Contributions of International Volunteers to Gender Equality

Around the globe, gender-based disparities persist in employment, income, property ownership, caregiving responsibilities, access to opportunity, and other domains of life. In what ways can international development volunteers advance equality and empower women in their host countries? Conversely, how might volunteers challenge or complicate communities’ efforts to advance gender equality?

Contributions of International Volunteers to Gender Equality is a collaborative and participatory project to better understand the contributions that international development volunteers make to programming on gender equality in the Global South. Funded by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada, this collaboration with the University of Ottawa and an international team of researchers has collected and analyzed data from volunteer-receiving organizations in 10 countries.

Findings from this project are reported in a special issue of Voluntaris.

Funding Partner: Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada

Principal Investigator

Benjamin Lough

CSD Faculty Director; University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

• Email: bjlough@illinois.edu

Contact

Lissa Johnson

CSD Associate Director; Director of Administration and Research;
Co-Director Financial Capability and Asset Building

• Email: ejohnson@wustl.edu