A Community Center in a Humanitarian Context:
The Professionalization of a Grassroots Initiative in
Istanbul, Turkey
MA Thesis
Research Master Social Sciences
Graduate School of Social Sciences
University of Amsterdam
Tsjalline Boorsma
Student Number: 11786434
t.m.p.boorsma@gmail.com
Supervisor: Dr. Barak Kalir
Second reader: Dr. Lea Müller Funk
Amsterdam, 17
thJune 2019
Table of Contents
Introduction ... 3
The professionalization of humanitarian aid... 4
Methodology ... 7
An international community in a Turkish setting: the development of the NGO ... 9
The shifting motivations from volunteers to staff members ... 12
From the personal to the professional: changing social relations ... 18
Organizational practices and narratives of professionalization ... 22
Conclusion ... 28
Bibliography ... 30
Abstract
The humanitarian crisis following the mass displacement caused by the Syrian conflict was characterized by the emergence of diverse humanitarian approaches refugee support. One of these initiatives is an independent NGO with international staff members and volunteers running a community center for Syrian refugees in the city of Istanbul. This case study examines whether it is possible for a grassroots NGO to grow and professionalize, while also preserving the meaningful connections and informal networks of support between community members. The transformation of the NGO is characterized by three aspects: 1) the changing motivations of the aid workers; 2) the formalization of social relations; and 3) the implementation of organizational practices based on an ideal of professionalism. The NGO’s staff and volunteers were increasingly focused on the need for recognition and validation in the humanitarian sector. The case study demonstrates how organizational transitions in humanitarian NGOs can be accompanied by internal conflicts, as some aid workers considered professionalization to be a necessary and valuable development for the organization, while others criticized the loss of the community ideal that was at the core of the grassroots approach.
Key words:
Introduction
“Yes, you want to change, you want to do something, but don’t kill the soul”.
- Naima (volunteer) This thesis is about the diverse visions on humanitarian aid as expressed by the staff and volunteers of a grassroots NGO running a local community center for displaced Syrian families in Istanbul, Turkey. The story takes place in the political context of prolonged conflicts in the Middle East, especially the conflict in Syria and the consequent forced displacement of millions of people. Turkey, as a neighboring country of Syria, has become world’s largest refugee-hosting country since 2015. More than 3,5 million Syrians were registered under the status of temporary protection at the beginning of 2018 (Sunata & Tosun, 2018: 2). Korkut (2016: 14) described this mass displacement as a ‘humanitarian crisis’, because of the insufficient government response to the high numbers of displaced people. Turkey had limited capacity to deal with such a large and sudden influx of refugees (Genç, Heck and Hess, 2018: 13). This crisis of reception1, or
the ‘failure to protect’ (Kirişci and Ferris, 2016) stimulated the involvement of international organizations and humanitarian NGOs (Bülent and Duman, 2018). Humanitarian aid is based on the ideal of helping people in need, providing assistance in times of crisis. This support can take on various forms, ranging from large-scale humanitarian operations managed by well-known international NGOs to small-scale local initiatives of solidarity. Much has been written already about established humanitarianism (Barnett, 2011; Malkki 1996; Bornstein and Redfield, 2011; Fassin 2012; Ticktin, 2014), and there are a few ethnographic studies of local grassroots approaches to aid (McGee and Pelham, 2018; Sandri, 2018; Rozakou, 2017). However, there is a gap in the literature when it comes to the transition of grassroots initiatives to established humanitarian NGOs through processes of professionalization. It is relevant to study what motivates this development, how it might help the organization to move forward in the humanitarian sector, but also what challenges it poses.
This inquiry takes the form of an ethnographic case study of the professionalization of a local initiative that aims to help displaced Syrians in a community center in Istanbul, ‘The Almond Tree Community’2. The organization characterizes itself as ‘grassroots’,
but has been growing considerably in recent years, becoming a recognized NGO in the humanitarian sector in Turkey and internationally. Following Katerina Rozakou (2017:104), who argued that the main objective for anthropologists studying humanitarianism is “not to examine the ideological purity of solidarity initiatives, but
1 I deliberately chose the terms ‘humanitarian crisis’ and ‘crisis of reception’ over the more well-known
term ‘refugee crisis’, because the latter implies that displaced people themselves are the cause of the emergency situation.
rather to capture changes in the contemporary humanitarian world”, my aim is to analyze the changes that happened in this particular NGO. The thesis focuses on the narratives and practices of the NGO’s volunteers and staff members working, investigating how their approach to humanitarian aid changes when the NGO shifts from a grassroots initiative to an established humanitarian organization, as reflected in the following research question:
How is the concept of professionalization in humanitarian aid manifested in the changing narratives and practices of the NGO’ volunteers and staff members?
The thesis considers whether it is it possible for an NGO to maintain the meaningful connections and informal networks of mutual support that characterized the grassroots phase, while it is transitioning into a more established organization. Three aspects of change are connected to the professionalization of the NGO: Firstly, the changing motivations of humanitarian workers to be involved in the organization are connected to the shift from volunteers to paid staff members. Secondly, the formalization of social relations between people in the organization are linked to the increasing focus on growth and professionalization. Thirdly, the transformation of organizational practices is associated to an increased focus on fixed structures, affecting the previously informal character of the organization. Some aid workers expressed the concern that this transformation would result in a loss of the ‘community spirit’ of the grassroots initiative, emphasizing the importance of meaningful personal connections as a prerequisite for effective aid. Others supported the process of professionalization, arguing that it would lead to better efficiency, productivity and validation of the NGO in the humanitarian sector.
The professionalization of humanitarian aid
In order to frame the professionalization of a grassroots organization in existing literature, this review will focus on the distinction between different types of humanitarian aid to refugees3 and on the application of the concept ‘professionalization’
to the humanitarian sector. The term ‘humanitarianism’ has been defined in different ways. Ticktin (2014: 274) characterizes humanitarianism as “one way to ‘do good’ or to improve aspects of the human condition by focusing on suffering and saving lives in times of crisis or emergency”. Fassin (2012: 244) contended that “humanitarian reason is morally untouchable”, because it is applied to attitudes and actions that we automatically believe to be good. The boundaries between humanitarianism and other projects that want
3 The term ‘refugee’ is considered problematic by some academics (see Malkki, 1995; Crawley and
Skleparis, 2018). I prefer the term ‘border crossers’ (Khosravi, 2007) to avoid the ambiguous distinction between migrants and refugees, but it seems less applicable in this case, as the NGO assists Syrian families who have been living in Istanbul for several years. I have tried to use alternative terms like ‘displaced person’, or a more specific description like ‘the Syrian lady’ for ethnographic descriptions.
to ‘do good’, such as human rights and development are still unclear and are constantly being revised. Bornstein and Redfield (2011: 6) claimed that humanitarianism primarily focuses on relieving the physical and psychological condition of suffering. This definition stands in contrast to development aid, which frames human good and well-being through an imagined better future. Humanitarianism can also be differentiated from to human rights discourse, which defines its version of well-being as ‘justice’, striving to legally manifest this ideal in universal political liberties. In another effort to demarcate the concept of ‘humanitarianism’ Barnett and Weiss (2008: 11) have argued that the academic definition should be distinguished from the practical understanding of the term by humanitarian actors in the field. While many within the humanitarian sector tend to conceive the ideal humanitarian act as “motivated by an altruistic desire to provide life-saving relief, to honor the principles of humanity, neutrality, impartiality and independence; and to do more good than harm”, very few humanitarian organizations achieve this idealized status. Malkki (2015: 207) shifted the focus from aid recipients to aid workers, arguing that the humanitarian practice constitutes “neither saintly self-sacrifice nor sentimental distraction subject to a contemptuous dismissal”. Instead of judging the morality of humanitarianism, she studied aid workers’ narratives, which positioned them as members of a greater ‘community of generosity’ (2015: 12).
The difference between ideal and practice is reflected in the increasing critique on established humanitarianism from a variety of scholars, who have in different ways pointed out the problematic collaborations of the humanitarian sector with the state. Pallister-Wilkins (2015) has characterized the application of the humanitarian doctrine of ‘saving lives’ by security apparatuses of the state as ‘humanitarian politics’, specifically in the context of the illegalized border crossings in the Aegean Sea between Turkey and Greece. In addition to this argument, Chouliaraki (2013: 21) has critically described the institutional logic of contemporary humanitarianism as “a neoliberal logic of micro-economic explanations that ignores the systemic causes of global poverty and turns humanitarianism into a practice of depoliticized managerialism” (Chouliaraki, Managerialism can be conceptualized as “a specific form of organizational structure that incorporates effectiveness, efficiency, agency, and progress as central norms” (Kreutzer & Jäger, 2011: 638).
However, humanitarian aid has also taken alternative approaches, in some cases as a critical reaction to established forms of aid. These informal practices of aid for refugees have been characterized by scholars in various terms, depending on the local context. Sandri (2018: 66) used the term ‘volunteer humanitarianism’ for the informal aid to refugees in Calais, France, as these solidarity initiatives were “not supervised or funded by international aid agencies or governments, but based entirely on the work of volunteers and financed by donations from the public”. In the same context of Calais, McGee and Pelham (2018: 27) used the term ‘grassroots humanitarianism’, arguing that this alternative form of aid “serves as a striking alternative to the state humanitarianism
which is said to have proliferated under neoliberal regimes”. In a similar way, Rozakou (2017: 103-104) has observed that grassroots solidarity initiatives with refugees in Greece were often overtly antagonistic to humanitarian organizations, as “solidarians emphasized the disinterestedness of their endeavor and scrutinized the professionalism of humanitarian workers” and referred to “the dangers of the ‘NGOification of solidarity’. On the other hand, Dempsey (2009: 340) pointed out that grassroots initiatives is often perceived as “tied to a romantic ideal of place, in which the local is understood as unified and conflict-free”, which is problematic because it denies the politics operating at this local scale. In practice, grassroots initiatives are often characterized by conflicting interests.
Grassroots initiatives are affected by the increasing focus on professionalization in contemporary humanitarianism. The humanitarian sector is evolving from an “impromptu, emotion-driven system to a professional service delivery system” (Dube and Broekhuis, 2018: 152). Barnett (2011: 8) analyzes that humanitarianism has become an area of global governance, meaning that it has become increasingly public, hierarchical, and institutionalized. The professionalization of the humanitarian sector and the attempt to retain highly valued staff and to attract employees from the private sector has made the sector increasingly competitive. Humanitarianism is increasingly perceived as a profession on its own (Barnett and Weiss, 2008: 12).
Professionalization is manifested in humanitarian NGOs on both organizational and individual levels. As Hwang and Powell (2009: 270) have pointed out, “the nonprofit sector’s professionalization may have significant implications for its core identity as an arena for volunteerism and participation”. The professionalization of NGOs is reflected in the shift from informal activities organized by unpaid volunteers towards more formalized organizational structures and management involving full-time paid staff members. On an individual level, aid workers “are motivated very differently from the humanitarians of old”, with an increasing focus on organizational requirements and personal career development (Hopgood, 2008: 112). On an organizational level, NGOs increasingly suppose that professionalization will “enhance their credibility and authority, and legitimize their ‘voice’ at the global level” (Simeant, 2005: 856).
While the professionalization of NGOs is perceived as a positive development by many scholars, others have argued that this change should be approached with caution. James (2016: 186) has identified three significant negative effects humanitarian professionalization: 1) the increased the distance of the relief worker from the beneficiary4, 2) barriers to entry into the humanitarian sector and 3) risk aversion and a
decline in innovation amongst humanitarian workers. Nonetheless, professionalization
4 The term ‘beneficiary’ could be considered problematic, because it implies that participants in NGO
projects necessarily ‘benefit’ from the aid that is offered, which is not always the case in reality. I will try to avoid it, unless it is used by informants themselves. Instead, I will use the term ‘participants’.
continues to be an important influence in the aid sector. This can be explained by the shifting definition of ‘professional’ from a term that only applied to certain occupations towards a term that signifies ‘good work’ in general. The notion of professionalism became increasingly associated with legitimacy and validity. Reed (1996) called this emphasis on professional skills ‘the politics of expertise’, claiming that professions which are based on standardized knowledge benefit from a significant advantage over occupations that are based on a contextual adaptation. In order to profit from this advantage, individuals and organizations are increasingly seeking access to training opportunities to acquire this standardized knowledge, which is expected to increase their level of expertise (Jacobsson, 2000). The term ‘professional’ has become synonymous with “the qualifications for a particular role” (Hwang and Powell, 2009: 269). To call someone a professional signifies that this person is qualified for the job, having acquired the relevant knowledge and skills. The adoption of professional practices in the field of refugee support is influenced by the pervasive belief in the humanitarian sector that professionalization will lead to more successful aid practices. NGOs are increasingly adapting their narratives and practices to the professional expectations of established humanitarianism. This trend was also manifested at the Almond Tree Community, the grassroots NGO in Istanbul where this case study was conducted.
Methodology
The method of investigation for this research was a combination of qualitative interviews and ethnographic participant observations in the NGO. I already had been involved in the Almond Tree Community before, as a volunteer with the organization in the fall of 2016. Consequently, the majority of the informants were familiar with me, because we had worked together or we had met during later visits to Istanbul. The sustained contact with people in the organization was a great help in the research, enabling an in-depth study of the NGO.
In total, twenty volunteers and staff members were interviewed. The informants were contacted through the communal Whatsapp-group, which included many former volunteers and staff who had already left the organization. In addition, informants were contacted personally during the fieldwork at the NGO’s community center. Three interviews were held through Skype, as some informants had left Turkey after quitting their work with the NGO. The other seventeen interviews were held in person, in the community center of the NGO or at another location if this was more convenient for the informant. Most interviews lasted around one hour, with some shorter interviews of thirty minutes and longer interviews of up to two hours. The interviews generally did not follow a fixed set of questions, but were based on more spontaneous inquiries that emerged during the interview itself, based on my previous knowledge about the informant and the information that was being shared. Informants were asked about their
motivation to be involved in the NGO, their experiences with the work and their views on humanitarian aid. The questions were adapted to the situation and the position of the informant in the organization. The informants were between 19 and 52 years old, mostly younger than 30. Only two informants were Turkish, while the majority had different nationalities, ranging from Middle-Eastern to European, American and Australian, among others5. The interviews were conducted in English, which was also the communal
language at the NGO, next to Turkish and Arabic.
The ethnographic observations were conducted during daily visits to the community center of the organization during a period of three months. These observations were combined with my previous knowledge of the NGO. In the period of the fieldwork, I was also involved as a volunteer again. This enabled first-hand observations and interactions, while also giving me the opportunity to be useful for the organization. The focus point of the research was the administrative office, where the staff members were located who were in charge of the management of the organization. The observations focused on remarkable incidents that took place at the office, but also on routines, everyday interactions and conversations that reflected the practice of humanitarian work. In addition, observations were made during my participation in the activities and involvement in the daily life of the organization. I also participated in social gatherings between members of the NGO in private homes and public places, which enabled observations of their social interactions and informal conversations about the work.
At the same time, my access to the fieldwork site through personal connections also posed some ethical challenges. As there were no clear boundaries to what would be included in the research, any event or interaction in the NGO could technically become part of my fieldnotes. Observations were also made during more private and sensitive moments, because the research focused on the personal narratives and practices of aid workers. It was not always clear what could be recorded about the personal life of the informants, and what should be kept private. When staff members or volunteers were having a conversation with me as friends, they would share information that might not have been shared in a formal interview. To overcome this ethical challenge, the thesis only uses quotes from interviews that were recorded per informed consent. Information that was shared in informal conversations is not quoted directly, but does inform the general analysis.
I reflected on my positionality and my personal involvement in the organization as a volunteer throughout the research process. Indeed, my interest in this topic was motivated to a great extent by my own experiences as a volunteer in the humanitarian sector, in this NGO and other organizations I have worked with. The narrative that is presented in this thesis is therefore informed by my own experiences and subjective evaluation of the interviews and observations. The thesis aspires to demonstrate the changing perspectives
5 See the appendix for a list of all interviewees in alphabetical order with names (pseudonyms), nationality,
on humanitarian aid that exist among aid workers within one organization. My personal connection to the NGO enabled the ethnographic character of the research, resulting in an informed subjective account that utilized qualitative research methods (Booth et al., 2003; Emerson et al., 2011; Murray and Moore, 2006), combined with an analysis resulting from long-term personal involvement.
An international community in a Turkish setting: the development of the NGO To understand the transformations that have taken place within the Almond Tree Community, it relevant to discuss the development of the organization, connecting to the political context in Turkey. The Almond Tree Community started as an informal grassroots initiative in 2012 by a group of international and Turkish residents of Istanbul and a number of Syrian families that had recently been displaced by the war in Syria and relocated to Istanbul. The first activities started in a local park and private homes, focusing on the schooling of displaced children, financial support for urgent cases and emergency housing to families in transition. In 2013, the group rented a small room for the activities, which included educational sessions, psychosocial support and social events. The network was growing and the initiative attracted volunteers and donations from supporters in Istanbul and abroad. Gradually, the children could be enrolled in Turkish schools and the families were settling in the Istanbul. The community center had acquired a more supplementary function, offering afterschool education support and homework help, but also recreational activities, such as arts and crafts, cooking, theatre and music workshops. The NGO tried to address the need for psychosocial support, since many of the people visiting the center were dealing with post-traumatic stress disorders caused by violent conflicts and forced displacement. The majority of the participants were Syrian, but there were also a number of Iraqi, Egyptian, Afghan and Turkish community members.
In 2015, the Almond Tree Community was registered as an official association in Turkey. Even though it was registered as a Turkish NGO, it did not appear like a Turkish organization in practice. Most volunteers were non-Turkish nationals from Europe, the United States, Australia, the Middle East, among others. The main language in the community center was English, followed by Arabic, which was the native language of the Syrian families. Turkish was primarily used in the activities that related to integration and education. The community center opened five days a week, serving over forty families with its growing weekly program of activities, attracting displaced families with children, but also displaced single young adults, mainly from Syria, Egypt and Iraq. The NGO organized a variety of social activities, workshops, and language classes. Several of the participants also became volunteers and staff members for the NGO. Over time, the program became increasingly focused on families, especially on women and children. The NGO started a social enterprise with a group of Syrian women, who designed and
created handmade products, while attending entrepreneurial training sessions and Turkish language classes. The aim of the social enterprise was to increase the financial independence and entrepreneurial skills of the women. While the women were at work or in class, their small children were looked after in the childcare area.
When I got involved the NGO as a volunteer in 2016, the Almond Tree Community had just moved to a bigger space. The community started gaining more attention in Istanbul, attracting volunteers from different backgrounds and nationalities. These people were mostly young, highly educated, English-speaking and already employed in another job in Istanbul. All the work in the NGO was unpaid in the beginning. However, as the organization was growing, there was a need for more full-time staff members. A selection of volunteers was given more responsibilities in return for a small financial compensation. In 2017, the NGO moved to a new building again, just around the corner of the old community center. This was the biggest space so far, divided over several floors. The Almond Tree Community had become a more well-known and established humanitarian organization, with an administrative office and a team of full-time paid staff-members.
The emergence of humanitarian organizations in Turkey in response to the arrival Syrian refugees was frequently met with suspicion by the Turkish government. Several international NGOs were forced to quit their operations in Turkey on the ground of “national security”6. As the Almond Tree Community was becoming more well-known as
a humanitarian organization in Istanbul, a news article appeared in the Turkish press suggesting that the NGO was undermining the Turkish state by offering separate schooling. In a reaction to the article, Jamila, a 26-year old American volunteer who had been living in Istanbul for several years, commented that the suspicion of international NGOs had been increasing, reflecting on the complicated position of the Almond Tree Community in Turkey:
It’s just difficult to make the connection to Turkish society. The NGO is registered under a Turkish name, but this does not make a difference in how it is viewed by the general Turkish public. We have experienced quite some police investigations, up to the point of harassment. We are seen as an international NGO with mainly non-Turkish employees.
The Almond Tree Community had to be careful regarding the potential power of the Turkish state to close the NGO. They did not want to give the impression they were running an unofficial school, against government regulations. This was a particular political issue, as many unofficial schools, the so-called ‘temporary education centers’,
6 Erkuş, Sevil (2017, April 13). “Foreign humanitarian organizations in Turkey under scrutiny”. Hürriyet
Daily News. Retrieved from:
had been set up in Turkey in the past years to address the demand for education during the sudden arrival of millions of Syrian refugees. However, these unofficial schools were all being closed down again by the Turkish government in favor of state-schools, because of the increasing emphasis on integration of Syrian refugees in Turkish society. The illegalization of non-state schools combined with the suspicion of foreign NGOs placed the Almond Tree Community in a precarious situation. The legal context in Turkey created precarious working conditions for staff and a feeling of insecurity over the risk of being closed down. Some of the activities at the community center were at risk of being considered illegal business practices, especially the educational activities for Syrian children. The staff members were cautious to not use terms that would make the NGO appear like an illegal educational facility, by saying ‘language club’ instead of class, which they thought seemed less official.
In these circumstances, the Almond Tree Community decided to collaborate with the Turkish state to run an intensive Turkish language course for adults in the community center. The salaries of the language teachers were paid by a development organization that was funded by the Turkish state. Joyce, the Australian co-director of the NGO, argued that the collaboration was a sign that the Almond Tree Community was gaining legitimization by the Turkish state: “We’ve got legal classes from the Turkish government, which is quite rare to have, with the teaching of Turkish to all the women in the community. It is normally quite difficult to have this support from the government”. The staff members of the Almond Tree Community observed that the Turkish government was partially outsourcing the support for newly arrived Syrian refugees to NGOs and civil society. This was perceived as an inevitable development, which was justified by the limited capacity of the Turkish state, as explained in the NGO’s annual report of 2017:
With limited infrastructure and resources, the Turkish Government cannot, on its own, comprehensively and effectively respond to the complex set of long-term challenges facing its Syrian guests. At the local level, we believe that civil society has a critical role to play in filling the gaps in services and support.
At the same time, the NGO was kept under state control through the threat of criminalization. In order to acquire legitimacy from the Turkish state, the Almond Tree Community had to become an established humanitarian NGO. Diana, a 28-year old Australian staff member who started as a volunteer, argued that it was necessary to transition from a grassroots initiative to a professional organization, in response to the legal demands of the Turkish government:
We cannot be a facility providing community services without having structure. As a registered organization, we are by default existing in a system. There are legal requirements to achieve, so in order to fulfill those there has to be a level of structure.
Nevertheless, there was also a desire to preserve the grassroots ideal of a local, small-scale organization based on personal connections. This tension was reflected in the distinct narratives of volunteers and staff members within the organization.
The shifting motivations from volunteers to staff members
This section explores how the motivations of aid workers to be involved in the Almond Tree Community have changed as the organization grew from a grassroots initiative towards a more established humanitarian NGO. It will compare the motivations of the unpaid volunteers that characterized the grassroots phase of the organization, to the motivations of paid staff members who joined at a later stage. The guiding question here is to which extend the professionalization of the NGO is reflected in the motivations of the aid workers. In this case ‘aid workers’, refers to anyone involved in the NGO, including both volunteers and staff members. In the grassroots phase, the aid work with refugees at the Almond Tree Community was based on the contribution of unpaid volunteers. Some of the people who started as volunteers later became paid staff members, while the NGO also began recruiting aid workers from outside the organization.
Generally, the motivations of early volunteers were based on a sense of altruism, expressed through a narrative of ‘helping others’. One of the Turkish volunteers who later became a staff member was the 28-year old Ela, who had switched to the humanitarian sector after previously working for an advertisement agency. She recalled how she had felt touched by the plight of Syrian refugees in Istanbul, the city in which she grew up: “For the first time I had the feeling, the urge, that I had to do something.” When asked about their motivation to be involved in the NGO, volunteers emphasized the importance of ‘doing good’ by giving time and energy to others without expecting any payment in return. One of the volunteers who had been active in the NGO since the beginning was the 27-year old American Cecily, who organized several weekly activities in the NGO’s community center next to her paid job as an English teacher at a private school in Istanbul. Cecily expressed her motivation to get involved in the NGO in terms of enjoyment, while emphasizing the absence of financial interest in volunteer work: “It feels good to help somebody! With volunteering, you don’t really doubt people’s motivations, because besides that feeling not much else is gained. I do really enjoy helping people just to help people”.
This idea that helping others leads to feeling good was also expressed by many other volunteers I spoke with, which was based on the desire to create something meaningful in a community setting. Volunteers emphasized the pleasure they found in connecting with other people. One of the paid staff members who started as a volunteer was the 26-year old French Lea, who got into contact with the Almond Tree Community during her former employment as an international journalist and decided to switch to the
humanitarian sector. Lea explained her motivation in a way that focuses on social connections, as she stated: “I joined the organization for the team spirit and just the feeling that I belong”. Other volunteers who were involved since the beginning also emphasized the joy of working in a team of like-minded people and collaborating to help others. The desire to belong to a group was an important factor in their motivation to do volunteer work. Diana specifically clarified her motivation to become an aid worker by her need for meaningful connections to other people:
I’ve always stayed motivated and energized through these experiences of having both the rewarding experience of the work but also a satisfying respond to my own needs of being connected, having good social contacts, as someone who really thrives on meaningful human engagement.
As these statements demonstrate, the need for personal connections was a central motivation for the volunteers at the Almond Tree Community. While the volunteer work was seen as rewarding itself, the motivation to continue to be involved in the NGO was strongly linked to social character of the work. Another motivation that was often mentioned by the early volunteers was the feeling of making a positive impact and seeing the result of the work directly. Max, a 28-year old British former volunteer explained his motivation in connection to the feeling of making an impact. He thought that this impact was connected to the small size and grassroots character of the NGO: “At the Almond Tree Community I felt part of what was happening, you feel like you are doing something. You can see the impact of your work every day”. Max illustrated his argument by telling the story of a Syrian teenager who used to regularly come to the community center: “Over the course of a year, he transformed from a shy kid to a confident teenager, and that’s only because we, the small NGO, gave him that opportunity to come everyday”. Max argued that warm social connections between the community members were an essential part of the NGO’s positive influence. The gratification of making an impact on others was an important factor that motivated Max’ volunteer work. Some volunteers connected this feeling of gratification to the idea of self-interest. Lea underlined that her various motivations to do volunteer work were all connected to personal interests:
It feels good to help people. The people I work with are so nice. I get to see the direct results of what I am doing to the people I am helping, which is awesome. But in the end the answer is just very selfishly that it makes me feel good.
Sophia, a 27-year old Greek former volunteer, connected this idea of self-interest to the specific character of aid workers. She argued that people who do humanitarian work enjoy finding solutions to problems and are always looking for possibilities to improve something: “Why to get in difficult situation if you are not getting satisfaction from it? Most people that are involved with this kind of humanitarian aid want to be part of this difficulty and try to resolve it.” Sophia pointed out that the ideal of helping people who
are in a difficult situation may sound altruistic, but aid workers are still motivated by their personal interests, because they seem to get satisfaction out of opportunities to make an impact.
Several former volunteers emphasized ideal of generosity in volunteer work, while others were concerned about the viability of unpaid work on the long term. Naima, a 20-year old Jordanian volunteer said that her involvement in the Almond Tree Community made her less selfish: “I learned how to give something without expecting that I have to get something back”. During the period of her volunteer work, Naima was finishing high school. Since she was living with her family in Istanbul without needing to provide her own income, paid work was less of a concern to her. However, other volunteers expressed their desire for payment, especially those who were more intensively involved in the NGO. Sophia argued that “the people that are responsible in the core of the whole NGO must be not only paid, but well-paid”. Sam, a 29-year old American former staff member, had recently quit working for the NGO after being involved for several years. He started as an unpaid volunteer, but was gradually given more responsibilities as a volunteer coordinator, receiving a small monthly payment in return. Sam stressed that the payment of the early staff members was insufficient for living in Istanbul:
We really could not continue work under these circumstances. We were working so hard because we cared so much about this organization. I mean financially, I worked two or three jobs the entire time. The money I got didn’t really pay my rent.
This same concern was also raised by several other former staff members, who received a small payment, like Lea, who used to be in charge of the NGO’s external communication. Since she was not earning enough money from her job at the Almond Tree Community, Lea went back to France in the summer months to work in a better paid job, after which she returned to Istanbul to work at the Almond Tree Community again. She said that in her perspective, an essential requirement for humanitarian work to actually function is paying the employees and telling donors to understand that the work does not just happen by itself: “We need people behind it to make it happen and we need to pay these people because they have lives and they need to go grocery shopping”. After several years of working in the humanitarian sector, Lea concluded that NGOs should not rely on volunteers only:
It’s good to have volunteers, but the problem with volunteering is that it makes people think that the work they’re doing doesn’t deserve to get paid. It’s not right, because every kind of work deserve gratification and not paying people leads to frustration and personal crisis. I have felt like a lot like like: “What am I doing? This is not okay.
Lea had recently quit her work for the Almond Tree Community and had started working for a different NGO in Athens, Greece. There she was also receiving a relatively small wage, but was offered free accommodation, so she did not have to pay her own rent. Lea
noticed that she had taken a different work attitude at her new humanitarian job: “I have much more professional approach to it. At the Almond Tree Community we had no boundaries between work, friends and social life. Now I have co-workers and beneficiaries, but they’re not my family. I think it’s healthier”. Max had also decided to continue working in the humanitarian sector after his volunteer experience, but did not want to become a staff member of the Almond Tree Community, because the payment was so low. Instead, he had applied for a job at the headquarters of an international NGO in London. He noticed that his motivation to do humanitarian work had become more career-oriented.
This is going to sound very selfish, but the thing with big NGOs is you’re paid more money and there is career development. If you want to do humanitarian work as a career you have to make that balance.
Many of the early staff members of the Almond Tree Community were leaving the NGO, because of the low salaries and internal conflicts. Lea said that the main reason of leaving was the lack of a healthy work environment. She felt that her concerns were not heard and that she was considered to be “just someone that can be replaced”. Lea was still very upset with the founder of the NGO, who had called the staff members ‘second hand employees’, as if they were “just like a thing people throw away and then you employ them because there is no better option”. Leaving the Almond Tree Community was very difficult, Lea told me, but she felt that the early staff members were not fully appreciated by the organization: “No, that is not acceptable. We want to feel meaningful.”
The founder of the Almond Tree Community, who later became part of the board of directors, was the 52-year old Joyce. Originally from Australia, she had been working in humanitarian projects with refugees in the Middle East for several years before moving to Istanbul. Even though she had started the Almond Tree Community as a grassroots initiative based on volunteers, Joyce increasingly believed that it was necessary to professionalize the NGO and employ full-time staff members. When I asked her how the Almond Tree Community had transformed in the past years, Joyce said:
The whole project has changed enormously. The more professional the people are that we have coming in, the better our service becomes. We are coming now from a grassroots NGO into an NGO with full-time people, with better evaluation systems and a better sense of direction.
For Joyce, the transition to full-time ‘professional’ staff members was connected to a better delivery of aid to refugees, together with a wider recognition as a valid NGO in the humanitarian sector. Joyce thought that the social relations between the team members were too informal and their way of working was not professional enough. She confirmed in the interview that she thought it was necessary for the old team members to leave the organization. These internal tensions and disagreements had already caused numerous conflicts, after which the majority of the old Almond Tree Community team had decided
to leave the NGO. For many former staff members, this had been a heartbreaking experience, which they considered to be a disastrous moment in the history of the organization. The community-oriented outlook of the NGO seemed to have completely changed.
Soon after the old team left, several new staff members were hired. This was the first time that the NGO had recruited employees though an official job application, instead of asking people who were already involved in the community to take on more responsibilities. The job application for ‘Fundraising Strategist’ mentioned required competences like “fluency in a minimum of two languages, including English”, “previous experience working as a fundraising officer in a charity organization” and “a minimum of 3 years experience in a managerial position”. The organizational shift from volunteers to paid staff members was reflected in the different motivations of the new recruits. One of the newcomers was Lana, a 25-year old Iraqi staff member with previous experience in other NGOs in the Middle East, who became the new volunteer coordinator. She explained her motivation to start working for the Almond Tree Community based on career ambitions and professional interests:
What made me apply? I was looking for a job! I have experience working with other NGOs. Ever since I graduated university I was determined to enter the NGO-world and I want to work with different humanitarian organizations. I want to have the practical experience and I want to work with refugees.
Lana’s motivation demonstrates the shift in the perception of the aid workers in the Almond Tree Community regarding the identity of the NGO. The early volunteers who joined the organization in its grassroots phase emphasized the identity of a local community center, as a social place to meet and hang-out while doing something good through the volunteer work. However, as a newly recruited staff member, Lana perceived the Almond Tree Community to be an established member of ‘the NGO-world’, which made it an interesting place to gain work experience in the humanitarian sector. As Lana stated, her new job at the NGO is a strategic decision in her career as a humanitarian worker: “This is actually my road map, it’s on my plan to gain this type of experience. So it feels good to work here. I know what types of things I want to work on in this place, what kind of experience I want to gain”. Lana’s statement shows that the motivation of the newly hired staff members is more focused on the professional opportunities that the NGO offers, which is quite different from the focus on community and ‘feeling good’ in the motivations of the early volunteers. This change in motivations also becomes clear from the words of Malik, a 35-year old Syrian staff member, who recently got hired as the contact person for the Syrian families that participated in the NGO’s programs. Malik already had multiple experiences working in humanitarian organizations. He was working for a smaller Syrian NGO in Istanbul when he decided to respond to the job application at the Almond Tree Community:
I wanted to work in an international NGO. This type of NGOs has a different way of working. The personal relations don’t affect the work as much. I’m looking for a place where people are focused on the future of the work, not just working without any target. I don’t like to just pass the time without any objective or goal.
Malik’s statement characterizes the Almond Tree Community as an international NGO, which contrasts with the accounts of the early volunteers who emphasized that they were motivated by the local and grassroots character of the organization. Malik also emphasized that personal relations should not affect the work. This distant approach contrasts with the accounts of the early volunteers, for whom the personal connections in the community center were essential to their work. To characterize the Almond Tree Community as a place with a clear “objective or goal” sound much more typical for established humanitarian organizations than for grassroots initiatives. The term ‘target’ even makes a connection to the business sector.
This association to a business-oriented narrative makes sense in the light of the recent developments in the NGO, which were characterized by an aspiration to employ staff members with experience in the business sector. As Aidan, the 28-year old Syrian former finance officer said: “Many organizations here in Istanbul that serving Syrians and community have the same problem: they have no system, data and archive, because most of these people don’t have a business background.” The 29-year old Turkish Demir, who became the new finance officer, was hired because of his previous experience in the private sector. As Demir explained, he got “really tired of working in the private sector. Business people don’t take steps one by one, but jump to gain the highest profit. It did not feel right to make a bunch of stakeholders I barely know get richer. Working in this NGO is actually more ethical to me, because people work here out of dedication”. His motivation to work for the Almond Tree Community represents a shift from profit to the non-profit, focusing more on the ‘ethical’ character of the humanitarian sector. Even some staff members who had started as a volunteer noticed that they had become more career-oriented, like Ela stated:
I am more confident now, because I am learning new skills. Now I feel much more professional. There is a new motivation of making a career, which I had not planned when I started, but that I am really enjoying.
There were some significant changes in the motivations of the people who were involved in the Almond Tree Community, as the organization grew from a grassroots initiative towards a more conventional NGO in the humanitarian sector. When comparing the motivations of volunteers to the motivations of paid staff members who were recently employed, it becomes clear that the ambition towards professionalization is reflected in the changing narratives of the aid workers. While volunteers’ motivations were characterized by a desire to ‘do good’ and creating social connections, recently recruited staff members demonstrated a career-oriented motivation. The NGO was described as
‘small’ and ‘local’ by early volunteers, but it was perceived as an ‘international’ NGO by new staff members. The changes in the narratives of humanitarian workers reflect a revision of the community ideal of the Almond Tree Community, as the organization grew and became determined to professionalize. The previously informal social character did no longer characterize the organization, which was also reflected in the changing social relations in the NGO.
From the personal to the professional: changing social relations
This section discusses the changes in the social life of the Almond Tree Community, as the organization was growing and became more focused on professionalization. The people who had been active in the Almond Tree Community since the beginning emphasized how there used to be a strong sense of community, characterized by intimate personal connections between the people at the center. The positions of ‘volunteers’ and ‘beneficiaries’ were not fixed, as the community members could both provide aid and receive aid. They would be helping out with organizing the program, while also attending activities and receiving support from others. As the Almond Tree Community was transforming into a more formal humanitarian organization, the roles of volunteers and staff also became more fixed. The social engagements at the NGO became less casual and more tied to certain responsibilities. Volunteer were expected to come to the community center to organize a certain activity, but not to ‘hang around’ without having a specific task to do. This contrasts with grassroots approach in the early days of the Almond Tree Community, when the NGO was primarily supposed to be a site of social interaction. Max, a former volunteer, explained how the dynamic social life at the organization extended beyond generic work interactions:
It became more than working for an NGO. You were just hanging out. Every weekend you had somewhere to go with your friends. You worked together to help other people, which is a really good way to spend your time.
Max said that he had several reasons to continue with the volunteer work at the NGO, such as the work, the families, the children and the friendly atmosphere. However, he emphasized that the main reason he “stuck around”, as he formulated it, was because of the friendships with other volunteers and beneficiaries. These connections made his volunteer experience valuable and memorable, he said: “We’re all still very close, so I’d count those guys amongst my best friends. It probably made Istanbul the experience what it was really: getting there, working with them, and hanging out with them all the time”. The collaboration with other volunteers in the NGO created strong relations. Rami, a 29-year old Syrian former staff member, expressed how important the social aspect of the work was for him:
The environment there was so nice and everyone wanted to help. Also, I needed a social life, because I didn’t have any friends at that time, in the beginning. I was alone, so there I could do something to help people and at the same time I could make new friends and have a social life.
Rami spoke candidly about his own loneliness after just arriving in Istanbul, being displaced from Syria himself, and not having any social connections in this new place. The community center became a place that offered volunteers a social life, while also functioning as a place to learn and have a good time, as was demonstrated by the way Rami talked about his co-workers: “I really loved them, I learned a lot from them. We were not only working, we were friends, we are still friends, and I like that”. The NGO provided an opportunity for social connections between the humanitarian workers. Diana emphasized how important the NGO was for her: “The Almond Tree Community has been a major part of my life. All my social connections, friends, networks, pretty much come from here. I haven’t had much outside of the NGO”.
The need for sociality was keenly felt by many volunteers and staff members. The organization was perceived as a place to meet like-minded people, build strong friendships and work together on a cause that everyone was invested in. Cecily explained how humanitarian work connected her to other people: “I like volunteering because of the people I meet. Everybody is really centered around a cause, and they are all really passionate about it and really giving”. The community center was described by the volunteers as a place that aimed to foster a ‘social life’ for displaced families who had just arrived to Istanbul. At the same time, the volunteers of the organization had a strong need for a meaningful form of sociality and connecting to other people. Many of these volunteers were new to Istanbul as well, and they did not have many other social connections in the city. As such, the Almond Tree Community provided this much needed social network. Vivian, a 28-year old American staff member involved in the Syrian women’s social enterprise said: “In this work in particular you really have to find people who understand how you feel about the world. It’s been hard for me to connect to people like that out side of the Almond Tree Community”. For Turkish volunteers, on the other hand, the NGO was a place to encounter people from all around the world, as Ela illustrated: “You have the chance to get to know people from very different backgrounds. It’s a big gift to have this kind of environment. It’s beautiful, there are different languages, different cultures”.
As the Almond Tree Community was growing, the social relations shifted from informal friendships between volunteers towards more formal relationships between colleagues. Lana, one of the newly hired staff members, remarked that she did not really know most of her colleagues personally, because they generally did not communicate about personal topics with each other:
People don’t share, at least in the office, because it’s an office not friends, but they are very friendly and helpful even when they have disagreements. I noticed they still sit together and do the work. They are very respectful.
Malik also emphasized that the social relations in the NGO were based on respectful collaboration, with a focus on the outcome of the work: “I felt respect in general. I was accepted in this position because of my qualification, not because I am Syrian. I’m trying to be in the position of a staff member, to do my work.” Talal, a 43-year old Afghani staff member said that he appreciated that he was not judged on his nationality: “I have very good relations with the Arab people here, and the other people, Turkish, foreigners. It’s not a problem that I am the only person from Afghanistan”. Lana explained that she focused on the work itself, not on personal connections. She was trying to make that part of her “professional person”, as she called it:
This job is really teaching me how to deal with people. It’s a professional aspect of the work. It doesn’t matter if I like the person I am talking to, or if I agree with them, or if we have the same principles. I still have to work with them and make them comfortable.
Lana said that she was trying to not involve her personal preferences and emotions in the work: “I want to avoid being emotional, at least I’m trying not to act on my emotions. My priority is to be more professional”. Lana saw the Almond Tree Community as a professional workplace, where expressing personal feelings would be inappropriate. Instead, she associated professionalism with a neutral work attitude that focused on results. Social relations between staff members were not seen as necessary to the work of the NGO. In contrast, Cecily expressed her disagreement with this ideal of neutrality, arguing that personal connections are central to the concept of ‘grassroots’, especially when working with volunteers:
Grassroots humanitarian organizations are something that people put their heart into. When you have a project that people will work in for free, the corporate approach of ‘your emotions should not be in this’ does not work. Because connecting with people is the whole point of these kind of projects.
Several people who had been involved in Almond Tree Community since the beginning expressed their concern about the increasing focus on professionalization of the NGO. Looking back at what had changed over time, they emphasized the advantages of a small grassroots NGO and the dangers of growth. As Sam, one of the former staff members argued: “I think what you are looking at with the Almond Tree Community is the growing pains that an organization goes through when transitioning from grassroots into something more established, professional or whatever you want to call it”. The staff members and volunteers who had witnessed the transformation and growth of the organization, specifically criticized Joyce, the founder of the Almond Tree Community,
who had been advocating the shift towards professionalization, motivated by the desire of becoming an established humanitarian organization. Lea remembered how Joyce had said “we’re an NGO now, so we’re not a community center anymore”. This new approach had completely changed the organization, as Lea argued: “She actually had us change our focus onto more professional work, because she wanted the community heart out of it”. Naima emphasized that she appreciated Joyce’s good intentions with her efforts towards professionalization, but she warned that it might have destructive effects on the organization: “She can’t make it all professional, because this place is not something so professional. She is trying to help by trying to get more offers, funding and everything. That’s great, but don’t ruin the main point of it”. Naima felt that the contribution of the community itself to the success of the NGO had been underappreciated:
In the beginning we were so small. It was just one room. Nobody imagined they would move to this big building. All of this growth happened because of the people that were there: the families, the volunteers and the neighbors. The Almond Tree Community exists because of the people, and now people are leaving, because of everything that is happening.
Pointing out that many long-term staff members had left the organization, Naima expressed her discontent about the conflicts and the direction that the organization was taking. According to her, the core of the organization was located in the strong connections between the people in the community. She was worried that the NGO was loosing its social focus. The more formal atmosphere in the community center was also reflected in the physical aspects of the building. The first center had been just one small space that was shared by everyone. The new building was much bigger and encompassed several floors. This expansion was not appreciated by everyone. Mounir, a 28-year old volunteer from Egypt, explained why he preferred the smaller community center: “I loved the old place more than the new one, because it gives you the feeling that the place is surviving to help people surviving. There is nothing over-fancy, it was so simple”. Mounir felt that the growth of the NGO had created more distance between the staff members, volunteers and the Syrian families.
In general, the volunteers and staff members believed that the social relations at the NGO had become more formal. They connected this to the growth of the organization and the bigger size of the new building, which increased the sense of hierarchical relations. Many people felt worried that the social character of the Almond Tree Community was disappearing, to be replaced by the professional focus of a reputable humanitarian organization. The main point of the grassroots project was to establish connections between a diverse group of people and supporting each other. The term ‘community’ used to refer to anyone that was involved in the NGO, both volunteers and program participants, as the distinction between both was not so obvious. However, ‘community’, was increasingly being used exclusively to refer to the participants. The
physical and social distance between participants, volunteers and staff members had increased, since the latter had relocated to the administrative office. In the office, the social connections that were previously so important were not considered essential anymore. The focus had shifted to the outcome of the work and the establishment of a ‘professional’ work environment. Increasingly, the staff members were looking for ways to increase the efficiency and output of the NGO, which became manifested through a change in organizational practices.
Organizational practices and narratives of professionalization
The way of working at the Almond Tree Community changed significantly as the NGO adopted the ideal of growth and professionalization. This transformation was also reflected in the narratives of the aid workers. The staff members of the organization started to actively promote the model of professionalization, despite the NGO’s initial identity as a small-scale grassroots initiative. The style of working as a grassroots organization was based on informal methods and a focus on the ideal of creating a supportive local community. The organization relied on unpaid volunteer work and small donations from individual supporters. Over time, however, the organization shifted towards the employment of full-time staff members and a funding strategy that focused on gaining competitive humanitarian grants and collaborations with international organizations.
In the early days, the organization was still relatively decentralized. Most of the activities at the community center were created spontaneously by the volunteers, depending on the skills available and the demand of the Syrian families visiting the center. The exact content of the activities was left up to the volunteers. Lea highlighted that volunteers at Almond Tree Community were expected to be resourceful and independent, reflecting the ‘community spirit’, as she said:
I think the volunteers that really made a difference at the organization are the most extrovert people. I have met a bunch of people who are full of energy, happy to be there, resourceful, independent, didn’t need to hold hands to make them do anything. To me these were the people with the Almond Tree Community spirit.
Cecily said that this was one of the things she loved most about the volunteer work in the grassroots phase: “There was this freedom to create your own initiative and implement new ideas. I really enjoyed that”. She explained that used to be very few regulations and policies. The approach was more bottom-up than top-down, which was typical for a grassroots initiative. Nevertheless, she remarked that there was also a downside to this spontaneous way of working, as she noticed that it was hard to develop high quality long-term programs. The activities at the community center were often completely changed after a volunteer left the NGO. New volunteers basically had to ‘invent the wheel’ again,
because there were no guidelines on what the activities were supposed to look like. In the language classes for example, a new volunteer might repeat the same lessons, because there was no documentation on what had already been covered. In general, there used to be no long-term plan for the community center. Several staff members expressed the idea that the NGO needed to create fixed procedures and establish a structured way of working in order to be taken serious as a humanitarian organization. Karim, the 26-year old Syrian IT coordinator, argued that a grassroots NGO would not be able to function properly on the long term: “The problem with a grassroots NGO is that nothing is planned. There is no assignment of tasks. Who is the manager, who is responsible, who decides on the faith of the organization?”
A similar narrative was expressed by Malik: “Having an NGO means having a plan. If you don’t have a clear plan, the NGO will not last for a long time”. Malik thought that if the Almond Tree Community did not have a well-defined organizational strategy, it would not be considered a valid NGO. There was a perceived need to develop more formal policies in the organization, in order to be taken serious in the humanitarian sector. Rami, one of the early volunteers and former staff members, explained what was needed in order to become an established humanitarian organization:
I was trying to help the Almond Tree Community to grow, because nobody in the team had any experience with humanitarian work. To make the NGO grow, to make it structured and organized, they needed much help collecting information, communicating with people, and all of these things.
The necessity of structure, growth and systematization was self-evident to Rami, as it was to many other volunteers and staff members. The general narrative was that in order to grow, the NGO would have to professionalize. This became clear from a number of changes that were made in the organizational practices of the Almond Tree Community, concerning the formalization of the activities, the stricter volunteer management, the interest in collecting data and the emphasis on policies and guidelines. These changing organizational practices were connected to the shifting narratives about what constitutes effective humanitarian aid. The formalization was perceived as a necessary process in order to construct a better functioning organization.
An important concern among volunteers and staff members was that the available resources at the community center were not being used to the fullest. There was a lack of knowledge on what materials were available and how they could be used in activities. In an effort to address this problem, a group of volunteers created an online storage system for the digital materials of the activities and organized the storage room, which was filled with resources that could be used as tools in the activities. Despite of their efforts, the volunteers noticed that the storage room would get messy again, because there was no guideline on how to use it. Cecily expressed her concern about the lack of clear policies to the volunteer coordinator Lana. They decided to set up a meeting with all the lead
