Marching with the volunteers

Abstract

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to examine the role of volunteers and its impact on related accountability practices towards beneficiaries by a large humanitarian non-governmental organisation (NGO) in Indonesia. Design/methodology/approach The authors adopted a qualitative case study design. The empirical evidence comes from rich fieldwork carried out in an Indonesian NGO. The authors collected the evidence mainly via 46 interviews and five focus groups. Findings The authors found that the case NGO drew heavily on the social and cultural capitals of volunteers in the process of serving its beneficiaries, which, in turn, facilitated the enhancement of its accountability to the beneficiaries. The authors also found that volunteers play a bridging role to reduce the distance between NGOs and beneficiaries. Research limitations/implications For NGO managers, this study provides necessary empirical evidence on the positive role played by the volunteers in the development and operationalisation of accountability to the beneficiaries. In the authors’ case, beneficiary accountability is enhanced by the social conduct and practices performed by the NGO’s numerous volunteers. Beneficiary accountability is of significant concern to the policy makers too. This study shows that volunteers and NGO can work in a reciprocal relationship where social and cultural capital can be mobilised to each other’s advantage. To facilitate beneficiary accountability, NGOs can draw on the socio-cultural capitals held by the volunteers who appear to share the same norms and expectations with the beneficiaries. This process can also lead to the building of social and cultural capital by the volunteers themselves as they achieve great satisfaction and gain valuable experience in this process that could lead to greater satisfaction in their spiritual and material lives. Originality/value The authors extend the previous literature on beneficiary accountability by highlighting the under-researched role of volunteers in such accountability practices. In this paper, the authors first discuss the facilitating role of volunteers in enhancing NGOs’ accountability towards beneficiaries. Then, this is illustrated empirically. In addition, the authors argue that although Bourdieusian concepts like field and capital have been widely used in the analysis of various organisational practices the concept of habitus received limited attention particularly from the context of developing countries. The authors undertake an examination of the habitus of volunteers in the Indonesian case organisation and explore their linkages with the field and associated capitals.

Accounting for stakeholder engagement in developing countries: proposing an engagement system to respond to sustainability demands

“…Some studies have been conducted on how and why DSS accountability should be practised by NGOs (Dewi et al, 2019a(Dewi et al, , 2019b. One of such studies is focused on Uganda NGOs and it investigates how accountability is discharged by local NGOs to the communities they serve (Awio et al, 2011).…”

“…We note that NGOs' internal mechanism pays more attention to short-term results and outcomes while engagement of DSS is sometimes symbolic (Dewi et al, 2019b) and not aimed at entrenching DSS independence. To close this gap, NGOs are expected to balance accountability and avoid action that privileges accountability to stakeholders seen as more economically powerful (Dewi et al, 2019a(Dewi et al, , 2019bKingston et al, 2020;Kuruppu and Lodhia, 2019;Tanima et al, 2020).…”

“…However, literature shows that there is a growing concern for a more downward-driven accountability (see e.g. Cazenave and Morales, 2021;Dewi et al, 2019aDewi et al, , 2019bGoddard, 2020;Kingston et al, 2020;Kuruppu and Lodhia, 2020;O'Leary, 2017) to ensure that deliverables of the NGOs are yielding the desired result by meeting the needs of service recipients, leading to downward accountability. Similarly, Dewi et al (2019b) argue that enhanced stakeholder engagement is a necessity for NGO programs to have impact on the lives of service recipients.…”

Volunteer community service providers during the COVID‐19 crisis response in China: What are their personal needs and how to respond?

“…When VCSPs engage in their professional occupations and provide community service, they could be said to be realizing their potential (Dewi et al, 2019). However, to improve their self‐actualization needs, the VCSPs needed to improve their competencies to better perform their PPC activities (Blomquist et al, 2018).…”

Motivation for and Effect of Cooking Class Participation: A Cross-Sectional Study Following the 2011 Great East Japan Earthquake and Tsunami

“…Decades of studies have produced well-documented evidence from food diaries, revealing the social facilitation of eating [ 17 , 18 , 19 ]. However, the intentions of volunteers and aids do not always match the needs of beneficiaries [ 20 ]. Limited studies have examined the kinds of post-disaster dining activities or eating supports that have motivated the survivors in the past, including the results of current eating support interventions [ 21 , 22 , 23 ].…”