Do Good or Do Shots

Recently, a friend asked me if I wanted to go to a developing nation together to volunteer for a few weeks. When I asked what she had in mind, she said she wasn’t sure, but that it would be fun to explore the country and “make a difference.” Since I had never been there, I thought it sounded fascinating – yet I also couldn’t imagine trying to effect meaningful social change in a place where I have such little knowledge of the key social issues and hardly any familiarity with the culture.

To my surprise, my friend’s mindset seems to be a fairly common one within our generation. We feel we can justify taking expensive trips to seemingly exotic locales by “doing good” while we’re there – even if the balance between vacationing and volunteering is often nebulous, and if the actual social impact of volunteering for a few days is minimal. This trend is reflected in the proliferation of companies and organizations that promote “voluntourism,” a way for people to explore new places and simultaneously “help” the host country. On our own campus, numerous student groups organize service trips and conferences abroad, although the application processes for such trips sometimes emphasize the travel experience more than the social impact. In at least some cases it seems that the tangible social impact created by the trip is also unclear. To be sure, there are also many student groups that travel abroad to implement projects that are truly focused on creating social change with concrete, measurable outcomes. But I am questioning those who purport to make a difference – and, indeed, exalt the supposed social good they claim to effect – when the purpose of the trip is really to explore and enjoy an interesting new place.

“Voluntourism” is fundamentally incompatible with making a real social contribution. By definition, these trips take people to places they know little about, so that they can enjoy the new sights as tourists. It is naïve – and presumptuous – to think we can create positive social impact in places with which we have little or no cultural familiarity. As Uzodinma Iweala ’04 wrote in The Washington Post a few years ago, idealistic college students and others who travel to Africa with a mission of “bringing light to the dark continent” do more to affirm their own cultural superiority than actually to aid those in need. Along these lines, it would have been highly presumptuous of me to travel to an unfamiliar developing country and seek to offer something in a place where I hardly know the needs of the local population and where my cultural ignorance might hinder me from actually helping.

Additionally, volunteer vacations are typically too short to make a significant difference. Volunteering with third-world orphans for a week or two may be an inspiring and transformative experience for the volunteer, but such a transient stay is unlikely to make a lasting impact on those whom the trip purportedly helped. I learned this tough lesson from my own experience. Last summer I traveled to India, the country where I was born and spent numerous summers during my childhood, to work in a marginalized community of sex workers along with two fellow Harvard students. We each spent from three to eight weeks in the community and volunteered and played with the children there nearly every morning. Although we – and hopefully the children – enjoyed our time we probably did not create a lasting impact. More sustainable is the weekly volunteer program we set up in partnership with New Delhi college students who are able to serve as lasting role models for the children. Although the trip certainly was not voluntourism, as its purpose was neither to tour India nor solely to volunteer with the underprivileged children of sex workers, I think the relatively short duration of our time with the children makes it unlikely that we made a real difference in their lives.

Voluntourism can be a fun and interesting way to explore a new place. Such trips can help tourists learn about the world and gain a better understanding of how people in other cultures and social situations live. But the volunteering itself is highly unlikely to result in real social progress; in fact, perhaps the greatest benefit results from the tourist spending that stimulates local economies. If the primary goal were to effectively tackle critical social problems, the money paid for travel and accommodations on these trips could be better spent on existing organizations that are already doing great work in their own countries. When we volunteer in a foreign country for a few days, we shouldn’t deceive ourselves that we are effecting transformative social change.

Niharika S. Jain ’12 is a social studies concentrator in Dunster House. Her column appears on alternate Wednesdays.