ABSTRACT
At a time when the efficacy of sustainable tourism is under critical reflection, dark sky tourism offers potential for rethinking how sustainable tourism is considered, produced, and managed. Equally, dark sky tourism could also hold promise in addressing the ethical and non-economic dimensions of sustainable tourism. Here, using sustainable tourism as a construct and informed by examples from a dark sky site in County Mayo, Ireland, we explore human and socio-cultural connections to the night sky, alongside the conceptual values attached to darkness as a natural resource, for increasing community custodianship and pro-environmental behaviours.
