Leisure and the Politics of the Environment

Within leisure studies there is a growing awareness and intensifying conscience about the potential environmental threat posed by the continued and unmanaged economic growth and development of sport, tourism and leisure. This collection brings together explicit discussions from a range of fields including environmental geography, consumer research, sociology and politics of the increasing relevance and complexities of environmental politics in leisure studies. It provides a snapshot into the wide-ranging debates on the politics of the environment and leisure/sport/tourism and serves as a starting point for further dialogue between leisure studies scholars and those in other disciplines where many of environmental debates have been advanced. The volume will be of great value to scholars and practitioners in the areas of leisure studies, conservation and local politics. This book was published as a special issue of Leisure Studies.

1. Leisure and the politics of the environment 2. Politics, research and the natural environment: the lifeworlds of water-based sport and recreation in Wales 3. Leisure, nature and environmental movements in the mass media: comparing Jumbo Pass and the Tobeatic Wilderness Area, Canada 4. The politics of the environment, and noisy sports: two totally different outcomes in the Lake District National Park for powerboating and off-road motoring 5. Leisure and sustainable development in Norway: part of the solution and the problem 6. Recreational activism: politics, nature, and the rise of neoliberalism 7. Embodiment and social and environmental action in nature-based sport: spiritual spaces 8. In search of belonging: immigrant experiences of outdoor nature-based settings in New Zealand

Louise Mansfield is Deputy Director of the Brunel Centre for Sport, Health and Wellbeing at Brunel University, London, UK. Belinda Wheaton is Principal Research Fellow in Sport and Leisure Cultures (sociology) at the University of Brighton, UK.