'More Harm than good'

star gazer

It seems strange but the Trocaire chief said at an EU conference that volunteers going to work in the third world end up doing more harm than good in some of cases. Not having the local knowledge or experience elsewhere seems to be a big problem and Trocaire are moving to pay people instead of accepting volunteers. So it raises the question, if the money is there, should volunteerism be a part of modern society?
Obviously professionals doing a job will traditionally be better at it than ordinary volunteers, so is our money, rather than ourselves more appropriate to fill gaps in social services at home and abroad?

( Irish indepndent article, Third World volunteers 'more harm than good')

the_syco

Originally posted by star gazer
Not having the local knowledge or experience elsewhere seems to be a big problem

Just wondering; do they teach them much, before sending them? As an IT person, I know that if an untrained person was put in an IT Support centre, it would ensure havoc.
Same goes for sending people out. Lack of language, and esp the way we dress ourselves, may offend the locals, etc.

Just a thought.

Victor

The volunteer needs a skill that isn't available (or available supply in under excessive pressure) in the target region, but more importantly needs to be able to pass on that skill to locals.

"Ordinary" volunteers are just surplus labour.

qwertyphobia

another issue with volunteers can be lack of detachment this can be particularly important given the high pressure and emontionaly draining situations they will find themselves in. They can often find themselves over involved.

paid staff should (but not always) be able to not get so sucked into this

star gazer

originally posted by Victor
The volunteer needs a skill that isn't available (or available supply in under excessive pressure) in the target region, but more importantly needs to be able to pass on that skill to locals.
"Ordinary" volunteers are just surplus labour.

Not necessarily in that plenty of people might have the skill but would be unwilling to give up their time for non-paid functions. The function they fill might be very important to some people in the community and the community as a whole, but people aren't always willing to do it. I am not sure how it works in the third world but here plenty of people have skills that would be suitable to work at meals on wheels, telephone helplines or whatever, but are not necessarily willing to help out people on a voluntary basis.

As for wanting to professionalise the third world work it could simply be more an industrialising effort with more and more money going on administration and salaries than going into infrastructural development in the 3rd world crisis points. The people making the suggestion are probably coming at this from laudable position but the danger with having full-time staff is that at times there won't be as much money to spend and it might be easier to spend it on salaries than on redundancy payments and this could reduce monies available for activity on the ground.

originally posted by qwertyphobia
another issue with volunteers can be lack of detachment this can be particularly important given the high pressure and emontionaly draining situations they will find themselves in. They can often find themselves over involved.

But isn't that the community spirit kicking in, i mean that it is important not to take the troubles of the whole situation onto your shoulders as a volunteer, but as a volunteer you are taking the responsibility for shortcomings in the community that have arisen and doing it out of your own resources. Someone being paid is not doing that.