Republished from Faculty of Management, Research, Research Profile
FoM Research Profile
Kevin Quigley, School of Public Administration
Scenario planning and the future of tourism for persons with disabilities
With Lorn Sheehan, Rowe School of Business, Faculty of Management
Dr. Kevin Quigley
The global tourism sector has been devastated by COVID-19: financial losses in the sector are already more than five times the loss experienced during the 2009 global financial crisis. This impact will require a significant industry realignment; there will be an intense search for efficiencies.
As the tourism sector finds its footing, how will the sector meet the needs of persons with disabilities? They may have a heightened sense of risk as a result of the pandemic, be more susceptible to diseases, need better access to health services when on holiday, require assistive devices and enhanced sanitation protocols and contact-less technologies. Information will have to be communicated in accessible formats. Persons with disabilities may require assistance that challenges aspects of social distancing directives and border controls. They are often avid travelers whose right to accommodation is protected by law if not always in practice. Prior to COVID-19, accessible tourism was expected to represent 25% of the market by 2025.
This project examines the governance of ambiguous risks—for which there are legitimate, competing and irreconcilable knowledge claims—that currently manifest in discussions about tourism and persons with disabilities as a result of COVID-19. The intuitive logics school of scenario planning provides an effective way to address the issues that result from ambiguous risks. The project will juxtapose experiences in Atlantic Canada and Scotland.
Research supported by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council.
People who are responsible for mass evacuations during natural disasters are confronted with significant challenges: they must allocate and coordinate limited resources in a dynamic context, often in degraded conditions, and their decisions are consequential, time-constrained and often irreversible.
I was awarded a SSHRC Insight Development Grant to study military women’s perception of the Canadian Armed Forces (CAF) as an obstacle to female retention. From a human resource management perspective, this research project addresses female underrepresentation in the CAF. The Department of National Defence (DND) and the CAF committed in the 2017 Canada’s Defence Policy to increase the proportion of women in the military by one percent annually in the next ten years. Despite efforts to increase the proportion of women through recruitment and retention strategies, the impact on the proportion of women in the CAF is barely noticeable—women still make up only 15% of CAF members. This research project explores the perception military women hold of the CAF culture and aims to identify the beliefs and perceptions that can hinder female retention. Although the project was delayed due to the pandemic, we have just completed 32 inspiring interviews with former military personnel who shared their experiences as women in the CAF. They spoke about the constant struggles and discrimination they faced, but despite all of this, they were still able to find a place for themselves in a male-dominated organization and were eager to make it a more inclusive organizational culture. We are now in the transcription and data analysis phase. Phase 2 of the project, a survey of more military women, will be launched this winter. This research contributes to enhancing knowledge about obstacles to women’s retention in traditionally male roles and increases understanding of the levers that could contribute to making an organizational culture more inclusive.
This study is the second part of a larger research project that aims to examine the identities, motivations, information behaviours, activities and social impacts of online zero waste (ZW) communities. The first study focused on ZW activities that members incorporate into their daily lives. The World Bank estimated that by 2050, waste generation will drastically outpace population growth by more than double. While large-scale ZW initiatives from corporations and government agencies are crucial in global efforts to manage waste, the World Bank report emphasized the importance of citizen engagement in tackling waste production. Despite the rapid growth of online ZW communities, the impact of ZW activities at a personal level has not been examined in any detail.
