Trivandi are trusted partners in the design, delivery and operations of major events and venues, helping to successfully deliver over 250 projects in 26 countries, including every summer Olympic Games since London 2012, Super Bowl, FIFA World Cup, World Expos, Major Government Summits, the Middle East’s Giga-Projects to the Pyramids of Giza and Formula 1 Grand Prix. Mike’s role is to connect world leading major events scholars/scholarship and practitioners/practical knowledge to generate cutting edge research, evidence-baed intelligence, and a new international educational program to advance how we think about and do major events - to continually improve delivery and leave a sustainable legacy.

InsideEvents examines key ideas, concepts, “Wicked Problems” and “Difficult Conversations” related to events. With 32000+ views by Summer 2023, InsideEvents has been used by academics, students, and industry stakeholders all around the world. There are over 50 audio and video interviews published across a broad spectrum of areas with leading thinkers.

Founded in 2000 and based in New York (USA), Event Management Journal (EMJ) (ABS 2* | ABDC ‘A’) is the leading academic journal for the study and analysis of events and festivals. Mike’s vision is to bring together scholars from around the world to publish high quality events-related research across a range of fields and disciplines and bridge this knowledge with leaders in the event industry.

Join us for the inaugural Event Management Conference (EMC) 2024, the official conference of Event Management Journal (EMJ). Our goal is to utilize EMJ’s position as the leading international journal for the study and analysis of events, to host the leading intellectual space that brings together scholars and practitioners from around the world to discuss, debate and tackle today’s event-related challenges. EMC ’24 aims to delve into the most pressing societal and economic issues associated with event studies, whether that’s past, present, or future. EMC welcomes those studying various types of events, in different settings, and across a wide range of disciplines, as reflected in our Call for Papers.

Mike joins the Centre for Science and Policy’s (CSaP) network of trusted international scholars who provide policy advice to governmental and non-governmental organizations, based at the University of Cambridge (UK). Mike advises specifically on how events and festivals — from cultural festivals, business conferences and football clubs to sports events — can transform both the people, places and communities that take part and play host, and provide methodologies and both “strategic” and quick-win “tactical” ways to do this.

Available on Amazon. This edited text, intended to support a research-informed approach to learning and teaching, presents an array of concepts, collaborations and in-depth cases related to managing events, festivals and the visitor economy. Authors offer an array of philosophical, political, cultural, and ethical perspectives on how to achieve this across a range of contexts, from Cambodia, China, Egypt to the British cathedral city of Lincoln. Though recognising individual difference, each chapter unites in their common pursuit of supporting the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (UNSDGs). This is significant as utilising the UNSDGs as a normative organising framework for how we all think about, plan, and manage a ‘good’ visitor economy is increasingly ubiquitous. It is with this in mind that each chapter provides explicit links to the UNSDGs and policy and/or practical implications, along with a series of critical self-assessment questions to reflect on the chapter’s key arguments…

I discussed how, as scholars and practitioners in the field, major events act as bridge, platform and driver of social change. I outline why this is important as governments and funders increasingly invest in events but particularly major events as a key economic growth strategy and to tackle endemic social challenges at the host level. I first provide an appreciative account of how events can achieve such change and how we can evaluate this, and then I outline the challenges blocking this and the contemporary social challenges facing major events.

Originally published in ‘The Conversation’. A world fair is currently being held in Dubai, with delegations from 192 countries celebrating and promoting their nation’s place in the global community. Among the attractions at Expo 2020 is Russia’s intricately designed pavilion, where visitors are invited to consider two pertinent questions: How do we find our place in an interconnected world, and how can we better understand each other despite our differences? Meanwhile, as missiles land on Ukraine, Vladimir Putin has completely disconnected his country, and shown no interest at all in understanding difference. Perhaps then, Russia will not be invited to Japan’s 2025 World Expo, in the same way that it is now being excluded from many of the world’s major events…

Originally published in ‘The Conversation’. This summer has marked 10 years since the London 2012 Olympics, and a chance to reflect on the event’s legacy. From the outset, the aim was to make it a ground-breakingly sustainable event. According to the United Nations, sustainability is “development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs”. It has as much to do with legacy as it does environmental impact. The BBC comedy Twenty Twelve, which satirised the organisation of London 2012, drew attention to this. In one episode, the (fictional) head of sustainability describes the Games as being a “catalyst for change” and “improving the quality of life in London’s East End”…

Scholars and practitioners have long been analyzing and evaluating the way events, particularly mega-events, serve as a mechanism of change. Powerful descriptions are typically brought to life via event impact and legacy case studies: yet, I argue such work can remain atheoretical—or—conceptually disorganized. I draw on Bourdieu's field theory and the management study of Field Configuring Events to develop a new analytical framework: the "Cognitive and Relational Mapping of Field Configuring Events"—offering a set of interrelated concepts to strengthen analysis and conceptual consistency between studies…

Published in Annals of Tourism Research (ABS 4* | Q1 | IF: 12.8), “Thirty Years of Events-Related Research” examines how events-related research has and increasingly contributes to tourism studies, and how these lines of argument have evolved over the last thirty years, primarily in Annals of Tourism Research.

Originally published in ‘The Conversation’. Japanese Olympics minister Tamayo Marukawa has confirmed that, due to COVID, no spectators will be allowed to attend Tokyo 2020. This comes after initial announcements in March 2021 that no international tourists would be allowed to enter Japan for the events which are scheduled to open on July 23. No visitors means no income…

Published in Tourism Management (ABS 4 | Q1 IF: 12.8) our paper reviews progress in the field of urban tourism, revisiting and challenging the validity of the paradoxes presented in the paper by Ashworth and Page (2011). To do this, the paper examines the expansion of research endeavours in urban tourism in relation to these paradoxes, including the outputs in dedicated journals on city tourism along with the wider range of outputs generated since 2011 in social science. It also revisits the initial proposition set out regarding an imbalance in attention in urban tourism research (Ashworth 1989, 2003)…

Our research published in Annals of Tourism Research (ABS 4* | Q1 | IF: 12.8) examines how the negative impacts of tourism, often associated with overtourism, can lead to resistance by local stakeholders. This study focuses on collective resistance across Japan in the lead up to the Tokyo 2020 Olympics, during a period of exponential growth in tourism that produced disruption and fear, and led to a rise in tourismophobia. We conceptualise negative reactions through Castells' theory of the network society. Utilising qualitative data, we argue that Japan's national tourism growth strategy represented a state-imposed legitimising identity, leading to communal resistance sentiment and tactics across Japan and Tokyo…

Putin’s war in Ukraine sparked major events, from F1 to Eurovision, to ban Russia and some Russian athletes from competing. Moderated by Sir Trevor Phillips, I debate with Dr Rachel Pistol (Kings College London) on the role major events play for tackling social issues, following a thought piece I wrote in ‘The Conversation’.

Our research published in Tourism Management (ABS 4* | Q1 | IF: 12.8) examines how able-bodied, and increasingly people with disabilities, represent a key audience for mega-events; occasions that act as crucibles where social problems endemic to host destinations can be exposed and tackled through targeted social policy. Drawing on the social model of disability, the paper examines how Japan utilised Tokyo 2020 as a field configuring event to disrupt systems of ableist thinking and tackle physical and attitudinal barriers restricting Persons with Disabilities (PwD) to accessible tourism…

Despite concerns about extreme heat, ballooning costs and accommodation shortages, organisers of the Tokyo 2020 Olympics and Paralympics are resolutely upbeat with one year to go until the opening ceremony – and not without some justification. Asked about the biggest challenges organisers have overcome so far a spokesperson, Masa Takaya, said that “Tokyo 2020 has not really faced any major issues”, adding the International Olympic Committee and International Paralympic Committee are “very satisfied with our preparations”…

This work identifies important influencing factors that affect event visitor behaviour in and beyond event zones, utilising a four-year, mixed-method, longitudinal study (n=6212) of the Cambridge Half Marathon (2017–2020). We counter a commonly held view that visitors naturally spill out into local cultural and business precincts, arguing that event zones represent cities within cities that spatially segregate visitors from the host destination; only 7% of the sample engaged in longer and deeper cultural stays...

Although events are improving approaches to capturing immediate economic, social and environmental impacts we are still at an early stage of truly understanding how to fully capture and articulate the longitudinal field configuring legacies events, particularly major events, produce. This means organisers and funders are unable tell the full story, for good and for bad, and we need to radically re-think the way we present how major events reconfigure three types of fields: industrial, geographical, and social fields. My talk will address this problem and provide some ideas as to how we might do this.

Published in Event Management journal (ABS 2* | ABDC ‘A’), the aim of this research note is threefold: 1) to introduce the concept of paradox and its numerous applications to the study and management challenges associated with the planning and delivery of events, with a specific look at large-scale events like the Olympics to provide an extreme case; 2) to present a new paradox entitled the "Global–Glocal Paradox" that interrogates how inherent global and local stakeholder interests and tensions are managed; and 3) to present a series of conceptual and practical ways events can "accommodate" as opposed to "resolve" this paradox to help balance stakeholder interests instead of pitting one against the other.

Imagine watching swimming at the Paris Olympics with Michael Phelps or talking hoops with a member of the original Dream Team or cheering at athletics with Usain Bolt. These opportunities could be on the Paris Games menu, for a princely price, next year as the International Olympic Committee (IOC) and hospitality partner On Location roll out a VIP version of faster, higher, stronger. Following a playbook developed for the Super Bowl, On Location will offer gold medal fan engagement with faster access, higher prices and a stronger connection to the action…

This report is the result of a collaboration between the World Tourism Organization (UNWTO), the Centre of Expertise Leisure, Tourism & Hospitality (CELTH) of Breda University of Applied Sciences and the European Tourism Futures Institute (ETFI) of NHL Stenden University of Applied Sciences.

Published in Tourism Management (ABS 4* | Q1 | IF: 12.8) our research examines how London 2012 promised local small businesses access to lucrative Olympic event-tourism and visitor trading opportunities. However, as urban spaces were transformed to stage live Games, many local stakeholders found themselves locked out…

Published in the Journal of Destination Marketing and Management (ABS 1* | Q1 | IF: 7.1) this research examines how, after recovering post-Fukushima, Japan utilised Tokyo 2020 to re-image the country as a safe and culturally distinctive destination by deploying creative place-branding initiatives. This paper investigates how and why, by drawing on insights generated via three complimentary methods…

Published in Annals of Tourism Research (ABS 4* | Q1 | IF: 12.8) our paper throws new light on how entrepreneurial leverage is achieved in Olympic Transit Zones. Specifically, we investigate: i) contextual features enabling and constraining ‘immediate leveraging’ efforts, ii) tactics deployed to leverage, and iii) how local-entrepreneurs encouraged visitors to connect and interact with localities…

This study investigates the impacts of the London 2012 Olympic Games and their related cultural programme on local small creative organisations in East London. It contributes to unpacking the elusive concept of legacy thorough an in-depth analysis of creative organisations' stories and experiences, combined with an analysis of policy documents and interviews with key informants, over a four-year period (2010-2014)…

The full financial impact is yet to be determined but there is loose consensus in Japan over the ‘coercive’ approach of IOC. The public square outside Shimbashi station, the scene of anti-Olympic protests this summer, has resumed its usual role as an after-work rendezvous. Newspapers that juxtaposed athletic feats with a rising coronavirus caseload now wonder how Japan’s new prime minister…

Published in Annals of Tourism Research Empirical Insights, our research argues that numerous environmental, political, and pandemic factors demand remote study. From live streaming and cameras to big data, new and innovative methods are suggested as to how we can achieve this. We argue that fusing methods may increase volume, variety, velocity, veracity, value of analysis. We synthesise & develop the Remote Methods in Leisure Settings Framework and applies these methods to leisure settings, like events & tourist spaces…

Originally published in ‘The Conversation’. When London was preparing to host the 2012 Olympic Games, 250,000 people signed up to volunteer as official “Games Makers”. Of these, 70,000 people were ultimately selected to wear the distinctive purple-and-red volunteer uniforms. For 40% of them, it was the first time they’d done anything like this. In the run-up to the Games, Sebastian Coe, chair of the London 2012 Organising Committee, highlighted how important this kind of community engagement was…

Published in Tourism Geographies (ABS 2* | Q1 | IF: 11.3) our research examines how Olympic cities increasingly draw on New Urban Tourism (NUT) principles as part of a host’s strategic tourism development objectives. By doing so, governments and event organisers seek to entangle visitors with local urban, cultural and everyday life. Yet, empirical evidence generated across previous Olympic cities illustrates how hosts often fail to encourage such host–guest interactivity…

Originally published in ‘The Conversation’. In the run up to the Rio 2016 Olympic Games, the favela community of Vila Autódromo was virtually destroyed. It sat on prime real estate at the water’s edge, in the up and coming West Zone neighbourhood. Dwellings were demolished, and hundreds of families were pressured to leave. One long-term resident, Luiz Claudio Silva, lost the home he had built with his wife over two decades…

This summer has marked 10 years since the London 2012 Olympics, and a chance to reflect on the event’s legacy. From the outset, the aim was to make it a ground-breakingly sustainable event. According to the United Nations, sustainability is “development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs”. It has as much to do with legacy as it does environmental impact.

Published in the Journal of Destination Marketing and Management (ABS 1* | Q1 | IF: 7.1) our research examines how major events possess limited resources relative to those they must seize, extract and control from a host destination. All sport events, to varying degrees, are parasitic as they are highly dependent on external host destination resource environments to deliver complex operational and strategic event objectives…

If the health disaster feared by the population did not take place, the Tokyo 2020 edition was the most expensive in history. For economic benefits that are still unclear. "I believe we have lived up to our status as a host country," said Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga. While the Tokyo Olympic Games are over, the head of government thanked all stakeholders for their cooperation, allowing this edition - unprecedented by the health context - to be held (almost) without a hitch…

Published and recorded by the National Centre for Research Methods at the University of Southampton, UK. details what walking methods are, how they have evolved, why they are useful. Specifically, how they have become popularised across a variety of disciplines + fields, including anthropology, human geography, sociology, + tourism. Particularly useful for accessing entangled relationships that exist between humans, non-humans, natural and social environments. And, how complex environments can be rich in data and accessed by walking and associated activities like riding bikes, back of taxi or other modes of public / private transport…

This special issue published in Annals of Leisure Research seeks to critically examine the relationship between events, urban spaces and mobility. Specifically, it seeks to explore how and why events enable and/or produce new spatial (re)configurations when staged and how these changes influence mobility, exploration, engagement and/or consumption across host environments – whether at an international, national, regional, city and/or community level.

The Olympics, mega- and major- events have a long history of human rights abuse (Amnesty International, 2021a). An increasing body of work over the last two decades have advanced a rights-based agenda in the context of large-scale events (e.g. Caudwell and McGee’s (2017) Special Issue on ‘Human Rights and Events, Leisure and Sport’ and more recently the European Funded ‘Event Rights’ (2020) project)…

Originally published in ‘The Conversation’. Ten years ago, London hosted the Summer Olympic and Paralympic Games. For London 2012 planners, a central aim was that this mega-event would change the way non-disabled people – and society at large – see disabled people in the long-term. Prominent political figures including Tony Blair, Ken Livingstone and the chairman of the London Organising Committee, Sebastian Coe, placed diversity and inclusion at the heart of the London legacy plans. They contended that the magic of hosting is in the ability of such events to tackle endemic social problems.

Published in Leisure Studies (ABS 2*), we investigate the live staging spatial-organisational requirements of the Rio 2016 Olympic Games, exploring the extent to which the project sequestrated, territorialised and commodified public space. Relatedly, we examine the role of new legal, regulatory and securitised event conditions in affording an effective and efficient ‘Olympic takeover’…

Originally published in ‘The Conversation’. The world’s best tennis players are on court at the 2022 French Open, the first grand slam since the Russian invasion of Ukraine began in February. Unlike Wimbledon 2022, the French Open has decided to let Russian and Belarusian players compete. The French Open decision is in line with other tennis tournaments since the Russian invasion, which have allowed Russian and Belarusian players to participate. This outcome may partly be due to the backlash from players…

Originally published in ‘The Conversation’. Over the past 20 years, the notion of the legacy of the Olympic Games has become increasingly crucial to any campaign to host them. As World Athletics president and former chairman of the London 2012 Organising Committee Sebastian Coe put it in 2006, legacy counts as nine-tenths of what hosting the Olympics is all about. And he was clear about what that meant: “It is the local people,” he told the House of Lords, “who should stand to gain most from the Games”…

Originally published in ‘The Conversation’. It’s been over six months since the Olympic games came to a close in Rio. With the benefit of hindsight, many are surveying the city with a critical eye, wondering whether the multi-billion dollar mega-event was “worth it”. When a city is graced by the pinnacle of cultural and sporting celebration that is the Olympic Games, it also carries out a programme of ambitious urban development…

Originally published in ‘The Conversation’. A boost in tourism is meant to be one of the big bonuses of hosting the Olympics. There is never any shortage of pre-games rhetoric about the bounties – generally packaged as “Olympic legacies” – that the mega-event will bring hopeful cities and their governments. But Rio 2016, as with London 2012 and others before it, has shown that the reality…

Originally published in ‘The Conversation’. Festivals and events come in all different shapes and sizes; from the humble local food and drink market to global mega-events such as the Olympics or Euro 2016. There are also the inbetweeners: the “hallmark” events, usually in the same place, at the same time, with the same theme and the same size. Think the tennis at Wimbledon or the long weekend of music and mayhem at Glastonbury. All these events have rather differing social, economic and ecological impacts…

Funded by the International Olympic Committee. This report examines research funded thanks to the International Olympic Committee, exploring the experience of two host cities, Rio de Janeiro and London, through the lived experience of 25 individuals in social ventures and surveys and interviews with 100 others working in or supporting entrepreneurship, identifying critical factors which might encourage social entrepreneurship as a strong legacy of the Olympics

Published in Journal of Place Management and Development (ABS 2*). This paper aims to examine the role of grassroots (food) festivals for supporting the sustainability of micro and small producers, whilst exploring potential productive linkages between both stakeholders (festivals and producers) for enhancing a more authentic cultural offering and destination image in the visitor economy…

This chapter addresses some of the challenges of “fast” forms of tourism that has come to typify the modern day visitor experience. The authors consider how through embedding principles of “slow tourism,” tourist-historic cities like Cambridge (UK) can encourage temporally longer, symbolically deeper and meaningful tourism experience that celebrate local authentic and diverse resources and settings. In turn, the authors argue…

Publihsed in Tourism Geographies (ABS 2* | Q1 | IF: 11.3). This paper conceptualises the way physical and digital spaces associated with festivals are being harnessed to create new spaces of consumption. It focuses on the ways local food businesses leverage opportunities in the tourist-historic city of Cambridge…

Published in Event Management (ABS 2* | ABDC ‘A’). Micro and small business (MSB) interests legitimize mega-sport event (MSE) candidature bids. Yet, MSB interests can be sidelined in the event lead up, live staging, and legacy periods. This article provides a detailed: 1) review of MSE impacts on existing MSBs residing within targeted host communities, 2) conceptual and practical examination of MSE leveraging opportunities, 3) synthesis of good inclusionary practices identified in previous MSE case studies. As a result, a series of general and specific ways MSEs can foster MSB leveraging and legitimize local interests are suggested…

Researchers primarily focus on the formal practices used by event organisers to establish temporary spaces like Host Event Zones, characterised as a unilateral process that ignores community interests. Yet little research investigates both the formal and informal interactions between stakeholders. Interviews with London 2012 senior organisers after the ‘fog of organising’ has lifted – and without political pressure to toe-the-line – reveals how two-way dialogue was facilitated through various communicative mechanisms, from ‘road shows’ to more inclusive Olympic Organising Committee meetings. This counters previous arguments…

Published in the Journal of Place Management and Development (ABS 2*). London’s Candidature bid projected an irresistible legacy of lasting benefits for host communities and small businesses. Yet, local post-Games perspectives paint a contrasted picture – one of becoming displaced. This paper aims to draw on event legacy, specifically in relation to rising rents, threats to small business sustainability and impact on place development by empirically examining London’s local embryonic legacies forming across one ex-hosting Olympic community: Central Greenwich.

Published in Tourism Geographies (ABS 2* | Q1 | IF: 11.3). Building relationships of trust and mutual understanding between researcher(s), local stakeholder(s) and gatekeeper(s) is widely regarded as a critical factor in successful research. Methodological strategies and tactics are often based on contextual variability and accessing some communities presents a harder and riskier proposition than others. Here we propose an empirically driven and holistic methodological approach for accessing high-risk communities whereby deprivation and criminality characterises everyday living…

Published in Annals of Leisure Research (ABS 2*). Hosting the Olympic Games demands the efficient and effective sequestration of public space across the city to stage official sports, cultural, and commercial activities. Specifically, this paper examines how fast-tracked urban development processes create exclusive, commercial enclaves to maximize leverageable benefits for external actors. We focus on the case of Rio 2016, drawing on: (i) observations across the city and event zones, including Live Site, Last Mile, and transit spaces…

Published in Leisure Studies (ABS 2*). Focusing on the London 2012 Olympics, we investigate the impact of mega-sport events’ spatial transformations on visitor mobility, local leisure consumption and resulting small business trade. Our case study draws on 43 in-depth interviews with local authorities, governmental and non-governmental project actors, and small-local leisure and visitor economy businesses…

Before 2020, well-established tourist cities and the people and communities situated on local well-trodden “beaten tracks” have been grappling with the negative economic, social and ecological fall-out of hosting large swathes of tourists – what pundits and scholars alike dub “overtourism”. Then COVID happened. Travelling across borders virtually stopped. Commentators described how the amount of people movement pre-pandemic would not recover post-pandemic. They are being proven wrong. Pent up demand means we are witnessing a bounce back, slowly but surely, and those responsible for managing tourism and flows of visitors to and across destinations must be vigilant to the challenges associated with overtourism. COVID provided us a period of time to rethink current approaches to managing tourist and respective behaviors. Whether or not we have remains to be seen.

Giga-events disrupt urban communities and businesses rendering vulnerable social groups marginalised, unable to leverage economic benefits. We focus on event visitor economies during the ‘live staging’ between the Olympic Games Opening and Closing Ceremony. Giga-events are managed to redirect visitor economic consumption from small business communities towards official sites of corporate consumption. Using this critique of large-scale events, the burgeoning accounts of liminality are used to disrupt and provide a potential antidote…

Mega-sport events (MSEs) target, sequestrate and territorialise a ‘host’ (city – or nation) to exist, sustain themselves, survive and deliver on organisational objectives. Yet, little systematic and empirical evidence examines such urban processes, specifically in real-time during ‘live staging’ periods, including related implications for host community inclusion (and exclusion). In this article, we present the #RioZones project; a series of physical-embodied and digitally enabled primary data collection methods focused around embodied walking and participatory digital methods aimed at…

Rio 2016 sought to connect Olympic-tourists with the city’s local-Cariocan community and culture. Yet the way mega-events are spatially and regulatorily organized, alongside the behavioural tendencies of Olympic-tourists, constrain such ambitions. Using Rio 2016 as a case-study, we offer in-depth, qualitative insights through the lens of 35 individual Olympic-tourists to examine how and why these factors determine behaviour, and thus experiences across host-environments. We detail how concerns over tourists’ safety result in managers designing risk averse experiences, produced by overlaying hyper-securitized and regulatory enforcements inside existing tourist bubbles, creating what we refer to as a ‘double bubble’…

Olympic event zones are characterized as being intensely formally regulated during live staging periods, producing exclusionary environments blamed for sidelining host community interests. Yet, our findings contradict what scholars perceive to be inflexible formal regulations, and, the regulator's ability to take informal action. By interviewing and drawing on the experience of 17 regulators during London 2012 we identify how regulators simultaneously oscillate between modes of regulatory formality and informality, straddling what is referred to as the "formality–informality span”…

This chapter argues festivals and events are complex management and organisational contexts. It suggests overlaying events management studies with organisational studies is a fruitful space for theoretical and applied analysis. This chapter aims to illustrate how festivals/events offer a unique organisational setting for scholars to conduct empirical analysis and drive theory development…

This special issue seeks to critically examine the relationship between events, urban spaces and mobility. Specifically, it seeks to explore how and why events enable and/or produce new spatial (re)configurations when staged and how these changes influence mobility, exploration, engagement and/or consumption across host environments…

Published in the Journal of Policy Research in Tourism, Leisure, and Events. From the evolutionary changes seen in city event strategies, to the anticipated direction of post-industrial cites and the role of infrastructure and appropriate urban development strategies…

The editors of some of the main tourism and events journals came together to discuss the aims and scope of our journals, requirements for publishing, and tips for getting published…

The title of THE INC 2024 is “Technology Enabled Competitiveness and Experiences in Tourism, Hospitality and Events”. Under this theme, Mike will be presenting a new and enhanced in-depth impact and legacy evaluation system.

This research focused on examining 1) place reimaging, 2) urban regeneration and development, 3) New Urban Tourism (strategies to connect localities with tourist experiences), 4) overtourism, 5) accessible tourism (physical and attitudinal barriers…

The editors of some of the main events journals came together to discuss the aims and scope of our journals, requirements for publishing, and tips for getting published…

Talk on slow tourism at the University of Bergamo (Italy) as part of a COST EU project on connecting territories to develop slow tourism and events itineraries.

Talk given at Breda University, Netherlands on the way major events serve as a platform to tackle human rights issues but also exacerbates rights violations too.

Talk at the University of Cambridge “Festival of Ideas” where I discuss the ways in which major events include and exclude local small business interests.

We welcomed Shona McCarthy, CEO of Edinburgh Festival Fringe Society, to talk about the strategic ways one of the largest festivals in the world works with the local community to integrate interests and to develop cultural programming.

Between 2024 - 2027 Mike will be writing and publishing a four-part multi volume book series spanning the politics, economics, social impacts, and the sociology and anthropology of events, commissioned by Routledge.

Together with other professors around the world, Mike gave a talk on the power of sport events to tackle human rights challenges.

This short piece written for the UK Government Trading Standards publication aims to illustrate how during London 2012 enforcement officers were tasked with enforcing Games-time regulations in London. Most people think these regulations are enforced verbatim and to the letter, however, this is not always the case and individuals on the ground use their “power of discretion” to deploy regulation whilst at the same time recognising the needs and interests of local residents and business too.

Between 2023 - 2025, bringing together a diverse array of international scholars, this research project aimed to examine the tourism and urban development impacts of hosting Paris 2024. The research aligns to Paris 2024 objectives, including but not exclusive to: community engagement; developing authentic tourist experiences; festivalisation of the city and cultural programming; accessibility and inclusivity; place imaging, marketing and branding and numerous other themes that have emerged out of conversations with local- and city-level stakeholders.

Published in the Cambridge News, Sally and Mike discuss the importance of food festivals for bringing together hospitality businesses toward the long term survival of their business and how festivals serve as an important hub to connect businesses together to develop new innovations..

Since 2020, Mike has been working with leading global charity It’s a Penalty to support international campaigns to educate visitors about the signs and risk of human trafficking. This work explored the importance of events as platforms for educational outcomes.

In his early years of his full time lectureship (2026-2018), Mike was nominated for various university-wide awards, including innovative teaching, teacher of the year, and in 2018 the highest university award: “Special Recognition” out of over 1200 university academics. This is him proudly sporting the award in 2018.

When major events come to town there is a big play on the assumed benefits for local industry; Mike talks here about some of the opportunities, challenges and barriers for accessing event-led visitor economy opportunities specific to the Tour de France back in 2013.

Mike gives a keynote bringing together the key strands of the conference together and some thoughts on future research.

Major sporting events pose extraordinary challenges for managers tasked with navigating complex, legal and regulatory frameworks demanded by event owners. Of course, the Birmingham 2022 Commonwealth Games will be no different. Across this short article we focus on two key interrelated types of regulation: i) spatial and security planning, and ii) advertising and trade, and specifically, how Games preparation and delivery relates to host community small business inclusion and exclusion. This is a highly contested space of debate as the inclusion of – and opportunities for – incumbent, host community stakeholders play a central role in legitimising the event, and related public expenditure. Yet, both critical scholarship…