Weaponized volunteering: Where and whither

Abstract

Writing on weaponized volunteering in these perilous times, one risks the perils Auden described of ‘lecturing on navigation as the ship goes down’. Aging and unarmed, this scholar proceeds to respond to the invitation of providing concluding remarks to the monograph issue. I address four aspects of weaponized volunteering, as introduced in the five articles presented in this issue: (1) the significance of the content of this phenomenon; (2) the scope and quality of initial presentations; (3) the refinement of criteria for the subject; and (4) the range of responses that are likely to greet initial efforts to develop this field. Researchers in this field, if they are to succeed, will need to be exceptionally introspective, reflective, and self-critical. It will not be difficult for their critics to attack them as apologists for one or another side in the conflicts they study, or even as advocates for violence or terrorism. Studies in this field will themselves require study, relating, for example, the depiction of groups targeted for study to the intellectual backgrounds and political orientations of the researchers themselves. And the field itself will expand in both time and space: the long history of weaponized volunteering will be discovered and explored as it unfolds in the many corners of the earth; alternative futures and their implications for social peace and justice will require charting. In short, this may become a lively and important field, one which opens a wide range of new issues and concerns to the researcher aiming to understand the broadened nature of voluntary and purposive social action.