A workcamp is international volunteering, where groups of volunteers from different countries work and live together as a team on a short-term basis and for a not-for-profit cause, usually for one to three weeks. [1] [2] Workcamps are considered one of the most important types of international volunteering programs. [3] They were first introduced in 1920 as a way of bringing people together for increased international understanding and peace reconciliation efforts.
Workcamp volunteering commonly involves teams of 10–16 young people from multiple countries that live and work together while completing some form of work project. [4] Usually younger people from the ages of 18 on are the main participant group, but some organizations also havecamps for teenagers from the age of 15 or specifically for older people. [2] Workcamps typically do not require any special skills or qualifications for volunteers to participate. [1]
International volunteers are supposed to support local communities with their work. There are different types of work depending on the task to carry on, e.g. archaeology, restoration of monuments, environmental protection, community work. [2] While the work itself is an important part of the concept, they also usually to strengthen intercultural understanding, democractic awareness, to increase independence and self-reliance of participants and to increase their understanding of history and politics, with most organisations offering workcamps focusing on the aspect of intercultural understanding. Workcamps are supposed to reduce conflicts and prejudice between people from different national and social backgrounds. [3]
Prices oscillate depending on sending organisation, hosting country, modality and length of the stay. Participants usually must pay for their travel tickets, whereas the hosting organisation would pay for accommodation and meals. [2]
From 20 November 1920 to 21 April 1921, the first workcamp of Service Civil International took place in Northern France in order to reconstruct the village Esnes-en-Argonne, damaged in the Battle of Verdun in World War I. Behind this initiative was Swiss pacifist Pierre Cérésole, who came up with the idea at a peace conference in 1920 that was part of the Bilthoven Meetings. He saw this form of volunteering as a way to overcome nationalism and militarism. The English Quaker Hubert Parris, who had experience in organizing relief work, supported Ceresole in preparing the project. [5] [6]
In the middle of November 1920, Ceresole and Parris started building a shelter for the volunteers who would be arriving in December, among them several German volunteers who had been soldiers during World War I. During the winter months, the volunteers built several huts for the village. Already in January the working conditions deteriorated and the work of the volunteers became more demanding. The French government reduced the funds for the building materials and in March the prefect of Meuse forbade the mayor of Esnes from allocating work to the volunteers. The difficult political circumstances of that time when the negotiations concerning the German war reparations had just failed, were behind the prefect's decision. After this, the volunteers continued to help the farmers in the village and a neighbouring village put forward a new agricultural reconstruction project. Eventually, the local authorities demanded that the German volunteers would have to leave the area. The team finished its work in April 1921 and left Esnes-en-Argonne. [5]
Workcamps from the 1920s onwards became a way of responding to global and local humanitarian and crisis situations. [4] The biggest project took place, again organised by Cérésole and Service Civil International, in 1928 in Liechtenstein, where 720 volunteers from over 20 countries helped to reconstruct the country after a flood event. The experience in Liechtenstein and the enthusiasm of the volunteers became a model for future work camps, which from 1930 onwards were carried out in France, Great Britain and other countries. [5]
Until the 1950s, the concept of workcamps was mainly spread within Europe and many projects were focused on the reconstruction of the continent after World War II. [3] Service Civil International started branches in several countries, but also organisations like the Christian Movement for Peace (CMP) started adopting the concept of workcamps for example for post-war reconciliation between French and German Christians. Since the 1950s, workcamps have increasingly been organised also in Asia, Africa and Latin America, with a rise in projects especially since the 1990s.
In 1948, organisations from Western and Eastern Europe as well as the USA started the Coordinating Committee for International Work-Camps (CoCo), since 1965 Coordinating Committee for International Voluntary Service (CCIVS), at a workcamp conference organised at the UNESCO Headquarters in Paris. The organisation since then focuses on creating a stronger network between its member organisations and to have a stronger representation in international institutions. [7] [8]
Youth For Understanding (YFU) is an international educational exchange organization. A network of over 50 independent national organizations worldwide, YFU representatives work together to advance learning across cultures.
CISV International was founded in 1950 by Dr. Doris Twitchell Allen and aims to educate and inspire action for a more just and peaceful world.
Service Civil International (SCI) is an international peace organisation, founded by Swiss pacifist Pierre Cérésole in the aftermath of World War I to foster understanding and a culture of peace between people from different countries. Since 1920 SCI has organised international volunteering projects in the form of workcamps and has expanded to have branches in 40 countries, as well as partner organisations who help run the projects.
The European Solidarity Corps (ESC), known until 2016 as European Voluntary Service (EVS), is an international volunteering program by the European Commission for young people to go individually or in teams to another country, usually from one European country to another, to work for a non-profit cause. Since 2017, the program also offers opportunities for European youth to get engaged as volunteers in their own communities.
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Youth for Exchange and Understanding (YEU) is an International Non-Governmental Non-profit Youth Organisation established in 1986 and member of the European Youth Forum in Brussels. YEU is recognized by the Council of Europe and the Directorate of Youth and Sports of the European Commission. YEU has its Head Office in Brussels, Belgium and a second office in Faro, Portugal from where it coordinates a network with more than 27 member organisations from Europe and North Africa. YEU is a non-profit International Youth Non Governmental Organization (IYNGO) independent of all political affiliation.
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The Action Reconciliation Service for Peace is a German peace organization founded to confront the legacy of Nazism.
International Voluntary Services,Inc. (IVS) was a private, non-profit corporation for benevolent, charitable, and educational purposes chartered under the laws of the District of Columbia in 1953 to place volunteers in international humanitarian and development projects. From its founding until its dissolution in 2002, IVS placed volunteers in 39 countries in Asia, Africa, and Latin America. Its largest and longest programs were in South Vietnam, Laos, Algeria, and Bangladesh. Although the organization's roots were grounded in part in Christian pacifism, it operated on a nonsectarian basis, accepting volunteers regardless of their religious beliefs or nationality., Over its lifetime, the IVS program evolved from the placement of only American citizen volunteers to placement of internationally-recruited volunteers and then in later years to recruitment of local volunteers from within the country being assisted. Elements of the IVS program model have been adopted by the U.S. Peace Corps and many present day non-governmental organizations (NGOs). Sections below discuss the IVS program model, activities over time, and legacy.
European University Sports Association (EUSA) is an umbrella non-governmental (NGO) non-profit organisation, working in the field of university sport in Europe.
Pierre Cérésole or Ceresole was a Swiss pacifist, remembered for founding the peace organisation Service Civil International (SCI) and the international workcamp movement.
Model European Union Strasbourg (MEUS) is the original simulation of the European Union's legislative process organised by BETA France. It was initiated in the spring of 2007 by a group of university students and gathers around 180 young people from across Europe in the Seat of the European Parliament in Strasbourg, France annually.
International Voluntary Service (IVS), formerly International Voluntary Service for Peace (IVSP), is the British branch of the Service Civil International (SCI). Founded in 1931, IVS promotes peace through volunteering, both in the United Kingdom and other countries.
AFS Intercultural Programs is an international youth exchange organization. It consists of over 50 independent, not-for-profit organizations, each with its own network of volunteers, professionally staffed offices, volunteer board of directors and website. In 2015, 12,578 students traveled abroad on an AFS cultural exchange program, between 99 countries. The U.S.-based partner, AFS-USA, sends more than 1,100 U.S. students abroad and places international students with more than 2,300 U.S. families each year. As of 2022, more than 500,000 people have gone abroad with AFS and over 100,000 former AFS students live in the U.S.
VolTra is a voluntary non-governmental organization, registered as a charitable institution in Hong Kong. VolTra is dedicated to promoting international voluntary services in Hong Kong through a well-established worldwide network of international workcamp organizations. VolTra is an official member of CCIVS, which stands for Co-ordinating Committee for International Voluntary Service.
International volunteering is when volunteers contribute their time to work for organisations or causes outside their home countries. International volunteering has a long association with international development or environment, with the aim of bringing benefits to host communities.
Saint-Désir-de-Lisieux is a Second World War German military war grave cemetery, located close to the village of Saint-Désir and 4 km (2.5 mi) west of Lisieux in the Calvados department, Normandy, France. It is located adjacent to the British Saint-Désir War Cemetery and is unique as the two burial grounds are linked by a pathway. It is the smallest German war cemetery in Normandy and contains the remains of 3,735 German military personnel. The cemetery was created by the British Graves Registration Commission in August 1944 with British and German casualties buried in adjacent fields.
The Bilthoven Meetings were a series of networking and capacity building meetings of pacifist activists after World War I in the town of Bilthoven in the Netherlands. The activists gathered under the name of Movement Towards a Christian International, which was later renamed to International Fellowship of Reconciliation. The meetings took place at the house of Kees Boeke, a Quaker missionary and pacifist.
Hélène Monastier was a Swiss peace activist and teacher in Lausanne.