McLennan, S. (2021). New Zealanders as international volunteers Who, what, why . . . and should I?. In D. Belgrave, & G. Dodson (Eds.) Tūtira Mai: Making change in Aotearoa New Zealand. (pp. 92 – 210). Auckland, NZ: Massey University Press
Every year in February, as students arrive back on campus and into classes, the recruiters are ready. The coloured flyers are pinned on noticeboards, the classroom booked for lunchtime meetings, permission sought to speak in lectures. The slogans are enticing: ‘Experience the difference you can make’ … ‘Want to be part of something bigger? … ‘Where do you want to explore?’ Accompanied by pictures of happy volunteers posing with children in Fiji or hugging elephants in Laos, these slogans are common in volunteer tourism (‘voluntourism’) marketing, and attract thousands each year to travel to locations all over the globe.
But, should the prospective volunteer search further, they might come across a very different set of ideas on volunteering. From ‘Barbie Saviour’ on Instagram, satirising volunteers through ‘#slumfies’ and ‘#saviorchic’ (barbiesavior, 2016), to SAIH Norway’s ‘who wants to be a volunteer’ parody video (SAIH Norway, 2014), and a raft of critiques of volunteers on blogs, Twitter and in the media (Cole, 2012; No White Saviors, n.d.; Rosenberg, 2018; Zakaria, 2014). Scholars have also pointed out concerns with the marketing and practices of volunteering, critiquing voluntourism organisations for unethical behaviour and for perpetuating colonial power structures and white saviourism.
Despite this, large numbers of New Zealanders continue to volunteer overseas, at least up until the Covid-19 pandemic forced international travel to a near shutdown. This chapter explores volunteering as a form of active citizenship outside our border, from long-term skilled volunteering to voluntourism, and examines both the opportunities and the pitfalls of international volunteering, including the debates introduced above. As citizens of Aotearoa New Zealand (ANZ) we are often engaged in discussions about colonialism, and in ongoing debates about citizenship, rights and justice within our country. This chapter brings these debates to the practise of international volunteering, asking new questions of New Zealanders who want to volunteer outside our borders, in order to encourage critical thinking around the role and practices of international volunteers, and to pose new questions for those who are thinking of volunteering in the post-Covid era. Rather than asking where you want to go, or what you want to do, we ask: Why do you want to go? What can you actually do? And, should you be going at all?
Dr Sharon McLennan 