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The field of events management has been critiqued for being overly focused on operational and managerial concerns to the detriment of critical analysis of power and representation, of which equality, diversity, and inclusion (EDI) is an important aspect. This paper reports on an audit of the four leading events management journals over the period 2011-2021 to assess the current state of play in relation to engagement with EDI issues and consider whether this critique remains justified. After screening, 49 articles were included. Findings reveal that EDI remains a marginal issue in events management journals, often confined to special issues, with no evidence of increasing engagement over the review period. EDI needs to become more integrated in the core body of knowledge of events management to ensure that events research is socially useful to students, other researchers and practitioners, contributing to the development and reputation of the field.

Purpose: This article explores: 1) student perceptions and understanding of Events Management; 2) how Events Management is positioned by different UK higher education providers through their online marketing; and 3) the perceived value of an Events Management degree among students. Findings: Students demonstrate a lack of knowledge about what Events Management is, what a career in Events Management might entail and, the perceived value of an Events Management degree. This suggests the need to re-position Events Management degrees within a broader applied management base. Course marketing presents a narrow view of Events Management degrees. This does a disservice to Events Management as the narrow vocationally-laden narrative undersells and ‘over-vocationalises’ Events Management degrees. Design/Method/Approach: A mixed-methods approach, combining an online student questionnaire (n=524), semi-structured interviews with current first year Events Management students (n=24) at two UK universities, and website analysis of all Events Management degrees offered in the UK. Practical implications: Better understanding student perceptions will help Universities market Events Management degrees more effectively and will benefit broader efforts to illustrate the value and credibility of it as a degree subject choice and career. More balanced presentation between the practical and non-practical aspects of the courses in University marketing may help reposition Events Management alongside more readily understood vocational subjects. Originality: This is the first study to examine student perceptions over the credibility of Events Management degrees. It also addresses Park and Park’s (2017) observation that reviews of Events Management education and curricula are conspicuously absent from Hospitality and Tourism journals.

Taking a strategic-relational approach this paper critiques a range of event tourism funding policies and practices which seek to create regional and/or national event strategies. A multiple case study method combining document analysis and key informant interviews within selected regions provides insights into the political nature of event funding, the equity of its distribution and the decision processes involved. Programmes were found to operate in a sensitive and complex context due to intertwined power relationships between policy and agency embedded within governments. We conclude that to bring about broader benefits and legacies a paradigm shift is needed to rebalance economic and social outcomes within funder KPIs and governance structures. This needs to include innovation in evaluation and wider more meaningful stakeholder engagement. The study shows that without fundamental change, national and regional funding programmes are likely to continue to operate within their existing narrow remit.

Comparatively little is known about the extent to which students on vocational courses like events management fit within the student-as consumer framework and, in particular, why and how they decide to study for an events management degree. A study of 582 new events management undergraduates was undertaken at two UK universities. Survey and interview data illustrate that, although students demonstrated aspects of consumerist logic in valuing their degree predominantly in relation to their future careers, they based their choice of course and university largely on emotional, subjective criteria and so were not the ‘informed consumers’ espoused in public discourse.

The starting point of our paper (Thomas & Ormerod, 2017) was to assess the extent to which academic research influenced policy and practice. Others have undertaken this task and come to a broadly similar conclusion; collectively, tourism researchers appear to have little impact on anyone other than fellow academics (and perhaps their students). Whether this is ‘good’ or ‘bad’, important or unimportant, depends on your perspective. In addition to illustrating the novel use of digital methods, the main contribution of our research lay in its attempt to explain why some academic researchers appear to have more non-academic impact than others. Our theorising of impact was, therefore, designed to identify variables that influenced impact and to show their inter-relationships. Readers will reach their own conclusions about the extent to which we were successful in our ambition, but few will deny that we had a very comprehensive data set to work with, albeit limited to the UK.

The need to demonstrate the value of research to non-academic audiences is an increasingly prominent feature of the research policy landscape in many parts of the world. Yet, little is understood about the factors that differentiate academic researchers in terms of their relative influence on non-academic actors. Following a review of the literature, this study uses novel digital methods to undertake a detailed study of the non-academic impact of UK based tourism academics. The findings suggest that non-academic impact is strikingly lower in tourism than in the social sciences more generally. The multiple regression analyses used reveal that researchers who score highly using a range of academic metrics are also cited more by policy-makers and other practitioners. On the basis of the findings, research impact in tourism is theorized. This has implications for individual and institutional tourism research strategies beyond the geographical limitations of the study.