ALERTNET VOXBLOG: Are gap-year do-gooders wasting their time?
Blogged by: Alex Klaushofer
Volunteers build homes for the poor in Chile. REUTERS/photographer
Every year thousands of young Westerners take time out between high school and further education to work on aid projects.
But are these eager do-gooders pitching in for the wrong reasons? Worse, are they doing more harm than good?
We'd like to know what you think. Please leave your comments at the bottom of the article.
***
In a hard-hitting statement issued this week, Voluntary Service Overseas highlights the dark side of a growing trend for young people to go abroad to Do Good.
"Voluntourism", the international development charity points out, is a growing market in which increasing numbers of school leavers are paying commercial companies for the privilege of working for nothing in some of the world's poorest communities.
In return, they get a good line for the resume, a clutch of traveller's tales and a warm feeling created by the sense of doing something worthwhile while getting a key "life experience".
Some 200,000 British people - of which 130,000 are school leavers - take a gap year each year, spending on average $9,500 each. Unsurprisingly, some report unrewarding placements provided by unscrupulous companies who fail to fulfil their promise of a meaningful role at the heart of a grateful community.
VSO UK's director, Judith Brodie, doesn't pull her punches in condemning such sharp practice. Young people who want to make a difference, she says, "would be better off travelling and experiencing different cultures, rather than wasting time on projects that have no impact and can leave a big hole in their wallet".
The charity, in conjunction with other organisations, is developing guidelines to help would-be volunteers avoid the pitfalls - common-sense points about checking what's involved in the package, along with some aid-world style awareness of the long-term impact of the placement on the host community.
But while there's clearly a need to put a check on the commercialisation and exploitation of well-intentioned desires, the issue raises some rather difficult questions about our relationship with the developing world, and how we go about helping it.
In one sense, the phenomenon of voluntourism is a problem of success, a testimony to the fact that there is now a huge interest, among the young of the affluent West particularly, in the lives and struggles of communities across the globe.
Generating this kind of concern, and whetting an appetite to act on it, was exactly what made landmark anti-poverty campaigns like Make Poverty History such a success.
But a problem that afflicts the aid world more broadly follows quick on its heels. Having generated this energy, how then to harness it in a way that makes a difference?
Charities are all too familiar with the fact that high-profile, high-tragedy crises tend to generate legions of offers from well-meaning members of the public to go and volunteer in the afflicted area, without having the skills or resources to be effective.
South Asia's 2004 tsunami was a case in point - and now, ironically, negative perceptions of a dangerous Sri Lanka mean that VSO's work there is in jeopardy because of a shortage of volunteers.
A second, related complexity concerns the motives for volunteering. Last year, VSO warned that gap year volunteers risked becoming the "new colonialists" if they didn't change their attitudes to the developing world and stop putting their needs above those of the communities they profess to help.
But can the motives for international volunteering ever be pure? Nearly a decade ago, I did my own mini-version of a gap year while mid-career change, with a month's English teaching in a West Bank refugee camp. It was my first trip to the Middle East, for which I paid a modest fee - around £350 ($700) - to cover the costs of the flight, insurance and food.
On the placement side, the scheme would probably have passed VSO's guidelines: a rigorous selection day was followed by training sessions in what work, culture and conditions to expect. Once in the Palestinian Territories, things were well organised and we were well integrated into the community, which seemed, quite genuinely, to appreciate our efforts.
But - if I'm honest - my motives for volunteering were far from pure. Initially what drew me was an inchoate desire to explore that part of the world by getting under its skin rather than floating over the surface like a regular tourist. In fact, voluntourism wouldn't have been an unfair description of what I was doing.
In the event, the experience went much deeper, and launched me on a professional course that I'm still pursuing today, to which the Middle East is central. But the accidental path by which I got there makes me reflect on the muddy waters of the global consciousness of which voluntourism is a part.
Hopefully, more and more people will seek a meaningful relationship with the developing world. But as they do so, there will doubtless be more complexities and pitfalls for organisations such as VSO to point out.
Reuters AlertNet is not responsible for the content of external websites.
17 responses to “ALERTNET VOXBLOG: Are gap-year do-gooders wasting their time?”
Please note that comments should not be regarded as the views of Reuters.
Leave a Reply
When you submit a comment to us we request your name, e-mail address and optionally a link to a website. Please note where you submit a website address, we may link to it via your name. By sending us a comment, you accept that we have the right to show the comment and your name to users. Although we require your email address, this will not be published on the site, and is only required to enable us to check facts with you, e.g. if you are making a claim we can not confirm easily. Additionally, if you would like your comment removed at anytime, you'll have to use this e-mail address when you contact us. To remove a comment at any time please e-mail us at blogs-(at)-reuters-(dot)-com (address obscured to avoid spam) specifying who you are and what you would like removed. We moderate all comments and will publish everything that advances the post directly or with relevant tangential information. We reserve the right to edit comments in order to maintain the quality of the comments, and may not include links to irrelevant material. We try not to publish comments that we think are offensive or appear to pass you off as another person, and we will be conservative if comments may be considered libelous. Reuters will use your data in accordance with Reuters privacy policy. Reuters Group is primarily responsible for managing your data. As Reuters is a global company your data will be transferred and available internationally, including in countries which do not have privacy laws but Reuters seeks to comply with its privacy policy.
Alex Klaushofer is a freelance journalist writing on social affairs and politics in Britain and the Middle East. She has previously worked as Middle East communications manager for Christian Aid, and has a particular interest in humanitarian issues. She is author of "Paradise Divided: A Portrait of Lebanon".
16 Aug 2007 08:20:30 GMT
As a 'professional' aid worker of some 15 years I find this article very interesting in the fact that it echoes my own strongly expressed views. Nowadays we get so many 'do-gooders' who, although their original intentions may have been somewhat honourable, are ill-equipped to contribute any kind of meaningful assistance to our work. In so many cases,as you quite rightly say,they worry about their own conditions, needs etc.,first and foremost which takes up valuable time and resources or, even worse perhaps, have pre-conceived and often mis-guided ideas of what the people need in the countries where they have volunteered and are intent on doing things their own way which can be very harmful to our programs. In so many cases (but by no means all)they are there because it's all a bit of an adventure and, again as you say, will look good on their C.V. It can be very frustrating, I can tell you!!!
16 Aug 2007 08:22:56 GMT
Alex raises some excellent concerns regarding how best to harness the well-meaning but often misguided passion and interest of young people in the affluent West regarding people less fortunate overseas. Many people (and many organizations as well) are still thinking of overseas assistance work with a mindset that is now more than fifteen years out of date: that there is desperate need, and any warm body will do to help us meet that need.
Relief and Development specialists today have generally undergone years of academic and professional training to reach the stage where they are trying to wrestle with how best to help people in difficult situations, without causing additional problems through their interventions. High-level issues of program quality and developing humanitarian best-practice are now processes that are ingrained into most serious charities and NGOs today, and are taken very seriously. Understanding cultural contexts or grasping the potential to cause long-lasting damage to livelihood systems is not something that can properly be developed in an individual during a 3-month charity project (although a first taste can definitely have value when, as with Alex, it convinces somebody to change what they are doing with their lives). Unleashing untrained volunteers into the developing world stands to pose huge risks in terms of the quality of work and the integrity of international assistance if it! is not carefully managed. As Alex points out, what is really needed is not the flash-in-the-pan, 60-seconds-for-humanity approach (yes, replete with great stories and that warm fuzzy glow, both very real pulls in an increasingly sterile and litagation-driven West). The overseas assistance industry needs passionate people (young and old) who are prepared to commit not just a few months, but their lives and careers to first learning how best to make a difference, and then going out and making it happen.16 Aug 2007 08:24:03 GMT
I really like the way this article is written. The volunteer tourism is a real problem. I came to Sri Lanka without joining an organizations to help out after the 2004 tsunami. What initially was a 3 month trip to lend a hand turned into a career which I totally enjoy. In my time I have seen many people come and go and all sorts of volunteers. Simply put, it is a very difficult thing to mix your own interests with the interest to help others. Unwittingly even people with the best intentions can bring about the wrong kind of change to a society they are unfamiliar with. If you are going to volunteer, the first thing you need to think about is putting your own interests aside, that is the whole idea, use the time to help others. If you do get the chance to explore a new country, it should be taken as a bonus, not as a given. Some new organizations have sprung up to take advantage of naive students and travelers who wish to lend a hand. I witnessed one such organization, after taking nearly $2,000 from each volunteer, attempt to build a house for a tsunami affected family. It was a total joke, as they had no tools, no training and simply no idea. Eventually they had to contract a local company to do the work, while they sat and watched. Later this organization managed to get a full page article in a national paper highlighting how wonderful they were. Their website also published photos of work at disabled persons home which they didn't actually do. Just a word of advise to all who wish to volunteer, do your research before you come and DON'T join up with these money making organizations. Follow the principle "Do no harm".
16 Aug 2007 12:16:40 GMT
The fact is organisations like MSF operate mainly with volunteers, and if my memory is right, they aspire to a rate of 50% first timers. The issue seems to be less the motivation or preparation of young people to this kind of work, rather the type of organisations which organises these programmes. As for the motivation of relief or development workers, like for any other jobs, fulfilment of personal needs are part of the equation. They should not get in the way, but to pretend they do not exist is saying that we, the professional aid workers, have chosen this job only for altruist reasons. And it would be a lie!
16 Aug 2007 16:55:44 GMT
I found this article particularly interesting given my own stance as someone wishing to 'make a difference' during my gap year. Being so vehemently against these exploitative 'volunteer' companies, which I think the above comments describe accurately, I set off on a trip around Latin America hoping, in a perhaps idealistic, spontaneous manner, to encounter genuine need for my help. Meeting gap-year volunteers whilst travelling only confirmed everything I had so strongly opposed in the way of enterprised volunteering: the people I met either felt utterly ineffectual in their work whilst others suggested that they had 'ticked a box' and could now happily, and guilt-free resume their western lifestyles knowing they had once helped orphans colour-in colouring books. As for me, when I met people (ex-pats or nationals) who had started their own initiatives, albeit on a small scale, I felt overjoyed at having found a rare chance to actually volunteer in the true genuine sense. The sad underlying fact of all this is that the small number of people who do want to help, irrespective of their CV or about broader concepts of western guilt, simply have so little opportunity to do so. Since returning from Latin America I have been desperate to go away again in the hope of working for an NGO but of course the requirements for such work include qualifications that ! school-leavers do not have (and rightly so; what use would I be in an emergency crisis, administering medicine and aid, without proper training?). In my research however, I have found that many NGOs do not even invest in training their own staff to appropriate levels. I think the whole volunteer 'industry', as it seems to be, needs a thorough shake-up; allowing those who want to help the opportuniy to do so, with adequate training. People sharing my situation should research volunteerism thoroughly before deciding to part with their money. Despite all the problems associated with charity, making a difference is what ultimately matters. I'm now on 'gap year number two' and am therefore now trying to bypass the same commercial 'volunteerism' this time round. I couldn't help but smile when reading about the author's time in the West Bank - I knew that when leaving Latin America, my next challenge would be finding aid work in the Middle East.
16 Aug 2007 17:02:23 GMT
I completely understand the concerns of this article and of the other respondents, but I think that people shouldn't rush to discount some of the more positive reasons that people undertake 'voluntourism', and the very real benefits they get from it (beyond resume building and the 'warm feeling' referred to above). Let's face it, most of the developed world live their lives in complete ignorance of how the rest of the world lives, and some of these recent graduates are keen to understand these realities and do what they can to help. That experience will then influence their perceptions of their own world for the rest of their lives. Take the issue of refugees, for example. A person who has spent time in a developing or particularly post-conflict environment will have a much better understanding of who refugees are and why they migrated, and will be far more open-minded than their counterparts who spent a year on the beach in Australia. I don't think we should be so swift to condemn people for their desire to help and to understand, or to underestimate the true impact these activities can have. Yes, I've worked professionally in a developing country, and I've seen the problems with 'voluntourism'. But, while I think that efforts to ensure the best projects (such as the VSO projects, which in my experience have been of a high standard) I don't think it should be swept aside entirely with claims that it is neocolonialism or that young graduates are just after a quick warm'n'fuzzy fix. The same could be said of aid more generally, in which many of us carry out our professions.
16 Aug 2007 17:03:32 GMT
Having been in the field as an aid worker, I often receive emails from people looking to make meaningful contributions in a similar manner. I relate to their desire to be involved; after all, that's the reason I went into this industry. I usually advise them to send money to organizations that do the work they would like to support (along with a lengthy explanation about why Iâm crushing their dreams to make a difference volunteering). But perhaps the "legitimate" aid actors should take more seriously the presence of those companies that exploit would-be volunteers. Undoubtedly the more dubious actors lay shaky groundwork for any NGO that would like to intervene in the same areas. We are quick to jump on encroachment by non-humanitarians, such as the military, into our realm of humanitarian action because it compromises our work. Development work can also be similarly undermined by the presence of non-development actors doing development work to achieve other agendas. Organizations with shady values, experience, and approaches are detrimental to our work for a variety of reasons. Is it not our responsibility then to take seriously the effects of organizations out to make money through voluntourism? The real problem is how to deal with the cases of well intentioned organizations and people doing work that simply isnât very good and could undermine that of the âprofessionals.â After all, who wants to be the one to tell a group of 12-year olds who spent all year raising money for a school in Ghana that their efforts resulted in a mediocre project because the village teacher has been absent for 10 years and the thatched roof wonât last through the rainy season? As an industry, weâve been moving more into advocacy and need to deal better with utilizing the results of our awareness-raising campaigns. And us aid workers should keep in mind that we are all, to borrow the phrase, selfish altruists.
16 Aug 2007 17:33:36 GMT
This was a great article, and I agree with all the points made here. One wonders, however, how responsibility for this issue should ultimately be shared.
Unfortunately it seems that unscrupulous operators will always exist to take advantage of the enthusiastically ill-informed. The entire industry, meanwhile, will have to deal with issues of neo-colonialism for some time to come. It is absolutely right to ask potential volunteers to carefully measure their commitments based upon a critical assessments of the programs involved, and to approach their work with a nuanced understanding and respect for the culture and communities they work with. But who is to equip them with the skills to do so if not the âprofessionalsâ themselves? Most volunteers would like nothing more than to have the opportunity to learn how to make precisely the judgments discussed here, and this is often their reason for volunteering in the first place. Education is certainly a large part of this, and the increasing number of courses available that incorporate practical and critical approaches to aid work is to be applauded. By supporting such programmes (and not only in the west) and also by encouraging and supporting expanded volunteer and traineeship programmes in their own, responsible agencies, âprofessionalâ aid workers have an opportunity to provide the understanding that they (often rightly) criticise non-professional volunteers for lacking. In doing so we may even reinforce such standards and professionalism in our own practice, which would be no bad thing. It is not just the 'young and naïveâ, after all, who occasionally have trouble putting the complex needs of others ahead of those of themselves.17 Aug 2007 15:48:34 GMT
Great Article!! I have spent the last year volunteering as an adolescent refugee mentor. Now I am in the process of applying to the Peace Corps and have been pouring over these same ideas, trying to explore my inner most intentions and motivations.I read a quote that I loved: "if you are looking for a two year vacation, the Peace Corps is not for you". I'm not looking for a vacation or just a great story to tell, but I do want to have this on my resume because I want to get a job helping people. I hope I help people and I imagine this will make me feel good. I want to learn how to help people and I want to be useful. I volunteered with a well known organization down in Louisiana after Huricane Katrina. With little training I was sent out in a vehicle to inspect homes and determine whether people qualified for financial assistance. I didn't go down there with the idea that I would be saving the world, so I wasn't terribly disappointed with the experience. Mostly, I just listened to peoples' stories. I was not surprised when I ended up down there realizing that I could not provide these people with anything they really needed: a new house, better education, money, etc. When a group of volunteers invited me to go to Mississippi, I said "Sure, why not?". When we arrived in a devistated town they jumped out of the car and started taking photos! There were poeple sleeping in tents, using buckets as toilets and here they were snapping pictures. I felt so ashamed of myself for being there as a tourist when all these people just lost everything. Recognizing the horror I felt watching them, I realized there is a dark line between the folks who are volunteering to travel and those who travel to volunteer. No one is completely selfless, but I truly hope I am on the right side and that this is enough to get me started.
17 Aug 2007 15:49:33 GMT
At an independent travel show a few years ago I collected an armful of leaflets from various "volunteering" organisations exhibiting there. What struck me most, apart from the lack of training for âvolunteersâ - it, apparently, takes just one weekend to turn a gap year student into a competent English teacher! - was how bloody expensive they were. Even allowing for the cost of scehduled, booked flights rather than last-minute deals, reasonably comfortable accommodation, "training" and support for volunteers (not health insurance, though), having been to some of the countries mentioned in the brochures, I just could not see how these organisations could justify charging as much as they did.
I read recently that one gap-year travel/volunteering organisation had been bought out by a leading travel company for £20 million (yes, that IS £20 million)... Now, I'm in no way knocking the founder of this particular organisation - if someone has a good idea and works hard, they deserve to be rewarded for that �â¬" but big businesspeople usually make business decisions on the basis of profitability rather than altruism, and the fact that they were prepared to pay so much for this one concern is enough to make one stop and think. Especially if youâre about to pay a lot of money to go to work for free among some of the worldâs poorest people. As some commenters have already said, if someone wants to "make a difference" they will probably do more good - and, often learn more - by visiting that place as a tourist and injecting their thousand quid or whatever directly into the local economy, rather than into the bank account of a company in the UK or wherever.17 Aug 2007 16:41:24 GMT
Management of expectations, especially those of the volunteer. Inter cultural learning must be a two way encounter. A volunteer who has lofty ideals of making a difference, changing a community, or teaching people out of poverty within the span of a few months leaves themselves open to a destructive neocolonialist approach. The volunteer most likely doesn't have the answer, is definately not superior to one with less income, and perhaps will do more harm to the local community than good. However, when the experience of taking time to volunteer is approached expecting that the local community will teach the volunteer many things about life, the door is open for true learning.
After four years in East Africa engaging in relief and development efforts, I came away with a sense of having been changed myself. I wonder if I made any lasting changes in the communities I worked in, but I know deep and lasting changes were made in myself. Respect and dialogue is step one for cross cultural exchange. Without it, talk and plans are only fluffy and nice.18 Aug 2007 11:42:49 GMT
Matt has put it well.
The attitude of the volunteer or aid worker is what matters most. Those who go in with lofty ideas and expectations and fail to use the opportunity to honestly examine themselves and their ideas and grow in the process will become the neocolonialists of the aid industry. However, that aside, in places of post humanitarian crises, I personally resent the idea of young 'do gooders' on youth expeditions coming in and 'lending a hand' by way of building houses and putting in other manual labour, while other teams bring in 'counsellors, pyschologists' to talk to the affected victims. Work is the best way to recover from a trauma, it's part of the recovery process = rebuilding their lives. These young groups of people coming in to lend a hand and feel good about themselves take away the jobs and sense of ownership and responsibility that the victims need to recover. And they sit idle and listen to other neocolonials preach to them about how to deal with traumatic stress.20 Aug 2007 11:39:47 GMT
Professional aid worker? What is that? To affluent westerners, the third world has remained pretty much what it has always been - a retreat. A retreat from winter, a retreat from guilt, a retreat from unemployment; and now to the new volunteers, a retreat from reality for a while. The fact remains that the legions of aid workers, professional and otherwise, have made little difference. But saddest of all it what we do to ourselves in the third world. My conclusion? keep them coming. We already have so many, what difference could a few more make. At the worst, they might bring in a little spending money for the local economy.
21 Aug 2007 16:13:09 GMT
The dilemma with an article like this, is that it runs the risk of discouraging those who genuinely do want to help others. Nobody in the "social tourism" world would ever claim that this is the most efficient way to help the short term need. And, yes, all the money that people use on these trips could be used to bring a higher level of aid. What needs to be said, however, is that firstly, that money would not likely end up on the field if it were withheld from the trip, and secondly, there is no replacement for creating an advocate. The long term effects of a person getting a heart for the developing world far outweigh the inconvenience of dealing with the issues of these trips. If even 1% of the trip participants devote themselves to helping, it is worth it all.
23 Aug 2007 08:52:01 GMT
Hi! Current computer models are predicting that the planet will heat up one more degree within two years. There is now hard evidence for global warming. It will create even more drought and poverty and hardship in some countries and there will be a need for well trained NGO's. I suggest untrained volunteers remain home and concentrate on changing the political and social climate of North America because we in North America, desperately need to quickly plant Trees and Gardens and attempt to change the mind set of our destructive leaders... I've noticed a trend that will be a suprise to North Americans. While we have NGO's leaving home to save the developing world, millions of people in the developing world have learned to plant trees and gardens and to create micro economies. North Americans, however, are stupidly continuing to create industrial desertification! We in corporate controlled North America continue to: pump Co2 emissions into the air we all breath, continue to follow dangerous leaders who pretend global warming does not exist, continue to believe that our economic system is not absolutely self destructive and who continue to clear cut and destroy Arboreal Forests for commercial purposes. North Americans will be extreemly surprised in four years when we fall below third world standards and we become dependant on other countries to feed us! Signed: Joseph Raglione Executive director: The World Humanitarian Peace and Ecology Movement.
23 Aug 2007 08:53:29 GMT
I am absolutely delighted that a voice has been raised, albeit for the second time, loud enough to gain some wide-spread media attention at the possible negative impact of the gap-year industry. However, I am very disappointed with the irresponsible way many big names in the press and broadcast media have reacted, asking young, usually naive and inexperienced ex-volunteers whether they think they wasted their hard earned money and 6 months of heart ache. Of course they don't think so- in the rare cases where the participant spoke enough of the local language to communicate fluently and confidently with the community concerned, very would ever have sought to question them.
26 Aug 2007 11:29:03 GMT
I agree with what Michele Tan says about work being important. I was living on Phuket when the tsunami happened. Yes, it was lovely of people to show they cared by coming to build houses for the people who had lost their homes, but what a lot of local (Thai) people needed was a way of earning a living after losing their fishing boats in the tsunami. One expat who earned much praise locally set about raising money at "home" then using it to pay local fishermen who had lost their boats to build homes.
I also spoke to an expat, an American, who had been working in the diving business. Not only did he lose his toddler son and his business premises in the tsunami, but then foreign volunteers arrived and started to do the work he had been doing before the tsunami for free, thus reducing his ability to rebuild his business. I'm in no way criticising volunteers - I have done, and am doing right now, voluntary work in a foreign country - and I know that in many circumstances they/we do a great job providing a service that would not otherwise be provided. However, I think it's important to recognise that there's more to the whole volunteering thing than just dispensing wisdom and benevolence to deserving and grateful natives.