Volunteer tourism and making choices : reporting from the field

Based on the observant participant, diaries and formal and informal interviews with 64 respondents over two months, this paper examines the institutional environment of volunteer tourism and its implications on local people and local socio-economic structures. In the process, we query how the various stakeholders in volunteer tourism pursue their interests and agendas and how, as a consequence, intended and unintended outcomes are generated. We draw on institutional theory to suggest that the contextuality of the activities of different stakeholders and their choices play a significant part in how volunteer tourism takes shape