Peace Corps Research Articles

The Albert Nekimken Turkish Theater Collection: Censorship, Contentious Politics, and the Cold War Stage

Turkish political theater of the 1960s-1970s was a genre that galvanized both its intellectual proponents and drew the ire of state authorities. Deeply marked by the work of Bertolt Brecht produced some half a century earlier, the stage became an important setting where the broader violence between far-left groups, far-right groups, and the government was recast in literary form. During his doctoral research on the influence of German Marxism on Turkish political theater, former U.S. Peace Corps volunteer Albert Nekimken collected plays, works of theatrical criticism, periodicals, short stories, novels, and rare recordings of performances, among other materials. The Albert Nekimken Turkish Theater Collection, primarily composed of Nekimken’s research materials, began to grow as playwrights, intellectuals, and others contributed interviews or gifted materials to the young scholar in the mid-to-late 1970s. These works were acquired by Nekimken at a time of rampant political censorship and ntellectual persecution–exemplified by the fact that many of the publications and performances in the collection were banned or subject to great censorship by the Turkish government. Among the works in the collection are those by well-known writers such as Orhan Asena, Engin Cezzar, Güngör Dilmen, Muhsin Ertuğrul, Nâzım Hikmet, Orhan Kemal, Aziz Nesin, and Haldun Taner. This newly described and processed collection held in the Booth Family Center for Special Collections at Georgetown University offers new directions to students and scholars of political theater, the history of Modern Turkey, Turkish-German literary exchanges, and intellectual histories of the Cold War. The collection also gives educators hoping to bring primary sources into the classroom new pedagogical tools to explore histories of censorship, erasure, and contentious politics.

THE CULTURAL UNCONSCIOUS OF PETER HESSLER AS A PEACE CORPS VOLUNTEER TEACHER IN RIVER TOWN

This article investigates the influence of the Peace Corps’ salient ideology in Peter Hessler’s works focusing on modern China. As a volunteer of the third cohort of the Peace Corps in China, Hessler served in Sichuan province from 1996 to 1998. We argue that the ideological overtones of the Peace Corps programme significantly influence his representation of China and use his memoir River Town as an example. Applying the concepts of the cultural unconscious by Ming Dong Gu, as well as decoloniality, colonial matrix of power and border thinking by Walter Mignolo and Catherine Walsh, we show how Hessler’s various actions in the memoir match the mission of the Peace Corps consciously and unconsciously. However, we also show that the narrative emits decoloniality through border thinking as Hessler eventually understands China and its different political culture and proceeds to recognise the shortcomings of American politics. While many enthusiasts of Hessler perceive his writings as challenging the dominant negative view of China in the Western mainstream media, we conclude that, from the perspective of the cultural unconscious, the Peace Corps volunteer’s objective to spread American values far outweighed the Peace Corps’ other mission of achieving a better understanding of other peoples on the part of the Americans.

Atividades do corpo da paz nas grandes cidades da China: uma exceção à filosofia diplomática americana?

Abstract: The Peace Corps program was once considered an unconventional approach to American diplomacy centered on pragmatic philosophy. The iniciative of Peace Corps in China was perceived as an extraordinary endeavor, yet it has been effectively operating in China for nearly thirty years. The volunteers involved in the program have been instrumental in promoting people-to-people exchanges between the United States and China, drawing from their experiences in cultural immersion. The creation of the “U.S.-China Friendship Volunteers” path was intended to improve bilateral relations between the two nations. Despite opposition from the U.S. Congress, the Peace Corps has not surpassed the foreign policy of the Untied States. However, when the Peace Corps program goes against the policy between the United States and China , it has to end its development in China. This contradicts the claimed political neutrality of the Peace Corps. Throughout the “U.S.-China Friendship Volunteers” program, most volunteers have worked in universities in large cities. Consequently, the cultural adaptation environment for Peace Corps volunteers in China is unique. They are presented with more challenging cultural differences, with relatively lower acculturation stress in their material life. The Peace Corps enables most volunteers to bolster cultural exchanges between China and the United States through active cultural learning support. The development of the Peace Corps project in China reveals no fundamental distinction between its activities in China and other countries. Hence, the “U.S.-China Friendship Volunteers” program of the Peace Corps is not an exception to the pragmatic diplomatic philosophy of the United States.

Regaining the path to malaria elimination: Lessons from the pandemic.

The stagnation in malaria elimination efforts can be attributed to several contributing reasons: large populations displaced by conflict and severe weather, insecticide and drug resistance, competing priorities with COVID-19 and Ebola. Part of the problem may also be us and our pre-pandemic systems. The accelerated response to the COVID-19 emergency carries lessons for global efforts against the 'other emergency', malaria. Michael has worked in vector control since 1977, beginning with Peace Corps in the Sabah (E. Malaysia) MCP. He earned an Sc.D. from Johns Hopkins researching malaria transmission in Pakistan; lived in Burma, Thailand, Cambodia and Zambia with stints in the US and Geneva supporting programmes throughout Africa and Asia, working for Johns Hopkins and Boston Universities, USAID, WFP, UNHCR, WHO, IVCC and NGOs involved in public health entomology and vector control in Africa and Asia.

Who were the US Peace Corps Volunteers and where did they serve?

Who were the US Peace Corps Volunteers and where did they serve?

ОРГАНІЗАЦІЙНА КУЛЬТУРА КЕРІВНИКА ЯК ВАЖЛИВИЙ ЧИННИК УПРАВЛІННЯ ЗЗСО (НА ПРИКЛАДІ ДІЯЛЬНОСТІ ЕКСДИРЕКТОРКИ ДОВЖОЦЬКОГО ЛІЦЕЮ КАМ’ЯНЕЦЬ-ПОДІЛЬСЬКОЇ МІСЬКОЇ РАДИ МАДИЧ ГАЛИНИ ГРИГОРІВНИ)

The article highlights the characteristic features of the management activity of the ex-director of the Dovzhok Lyceum of the Kamianets-Podilskyi City Council – Galina Hryhorivna Madych, a Methodist teacher, an excellent student of education in Ukraine. Attention is focused on the features of Halyna Madych’s interaction with pedagogical, student and parent groups.During the management of the educational institution, Halyna Madych ensured systematic intra-school control over the productivity of teaching activities and the me-thodical level of teachers. The School of Mentors was operating in the Dovzhok NEC, a branch of the Small Academy of Sciences of Ukraine was organized, and the “Peace Corps” program was implemented within the framework of the agreement between the Government of Ukraine and the Government of the United States.In 1999, the Dovzhok school was reorganized into a collegium, and later – into the GSE «secondary school of I-III degrees, collegium» with a philological and cul-tural-aesthetic direction. Also, on the basis of the school, the Dovzhok educational association was created – a school educational district, aimed to ensure equal access to specialized education for children in rural educational institutions.Due attention was paid to the spiritual education of students. The teaching of the optional course «Christian ethics» was introduced, the «Ukrainian spiritual music» circle was active. Every year, the students of the school took an active part in all-school folklore holidays, charity fairs, and excursions to spiritual centers of Ukraine.Halyna Madych enabled teachers to develop new approaches to the organization of the educational process, develop original programs, conduct pedagogical experi-ments on the basis of the educational institution. She created conditions for the unity of the pedagogical, student and parent team. She regularly held school-wide parent meetings, concerts of amateur artists.Characteristic features of Galina Madych’s managerial activity were democracy, demandingness, honesty, frankness, diplomacy, openness to new things, creative and humanistic orientation, innovative potential.The director of the Dovzhok secondary school of I-III degrees, collegium aimed her work at achieving compliance of the school’s activities with the requirements of the education standard, reforming the school, introducing advanced innovative tech-nologies, meeting the teachers’ need for self-expression, creating a favorable social and psychological climate in the teaching staff .The head teacher assigned an important role to work with parents, extracurricular work, education of students, creation of appropriate conditions for the development of student self-government.

My Experience Building a Water System in a Small Rural Community in the Dominican Republic

Clean water is vital for physical, social, and mental health, however, water insecurity is a public health threat for many countries. Sabana Larga is a rural community made up of approximately 230 families located in the province of Dajabon on the Northwest region of the Dominican Republic. Building a new water system has been a priority for the community for many years, however the reason for the delay in the process is the lack of funds and assistance in building such a water system. In 2016, as a Peace Corps volunteer living in the community, I asked the Saint Cloud Rotary club for financial support to build a new water system. The objective of this paper is to share my experience of building a water system in a rural community in the Dominican Republic with the Saint Cloud Rotary Club, the Dajabon Rotary Club, local engineers, and the local community. Between April 2017 and June 2017, the new water system in Sabana Larga was successfully implemented. The water system improved access to clean and safe drinking water for all families, leading to a healthier community and better quality of life. Many lessons were learned throughout the process including the importance of community involvement, understanding local customs and traditions, establishing a Water Committee, and gaining various skills.

Lawsuit: Peace Corps denies assignments over outdated mental health concerns

The Peace Corps has used fear‐based and speculative standards and ignored sound medical advice in denying volunteer assignments to numerous individuals with mental health disabilities, according to a federal class‐action complaint filed in Washington, D.C., late last month.

Conservation biology and conservation paleobiology meet the Anthropocene together: history matters

As a species, we have reached a tipping point for Earth derived from our unsustainable resource use. While conservation efforts occurred early in human civilization, it was not until 1980 that the full force of environmental destruction, including the Santa Barbara oil spill in the 1970s, culminated in the new discipline of conservation biology focused on the biosphere. Similarly, conservation paleobiology, named two decades later, brings the unique perspective of the fossil record to conservation efforts, uniting biosphere and geosphere scientists. To date, conservation history does not include paleontological or geological perspectives. Further, each discipline has a different benchmark—near time—for when Earth’s ecosystems were modified by humans. Accordingly, the history of conservation efforts leading up to conservation biology and conservation paleobiology was examined from a geological and ecological framework. To provide a benchmark for near time, the hominin record and their geo-environmental modifications were also examined and revealed that by the start of the Holocene, all continents except ice-covered Antarctica and Greenland had human-modified ecosystems. Therefore, near time is dispensable when the Holocene Epoch is universally understood and precisely defined as a time when H. sapiens dominated environments. Lastly, a conservation corps is urgently needed, following the long tradition of F.D. R.’s Civilian Conservation Corps of the 1930s and J.F. Kennedy’s Peace Corps of the 1960s, to promote a global network connecting all students and practitioners of conservation disciplines to focus on biotic resilience, recovery, and solutions for the world’s most pressing environmental problems.

The Interpersonal and the International: Development, Volunteering and Grassroots Diplomacy in the 1960s

This article examines the vexed nature of grassroots diplomacy by tracing the experiences and management of volunteers working in Asia and Africa with Britain’s Voluntary Service Overseas (VSO) and the United States Peace Corps during the 1960s. Development volunteering blurred the divide between individual bodies and the body politic and rendered the interpersonal relationships of otherwise ordinary individuals into a form of diplomatic encounter. In theory, grassroots diplomacy encouraged positive cross-cultural encounters and overt displays of international friendship. In practice, however, grassroots diplomacy also provided a space for ongoing international tensions around race, development, and neocolonialism to be contested. This article argues that the quotidian behaviour of Western volunteers provided a site of rupture through which alternative discourses and political positions could be advanced, especially by activists in Africa and Asia without access to conventional diplomatic channels. Although grassroots diplomacy was a celebrated ideal in the context of the Cold War and decolonisation, in practice non-elite agency in international relations came to be increasingly regulated by states and non-governmental organisations concerned with defending their nation’s reputation. It could also have serious impacts for individuals whose personal lives were derailed by international incidents.

Latin American Participation in the Olympics

In Olympismo: The Olympic Movement in the Making of Latin America and the Caribbean (2020), editors Sotomayor and Torres suggest that studying the Olympic Movement in Latin America is a way to explore the creation of their societies. but there are few publications examining how Latin American scholars consider their Olympic experience. Reviewing the growth of Olympic sports in Colombia provides a good test of this thesis. This study traces the development of Colombia’s involvement in sport from 1930 to 2022. We see that by competing in national and other western-hemisphere events, Colombian athletes have improved their performances; that the national government, supported by programs offered by the United Nations and the US Peace Corps, has encouraged sport development in education; that grassroots activities, such as boxing and cycling, have produced world-class athletes; and that women and Afro-Colombians have become celebrated competitors. From the vantage point of 2023, there is evidence that the desire to win Olympic medals has inspired positive social change and elevated and diversified athletic participation in Colombia.

Touched and Changed: Self-Reflexivity and Reciprocity in Fieldwork

Touched and Changed: Self-Reflexivity and Reciprocity in Fieldwork

The struggle for water in rural Paraguay: a ‘perverse confluence’ analysis of subversive participation

In March 1999, the people of Paraguay found themselves at an historical crossroads. At the national level and in rural communities, the legacy of the 35-year Stroessner dictatorship continued to limit the ability of democratic actors to make social and political change in the country. The old one-party rule of the Colorados confronted by international and local pressure for transformation, led to a political crisis that challenged both neoliberal development policies and the lingering authoritarian populism of the dictatorship. This essay explores a municipal infrastructure and water project sponsored by the Paraguayan government, the Peace Corps and the Inter-American Development Bank, in which the joint effort revealed tensions between emergent forms of democratisation and the goals of campesinos and their allies in the Catholic Church. Struggles for improved quality of life through infrastructure development intertwined with neoliberal modes of governance and efforts to overcome years of local authoritarian rule. Local communities sought a more active role in governing their affairs, which led to the successful implementation of Juntas de Saneamiento or ‘sanitation councils’.

Peace Corps Networks: Activating Volunteers for a Lifetime

The United States Peace Corps plays an important role in sustainable development and soft diplomacy across the globe through its vast network of cross-national partnerships and personal relationships. Peace Corps volunteers are trained to serve as catalysts for grassroots development, bolstering community initiatives with their network of expertise and resources. While personal connections between volunteers and their communities can sometimes last beyond a volunteer's service, the web of connections created through Peace Corps service has a long-term impact on both volunteers and host communities. The grassroots, "people-investing-in-people" nature of the Peace Corps creates an agile network that can respond both to acute crises and long-term challenges. This article explores the formation and impact of these Peace Corps networks and argues that ongoing investment in the Peace Corps and its global response initiatives is an investment in a more peaceful future.

We Write to You About Africa curated by Laura De Becker and Ozi Uduma; Wish You Were Here: African Art and Restitution curated by Laura De Becker, Bridget Grier, Timnet Gedar, and Ozi Uduma

We Write to You About Africa curated by Laura De Becker and Ozi Uduma; Wish You Were Here: African Art and Restitution curated by Laura De Becker, Bridget Grier, Timnet Gedar, and Ozi Uduma

Spiritualizing Politics Without Politicizing Religion: The Example of Sargent Shriver by James R. Price and Kenneth R. Melchin

Reviewed by: Spiritualizing Politics Without Politicizing Religion: The Example of Sargent Shriver by James R. Price and Kenneth R. Melchin David O’Brien Spiritualizing Politics Without Politicizing Religion: The Example of Sargent Shriver. By James R. Price and Kenneth R. Melchin. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2022. 200 pp. $45.00. This is an important book. James R. Price and Kenneth R. Melchin have a fresh address to the very old question of “religion and politics” as it once again explodes across the world and even upsets long settled arrangements here in the United States. The authors want to help clarify the situation which they think has been made difficult by the “fog of the culture wars,” the “proliferation of doctrinaire religious convictions,” and the “growing secularism the academy and the public square.” Price and Melchin are determined not to contribute to these endless debates but instead to “think responsibly about politics and religion” and offer constructive proposals designed to enable communities of faith to help their members carry out their shared responsibilities for public life. Their goal is contained in the title: to “spiritualize politics without politicizing religion.” To do this they intend to “affirm the religion-politics distinction that guards freedom of conscience and diversity of belief” while, with equal conviction, “affirming the religion–politics relations that ensure religious involvement in nurturing values essential for public life.” They understand that balancing religious [End Page 95] integrity and shared responsibility will always be a challenge, perhaps requiring in some cases conscientious objection to agreed-upon policies. The authors believe that religion and politics need to be distinguished from each other, but that politics needs religion to achieve its objectives while Christians need politics to carry out Gospel-based obligations. Faced with religious diversity, religion must avoid the twin temptations of disengagement and withdrawal at one end and theocratic power at the other. Politics on the other hand—and here they usually mean liberal democratic politics—requires the spiritual and moral energy of religion if its citizens are to bear their shared responsibility for self-government. Rather than lament divisions, Price and Melchin look for ways to address these challenges with full respect for religious claims and civic responsibilities. They begin with an extended analysis of the speeches of Sargent Shriver, founding leader of the Peace Corps. Shriver’s life and work illustrates how this worked out with one “exemplary figure.” They find him first as a Catholic layman familiar with church teaching, influenced by the scholastic philosophy of natural law updated by Jacques Maritain, and engaged with lively movements of Catholic Action inspiring women and men of his generation to take on new responsibilities at the centers of American life now open to them. Shriver found leadership roles in public education, race relations, and civic dialogue, first in Chicago, then in Washington in the administration of his brother-in-law John F. Kennedy and his successor Lyndon B. Johnson. Like so many of his generation, Shriver was formed in the remarkable families, parishes, schools, and ideas of the American Catholic community, then took full advantage of new opportunities opened by family aspirations and post-World War II prosperity. Making that move into centers of shared public responsibility while remaining faithful to Christianity and his American Catholic subculture required aspiring middle class Catholics like Shriver to adopt a bilingualism, speaking among themselves of Christian faith, Catholic practice, and the shared values found in church teaching, then using broader terms to embrace others in shared work for common purposes. When, in their professional and public work, they needed to find common ground with non-Catholics, Shriver and others continued to speak of service, respect for the other, and democratic aspirations for liberty and justice, all informed by what Shriver thought of as Christian charity. Some thought this move watered down the claims of faith, but the authors argue that, in the case of Shriver, he in fact expanded and deepened Christian ideals of justice and charity. At one point in his inter-racial work Shriver stated the goal that informed all his work: “to direct the [End Page 96] immense power of religion to shaping the conduct and thoughts of men...

Simple but not simplistic: Findings from a theory-driven retrospective evaluation of a small projects program

Background and purposeFrom 2010–2019, the United States Peace Corps Volunteers in Georgia implemented 270 small projects as part of the US Peace Corps/Georgia Small Projects Assistance (SPA) Program. In early 2020, the US Peace Corps/Georgia office commissioned a retrospective evaluation of these projects. The key evaluation questions were: 1) To what degree were SPA Program projects successful in achieving the SPA Program objectives over the ten years, 2) To what extent can the achieved outcomes be attributed to the SPA Program’s interventions, and 3) How can the SPA Program be improved to increase likelihood of success of future projects. MethodsThree theory-driven methods were used to answer the evaluation questions. First, a performance rubric was collaboratively developed with SPA Program staff to clearly identify which small projects had achieved intended outcomes and satisfied the SPA Program’s criteria for successful projects. Second, qualitative comparative analysis was used to understand the conidtions that led to successful and unsuccessful projects and obtain a causal package of conditions that was conducive to a successful outcome. Third, causal process tracing was used to unpack how and why the conjunction of conditions identified through qualitative comparative analysis were sufficient for a successful outcome. FindingsBased on the performance rubric, thirty-one percent (82) of small projects were categorized as successful. Using Boolean minimization of a truth table based on cross case analysis of successful projects, a causal package of five conditions was sufficient to produce the likelihood of a successful outcome. Of the five conditions in the causal package, the productive relationship of two conditions was sequential whereas for the remaining three conditions it was simultaneous. Distinctive characteristics explained the remaining successful projects that had only several of the five conditions present from the causal package. A causal package, comprised of the conjunction of two conditions, was sufficient to produce the likelihood of an unsuccessful project. ConclusionsDespite having modest grant amounts, short implementation periods, and a relatively straightforward intervention logic, success in the SPA Program was uncommon over the ten years because a complex combination of conditions was necessary to achieve success. In contrast, project failure was more frequent and uncomplicated. However, by focusing on the causal package of five conditions during project design and implementation, the success of small projects can be increased.

Como os voluntários do Corpo da Paz influenciam os Estados Unidos: uma análise baseada no pragmatismo

Abstract: From the perspective of pragmatic diplomatic philosophy, Peace Corps can benefit the United States, which is an important reason for the domestic support it receives within the United States. Through the volunteers’ acculturation experience, cultural exchanges between the United States and host countries are promoted and the awareness of the American society about the Third World countries is raised, which is the true value of the Peace Corps from the perspective of American interests. As members of American society, Peace Corps volunteers gain a comprehensive and in-depth understanding of the Third World in their host countries, which is not only an important part of improving the awareness of the American society the Third World, but is also an important bridge to spread this awareness in the United States. When volunteers return to the United States after finishing their service, they bring their understanding of the Third World to different industries and fields in American domestic society. Among them, American education and diplomacy are mostly affected. These are of great significance in improving the international vision and awareness of American education and the reliability of American foreign policy.

КОРПУС МИРУ В КОНТЕКСТІ «НОВИХ ГОРИЗОНТІВ» ПОЛІТИКИ ДЖОНА ФІЦДЖЕРАЛЬДА КЕННЕДІ

he article reflects the question of the volunteer movement as an integral policy of the US President J. F. Kennedy after the Second World War. The activity of the Peace Corps, founded by the 35th president of the USA, is analyzed. The purpose of the article is to analyze the main aspects of the Peace Corps activity as a component of the US President J. F. Kennedy’s «New Horizons» policy in the context of the possibility of development and use of volunteer activities in the implementation of the country’s foreign policy. The work uses general scientific methods of knowledge: historical (reveals the factors of the formation and development of the Peace Corps in historical retrospect), systemic (makes it possible to draw a complete picture of J. F. Kennedy’s foreign policy related to the struggle between democracy and totalitarianism), axiological (determines the value the essence of the institutionalization of volunteerism, its content as a type of social activity that has a humanistic potential for strengthening peace and friendship between people of different nationalities and cultures). The scientific novelty of the obtained results consists in obtaining a holistic systemic view of the peculiarities of the implementation of US state policy in the field of regulation of volunteer activities for solving foreign policy tasks. Conclusions. Summing up, the author confirms the importance of the Peace Corps as the most important element of the strategy of the US President J. F. Kennedy, which consisted in the need to reorient the US foreign policy in the Third World countries from the ideology of mutual security to the global rails of development after the Second World War. It is noted that J. F. Kennedy’s «New Horizons» policy found its embodiment in the creation of the Peace Corps, which has successfully survived decades and is still functioning, serving as an example of the activation of volunteerism in Ukraine at the beginning of the XXI century. It is emphasized that before the start of the Russian-Ukrainian war on February 24, 2022, more than 300 American volunteers of the Peace Corps worked in Ukraine, which made Ukraine the largest representation of this organization in the world. Since the start of the full-scale russian invasion of Ukraine, Peace Corps volunteers have left the country, but continue to coordinate nationwide efforts in support of Ukrainians, organizing charitable donations, sending needed goods to Ukraine, and using their social media to engage the public in support of Ukraine.

Interview with Gregory G. Maskarinec

Professor Gregory G. Maskarinec (May 16, 1951-June 16, 2022) was a member of the International Advisory Board of the Dhaulagiri Journal of Sociology and Anthropology and Professor and Director at the Office of Global Health and International Medicine, Departments of Native Hawaiian Health and Family Medicine and Community Health John A. Burns School of Medicine, University of Hawai'i. He came to Nepal, in 1977, as a Peace Corps Volunteer and served as a mathematics teacher in a school in the Jajarkot District. He explored Nepali society and culture and received his MA and PhD in shamanism. He has published several books and papers on shamanism, including "The Rulings of the Night: An Ethnography of Nepalese Shaman Oral Texts". In 1981, he won Tribhuvan University's Mahendra Scholarship and received a highly prestigious prize (the Birendra Pranyalankar) from the late King Birendra Bir Bikram Shah Dev. In addition to his significant contributions to Medical Anthropology, Prof. Gregory was a nature-lover, peaceful, devoted to generating and sharing knowledge, and supportive. He had good relationships with high-level scholars, literature artists, and politicians of Nepal. He also participated in literature festivals in rural areas and promoted local arts and artists. He had visited more than 70 districts of Nepal. Prof. Gregory suffered from cancer and had several operations done. In August 2020, he passed away from COVID-19. We are grateful to him for allowing us to publish his interview in our Journal. The interview captured his ideas, thoughts, understanding of anthropology, works in Nepal, and personal life. For the sustainability of the Dhaulagiri Journal of Sociology and Anthropology, at the end of his life, he donated US$ 5000. The journal family is always grateful for his invaluable contribution