There are people who are plenty valuable to ship to the site (MSF, say, indulges in the crazy custom of sending actual medical specialists, of the kind mostly-to-totally unavailable locally, and a few plane tickets costs rather less than a trip to med school); but ‘idealistic college kids, many not even studying subjects that first world economies would consider ‘vocational’’ probably don’t qualify.
Yes but doesn’t it strike you as a bit patronizing – to say nothing of imperialistic – to think that the mere presence of a well-meaning American is going to somehow help out the locals? The countries I traveled to in Central America had no shortage of college-educated people – many with degrees from the same universities as the Peace Corps volunteers.
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A recent book along these lines is “The Idealist: Jeffrey Sachs and the Quest to End Poverty” by Nina Munk. She appeared a few weeks ago on Econtalk.
That’s how I’ve always thought of the Peace Corps.
Unspoken takeaway is “It’s this, or, if you want, the other various US Corps”
But that’s only before my first coffee, after that I’m all “Peace Corps, yeah good for you Imma get a job”
I don’t know how effective it is at actually delivering them these days; but the Peace Corps, from its founding:
‘To promote world peace and friendship through a Peace Corps, which shall make available to interested countries and areas men and women of the United States qualified for service abroad and willing to serve, under conditions of hardship if necessary, to help the peoples of such countries and areas in meeting their needs for trained manpower.’
Has always been based on the premise that (A) it isn’t strictly a foreign-aid program, it’s also a cultural exchange/American PR thing, and that (B) its objective is to provide ‘qualified’ people to ‘interested’ countries.
My impression is that, if only because of the volunteer pool, the Peace Corps’ ability to get you anyone with serious skills, much less a coordinated group of them, may not be so hot, leaving it with a mixture of inertia and fluffy-cultural-diplomacy objectives; but not even its founders though that mere Superior Americanness was enough to make people useful for development and aid purposes.
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FYI: buying and shipping pregnant heifers from Australia to China (by air) costs about USD3,500 per head (based on a plane load of 225 heifers). Add some more if you ship to China in winter and need to deice.
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There are good foreign aid programs… there could even be good voluntourism programs.
This ridiculous racist sexist bullshit about little white girls like her is just manipulative ad copy. She’s finally doing aid right… by employing nothing but local workers… thats her competitive advantage over all the other foreign aid charities.
But she somehow participated in a bunch of ridiculous tourist trap crap.
Which, unsurprisingly, is the only type of foreign aid charity she mentions.
What about Oxfam, or Mercy Corps, or many of the other highly skilled, professional, accountable, and transparent foreign aid charities?
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Yes, but why does that require the pretense that those people are doing valuable work while they are there? Why couldn’t you treat it as part of a modern-day grand tour?
Depends on how you look at it. MSF has been in Haiti since 1991, and cholera has been a persistent problem there. I’m not sure that the issue of cholera has been best served by having a team of foreign doctors treat the problem on a long-term basis. This long-term dependency doesn’t seem like a sustainable or desirable result to me, especially since very little of what MSF does appears to be aimed at training locals or building local capacity, while at the same time creating tremendous moral hazard for the government.
Laying bricks, even incorrectly, is not fun. In fact, it sucks, particularly in heat.
Even if in some cases overseas volunteers are adding a questionable amount of value, it isn’t comparable with a self-indulgent luxury cruise, i.e. where people “see” Mexico without getting off a city-sized boat. (This is what comes to mind when you say “modern-day grand tour.”)
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Lots of things suck, but we don’t pretend that they’re all aid.
I was think more along the lines of young people who, or rather whose families, can afford to take some time off to travel and engage in activities that are prestigious in their respective societies. They do so to better themselves as persons and get some exposure to the wider world and because the whole thing looks good on a resume.
MSF are good. I’ve started giving to them instead of the legion on rememberance day.
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I would have less of a problem with voluntourism if it were marketed more accurately. If you go to volunteer for a week in another country with unfamiliar circumstances and language without specific skills and honestly think you will make any positive difference beyond providing some moral support, you are either being mislead or misleading yourself. On the other hand, if you go with the knowledge that this trip in itself is of no great value to the people you’re visiting, it could be of value as a way to open your eyes to the world outside your own borders. It can lead to more involvement through donations or longer term and more informed action. If you are representing a group, going as one person could lead to a lot more exposure than if it’s your personal holiday without the involvement of a network of people in your own country.
A big factor is that as social animals, it’s often difficult to picture other people’s needs without knowing anything about them personally. Forming links between communities across the globe can be a powerful force in providing the support that is needed. Send people over there who have relevant skills, and if possible bring some people the other way, too. Make sure anything you do is for the benefit of the people you’re working with, and make sure you listen to what they have to say. The important thing in all of this is that we are disabused of the idea that the trip itself or the ‘awareness’ that it brings are ends in themselves.
A few people have mentioned some beneficial organisations, so I’d like to plug Translators Without Borders. It’s not associated with MSF, but it supports groups like it by providing translation services for free. I do some work for them when I can, and find it a more practical way to give my time/money than actually visiting the places myself.
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FWIW, an independent contractor who worked for me (and several others…I didn’t drive her to this, I swear!) decided to finally live her dream and join the Peace Corps. She was nearing 50 at the time. She learned as part of the process that older volunteers with financial experience were routinely sent to former Soviet countries to help them learn how capitalism works. So there is some measure of matching skills to the country/job.
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I have friends in a similar program to MSF, and they have returned to the same hospital for decades now, as have most of the other doctors and nurses in the program.
Yeah, my mom (who had various business-related careers) spent some time in Bulgaria in the early 1990s as part of USAID (an agency which specially focuses on economic development) and was around 50 at the time as well.
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I would say that indulging your great white savior complex is actually at least as indulgent as a luxury cruise.
Please explain to me like I’m five why this statement isn’t racist.
I’m not clear who you think I’m being racist towards, here. If you interpret that as racist towards non-whites, I should point out that that particular term wasn’t coined by white people: http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2012/03/the-white-savior-industrial-complex/254843/
If you think I’m being racist towards whites, all I can say is that I’m pretty lily-white and waspy myself, I’m in no way ashamed of it, and the statement is in no way directed towards all white people, only the ones that fit that particular stereotype. If the shoe fits…
