In this Critical Review, Mekonnen Tesfahuney and Richard Ek depart from and extend their earlier work on the need to take the tourist seriously as a philosophical figure. Following Peter Sloterdijk’s work, they argue that tourism studies must address the question of what it means to be a tourist in the digital age anew. There is a need for both ontological and epistemological revaluations of the tourist subject’s condition of “being in the world.” The Critical Review deliberates on the tourist subject in this new, digital age from two distinctive philosophical directions, each crafting new research trajectories, but both converging on the question of “being,” or meaningful existence. It thus moves away from earlier uses of existentialist and phenomenological theory in tourism analysis, which posited embodiment as a precondition for tourism mobility. (Reviews Editor Introduction) 

This chapter introduces two fundamental understandings of place and cross-tabulates these two notions of place with two equally fundamental understandings of design. The two understanding of place are as follows: on the one hand place as an absolute geographical area (stemming from an absolute notions of space) and on the other hand, place as relational assemblage. We further approach the notion of design as a noun (a given, something fixed, being) and as a verb (a process, something in constant becoming). In sum, these four conceptions of place and design offer a four-field matrix that opens up for an understanding of the wide variety of approaches to place (in a place design—context). Each of these four possible outcomes of place (design) is illustrated with examples from spatial planning. © 2026 selection and editorial matter, Fredrik Hoppstadius, Mekonnen Tesfahuney and Ulrika Åkerlund; individual chapters, the contributors.

This paper presents a visual metaphor or figure as a tool for Indigenous mobilisation: an imaginary S & aacute;mi "Trail of Tears." This imaginary trail recalls the largely untold history of the forced evictions of S & aacute;mi families in Sweden during the first half of the twentieth century. We engage Agamben's political philosophy to examine and interpret the colonial present in Swedish S & aacute;pmi and argue that such an imaginary trail also invokes a figure for contemporary social mobilisation in S & aacute;pmi against the green (re)colonisation that increasingly threatens to turn the entire region into a green sacrificial zone. The trail has the potential to serve as a "dangerous dream," challenging colonial state power as well as global resource extraction, much like Indigenous artivism and the struggle for visual sovereignty.

This paper discusses the growing regional socio-economic disparity in Sweden and investigates two regions’ power relationship with the economically and politically dominant Stockholm region: one region with a negative economic trajectory and the other with a positive economic development over 25 years. The conceptual framework is based on the topography/topology nexus, using the key concepts of ‘reach out’ and ‘fold in’ in different resources. To enrich this framework, we incorporate two concepts in regional planning: ‘borrowed size’ and ‘agglomeration shadow’. The findings suggest that ‘reach out’ and ‘fold in’ explain why ‘borrowed size’ and ‘agglomeration shadow’ take place, or do not.

The chapter uses the tourism “–cene” to critically assess the Anthropocene-present as a unique order of worlding when (and where) Man is the Measure of All Things. It posits the socio-spatial implications of overtourism that hinge on the local as an unsustainable planetary process that threatens life itself. The chapter frames tourism’s post-Anthropocene future and accounts for what can only be described as “the monstrous” as a threat to the polis, as a political community, and as a contested urban space. Drawing on Marx’s and Nietzsche’s writings, it explores how contestatory desires, on the one hand for nihilistic consumption and on the other for radical kinship emerge from the monstrous. To buttress its claims empirically, focusing on Barcelona, it interrogates the upsurge in “tourist hate” documented in many European cities. Here, overtourism as a superabundance of tourists—hailing from cruises, arriving in busloads or planes—portend the nihilist swarm, a zombie army invading the polis, destabilizing the urban community, and colonizing and transforming urban space in its service. “Tourist hate,” can be seen as a populist rendering of the tourist as monstrous, pointing to the non-relationality and violence of tourism, the Chthulucene tentacles of which can be seen everywhere.

This paper addresses one of the pedagogical challenges that followed the presence of increasingly multinational student groups, particularly the increased diversity of academic backgrounds among students. Theoretically, this challenge can be understood as an encounter between different teaching and learning regimes (TLRs). TLR, coined by Trowler and Cooper (2002), implies a constellation of assumptions, rules, relationships, and practices regarding the conduct of higher education that colours academic staff members’ performance in their profession. It has become a widely used heuristic tool in the reflection process among university staff. It is shown in this paper that TLRs are not only a heuristic tool that can be applied in teacher reflection but may also be fruitfully applied in the classroom in student-teacher interaction. Consequently, we decided to bring the TLR into the classroom. The written student reflections constitute the empirical material that this analysis is based on. We approach these reflections as expressions of confessions of the Self, as laid out by Michel Foucault. We conclude that it is useful for the students to reflect upon TLR’s, but simultaneously, such an approach runs the risk of enhancing pedagogical and epistemological conformism at the neoliberal university. 

Political philosophy is applied to analyze the democratic potential of tourism social media. This study shows that while these media have deliberative potential, they also reflect the postpolitical and postdemocratic condition in tourism digital communication. This analysis is illustrated through the discussion of three metaphors: the menu, the stranger, and the tourist-light. The menu represents the increased invasion of lifeworlds by the commercialization and corporate regulation of the tourism social Web. The stranger symbolizes the weak accountability of online communities. The tourist-light embodies the relevance of hedonism in virtual worlds. Social media contributes to digital narcissism and supports consumer centricity. Digital communication produces a sanitized version of tourism and entails a subtle constraint of political citizenship.