Following through on a commitment to empower youth to carry out field research and data analysis, five young and emerging researchers recruited as National UN Volunteers worked with a senior researcher/Team Leader to conduct field research in four case study locations – Burkina Faso, Côte d’Ivoire, Kyrgyzstan, and the Western Balkans, with UN Volunteers based in Bosnia and Herzegovina and Kosovo (as per UN Security Council resolution 1244).

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This paper is divided into three parts. The first explores attempts to capture and describe how volunteering has changed over the years. This section examines the dominant conceptualizations of volunteering as a social practice and explores how research has taken into account the contribution of volunteering to the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and the 2030 Agenda. The second section briefly revisits the 1999 typology and discusses how it can be revised and updated in light of the changes described.

As our climate changes rapidly, it brings major new risks for communities. Across all societies, volunteers are at the forefront of responding to and coping with shocks, using local knowledge, networks, and capacities to build community resilience. But the scale and unpredictability of future risks, rising inequalities, and low capacities mean that new support is required to sustain this people-centred approach to climate resilience. The Policy Brief acknowledges how volunteers are already mapping and monitoring climate change at scale.

The purpose of this literature review is to set out a conceptual framework to inform the primary research methodology and protocol for 2018 State of the World’s Volunteerism Report, and to identify gaps that can be filled through primary research with communities. This review is based on analysis of different publications that touch on volunteerism and resilience, providing a synthesis of prior studies in order to inform the final report.

The report includes examples of how empowered Cambodian youth make a difference in their communities. It presents volunteering models that helped Cambodia recover from the decades of war and contributed to the country’s development, some of which can be replicated across the world. According to the results presented in the report, volunteer programmes in Cambodia have made a difference in reducing poverty, eradicating illiteracy, improving health, promoting gender equality, and protecting human rights and the environment.

UN Volunteers support peacekeeping operations and the multiple activities of the blue helmets. At the United Nations Stabilization Mission in Haiti (MINUSTAH) their work is evident through activities that strengthen the Haitian National Police (HNP) and those that work directly supporting the troops.  UN Volunteers with MINUSTAH represent a very particular example in peacekeeping: they work directly with the United Nations Police (UNPOL), a non-civilian component, to reinforce and reform the HNP.