Having an international and inter-cultural view of the world is a really important skill to develop. It shows that you are willing to learn about perspectives that are different to yours, and that you can foster inter-cultural understanding and collaboration between people from differing backgrounds, cultures, nationalities, and stages of life.  

International volunteering can be a life changing experience for people to support causes they care about abroad. However, there are several important things to consider when thinking about volunteering in another country. City Volunteering has put together our guidance and statement on international volunteering. 

We know that international volunteering is confusing to navigate, and it can be difficult to know whether you're doing a something ethical or not, so here are some things to consider:   

1. Is my volunteering taking a job away from a local, qualified person?  

Much international volunteering and humanitarianism originated as Westerners volunteering in economically disadvantaged countries. This is in contrast to today, where the emphasis has shifted to empowering and employing local people wherever possible to address their own issues and provide them with income. If you are considering volunteering abroad, you should be qualified to do the work or fill a legitimate skills gap in most cases. Your experience could include specialised skills such as nursing or construction work; working with people who are traditionally socially-excluded such as migrants, people with HIV/AIDs or people living with disabilities; experience teaching any subject or language of your expertise. 

It’s equally important to remember that all of the above can be gained locally in London through volunteering with a range of charities and organisations or pursuing a career in these areas. The bottom line is, if your volunteer role specifies activities that you would not be qualified to do in the UK, then you should not be doing this abroad. It is for this reason that we do not endorse volunteer programmes that involve construction/building or other vocational roles that do not specify qualifications as a requirement.  

2. What happens once your volunteering placement ends? Can the work be continued by the local community? 

Many international volunteer programmes run short-term trips, in order to accommodate people who can only commit a short amount of time to helping with a project. The problem with this is two-fold. Firstly, when working with vulnerable groups such as children, this is particularly harmful as it means that there is a constantly revolving door of new volunteers coming to their community, supporting them for a short amount of time, and leaving once a bond has been formed. Secondly, there is a risk that the project the volunteer works on will no longer be sustainable once the volunteers return to their home country, creating a power dynamic that also hinders possibility for self-driven projects. As such, we encourage you to consider whether your commitment can be sustained once you return to the UK after volunteering abroad.  

3. Has the programme been designed with the volunteers or the local community in mind? 

If the description of the volunteer opportunity sounds more like a holiday advertisement, then it’s more likely you’re falling into the risk of ‘voluntourism’ which combines tourism and travelling with volunteer work abroad. On the surface, this seems like a viable pairing, however it can be detrimental to the communities that programmes claim to serve. If the programme focuses on how much fun the volunteers with have, with photographs and marketing materials focused primarily on pictures of foreign volunteers interacting with the local community, but little information on how local people benefit from the work and lead the efforts, then this is a strong sign of voluntourism. The emphasis should be on undertaking volunteering that places the beneficiaries at the heart of the work. If you’d like to experience tourism at the same time, we suggest incorporating micro-volunteering into your travel and tourism, such as doing a litter pick whilst on holiday. 

4. Does the programme perpetuate neo-colonialist stereotypes in their media messaging? 

We like this except from this article titled ‘The Reduction Seduction of Other People’s Problems’, who have illustrated this point with a comparative example. The perspective is from an American lens, but the sentiment remains relevant: 

“Let’s pretend, for a moment, that you are a 22-year-old college student in Kampala, Uganda. You’re sitting in class and discreetly scrolling through Facebook on your phone. You see that there has been another mass shooting in America, this time in a place called San Bernardino. You’ve never heard of it. You’ve never been to America. But you’ve certainly heard a lot about gun violence in the U.S. It seems like a new mass shooting happens every week. 

You wonder if you could go there and get stricter gun legislation passed. You’d be a hero to the American people, a problem-solver, a lifesaver. How hard could it be? Maybe there’s a fellowship for high-minded people like you to go to America after college and train as social entrepreneurs. You could start the nonprofit organization that ends mass shootings, maybe even win a humanitarian award by the time you are 30. 

Sound hopelessly naïve? Maybe even a little deluded? It is. And yet, it’s not much different from how too many Americans think about social change in the “Global South.” 

If you asked a 22-year-old American about gun control in this country, she would probably tell you that it’s a lot more complicated than taking some workshops on social entrepreneurship and starting a non-profit. She might tell her counterpart from Kampala about the intractable nature of our legislative branch, the long history of gun culture in this country and its passionate defenders, the complexity of mental illness and its treatment. She would perhaps mention the added complication of agitating for change as an outsider. 

But if you ask that same 22-year-old American about some of the most pressing problems in a place like Uganda — rural hunger or girl’s secondary education or homophobia — she might see them as solvable. Maybe even easily solvable.” 

Ultimately, what this article is getting at is how volunteer programmes framed as ‘helping to save the world’ are not as simple as they appear, and that it’s very important to think about whether you are truly qualified to support such programmes or whether you are perpetuating a neocolonial stereotype that Westerners inherently possess superior knowledge than locals. Unless you possess a genuine understanding of the other country’s culture, history and background, then it is unlikely that you will know as much as those who live there about the problems they are facing.  

5. Is the programme harmful? 

There are some areas where we strongly discourage international volunteering, in line with the consensus worldwide. In particular, we do not endorse orphanage volunteering due to the ethical considerations behind it. Much research has found that this can be extremely harmful to children who are already traumatised from their experiences, and often companies profit from this. Furthermore, it is believed that over 80% of children living in orphanages have at least one living parent, with poverty being the main reason why they are in care. By volunteering in orphanages, it is highly likely that you are benefiting companies running orphanages services rather than the children and their families themselves, as many any ill-equipped to meet children’s needs. 

There is a great guide put together by Rethink Orphanages here. 

Some green flags from volunteer abroad opportunities to look out for are: 

• Requirement of some experience or skills for the role (e.g. teaching English language, or your subject) 
• The programme has a long-standing relationship with the community or was set up by them 
• The organisation has strong child protection policies in place  
• Local people are respected in marketing materials 
• There is quantified evidence of positive impact of the programmes 
• There is an impact report or an annual report with transparency on where money goes 

Organisations that we believe are ethical, sustainable, and designed with the service users (rather than the volunteers) in mind are:

• Meddeas - teaching English in Spanish schools, living with a host family for free
• Drapen i Havet - a Norwegian NGO working to improve living conditions of people living in refugee camps in Greece and Bosnia Herzegovina.  
• Archelon - the Sea Turtle Protection Society of Greece  
• Rewilding Apennines - supporting wildlife alongside Italian members of the European Rewilding Network to boost the rewilding movement in the country. 
• Gotoco - fully-funded Teaching English as a Foreign Language (TEFL) training programmes in Europe and Asia 
• Vocational Impact – international placements for students undertaking vocational degrees to utilise their skills abroad 
• Accounting for International Development - use your accounting expertise to build financial capacity of non-profits abroad 
• UN Volunteers – a combination of short-term remote and in-person volunteering opportunities based on skills and experience relating to the UN Sustainable Development Goals 

One final thing to consider 

It's important to consider that volunteering internationally doesn’t mean you have to travel abroad. There are countless ways to get involved in internationally focused projects, whether this involves volunteering remotely for an organisation in another country, or volunteering in the UK for a charity by working from home on a programme that they run internationally. Some great examples of this are: 

• The WONDER Foundation - empowering women and girls worldwide
• Teach a Man to Fish - supporting young people through enterprise
• Tanzania Development Trust - tackling poverty in Tanzania from the UK
• Translators Without Borders - helping people get vital information and be heard around the world
• CAFOD - Catholic Agency for Overseas Development
• Global Rahman Foundation - providing overseas relief 
• WaterAid UK - working to provide clean water and toilets around the world
• British Red Cross - providing emergency response in the UK
• Islamic Relief UK - Islamic humanitarian and development response