There are certain kinds of activities branded as “volunteering” that I find unethical:
- Voluntourism, where unskilled Westerners go abroad to “volunteer” – usually for a fee – and do work that either isn’t something local people see as a priority or is something local people would like to be paid for.
- Paying to volunteer in any capacity in a program that seems to be more about giving an individual money than about actually serving a community or cause.
- Companies that charge a fee for a letter that says a person engaged in volunteering that the person uses to fulfill court-ordered volunteering.
I use the word scam to describe these programs. By scam, I mean something that is unethical, at least in my opinion, because it:
- is not entirely honest, or is dishonest, in how the program or volunteering is described (perhaps the program says it hosts a particular kind of event but there are no dates listed of such an event, or the program says it has involved hundreds of volunteers but has no testimonials from those volunteers on its web site, or charges a large sum of money to volunteer but is vague on how that money is spent);
- recruits volunteers only for fundraising roles (does not value volunteers as people, just as sources of money);
- says it has approval from the government or the courts to operate as it does, but it does not and is therefore promoting something illegal (there are programs that say foreigners can come volunteer there but, in fact, foreigners are prohibited by law from volunteering, or a program that says you can pay for a letter saying you did community service because you watched some online videos);
- puts volunteers in inappropriate roles, such as short-term visitors interacting with children who are orphaned or otherwise at-risk, or volunteers interacting with wild animals in zoos or enclosures calling themselves “wildlife rescue centers” that, in fact, kill adult animals and abduct their young and call them “orphaned.”
My blogs related to voluntourism or volunteering as mostly income-generation for a program are below. My blogs about pay-for-a-community service-letter are here.
- Not-Good Reasons to Volunteer Abroad
- Volunteer bill of rights: a commitment by a host organization to volunteers
- Ethics of Paying to Volunteer Online
- The ethics of volunteering abroad during a global pandemic
- More Than Me scandal in Liberia: a lesson to all who “just want to help”
- Isn’t my good heart & desire enough to help abroad?
- “But I wanted to help POOR people…”
- Vanity Volunteering: all about the volunteer
- In defense of skills over passion
- Want to work internationally? Get involved locally.
- Is it really *impossible* to break into humanitarian work?
- Volunteers themselves speaking out about voluntourism
- J.K. Rowling speaks out against orphan tourism
- Medical Voluntourism Can Cause Serious Harm
- The harm of orphanage voluntourism (& wildlife voluntourism as well)
- Ideas for Creating Your Own Large-Scale Volunteering Activity
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