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The aims of this Editorial are twofold: (i) synthesise emergent themes from the special issue (ii) tender four theoretical frameworks toward examination of crises in tourism.

The thematic analysis of papers highlights a diversity of COVID-19 related crises contexts and research approaches. The need for robust theoretical interventions is highlighted through the four proposed conceptual frameworks.

Crises provides a valuable seam from which to draw new empirical and theoretical insights. Papers in this special issue address the unfolding of crises in tourism and demonstrate how its theorization demands multi and cross-disciplinary entreaties. This special issue is an invitation to examine how global crises in tourism can be more clearly appraised and theorised. The nature of crisis, and the extent to which the global tourism community can continue to adapt remains in question, as dialogues juxtapose the contradictions between tourism growth and tourism sustainability, and between building back better and returning to normal.

The appraisal of four conceptual frameworks, little used in tourism research provides markers of the theoretical rigour and novelty so often sought. Beck’s risk society reconceptualises risk and the extent to which risk is manmade. Biopolitics refers to the power over the production and reproduction of life itself, where the political stake corresponds to power over society. The political ecology of crisis denaturalises “natural” disasters and their subsequent crises. Justice complements an ethic of care and values like conative empathy to advance social justice and well-being.

The purpose of the paper is to explore how climate change and the discourses about adaptation to climate change are altering the spatial development of the tourism industry in coastal destinations. The paper also identifies how tourist development and climate change adaptation can be combined to transform space and place, especially in coastal tourism areas.

Using a theoretical approach based on the concept of production of space, the study focuses on relational space, relationships expressed through representations of space and social practices. A case study method is used to analyze the socio-geographic processes at work in the adaptation to climate change in a coastal tourism community in Quebec, Canada. The analysis of the study utilized Nvivo with thematic textual queries.

The results reveal an adaptation process at work, based on a “hold the line” strategy, where private stakeholders choose to invest in defensive structures to mitigate the impact of rising sea levels and erosion. This strategy reflects coordinated action in the face of the risk and to protect high-value land property.

This research illustrates how tourism and climate change adaptation discourses intersect. It also reveals how tourism development promotes the values and image of coastal space and how this can conflict with an efficient climate change adaptation strategy.

This research provides guidelines for coastal tourism communities, enabling them to design their own climate change adaptation strategy, taking into account how the different social discourses and tourism practices interact with climate change adaptation. It also provides some insights into the criteria that influence an effective climate change adaptation strategy.

This paper aims to explore the role of private stakeholders in the living lab (LL) ecosystem and the relationship of private stakeholders to open innovation (OI) practices. There is extensive literature on private stakeholders and OI, but seldom mention is made on the specific question of how private stakeholders integrate OI in the context of a LL.

The authors will analyze qualitatively how private businesses that have participated in a in situ open innovation evaluate and perceived their open innovation practices. Therefore, how they relate to open innovation. Then, the authors will identify a typology of the businesses in relation to OI.

The research focused on the relationship of private stakeholders to OI in the context of in situ OI activities. The results obtained are consistent with literature on OI (Chesbrough, 2003). However, there are differences: if the elements mentioned by the respondents are described in literature, their representation of OI and its components allows us to affirm that this practice is not generalised and that it is often open to interpretation. That emphasises the importance of the role LLs can play as intermediaries to accompany private stakeholders in the OI process. Private stakeholders look for a guide to develop their OI know-how and find their way in the OI ecosystem.

The value of this paper is to bridge the research on OI done with private organisation and the research on LLs. The research literature did not pay much attention to the representation of the private stakeholders in the OI ecosystem. This paper has provided the start to open up that field.