War-time volunteering and population displacement: from spontaneous help to organised volunteering in post-2014 Ukraine

Abstract

The paper reveals the role of volunteering in support of internally displaced people in a context with no or few regulations regarding volunteering and when the state and international organisations cannot fulfil the demands for assistance. It argues that ‘pure’ characteristics of volunteering are not applicable in such a context. The paper contributes to the literature by combining the understanding of volunteering as a hybrid phenomenon and a process model of volunteering. Drawing on empirical studies conducted by the authors, the paper explores volunteering in Ukraine through the lens of its individual and situational nature. Volunteering manifested itself in spontaneous actions at the beginning of the war and displacement in 2014 as a reaction to urgent needs for evacuation and humanitarian help, and later in the work of NGOs established to provide further support to internally displaced people (IDPs). The developed volunteering practices have a high capacity to support the post-war reconstruction in Ukraine.