concept’s political and analytical utility (Barnett, 2016; Hopkins, 2021; Przybylinski, 2022). We draw on this critical commentary to call for open dialogue within the sub-discipline of tourism geographies, as well as critical social scientists more broadly, to the conditions through which injustices are recognised and addressed, to make sense of ‘how and why observable patterns of inequity, discrimination, or unevenness are actually unjust’ (Barnett, 2016, pp.112).

We invite contributions that engage with broad interpretations on this theme, including (but not limited to):

• Distinctly geographic theorisations of justice in tourism and reflections on what it means to engage with justice-oriented frameworks within tourism geographies
• Theorisations of justice from disciplines beyond geography, with particular attention given to their alignment or differentiation from spatial perspectives and what alternatives might offer that cannot be captured through geographic framings
• Non-Anglophone accounts from philosophy and political theory that introduce new ways of thinking about justice in tourism geographies
• Empirical insights to considerations of justice in tourism landscapes, particularly those drawing on less familiar experiences or geographies
• Insights into the production of (in)justice in tourism geographies
• Considerations of the role of businesses and governance actors — from local enterprises to global corporations — as key agents in shaping, reproducing, or mitigating territorial inequalities and distributive injustices linked to tourism
• Informal and formal responses to experienced injustice in tourism landscapes (for example, legal and political engagement or artistic and activist accounts)

Submission Details:

Abstracts should be no more than 250 words. We are planning 15 minute, in person presentations.

Please submit abstracts (inc. title, author(s) and contact details) by Friday 20^th February 2026 to Anna de Jong, anna.dejong@glasgow.ac.uk

The RGS-IBG 2026 conference will take place in London, 1-4^th September, 2026, with this year’s theme being Geographies of Inequalities: Toward Just Places.

References

Barnett, C. (2017). The Priority of Injustice: Locating Democracy in Critical Theory. The University of Georgia Press: US.

Guia, J. & Jamal, T. (2025). Entangled engagements: posthumanist and affirmative ethics for tourism geographies. Tourism Geographies, 27(3-4), 608-619. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/14616688.2024.2330574.

Hopkins, P. (2021). Social geography 3: committing to social justice. Progress in Human Geography, 45(2), 382-393. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/0309132520913612.

Paddison, B. & Hall, J. (2022). Tourism policy, spatial justice and COVID-19: lessons from a tourist-historic city. Journal of Sustainable Tourism, 31(12), 2809-2824. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/09669582.2022.2095391.

Przybylinski, S. (2022). Where is justice in geography? A review of justice theorising in the discipline. Geography Compass, 16(3). DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/gec3.12615.

Tomassini, L. & Lamond, I. (2023). Rethinking the space of tourism, its power-geometries, and spatial justice. Journal of Sustainable Tourism,31(12), 2825-2838. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/09669582.2022.2091141.

Wan, Y.K.P., Sou, P. & Hang Kong, W. (2024). Spatial justice and street accessibility for wheelchair users in Macao. Tourism Geographies. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/14616688.2024.2443888.