"Volunteers make important contributions across the spectrum of event settings, most visibly at high profile mega events such as the Olympic Games where volunteers are lauded as 'Games makers',
'unsung heroes' and the like. Less visibly volunteers are the heart and soul of community events and festivals, often undertaking multi - faceted roles from event leadership through to
operations, ensuring that these celebrations are made possible in the absence of big budgets and professional event staff. This book is the first to showcase and advance international research
into the volunteering experience at events, drawing on the work of key scholars in this field. Events of all sizes benefit from volunteer support but event volunteering research is frequently
case study-based and individually these cases make a limited impact. This text brings together cases from around the world, specifically including those that expand theoretical and
methodological boundaries. It features mega events like the 2012 Olympics and the 2011 Rugby World Cup, alongside music festivals and sports events. New areas that are examined include the
benefits of event volunteering for students, the role of volunteers in social enterprise events and new methodological approaches to researching this phenomenon, specifically ethnographic and
cross-national studies. This innovative book acts as a global source of key information for practitioners and researchers, an important text for students of event management and will provide
stimulus forfurther work in this emerging area"--
