Transforming Volunteering in Development

The climate emergency, decolonisation, reduced aid budgets and the aftermath of the Covid-19 pandemic are challenging the ideas and practices of development organisations whose work has been structured around sending volunteering from the global North to the South. At the same time, there has been growing attention to the role of volunteers within their own communities, particularly in the global South, and innovations in the ways international volunteering is understood, structured and supported within and across global North and South.

This collaborative PhD between the International Forum for Volunteering in Development (Forum) and the Centre for Global Development at Northumbria University will develop research that explores the changing relationships between volunteering and development at this critical juncture. By analysing how organisations working with volunteers are responding to these challenges, the PhD will also contribute to wider academic debates around the present and future of humanitarian and development thinking and practice, including in relation to the roles of civil society organisations, ideas of knowledge and expertise, and understandings of agency and citizenship.

Through a collaborative approach between Forum and Northumbria University, the research will provide an opportunity to work closely with leading volunteering and development organisations, developing critical insight that will directly support policy and practice, as well as developing new conceptual knowledge of volunteering and development.

To find out more, please contact Janet Clark (PhD Researcher), Prof Matt Baillie Smith (Northumbria University) or James O'Brien (Forum).