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This study aims to examine how veganism is “seen” by young adult non-vegan consumers and how prevailing attitudes reinforce or challenge stigmas around veganism.

Photovoice methodology was used to explore young non-vegan consumers’ attitudes and beliefs towards veganism. Data was collected from students studying advertising at a major university in Australia, who produced images and narratives reflective of their own attitudes towards veganism. Polytextual thematic analysis of the resulting visual data was then undertaken to reveal the dominant themes underpinning participants’ attitudes. Participant narratives were then reviewed to confirm whether the ascribed meaning aligned with participants’ intended meaning.

Participant images were reflective of first, how they saw their world and their place within it, which showed the interplay and interconnectedness between humans, animals and nature, and second, how they saw vegans within this world, with both positive and negative attitudes expressed. Interestingly, vegans were simultaneously admired and condemned. By situating these attitudes along a spectrum of moral evaluation, bounded by stigmatisation and moral legitimacy, participants saw vegans as being either Radicals, Pretenders, Virtuous or Pragmatists. For veganism to become more widely accepted by non-vegans, there is an important role to be played by each vegan type.

This study offers a more nuanced understanding of how and why dissociative groups, such as vegans, become stigmatised, which has implications for messaging and marketing practices around veganism and associated products/services. Future research could use a similar methodology to understand why other minority groups in society are stereotyped and stigmatised, which has broader social implications.

Through two experiments, this study assessed source and message effects of Instagram-based pro-veganism messages.

Experiment 1 (N = 294) examined effects of organization (brand vs nonprofit) and message types (egoistic vs altruistic) on consumer responses to Instagram-based pro-veganism content. Experiment 2 (N = 288) examined effects of source type (celebrity vs noncelebrity) and message valence (positive vs negative) on consumer responses to Instagram-based pro-veganism content.

Results demonstrated significant main effects of organization type, with consumers indicating more positive attitudes and higher credibility toward the brand. Significant main effects of message type were also found, with altruistic messages eliciting higher perceived information value than egoistic messages. Subjective norms had moderating effects on attitude toward the organization, while attitude toward veganism had moderating effects on perceived information value. Results also indicated significant main effects of message valence on perceived information value of pro-veganism Instagram posts and significant interaction effects of the two manipulated factors on intention to spread electronic word-of-mouth (eWOM) about pro-veganism.

Implications for use of Instagram-based health marketing communication about veganism were discussed. Specifically, organizations looking to use social media to influence attitudes and behavioral intentions toward health issues should seek to reach their target audiences through selecting endorsers and messages that will optimally present the health issue in a relatable and engaging way.

This article explores the different ways in which the vegan turn within the animal advocacy movement in Australia has played out for two organisations, Animal Liberation Victoria (ALV) and Animals Australia. Previous research has found that this promotion of veganism has occurred to varying degrees for different organisations and this article will analyse some of these variations in greater depth, drawing on the sociological theory of resource mobilisation.

This article provides a case study on the campaigning of ALV and Animals Australia on the issue of the dairy industry, as well as an overview of their histories, with a focus on the changing level of vegan campaigning over time. In order to explore this issue, this article will draw on the campaigning materials of the organisations studied, a wide range of academic literature and interviews with key figures from both of these organisations.

Larger organisations have a limited ability to regularly promote a vegan message due to their need to bring in a large amount of resources to sustain costs such as their office costs and paid staff. It is more grassroots organisations that have far greater scope to consistently and strongly promote a vegan message, although they reach fewer people.

The increasing uptake of veganism will have important implications for animals as well as for human health and the environment. The environmental benefits of veganism become even more significant in light of the urgent need to tackle the substantial threat of climate change.

This article is a contribution to the expanding field of critical animal studies as well as to the literature on sociology and animals. It builds on the limited amount of existing sociological literature on vegan activism and contributes an analysis in Australian context.

This paper is based on several years of ethnographic and desk-based research studying the Hare Krishna movement. The work is the first in a series exploring how segments of specific faith communities embrace dietary veganism and how this relates to the concept of transformational learning/change in the context of sustainability transitions. The focus is on how these communities embrace a plant-based diet representing different rationales and attitudes of learning in the process of organisational change.

I investigated Krishna practices extensively by visiting and volunteering in several of its farm communities in Europe. I used the mixed method of qualitative observations, participation, in-depth interviews and email interviews during a period of ten weeks spent in the communities altogether. I had not been in contact with Hare Krishna believers before the fieldwork.

Krishna veganism is analysed in the context of sustainability transitions by drawing on the concept of transformative (third-order) learning/change. Findings reveal an unexpected tendency to veganism despite the movement's worldview and radical commitment to dairy consumption. By calling into question their own collective dietary paradigm, the Hare Krishna community provides an exemplary case of third-order learning and change in an organisational context.

The paper invites scholars to include third-order learning into sustainability transitions frameworks while aiming to address the shortcomings of theorising levels of learning. The connection between Krishna veganism, third-order learning and sustainability transitions has not been put forward before.

This study aims to examine the factors of the vegan lifestyle on the travel experience. Special emphasis was placed on difficulties during travel and influencing factors for destination choice.

The vegan lifestyle has emerged as a growing market. The dietary reference is well-known, but the impact of the vegan lifestyle on tourism has received less attention. Earlier researchers have cited motivations of ethics, the environment and health as key. An online survey was conducted within the target group of vegans to provide more understanding of vegan tourism.

A few participants stated that they refused to visit countries due to too high meat consumption or due to long flight distances. Nature was named as the most decisive factor for choosing a travel destination among the respondents. Problems that might arise were mainly the general lack of awareness about veganism, as well as the confusion between vegetarianism and veganism in the destinations. Most respondents indicated that these problems were generally prepared for during the pre-planning process.

Research on vegan tourism is a relatively unexplored niche topic, the study used related topics adapted to a vegan tourism context.

Enhanced education about veganism among tourism service providers would be desirable to counteract such problems in the future and make the travel experience more carefree for vegans.

There has been little research in the field of vegan tourism, thus, this study provides valuable information on the needs and challenges of this growing market.

This study aims to identify the archetypes, moral foundations and plots associated with veganism through the stories told by vegan bloggers and the effect on mainstreaming of this ideology.

Narrative data was collected from 15 publicly available vegan blogs. Underlying archetypes, morals and story plots were identified and presented as a “story re-told,” highlighting the context and content of what was being said by the protagonists and associated meanings.

The analysis revealed three moral foundations on which vegan ideology is built: sanctity of life, enacting the authentic self and freedom. A universal hero archetype was also unearthed; however, the moral orientation of the storyteller (agency vs communal) dictated how these morals and archetypes were expressed.

Through the use of common story archetypes, master plots and moral foundations, a deeper understanding of vegans and the choices they make is facilitated, thus making vegan ideology appear less threatening. Storytelling plays an important role in establishing connections through commonality.

This study applies cultivation theory, storytelling analysis and archetype theory to reveal how vegan bloggers counteract mass media cultivation of vegan stereotypes through the stories they tell. We offer a more robust description of vegans, moving beyond stereotypes, and the morals driving behavior. Moreover, a unique mechanism of mainstreaming is exposed that shows vegans connect with people by tapping into universal archetypes and morals that anyone can relate to and relive.

The study aims to investigate a relevant topic, but still underestimated by sociological studies: animal advocacy, namely, the organized interest in non-human animals' life, rights and well-being. The Italian case is discussed, with a twofold objective: to highlight the evolution of some repertoires of contention and to use this study to analyze the changes of contemporary collective mobilizations and their relation with the modernization process.

The analysis is based on an online survey (704 responses nationwide), 24 semi-structured interviews with relevant members of groups and associations and a protest event analysis. Furthermore, a vast empirical archive and some academic studies concerning Italian animal advocacy in its historical dimension have been consulted.

The paper underlines the current specificities of Italian animal advocacy, compared to past decades. The great importance assumed by personal action frames and repertoires of contention emerged as characterizing elements. Activism is always more individual and less related to collective organizations: the central role of veganism and of the internet as protest tool is underlined. Both the increasing possibilities offered by better discursive opportunities structure, but also the possible incorporation of more radical frames within consumer market dynamics emerged from the interviews and the survey.

The phenomenon of animal advocacy (and, more generally, the activities of contemporary social movements) is contextualized within some typical characteristics of modernity, looking both at structural “opportunities” (e.g.: the diffusion of post-materialist values) and “constraints” (e.g.: veganwashing operations). Based on previous definitions coming from social movements studies and following a debate hosted by this journal, the role of collective organizations and especially the centrality assumed by individual activism is critically analyzed, evaluating the new possibilities, but also the possible negative sides. Not only cultural changes, but also political and legal contexts matter. In this sense, both a focus on Italy and more general reflections on western modernities are proposed, trying to go beyond animal advocacy and reflecting on social movements and collective mobilizations more widely.

Per capita meat consumption in Switzerland has been rather consistent for decades, although the percentage of vegetarians has risen to 14 per cent according to a recent survey. This study tries to resolve this apparent contradiction

The study is based on household consumption data from Switzerland and focuses on the distribution of consumption rather than on average amounts, using descriptive statistics and a mixed-effects model which explains the coefficient of variation between single consumer consumption amounts.

Vegetarianism and veganism are not only overestimated through surveys but also associated with a segment of the population that is consuming increasing amounts of meat. This dual development leads to a stable per capita meat consumption.

Our results indicate that greater scientific attention should be paid to this segment of heavy meat eaters.

Literature on social movements increasingly identifies everyday life as significant to understand political practices and activism. However, scholars have retained a major bias towards movement mobilisation and collective action, often relegating the everyday at the margins of social movements. While there have been notable exceptions, with studies of prefigurative activism and everyday practices of social change, they have usually focussed on alternative community spaces such as autonomous social centres and protest camps, and paid less attention to “ordinary” practices and spaces of activism. The purpose of this paper is to address these problems by suggesting that everyday life may be central to the production of activist spaces and the action of social movements.

Drawing upon ethnography methods, interviews with vegan activists, an on-line survey of supporters of vegan movements and an examination of on-line vegan forums, it seeks to analyse the practices of the vegan movement in France.

This paper attempts to demonstrate that prefigurative activism and seemingly banal practices may be central to strategies for social change. Drawing on an anarchist perspective on activism, it further suggests that activism and everyday life should not be studied in isolation from each other but as mutually constitutive in the creation of everyday alternative spaces – hemeratopias.

This paper adds to the literature on activism and social movements by offering a more complex picture of the spatial politics at work in social movements and a better understanding of individual action and mobilisation.

The main findings of a detailed qualitative study of the motivations, beliefs and attitudes of practising vegetarians and vegans are reported. It is concluded that vegetarianism, while remaining very much a minority option, is increasing steadily in the UK population, although the rate of increase appears to vary by such factors as age, gender and socio‐economic category. Those who opt for a non‐meat‐eating dietary pattern may well represent the vanguard of a form of ethical consumerism to which food producers, processors and retailers will need to be increasingly responsive in the near future.