This article provides a brief historical overview of international volunteer service, along with changes to traditional forms of international service. It presents a general typology for contemporary international-service programs and reviews how these forms differ in practice. Using the limited data available, it provides a demographic snapshot of the scale and prevalence of international volunteer service from the United States and globally. The article reviews critical intersections between international service and social work, and describes debates of particular concern to the social worker profession. Finally, the article outlines important areas for future social work research and practice.
Citation
Lough, B. J. (2020, June). International volunteer service. In C. Franklin et al. (Eds.), Encyclopedia of Social Work. https://doi.org/10.1093/acrefore/9780199975839.013.959