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To outline strategies for balancing a critical approach to sport for development and peace (SDP) interventions with approaches that highlight the potentially positive outcomes of SDP. Two examples of attempts to balance these approaches are highlighted. One is a critical analysis of responses to sport-related environmental problems. The other is a study of how a sport-related reconciliation event led by celebrity athletes was successfully organized.

In the first part of the chapter, the complexity of the SDP concept (and the terms sport, peace, and development) is discussed along with the challenges of negotiating critical and more optimistic stances on SDP. In the second part, two approaches to navigating between “extremely critical” and “unwaveringly optimistic” stances on SDP are outlined through two case studies.

The two case studies are described along with preliminary findings from studies that were conducted. Each case study is accompanied by a discussion of how the author “middle-walked” between “extremely critical” and “unwaveringly optimistic” positions on SDP. A focus in this section is on how theory, methods, and strategies for reporting findings were accounted for in the process of balancing these distinct positions.

The difficulties attempting to balance critical and optimistic positions are discussed. The difficulties connecting critical analysis with practical suggestions for improving SDP-related work were also outlined.

The chapter explores the developments in work on the history of quantification and sport, explaining how quantification in sport is generally understood, and then establishing what a sociological approach offers to scholars interested in exploring new expressions of these developments in biometrics and Big Data. It then outlines some potential directions scholars might pursue to further develop knowledge of these developments in the context of sport.

The chapter synthesizes existing literature from the sociology of quantification, sport sociology and quantification, and Big Data to provide historical, contemporary, and future oriented assessments of sport and datafication.

By situating a discussion of Big Data and biometrics in the context of sport, this chapter argues for the value of a sociological approach to these areas. The chapter engages prior work as a way to move scholars to challenge the assumed epistemological and political power of numbers for the way we engage sport.

The chapter argues for a number of future areas of study that may push the boundaries of existing research in the area.

The chapter provides a survey of the literature on sport, analytics, and Big Data as an impetus for future research into the importance of a sociological approach to these areas in the context of sport.

This chapter examines patterns of neighbouring in the small Essex town of ‘Eastside’, located in London’s eastern suburban periphery. Drawing on qualitative interviews, two groups of resident interviewees are discussed: established, long-term, white British residents who have lived in Eastside for many years, and ethnically diverse newcomers who have recently moved to the area. This chapter focuses on patterns of neighbouring – both positive in the form of ‘neighbourliness’ and negative in terms of ‘unneighbourliness’ – and considers whether neighbouring provided the basis for residents to develop a sense of community. Basic neighbouring activities, such as saying ‘hello’ and the mutual provision of support, were commonplace, although proactive intervention and socialising with neighbours were more limited. Only a minority of both long-term and incoming interviewees identified a sense of community based upon neighbouring. The dominant aspect of the former’s sense of community was a ‘narrative of decline’ in which they lamented the loss of the more intense neighbourliness that they recalled from the past. Unneighbourliness was also evident, for example, in relation to noise, and various reasons for this are analysed including deficiencies within the physical environment, tenure prejudice, and established/newcomer resident tensions.

This chapter aims to assess the scope of India's gastronomic tourism post-COVID-19 and discuss the utilisation of vlogs to promote India as a gastronomic destination. First, the evolution of gastronomic tourism is reviewed. Next, opportunities and challenges associated with India's gastronomic offerings, both from international and domestic tourism perspectives, are discussed. Then, the role of vlogging to position and promote India as a gastronomic destination is established. The chapter suggests recommendations for the Ministry of Tourism, Government of India on utilising vlogging to promote gastronomic tourism.

To examine the trend of “witness tours” that travel to the North American Arctic to experience, document, and then advocate on behalf of environmental issues in the North. These tours are presented as part of a colonial legacy that has long witnessed the North as a space of potential investment from the South. Especially in their reliance upon suffering as a narrative practice to justify their experience, these tours repeat patterns that reduce the agency of Northern communities and peoples to address changes they are facing. The chapter also provides best practices for such excursions and compares their approach to Northern-based expeditions that also advocate for environmental conservation and protection.

In the first part of the chapter, the history of colonialism and exploration sets the foundation for understanding the recent trend in witness tours. These tours are then examined through a discourse analysis of their narratives to highlight their connection with colonial approaches to the North. The final section of the chapter presents three necessary steps to reduce the reliance upon colonial legacies for these tours.

The witness tours examined are heavily dependent upon using their resilience of the travels to travel through harsh landscapes to make their case for caring about these landscapes. Far from being an innocent narrative strategy, this reliance upon suffering provides a level of elitism to these narratives at the same time as it reproduces colonial patterns. The chapter suggests three steps to avoid these problems: (1) Recognize the stories of people who live in the North; (2) Do not present the Arctic as a timeless wilderness landscape; and (3) Understand our limited perspective on the North as outsiders.

The chapter suggests that witness tours need to be understood within the context of a history of colonial exploration in the Arctic as well as the agency of Northern peoples to address both environmental change and colonialism.