Volunteering as a determinant of civil society

• Main Author: A. V. Matiychyk
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: Publishing House "Grani" 2016-06-01
• Series: Granì
• Subjects: волонтерські організації; самоорганізація; інституціоналізація; благодійництво
• Online Access: https://grani.org.ua/index.php/journal/article/view/667

Volunteerism, which became widespread in the world, delayed due to lack of proper tradition and quality of its contents, in Ukraine. Gradually the process of institutionalization of volunteering began to take clearer forms as a result of political and legal documents adoption that define the specific activities of associations, foundations, organizations, and than volunteers and their movements. In 1998 the start of the regional program «Initiative to work on a voluntary basis» by Soros Foundation became external impetus for the development of volunteering in Ukraine. As a result of the declaration of International Year of Volunteers by the UN in 2001, the President of Ukraine has signed the Decree «On conducting of the International Year of Volunteers in Ukraine in 2001». From that time volunteering has got a new meaning in the government documents. However, the first legislation was characterized by using a limited interpretation of the concept of «volunteering». They hasn’t considered volunteer organizations as subject of political relations. Significant impact on the regulation of volunteering and the first surge of voluntary activity organization was caused by the European Football Championship in 2012 and the proclamation European Year of Volunteering in 2011. Moreover, the document «Regulations on volunteering in social services» was adopted and the law «On voluntary activities» was approved. Another prerequisite of volunteerism was the surge of Advantages Revolution in 2013-2014, and after it – the anti-terrorist operation in eastern Ukraine. In 2015 the aid organization in terms of ATO and internally displaced persons has increased directions volunteering. Important indicators of volunteering were high levels of involvement of Ukrainian philanthropy and consequently public confidence in voluntary organizations, qualitative growth of volunteerism, the founders of which were gradually included among the managerial elite Ukraine. At the same time, there are number of problems that discredit the work of volunteers and the idea of volunteering in general, for example, fraud volunteers and fake organizations. Moreover, the increased activity of the volunteer movement was caused by the internal crisis that led to the imbalance of public administration, lack of high-quality management decisions, lack of resource capabilities. Also it was caused by external factors, such as the need to participate in the organization of international events and conduct military operations against separatist groups in eastern Ukraine. So, volunteer activity gradually becomes an effective mechanism of self-organization of citizens.