Anna Mehlhorn
Every year, tens of thousands of young people from Germany travel to countries in the Global South with the desire to gain new experiences for life and do good at the same time. However, volunteer services are also criticised for reproducing stereotypical role models of helpers and recipients of aid and for perpetuating post-colonial power and dependency relationships between the Global North and Global South. But is all voluntary service the same?
The possibilities are numerous and often confusing for those interested. There are state-funded and regulated programmes such as the development policy voluntary service weltwärts (Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development), weltwärts (Federal Foreign Office) or the International Youth Voluntary Service Internationalen Jugendfreiwilligendienst (Federal Ministry of Education, Family, Seniors, Women and Youth). In addition, numerous commercial organisations and companies offer tourist trips combined with short-term volunteer assignments – so-called voluntourism.
How do state-regulated volunteer services differ from commercial voluntourism?
| State-funded volunteer service (e.g. weltwärts North-South) | Voluntourism | |
| Goal | Combining learning and engagement weltwärts: Service in so-called “developing countries”Raising awareness of global issues and engagement in the area of sustainable development goalsDevelopment policy engagement after return | Combining tourism and engagementFocus on adventure and experience travel Customer- and profit-oriented |
| Duration | 6-24 months | Shorter, flexible periods, e.g. individual days or a few weeks/months |
| Costs | Sending organisations apply for government fundingCosts for voluntary service (“pocket money”, flights, insurance, educational support, etc.) are coveredVolunteers collect donations via so-called “donor circles” | Volunteers pay for the assignment, e.g. as part of package tours and round trips |
| Support | Application and selection processSending organisations must ensure preparation, support and follow-up, as well as provide programme-specific content | Often possible without prerequisitesPreparation is usually not mandatory and sometimes involves additional costs. |
| Target group | Income-independent, but secondary school pupils, young people from lower social backgrounds, young people with a migrant background, East Germans and men are underrepresented (Fischer 2024: 275). weltwärts: since 2013 also as a South-North programme: volunteers from the Global South travel to Germany for one year | Depending on financial possibilities |
Voluntary services should benefit all those involved. A study by Brot für die Welt (2018) clearly shows that in voluntourism, the needs of paying customers are paramount, sometimes at the expense of child protection in local projects. In addition, local placement sites are often not involved in organisational processes. This can lead to volunteers replacing local workers or creating financial dependence on voluntourism donations. Placement sites often hope to receive donations that are to be raised by volunteers. If volunteers are not sufficiently aware of this and prepared for it, dependencies and conflicts of roles and interests arise. Overall, there is a lack of binding quality standards for voluntourism offers. weltwärts sponsors, on the other hand, are required to be part of quality associations. Quality seals such as QUIFT can create comparability and transparency for interested parties.
Both state volunteer services and voluntourism stays abroad take place within postcolonial structures and thus also carry the risk of reinforcing existing power and role relationships. This makes comprehensive preparation, support and follow-up for volunteers all the more important, which is often not sufficiently provided in voluntourism.
However, this educational work is indispensable in order to sensitize volunteers to prevailing conditions and their role in them and, ultimately, to equip them with the practical tools they need to question these (postcolonial) structures and help change them in the long term through hands-on training in voluntary service. This presents a great opportunity to make the encounters during voluntary service a starting point for further transformative engagement. However, this means that the responsibility for addressing unjust conditions within state volunteer programs cannot be shifted solely to the volunteers themselves.
Programmes such as weltwärts must question colonial notions of “development” and make decision-making and financing structures more equitable – not least in order to better meet their own standards for a partnership-based programme.
Weiterführende Informationen
- Brot für die Welt (2018): Vom Freiwilligendienst zum Voluntourismus. Herausforderungen für die verantwortungsvolle Gestaltung eines wachsenden Reisetrends. Berlin, online: www.tourism-watch.de/dossiers/voluntourismus
- Fischer, Jörn (2024): Freiwilligendienste im Ausland, In: Christoph Gille, Andrea Walter, Hartmut Brombach et al.: Zivilgesellschaftliches Engagement und Freiwilligendienste, S. 269-278, Baden-Baden: Nomos Verlag.
- Konzi, Kristina (2015): Postkoloniale Perspektiven auf „weltwärts“, Baden-Baden: Nomos Verlag.
Decolonial Travel Guide Tanzania 