Isabelle Cloquet

Currently 'Chargée de cours' (i.e., Associate Professor), Isabelle lectures in the 'Master en Sciences et Gestion du Tourisme' since 2017. Her courses pertain to tourism management, the interrelationships between tourism and the biophysical environment, as well as on qualitative and quantitative research methods. Since 2022, she is Head and Quality coordinator of the Master's programme.

With her first empirical research work, Isabelle studied the factors involved in tourism destination development or stasis. This was done based on the cases of Nunavik (as part of her 'Maîtrise en Loisirs, Culture, Tourisme' at the 'Université du Québec à Trois-Rivières' in Canada) and Gabon (as part of her Phd thesis (ULB)). In both cases, Isabelle adopted a sociological perspective, and paid particular attention to the conservation of protected areas. After her Phd, Isabelle did her post-doc research at the University of Exceter, UK, where she worked with Prof. Gareth Shaw. Together, they worked on accessible tourism and on tourist behaviours in post-retirement. From 2018 to 2022 Isabelle directed a pluridisciplinary and prospective research project named Cap-SMART. The project aimed at anticipating the effects of the adoption of smart technologies on tourism employment and work in the Brussels Capital Region. Cap-SMART was funded by Innoviris and conducted in collaboration with the 'Centre de recherche en psychologie du travail et de la consommation' (PsyTC) of the ULB.

More recently, Isabelle has been developing a new research topic, investigating the relationships between human beings and other (non-human) beings in nature tourism. Her focus is on tourism activities and mediation (communication and interpretation) with particular attention paid to rewilding areas.

Isabelle's research is characterized by her systemic and constructivist approach. Together with her very first research work, the new topic she's working on shows Isabelle's commitment to contribute to knowedge development on the relationships between human activities and biodiversity loss and/or conservation.

As an academic, Isabelle is also engaged in causes that considerably matter to her. This is why she is member of L'Atelier des Chercheur.e.s pour une désexcellence des universités which advocates against an "excellence"-oriented and managerial approach to the management of universities. In her opinion this approach has adversely affected both the quality of teaching and research. Isabelle is also committed not to fly as part of her duties.