This thesis is divided into two parts that draw on two levels of analysis. The first part of the thesis provides macro-level analysis tracking the evolution of several trajectories that have culminated in the volunteer tourism product we see today. Understanding this ‘product of our time’ from historical and globalised contexts reveals a complex picture of volunteer tourism and provides a position from which to undertake the second level of analysis in Part Two, that of a micro-level examination within the NGO sector. This part of the study draws on three case studies based on empirical work undertaken with development NGOs who are offering volunteer tourism experiences in India and Nepal.
The thesis discussion is organised into seven chapters. Part One of the thesis contains the first five chapters that incorporate the key themes drawn from my examination of the volunteer tourism marketing as outlined above. These themes guide discussions and offer a useful framework to examine the various trajectories of volunteer tourism. The examination contained in Part One provides important insights in to the internal and external forces that influence the actions of volunteer tourists. The results of which must be contended with by the local NGO when facilitating a volunteer tourism experience. Part One, therefore provides context for the examination of the NGO experience of volunteer tourism in Part Two.
Chapter One adopts the theme of ‘the helping experience’, which covers societal trends that have influenced, and are influencing, people’s decision to assist others through volunteer tourism. The chapter places volunteer tourism within a historical framework and unravels the historical legacies of colonial practice and the post-World War II era to reveal how the attitudes of today’s volunteer tourists have been shaped by the past. It is important to understand how history has left an imprint. In their pursuit of a helping experience,
volunteer tourists perpetuate the ideal that outside intervention is needed to initiate change. They believe that they are ‘doing good’.
Chapter Two draws on the message contained in volunteer tourism marketing that volunteer tourism can ‘make a difference’, a message implying that volunteer tourists can contribute towards the development of poor ‘Third World’ communities. This chapter examines the complexity of development and how meeting community needs is not an easy task. It is argued that despite this, individuals are being inspired to commit to the ‘cause’ of development, including via volunteer tourism. This is largely because of the popularisation of development through mass media and celebrity opinion, which has created a space in which it is assumed that anybody can ‘do’ development.
Chapter Three situates volunteer tourism in the global age and examines how societal changes have created conditions ripe for wealthy westerners to seek engagement in volunteer tourism projects. The changes that have occurred in the Higher Education sector provide an example of where young people must now look beyond traditional means of identity formation. In today’s globalised, competitive environment, individuals must often look beyond a graduate degree to enhance their profile in order to ‘stand out from the crowd’. It is argued that volunteer tourism is fulfilling this role by enhancing the ‘skill set’ and curriculum vitae of individuals. It is offering, as the marketing claims, a ‘transforming’ experience. This is often via the increasingly popular and structured gap year.
Chapter Four focuses on how tourism has evolved to keep pace with societal demands and changing tastes in a globalised world. It argues that tourism in developing countries has evolved in a comparable way to that of development, whereby the imperative has moved beyond economics to also account for social, cultural and environmental perspectives. Volunteer tourism is one tourism product that has evolved to meet the changing demands and
peoples’ desire for the ‘adventurous and challenging’ and ‘local and authentic’ experience. Chapter Four also discusses the position of NGOs in tourism and contends that volunteer tourism can be placed in the field of development because the local NGO is the common volunteer tourism conduit between tourist and host.
Chapter Five reviews the existing literature relating to volunteer tourism. Several areas of neglect are identified from an analysis of the current areas of research and the related debates in volunteer tourism. It is argued that the volunteer tourism research to date has been predominantly volunteer-centric leaving many questions about the phenomenon unanswered. The premise that volunteer tourism provides the means to help communities, as implied in its marketing, has gone largely unquestioned. The portrayal of volunteer tourism in the literature is overwhelmingly positive, based largely on anecdotal evidence or the volunteer tourist perspective. The literature currently fails to acknowledge the complicated web of stakeholders in the volunteer tourism mix and, as a consequence, an informed response to whether volunteer tourism is beneficial overall cannot be made. The research gaps make the volunteer tourism product vulnerable to criticism. One of the gaps identified, the voice of the local NGO stakeholder, provided the framework of the field study conducted for this thesis.
The second part of this thesis draws upon the arguments put forward in Part One and examines them through the eyes of one NGO located in India and two NGOs in Nepal. Empirical work conducted with these three NGOs provides important insights into how volunteer tourism functions alongside the work of a local NGO. The first chapter in Part Two (Chapter Six) details the considerations taken and the methodology employed to progress the research in relation to the empirical study of the local NGO stakeholder undertaken for this thesis. This chapter deals with the intricacies of fieldwork and the difficulties that had to be overcome to allow data collection to take place. The unsettled and transient nature of volunteer tourism predicated
methodologies that would allow flexibility in the field. Inquiry, therefore, employed a critical theory paradigm via case studies that provided the means to unravel the complexities within volunteer tourism relationships and identify how power works in the interconnected stakeholder dependencies. The second part of Chapter Six examines the NGOs involved in the empirical study, as well as the political and social contexts in which they operate. It is important to understand these contexts in order to explain why and how they operate in relation to the state and existing power positions, before placing them in the field of volunteer tourism, which is covered in Chapter Seven. Chapter Seven argues that volunteer tourism is a complex phenomenon involving several stakeholders with competing expectations and needs, as well as interconnected dependencies. These complexities are brought to light in a discussion of the evidence collated during the empirical study. Drawing on the experiences of the three NGOs involved in the research, as well as the stakeholders connected to them, analysis reveals that NGOs struggle to balance the various demands upon their time and resources but, particularly, managing the demands resulting from the provision of volunteer tourism. Moving volunteer tourism away from tourism discourse and placing it within the context of development allows a shift in focus to reveal that the transformative outcomes promised in the volunteer tourism marketing fall short of expectations.