Cerdá Suárez Luis Manuel, Valero Matas Jesús Alberto, Jaramillo Cardona Martha Cecilia, Ramírez Ramirez Margarita
Faculty of Business and Communication, International University of La Rioja, Logroño, Spain.
Department of Sociology and Social Work, University of Valladolid, Palencia, Spain.
Front Psychol. 2020 Jan 28;10:2978. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2019.02978. eCollection 2019.
San Diego and Tijuana configure two big cities that have faced each other across the international boundary between United States and Mexico for over 180 years. Within this context, the relationship emerging at the border can be characterized under different categories of individual, social, economic, and political situations connecting each side. Additionally, in recent years, the literature on cross-border conflicts has extensively focused on volunteers as informal agents helping children and other groups of population, but relatively little research has addressed the practical and managerial work and implications of the volunteers themselves. As actors of cross-border communities, volunteers play a relevant role in effective short-term migrants' settlement, but it is also observed that the profile of volunteers in religious organizations differs from those belonging to non-profit institutions. Grounded on the theories of Planned Behavior and Reasoned Action suggesting that intentions to cooperate with non-government institutions are influenced directly by attitudinal values and indirectly by their beliefs related to social conflicts, this paper analyzes the nature of volunteer commitment in religious and non-profit organizations (NPOs) providing information about managerial practices for newly arrived migrants. The main purpose of this study is to investigate the relevance of volunteer commitment as an instrument for managing cross-border conflicts in the particular context of San Diego and Tijuana Area. Based on research using interview data collected from beneficiaries by volunteers, institutional representatives, and documentary references, this manuscript highlights a psychological and individual-centric perspective of volunteer commitment, but it also explores a collective communicative action expanding the range of relevant voices in decisions about volunteering. Moreover, this study provides new insights into how organizational and relational elements impact sustainable volunteer management and points out the role played by attitudes toward non-government institutions such as religious and NPOs demonstrating the relevance of volunteer commitment, transforming part of the positive attitude toward social problems into a significant intention to cooperation. Understanding the importance of the organization's images in order to attract volunteers, these results show that commitment may become a key determinant of the volunteers' identity linked to strategies devoted to organizational activities.
圣地亚哥和蒂华纳是两座大城市，在美国和墨西哥的国际边界两侧对峙了180多年。在此背景下，边境地区出现的关系可以根据连接双方的个人、社会、经济和政治状况的不同类别来描述。此外，近年来，关于跨境冲突的文献广泛关注志愿者作为帮助儿童和其他人群的非正式主体，但相对较少的研究涉及志愿者自身的实际工作、管理工作及影响。作为跨境社区的参与者，志愿者在短期移民的有效安置中发挥着重要作用，但也观察到宗教组织中的志愿者形象与非营利机构中的志愿者不同。基于计划行为理论和理性行动理论，即与非政府机构合作的意图直接受态度价值观影响，间接受与社会冲突相关的信念影响，本文分析了宗教组织和非营利组织中志愿者奉献的本质，为新抵达的移民提供管理实践信息。本研究的主要目的是调查在圣地亚哥和蒂华纳地区的特定背景下，志愿者奉献作为管理跨境冲突工具的相关性。基于对志愿者、机构代表收集的受益对象访谈数据以及文献参考的研究，本论文突出了志愿者奉献的心理和以个人为中心的视角，但也探讨了集体沟通行动，扩大了志愿服务决策中相关声音的范围。此外，本研究为组织和关系要素如何影响可持续的志愿者管理提供了新见解，并指出了对宗教和非营利组织等非政府机构的态度所起的作用，证明了志愿者奉献的相关性，将对社会问题的部分积极态度转化为重要的合作意图。了解组织形象对吸引志愿者的重要性，这些结果表明奉献可能成为与致力于组织活动的策略相关的志愿者身份的关键决定因素。
