Voluntourism. You’ve probably heard of it as that thing your mate did over summer where they travelled the world while helping indigenous communities in poor countries. Sounds great, right? Not always. Voluntourism can be extremely exploitative, while advertising is designed to hook well-meaning students with deep pockets.
Students get involved in voluntourism for a number of reasons. Honours student Sarah, who went to Ecuador through voluntourism company Antipodeans Abroad, told Critic Te Ārohi, “I wanted to do something out of my comfort zone.” Nicola, who went to Nepal through World Challenge, and Olivia, who went to Borneo through Antipodeans, said they wanted to travel while helping people in some way, too. Meanwhile, for fourth-year student Kate who went to Fiji and Cambodia over a gap year in 2019, her “primary goal was to learn, not to achieve something.” Those who engaged with voluntourism in high school tended to be less conscious of the risks and negative aspects of the experience going in, which is understandable given the fact that many voluntourism organisations target high school students and don’t necessarily give the full picture.
Voluntourism companies often market themselves as charities or non-profit organisations. “There’s a lot of glamour associated with it,” said Kate. Third-year student Jade, who went to Ghana for the 2019 summer through Lattitude, said that the experience was “sold to me as an opportunity for personal development.” Sarah said her experience was “framed as a super cool opportunity” with lots of “cultural learning”, and went on to say that “I didn’t really question it but also didn’t really have the framework to be questioning it… I think I wanted to back out of it once I started thinking more deeply about what I was doing, but it just felt like I was too far in.”
The expectations of the voluntourism experience can be quite different from reality, but one thing was consistent: all of the students Critic Te Ārohi interviewed had good intentions. However, Social Impact Studio Coordinator Sze-en told Critic Te Ārohi that many organisations are “centred around the self-development of the volunteer [which] can override some of that good intention… The packages seem attractive as it's so easy but that probably comes at a cost somewhere.”
A common catchphrase used by these organisations is: “You can make a difference.” But, as Jade questioned, “how is a 18-year-old from New Zealand gonna make any real difference?” Jade told Critic Te Ārohi that she volunteered as an Information and Communications Technology teacher at a school in Ghana but had practically no computers to use. “I kept thinking, ‘This isn't gonna be helpful’,” said Jade. Nicola, who helped to build a toilet block at a primary school outside Kathmandu, told Critic Te Ārohi that most of the work involved moving bricks, while the actual construction was done by local builders. “The expedition leader told us not to overwork yourself otherwise you’ll burn out,” said Nicola. “There were lots of lazy people in my group.”
Sarah was also sceptical of voluntourism having any positive impact. She said there were a lot of “rich girls” on the trip, some of whom had “never carried a pack before.” Similarly, Nichola described the culture amongst the volunteers as “cliquey and closed off.” Although volunteering was one “reasonably small” part of the trip, Sarah said one of the volunteer’s mums posted on Facebook about her daughter “helping the poor in Ecuador”. Sarah went on to say, “If schools want to take trips they should label it as what it is: learning and self-development, rather than under some feel-good guise of helping poor communities.”
This isn’t helped by the fact that many voluntourism programmes require a hefty deposit and cost a pretty penny all up. Jade said she paid around $12k after flights, visas, and equipment. The $5.5k service fee supposedly went to host families, but Jade admitted that she did not know if that was adequate or what percent the family got. The $17.5k price tag could’ve been donated directly to families through a service like GiveDirectly, which does exactly what it says it does.
Despite the cost, Jade found her experience of living in Ghana for two months and volunteering at a local school to be “really culturally enriching.” Jade emphasised the importance of building authentic relationships: “I developed really strong relationships with the teachers and my host family.” Last January, Jade returned to Ghana after being invited back into the community and was able to continue relationships with the people she met in 2019. However, out of the 300 people that had engaged in the programme she was the first volunteer to have ever come back. “People think about the experience but don't think about going back [and] forming long-term relationships,” said Jade.
This is not uncommon - voluntourism is often characterised by its temporary and short-term impacts. "Voluntourism doesn’t have a great reputation,” said Douglas Hill, Associate Professor of Geography. “Usually these are short-term stays and the actual skills that the voluntourists bring to their work may not be really filling any meaningful gaps… the benefits to local communities are pretty limited.” According to Douglas, while short-term stays might get some insight into the culture and lifestyle of the local communities, “it is likely to be a fairly superficial understanding at best.” Ultimately, Douglas advised, “If people want to volunteer overseas, they should be realistic about the need to commit to a longer period of time and be humble in trying to understand the perspectives and culture of the people where they are working.”
Douglas was quick to draw the distinction between voluntourism and International Development Volunteering (IDV) which runs through NGOs “committed to building long-term relationships with partner organisations in countries of the Global South.” According to Douglas, the longer duration and higher level of commitment advantaged IDV over more common short-term voluntourism. The Uni, through the Geography department, has ties with one such NGO called Volunteer Service Abroad (VSA) which operates through UniVol. “Through this programme, many students have had the opportunity to go and work with partner organisations in the Pacific, Asia, and Africa for ten months,” said Douglas. However, Douglas admitted that “most volunteers would still say that their stay was not long enough to make the kind of meaningful change they had hoped for.”
Poppy, from the Social Impact Studio (the Uni volunteering and leadership hub) highlighted how “the temporary nature of voluntourism results in a lack of investment… change happens slowly and it takes time to build relationships.” Nicola, who was in Nepal for one week, told Critic Te Ārohi, “I had no time to make stable connections.” Crissy, who volunteered in Tanzania through WorkAway, said she always had an “uneasy feeling that I could leave and was always temporary.” Because voluntourism is often at vulnerable schools and orphanages, the temporary nature can also be “potentially harmful for children in these institutions to have people making short-term connections and then leaving again, with the pattern repeated over and over again,” said Douglas.
The language barrier also doesn’t help with making connections. Olivia said she “only knew how to say hello.” Sarah could speak a bit of Spanish, but mostly spoke in English. “One of the indigenous women said they really like having people come so that their children can learn English,” said Sarah.
The prior knowledge and connection to the places that students visited was also limited. Sarah said that “there was nothing specifically tying me to Ecuador.” Jade described the pre-departure briefing by Lattitude as “mostly just practical implications for packing” while “the real learning was when we were there.” Kate said, “I didn't personally have connections but came under the name of the Anglican Church through the NZ Church Missionary Society.”
Despite the lack of connection, many students Critic Te Ārohi spoke with were conscious of their privilege and how white saviourism drives many voluntourism companies. According to Douglas, white saviourism is built on “an assumption of cultural superiority and a desire to help those less fortunate in non-Western countries.” Sarah told Critic Te Ārohi that her experience “kind of felt like a consumption of culture… I feel like everywhere we went we were just this massive eyesore; I feel like we were creating a burden.”
Skyla (Ngāti Hine, Ngāti Wai) told Critic Te Ārohi that white saviourism is nothing new and goes to back to the Missionary Settlement period in Aotearoa. “What white saviours are trying to save BIPOC from are actually problems that were created by white people in the first place,” said Skyla. Meanwhile, in the context of voluntourism, “white folks are placed on a pedestal, in the belief that they are ‘doing the right thing’, and centering the work around their ideal experience rather than enhancing the well-being and quality of life for BIPOC communities,” said Skyla.
All of the students that Critic Te Ārohi spoke with were openly critical of voluntourism and conscious of its negative aspects. “Volunteering needs to be engaged with in a different way,” said Jade. Many voluntourism organisations rely on the status quo remaining unchallenged. However, Kate told Critic Te Ārohi that we need to focus on the underlying issues that support the existence of voluntourism and work towards resolving them instead of “simply propping it up.” Crissy agreed: “We should empower people to do it themselves rather than just dropping in.” Kate told Critic Te Ārohi, “the longer you stay the better… it takes a good number of years situating yourself in that context [to make a positive impact].”
Ultimately, Sze-En encouraged students to “do your homework… It takes a certain level of awareness and self-reflection, which I think can sometimes be pushed down because young people are so keen to get out and travel.”