The Voluntary Sector

The voluntary sector

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Volunteering refers to an act of expressing an individual’s involvement in his/her community. As the most basic expression of human behaviour, volunteering arises out of ancient traditions of sharing and reciprocal exchanges. In most cases, volunteering within ancient traditional schemes involves cooperation within a social group such as a family unit, community level, or a geographical area. This traditional form of voluntarism, for example in the Arab world, voluntarism is associated with aiding people in difficult times or celebrations and is considered as a religious duty and charitable work. The foundations of voluntarism are reinforced by relationships with the potential to augment the well-being of individuals and communities. Values such as social cohesion and trust thrive in the prevalence of volunteering (Eliasoph, 2013).

The contemporary perception of volunteering generally shows that the nature of services offered by volunteering organizations are very valuable for society. In Australia for example, the people have a positive view of volunteering which is similar to countries such as the UK, Scotland, and Ireland. This is attributed to their similar Anglo-Celtic backgrounds. Some cultures today also view volunteering as a form of slavery such as the Serbian culture. They argue that volunteering takes advantage of people by getting them to work for no wages. Serbians view it as an unacceptable practice. This is also similar to the Macedonians who believe that their attention should be centred on their own families. Choosing to focus on giving help outside their immediate family creates discomfort among the people (Paul Dekker, 2012).

This distinct characteristic of the Serbians, Macedonians, and Middle Eastern countries is due to their culture of a family orientations with less western influence. The different...