Next Steps in Mega-Sport Event Legacy Research: Insights from a Four Country Volunteer Management Study

Abstract

Mega-sport event legacy research methodologically is dominated by what should be considered single case studies often omitting the importance of the socially situated nature of events and tourism. The extant research has often been conducted during, or soon after, an event purporting to be about legacies. Thus, they are more about impacts than the legacy, or what remains. By interrogating the only known database of volunteer responses from four Olympic and Paralympic Games across four countries, this research note demonstrates the next steps that are required to design legacies research that will have methodological, theoretical, and practical significance for host and nonhost communities alike.