Sustainability research in tourism increasingly focuses on social issues such as the relationship between resident quality of life and community resilience through adaptive capacity. This study of resident and tourism relations in Iceland contributes to this growing body of literature. The research was supported by the Icelandic Tourist Board to meet the need to monitor the social sustainability of tourism in Iceland. Observation in public spaces showed disruption in daily routines for residents as physical infrastructure filled with tourists and the activities of tourism enterprises. In-depth interviews revealed residents’ awareness of potential benefits and problems with tourism, but a positive experience of and attitude toward tourists. A concern for the well-being of tourists was a theme in the interviews. However, residents were critical of the tourism industry and tourism management in both the private and public sector and questioned the sustainability of tourism growth. This leads us to consider the concepts of quality of life and resilience and responsible tourism as aspects of how communities experience and cope with tourism. We conclude that social sustainability, understood as both procedural and substantive, is a useful concept in addressing issues in tourism development.

Although horse‐based tourism is an important and growing sector of the tourism industry, it has not been extensively researched. The findings from the current research project, which involved interviews with owners/operators of horse‐based tourism businesses and a survey of their business practices, suggest that they belong to a culture of horsemanship rather than a culture of tourism as business operations in a service industry. The background, interests and outlook of the participants is that of horsemen: that is people involved with the breeding, training and riding of horses. This is also what they expect their guests to be interested in, and a passion they believe to be shared between hosts and guests. The business operation, including finances, insurance and business plans, were topics that the participants seemed less knowledgeable about and less interested in.

The nature of attractions in tourism is complex. Attractions can be places, events or experiences. In this paper the attraction of experience in horse-based tourism as promoted by horse-based tourism businesses, and in documentation from riders, is discussed. The argument is made that attractions must be considered as philosophical topics. Horsemanship is a cultural phenomenon, hence horse-based tourism is essentially cultural tourism. Classical perspectives of defining culture are used to interpret the findings, which suggest that the ideal of horse-based tourism is rather a romantic notion of horsemanship that incidentally fits very well with the elements of nostalgia and romance inherent in tourism as experience.

Scholars of political ecology have long been interested in questions of access, equity, and power in environmental management. This paper explores these do

This review focuses on how the concepts rural and rurality have appeared in the context of Nordic tourism and hospitality research published in the Scandinavian Journal of Hospitality and Tourism Research. All publications that contained the term rural or a synonym in one or more of these: title, keywords or abstract were considered. Content analysis was conducted based on the publications that have the term rural or a synonym in their title, keywords and Furthermore, the review considers the measurable impact of the publications on rural tourism and offers suggestions for fruitful future research directions. A brief theoretical framework is provided to analyse what rural and rurality refer to in the publications.