NS29 Session 21
29th Nordic Symposium on Tourism and Hospitality Research
Shaping mobile futures: Challenges and possibilities in precarious times
21-23 September 2021
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Title: Migrant workers in tourism: seeking clarity, accepting complexity
Organisers: Anu Harju-Myllyaho, Mari Vähäkuopus, Gunnar Thór Jóhannesson, Íris Hrund Halldórsdóttir, and Andreas Walmsley
Affiliation: Tourism Workforce research group/ Lapland University of Applied Sciences, Iceland Tourism Research Institute, and University of Iceland
Description
Tourism, commonly regarded as a low skill, low wage sector with informal recruitment practices, reliant on the secondary labour market, has perhaps unsurprisingly therefore attracted high levels of migrant workers (Baum, 2012). However, the nature of migrant employment in tourism is extremely diverse, a diversity masked by simplistic and stereotypical views of migrant work in the sector (e.g. Underthun and Jordhus-Lier, 2018, Walmsley et al.,2020). Looking at migrant employment in tourism in a Nordic context is unique due to its geographical location but more importantly institutional arrangements and societal structures.
This workshop aims to outline the features of migrant employment in tourism, before developing a range of implications for research and practice. The covered themes include how migrant employment manifests itself (e.g. the types of migrant workers in tourism in Nordic countries, their characteristics, motivations and how are they integrated (or not). We also propose to review the impact of Covid-19 specifically on the migrant tourism workforce, a hitherto largely neglected aspect of the pandemic. The participants in the workshop will develop a range of themes that would be suitable from a research perspective, as well as issues that could appeal to policy makers and managers in tourism firms. These are, for instance:
- managing diverse work force / talent / workers with different cultural backgrounds and training;
- tourism as a means of economic and social integration of migrants
- specific educational requirements for migrant workers
- reforming human resource practices regarding employee experience: attracting and retaining qualified workers
- the implications of Covid-19 on migrant workers
The session will offer both traditional papers as well as an interactive session to explore collaborative opportunities, discuss theoretical frameworks and a draft outline summary working paper of key insights, which can then be shared with the wider academic community and which may serve as the basis for a special edition
Norðurslóð 2 (E-building- 206)
600 Akureyri, Iceland