Solidarity and Volunteering: A View from Mexico

Abstract

The central objective of this chapter is to offer new information about volunteer activities in Mexico, as data that were presented for this country many years ago were very limited. This time our information comes from a national survey using a new methodological approach whose main traits are presented. The purpose of this has been to uncover volunteer activities as they take place in a country like Mexico, where volunteering seems to take place in a particular manner for which the traditional way of collecting information is not appropriate. Our research revealed that the majority of the Mexican population are involved in voluntary activities. It shows also that voluntary action in this country is varied, it is intense, and it is short term. These traits seem to be a characteristic in Mexico that might be different from what happens in other latitudes. International comparisons among countries with respect to civil society issues including voluntary activities should take a different perspective by paying less attention to a few quantitative indicators as has been more usual; rather the focus should be on the social meanings of the voluntary activities that occur in each sociocultural milieu.