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There is an emerging interest in Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender and Queer (LGBTQ) inclusion among researchers and practitioners. However, the interplay of macro-, meso- and micro-level factors that influence the behavior of various agencies, systems, structures and practices in different national, cultural and social contexts still needs to be researched. This paper aims to examine how organizations meaningfully engage with the marginalized and underrepresented workforce, especially the LGBTQ community, to promote diversity and inclusion through comprehensive policies and practices, thereby developing a sustainable inclusivity culture.

Adopting a practice theory lens and using a case study design, including multilevel interviews with 28 different stakeholders, this study examines how organizations institutionalize LGBTQ inclusion practices in an emerging market context with a historically low acceptance of the LGBTQ community.

Findings indicate that macro influences, such as regulatory, societal and market pressures and adopting international standards and norms, impact meso-level structures and practices. At the organizational level, leadership evangelism and workforce allyship serve as relational mechanisms for institutionalizing LGBTQ-inclusive practices. Furthermore, collaboration, partnerships and enabling systems and processes provide the structural frameworks within which organizations build an LGBTQ-inclusive culture. Lastly, at the micro level, cisgender allyship and the LGBTQ micro work environments provide the necessary psychological safety to build trust for authentic LGBTQ self-expressions. This study also indicates that organizations evolve their LGBTQ inclusion practices along a trajectory, with multiple external and internal forces that work simultaneously and recursively to shape HRM policies and practices for building an inclusive culture.

This study addresses the significant gaps in diversity and inclusivity research on LGBTQ employees and contributes to the literature in three significant ways. First, this study examines the diversity management mechanisms at the organizational level and explicates their interplay at the micro, meso and macro levels to create congruence, both internally and externally, for engaging with LGBTQ talent. Second, this study adopts a practice theory lens to examine the behavior of various actors, their agencies, the “flow” of underlying and emerging structures and processes, the continuous interplay between structure and action and how they enable inclusive culture for the LGBTQ community as a whole. Last, it addresses the call by diversity researchers for context-specific multilevel research design, including qualitative research, focusing on national, cultural and institutional contexts, where socio-organizational and historical factors and interactions among them shape diversity practices. Much of the literature on LGBTQ inclusion has, thus far, been within the Western context. By examining the emergence of inclusion practices in emerging markets like India, this study contributes to diversity and inclusion research.

This study aimed to investigate the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer (LGBTQ) hotel selection criteria.

A thematic analysis was performed to explore 104 LGBTQ traveler comments based on TripAdvisor's top five LGBTQ hotels in Thailand.

The results indicated that tangible and intangible hotel attributes influence the LGBTQ community's hotel selection.

The results emphasize the need for hoteliers to understand the diversity of the LGBTQ community's hotel selection criteria and adjust or adopt different marketing strategies to engage and attract LGBTQ travelers.

This study contributes to the tourism literature by showing the importance of recognizing the LGBTQ community's hotel selection criteria and providing recommendations to improve product quality and services of hotels.

This study aims to examine the role of different forms of corporate social advocacy (CSA) in shaping individuals’ attitudinal and behavioral intentions towards companies taking their public stand on controversial socio-political issues. With an online experiment as the research method, this study tests whether depicting nonpolitical or political behaviors in CSA messages increases individuals’ positive behavioral intentions.

This study uses a single factor between subject online experiment. A total of 135 US young adults were recruited through a Qualtrics online panel. Three social media mockups were created to manipulate three levels of actions in CSA messages (no action, nonpolitical action and political action). Participants viewed one of those social media posts depicting presented actions to counter anti-LGBTQ + legislation in the USA and answered questions about values-driven motives behind CSA, brand preference and positive word-of-mouth (WOM) intention.

Participants displayed higher levels of brand preference when they viewed CSA messages depicting the company’s political action intended to repel anti-LGBTQ + legislation. Participants showed more positive WOM intentions towards the company when they perceived its political actions as more values-driven.

The findings of this study offer practical insights to companies when designing CSA messages and strategies. The results of this study indicate that the presence of political actions in CSA communication increases individuals’ positive behaviors towards companies. The results also suggest that depicting altruistic motives behind CSA leads individuals to talk about companies more in positive ways.

This study is one of the early studies investigating the impact of various forms of CSA on individuals’ attitudinal and behavioral intentions to companies practicing CSA. This study provides practical implications on how to effectively appeal individuals’ favorable attitudes and behaviors towards CSA. In particular, this research presents the importance of action aspects in individuals’ attitudes toward corporations’ CSA messages.

We introduce the notion of rainbow burning and develop the concept of rainbow washing, which draws on the concept of genderwashing, to explicate the instrumentalization of Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Trans Plus (LGBT+) inclusion. Rainbow burning happens when LGBT+ rights and visibility are targeted through hate to divert attention from economic, social, and political decline. For example, LGBT+ rights are unjustly blamed for the decline of the social and economic fabric. Rainbow washing happens when an organization uses or instrumentalizes LGBT+ concerns for commercial and social ends. We draw on examples from unsupportive and supportive capitalist market systems and explore how rainbow burning and washing manifest in each. This chapter explores the antecedents, correlates and consequences of rainbow burning and washing in unsupportive and supportive contexts. We identify regulatory, cultural and governance measures that can be taken against rainbow burning and rainbow washing to foster LGBT+ inclusion.

The purpose of the paper is to produce new knowledge about the positions that public libraries both take and are given in the conflicts over politics and identity that play out in contemporary cultural and library policy debates. Using conflicts over drag story hour at public libraries as case, the study seeks to contribute to an emerging body of research that delves into the challenges that public libraries as promoters of democracy are confronting in the conflictual political landscape of today.

The paper presents an analysis of debates reported in news articles concerning Drag story hour events held at Swedish public libraries. Utilizing the analytical lenses of discourse theory and plural agonistics, the analysis serves to make visible the lines of conflicts drawn in these debates – particularly focusing on the intersection of different meanings ascribed to the notion of the reading child, and how fear is constructed and used as an othering devise in these conflicts.

Different imaginings of the reading child and the construction and imagination of fear and safety shapes the Drag story hour debates. The controversies can be understood as a challenge to the previous hegemony regarding the direction and goals of Swedish cultural and library policy and the pluralistic democratic society these policies are meant to promote.

The paper offers new insights into the consequences of the revival of radical right politics, populism and societal polarization, and the different responses from public libraries.

This study uncovers the challenges and coping mechanisms related to stigma and discrimination experienced by gay professional team sport athletes.

Utilizing interpretive phenomenological analysis, this study recruited six gay athletes in professional team sports. Data were collected through virtual one-on-one semi-structured interviews, along with field notes and reflexive journaling, and were thematically analyzed.

The first theme highlights the discrimination and marginalization experienced by gay athletes in professional team sports, as well as the perceived differences between these athletes and their heterosexual counterparts. The second theme includes anecdotes illustrating their experiences of exclusion, along with counter-stories that resist marginalization. The last theme comprises stories that underscore the lack of acceptance and advocacy, emphasizing the awareness education aimed at making the sporting realm more inclusive.

Despite the extensive recruiting efforts for this study, numerous sports and countries remain unexplored. Follow-up studies are required to fill this gap. As this study was initiated, additional research is needed to provide information on athletes who are still in the closet. Cross-comparisons between gay athletes and their heterosexual teammates can help bridge the gap in perspectives.

Participants emphasized collective efforts in creating inclusive and welcoming environments for gay athletes, including anti-discrimination policies related to language use, showers and relocation adjustments.

Participants have put forth concrete recommendations for enhancing inclusivity within team sport environments and society at large, including proposals for early educational initiatives within the school systems.

This is the first empirical study that focuses on the experiences of gay professional team sport athletes.

In this study, I use currere to examine excessive entitlement in my own high school education. By “excessive entitlement,” I emphasize teachers' actions and systemic conditions related to an excessive educational mindset justifying (and manifesting) self-infallibility. Teachers displaying excessive entitlement might take for granted, for example, the correctness of their actions, closing self-awareness, and more equitable relations with others (especially students). On a structural level, it includes, for example, societal norms, school policies, educational traditions, and often laws. Specifically, I present findings examining three levels of curriculum – the formal or explicit, the implicit or hidden, and the null or present/absent. I offer my own story as a case study of how schools and teachers may silence and erase student identity and culture as well as how more inclusive and dialogic teaching approaches (and methods of inquiry) can counteract and offer alternatives to such oppressive forces. My framework includes professional ethics, moral ethics, and social justice ethics. Looking back at my history as a gay high school student, I discovered that my school's explicit curriculum provided teachers with a safe haven for bigotry and hostility toward LGBTQ students (as well as female students and students of color), and its hidden curriculum projected messages that privileged such a curriculum (and denigrated epistemologies more on the margin). It was only in the null curriculum that I began to experience a sense of liberation and inclusion and an awareness of the multiplicity of epistemology and ontology.

This chapter introduces the topic of mental health and wellbeing in schools and the overarching theoretical framework for the book. The evolving role of schools from nurturing environments to frontline support for pupils’ mental health and wellbeing is scrutinised in the context of demand, capacity and constraints in a post-pandemic world. Alongside this is a critical consideration of schools’ and education staff’s role, responsibilities and boundaries. The disparate mental health needs of pupils within the school population are discussed, as well as key risk and protective factors to help facilitate timely identification and appropriate support pathways for vulnerable pupils. Key topics and case studies which comprise the remainder of the book are introduced to navigate the reader, and this concludes the chapter.