The Geography of Compassion in Volunteer Tourism

Abstract Volunteer tourism is at the center of new concerns over the ethical consumption of tourism experiences. As one link in a broader chain of expansion of neoliberal moral economies in the West, volunteer tourism participants coproduce a ‘geography of compassion’ that maps onto the ‘Third World’ and the children who live there. Drawing on 15 months of ethnographic fieldwork in Chiang Mai, Thailand, I examine the widespread sentiment that Thailand is an ideal starting point for international volunteer tourists who intend to seek out subsequent volunteer opportunities in Africa – where ‘real’ volunteer experiences are to be had. I also highlight the Third World child as the primary object of Western volunteer tourists’ benevolence. Finally, I examine the impetus and implications of these popular sentiments and argue that similar to the broader expansion of neoliberal moral economies, the geography of compassion in volunteer tourism is reflective of the larger – albeit inadvertent – depoliticization of global justice agendas.