Overseas Volunteerism—The Right Time?

Efforts are being made to create new U.S. overseas volunteer programs. Here’s information on two of
them, which we present without endorsement. A response
from FOC colleague Jerry Norris follows.
--Editor

U.S. Senator Russ Feingold is introducing legislation
to provide more Americans with the opportunity
to volunteer overseas and strengthen our
existing international education and exchange system.
The Global Service Fellowship Program Act reduces
financial barriers by awarding fellowships that
can be applied towards programmatic costs including
airfare, housing, or program costs. Feingold’s bill
also allows potential volunteers flexibility in the
amount of time they serve. Feingold, a long-time
member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee,
said, “People-to-people engagement is one of
the United States’ most effective public diplomacy
tools and, today more than ever, we need to be investing
in every opportunity to improve the perception
of the U.S. overseas.”

In a separate initiative, American World Service
Corps proposes to send U.S. volunteers abroad
under the umbrella of overseas organizations.
AWSC is the vision of Dwayne Hunn, RPCV-India
65-67, now Executive Director of The People’s
Lobby Inc., a non-profit group for citizen-initiated
legislative proposals. AWSC would send a group of
Americans “to expand the work of peace here and
abroad.” Hunn envisions placing one million volunteers
within seven years after his program is
launched. He proposes they be administered by
Peace Corps, Americorps, Red Cross, Habitat for
Humanity, Doctors Without Borders and Oxfam
America. These organizations have yet to sign on.

Hunn believes those who serve will have an opportunity
for a solid, real-life education while gaining
self-respect and bolstering the respect for our
country that has eroded in recent years. There
would be a ready supply of volunteers to respond
to hurricanes, floods and other disasters, natural or
man-made. AWSC would offer substantial financial
or educational compensation for two years of service.
See www.WorldServiceCorps.us.

From Jerry Norris, RPCV-Colombia:

I believe many of us who served during the
1960s retain a very fond memory of that time and
place in our nation's history. Less well-known is the
fact that programming volunteers into the field was
then and remains now a serious problem. About 10
years ago, the Congress gave PC sufficient funds to
double its size. It was unable to do so. Its size has remained
rather constant at 7,500 or so, without any
public figures having been released about the high
number of early returnees.

The world has turned over many times since the
1960s. The assumption that countries want now
what they wanted then is fallacious. They are deluged
with foreign consultants sopping up their resources.

A recent report from the OECD documented the fact that there were 740 aid workers in Cambodia assigned to the Millennium Development Goals. Their cost was equal to the 166,000 civil servants on the government's payroll.

At Peace Corps’ height in 1968, we were only
able to get 15,400 into the field; then it went
downhill and never recovered. When I travel
abroad I see many volunteers, but unfortunately,
far too many of them end up being assigned to
work with PVOs such as Africare and Project Concern.
This is the state of programming today.
A daughter of my former PC partner recently
went to Central America as a volunteer. She soon
found out that those she was assigned to work with
as counterparts all wanted to know how to get to
America. Most of the young adults in her village are
unemployed. She got the feeling that when they
looked at her they were thinking, why are you here
when I want to be where you came from?

The world has changed and we need to change
with it. Otherwise, we remember more from nostalgia
than accuracy the reasons why the Peace
Corps worked in the 1960s.

Do you have an opinion on this issue? Write
editor@friendsofcolombia.org.