RT Article
T1 Managing unruliness: the (anti-)politics of volunteer management practices in faith-based organizations
JF Journal of religion in Africa
VO 49
IS 3/4
SP 403
OP 427
A1 Kirsch, Thomas G. 1966-
LA English
YR 2019
UL https://ixtheo.de/Record/1759384569
AB Based on an ethnographic analysis of volunteer management practices in faith-based organizations in Zambia, this article outlines the dilemmas that these organizations face when deploying volunteers. Due to financial constraints, most of these organizations have to rely on voluntary work from local residents in order to realize their goals. I show that when the volunteers’ work is concerned with social problems that are deemed to be controversial, faith-based organizations are at pains to demonstrate that their aims and activities should be categorized as ‘social work’ or ‘humanitarian assistance’, and not as activist (party) political engagement. Yet since volunteers are only loosely linked to these organizations in respect to their formal status, in practice they have a great deal of leeway in how issues are handled. This means that some of them use their commitment to volunteering to pursue their own political agendas. The article explores the strategies that faith-based organizations use to navigate the challenges that this kind of ‘partisan volunteering’ pose.
NO Literaturverzeichnis: Seite 423-426, Literaturhinweise
K1 Kirche
K1 Ehrenamtliche Tätigkeit
K1 Politisches Verhalten
K1 Sozialverhalten
K1 Politische Mobilisierung
K1 Politisierung
K1 Zambia
K1 Christianity
K1 faith-based organizations
K1 Activism
K1 volunteer management practices
K1 Sambia
DO 10.1163/15700666-12340174