**3. Spontaneous volunteers**

The term spontaneous volunteer [26, 40–45] used in this study is also widely used in the literature with different terms such as helpers [46, 47], unaffiliated volunteer [48], informal volunteer [12, 49], walk-in disaster volunteer [50], and emergent groups [25, 51]. It is possible to say that the use of these various terminologies typically developed as a reflection of people's actions following emergencies and disasters. People frequently go to the affected area in a converging reaction to take part in response and relief operations when an emergency or disaster event happens. Given that the topic is how people behave after a disaster, it shows that sociological research constitutes the earliest study on the behaviors that literature refers to as "convergence" and "emergent" [11, 14, 20, 32, 46]. While Dynes et al. [20] claimed that the majority of people's activities following the disaster were a significant and positive impact on civic responsibility, Fischer [52] classified these actions as "altruism" in his study on people's behavior following the September 11 attacks. Disaster volunteers may participate in crisis response and relief efforts for various reasons, while altruism is often a major driving force for those who have experienced a crisis [53]. There are three ways to observe convergence behaviors: *personal convergence*, *informational convergence*, and *material convergence* [46]. The direct physical human movement to the disaster-affected area is represented by the personal convergence form mentioned here. According to Fritz and Mathewson [46], there are five different types of motivation for this personnel convergence reaction following a disaster: *"the returness"* (victims or survivors at the time of crisis), *"the anxious"* (those who want to be empowered through mobility, such as by learning about family or friends), *"the helpers"* (people who are motivated by altruism), *"the curious"* (disaster tourists), and *"the exploiters"* (opportunistic individuals looking to gain recognition or, at worst, access to vulnerable individuals to exert power in any number of ways). Kendra and Wachtendorf [54] added to these types of personnel convergence the motivations of *"the supporters"* (encouraging and expressing appreciation to first responders) and *"the mourners or memorializers"*. Although the reasons people move to disasteraffected areas can vary due to the unpredictable effects and consequences of modern disasters as well as the sociocultural differences of the affected communities, the types of personnel convergence discussed here act as an essential framework for comprehending these motivations.

Different definitions of spontaneous volunteering exist, similar to the terms that are used for these volunteers. One of the most accepted definitions of spontaneous volunteering in the literature is as follows: *"spontaneous volunteers are those who seek to contribute on impulse- people who offer assistance following a disaster and who are not previously affiliated with recognized volunteer agencies and may or may not have relevant training, skills or experience"* [14]. In their study, Whittaker et al. [12] defined spontaneous volunteering in a broader sense as follows: *"people who work outside of formal emergency and disaster management arrangements to help others who are at risk or are affected by emergencies and disasters. Such volunteerism may take place before,* 

*Spontaneous Volunteers in Emergencies and Disasters DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.109330*

*during, or after an event. Informal volunteers may participate as individuals or as part of a group, on short or long-term basis, regularly or irregularly, and in situ or ex situ. Their participation may be spontaneous and unplanned, or deliberate and carefully planned*". According to the criteria provided, it can be concluded that following a crisis, spontaneous volunteers appear as a natural phenomenon with various motivations and can contribute significantly to the labor force and the economy through their activities. As an illustration, professional cleanup efforts following the Florida tornadoes of February 1998 were anticipated to cost \$8 million and require 90 days to complete in Osceola County, but spontaneous volunteer efforts cost roughly \$1.4 million and took 55 days to complete [55]. Modern mass media, such as today's technologies and social media, play a significant part in the development of this reaction in addition to human instincts. For instance, 2.3 million people participated in the 2014 Malaysian Airlines search for the missing flight MH370 by scanning 24,000 square kilometers of satellite imagery published on the Tommod website [56]. After the crisis, it is also possible to argue that contemporary mass media has drawbacks. Even if the disaster is relatively modest, the media's dramatization and exaggeration can turn it from a local emergency to a national or international event [11]. While the efforts of spontaneous volunteers during the times of crisis cannot be discounted, their lack of organization, planning, knowledge, and skills regarding emergencies and disasters and uncertainty regarding the legal responsibility of professional organizations can result in these volunteers doing more damage than good. The types of activities that these volunteers have participated in as a result of previous emergencies and disasters, as well as the benefits, challenges, and risks associated with these efforts, will be covered in the next sections of the study.

#### **3.1 The benefits of spontaneous volunteers in emergencies and disasters**

When countries' disaster management systems are reviewed, it can be concluded that they are getting more specialized and that the response studies are being carried out more effectively. However, first response tasks are typically carried out by the locals who are already there in the period between the disaster's occurrence and the professional disaster managers' arrival at the affected area [12, 13, 55]. According to a Canadian research, 37% of people who experienced a major emergency or disaster resorted to family members, 24% to neighbors, and 15% to friends for assistance, while just 15% turned to the local government, 9% to first responders, 9% to the police, and 5% to the state government [57]. Undoubtedly, established organizations are essential in the times of crisis, but this study demonstrates how vital spontaneous volunteers are to response and relief operations.

Spontaneous volunteers participate in various tasks throughout emergency and disaster response and recovery phases. These activities may change depending on the kind of emergency or disaster and the location where it occurs. Spontaneous volunteers can be a valuable human resource for identifying vulnerable groups in the social structure, cultural content, and demographic structure and for more access to the necessary resources and geographic information that may be required by response teams and accelerate response efforts [13, 29]. Twigg and Mosel [25] presented the activities of spontaneous volunteers in emergency and post-disaster events in 9 main categories. **Table 1** illustrates that these activities show that spontaneous volunteers are generally involved in basic or special skills. In particular, they play a significant role in carrying out many tasks that call for only basic skills, such as gathering, transporting, and distributing relief supplies and clearing debris, in addition to


*Disaster response activities of emergency groups and spontaneous volunteers*

#### **Table 1.**

*Activities of emergent groups and spontaneous volunteers [25].*

performing critically essential responses such as search and rescue, first aid, and firefighting until professional teams arrive at the affected area. According to emergency managers in the study by Daddoust et al. [13] on the use of spontaneous volunteers, they can be used for tasks such as *"collecting and organizing donations", "assisting with evacuations", "food distribution", "meet and greet", "providing food and drink",* and *"pet services"*. As another illustration, following the 2009 "Black Saturday" bushfires in Victoria, Australia, more than 22,000 volunteers provided online support [27], and in response to the call of farmers whose farms were damaged, citizens helped to rebuild farms [12]. A community group called "BlazeAid," which aims to carry out recovery operations and assist rural areas devastated by natural disasters, was founded due to these actions [12].

Given that both the procedural restrictions of official organizations and the affected society may not be aware of these official procedures and rules, spontaneous volunteers can be tools that can lead to beneficial results for both groups after emergencies and disasters [13]. Effectively utilizing spontaneous volunteers can reduce

#### *Spontaneous Volunteers in Emergencies and Disasters DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.109330*

the number of deaths and minimize labor costs [13, 55] while also bringing about intangible advantages for the affected community's mental health, social cohesion, trust, and harmony [58]. Orloff [22] proposed that the efficient use of spontaneous volunteers will aid professional teams' response activities. In view of this, spontaneous volunteers, who typically originate from the affected community, might be a valuable tool in response activities due to their familiarity with its linguistic, cultural, and structural aspects. Additionally, it is possible to make efficient use of communitybased and religious leaders and organizations that can assist not only in the response effort but also in the procurement and evacuation for the organizations established pre-disaster and expanding organizations. According to Orloff [22], because spontaneous volunteers can provide advantages such as *"local experts", "cultural competency", "language skills", "specialized skills and resources from work or other experience", "official responders capable of doing more advanced work", "official responders capable of assisting community in healing and emotional recovery process"*, and *"savings money and time"*, relevant institutions can perform more effective response and resource management if they are integrated into emergency and disaster management systems. There are guidelines and tool kits published by the US, New Zealand, and Australia [27, 59–61] as well as the "*Security and resilience-Community resilience-Guidelines for planning the involvement of spontaneous volunteers"* [62] published by the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) for the effective use and management of spontaneous volunteers in addition to academic studies suggesting models [7, 13, 43, 44, 63–65]. It should be noted, however, that the process of integrating spontaneous volunteers into management systems is challenging and complex due to variety of factors, including emergency managers' resistance to using them, the various personality traits and skill sets of these volunteers, the variety of disasters, and social and cultural differences.

In summary, spontaneous volunteers are human resources that can help with a variety of problems during emergencies and disasters. At this point, it can be stated that societal resilience will improve and disaster damage will decrease if this unavoidable human resource can be integrated into the current emergency and disaster management systems and appropriately utilized.

## **3.2 The challenges and risks of spontaneous volunteers in emergencies and disasters**

Without being a part of an established or expanding organization and going to the disaster area with various motivations, spontaneous volunteers cause risks and challenges to themselves, those affected by the disaster, and professional organizations. According to the research, these volunteers could present the affected area with a wide range of risks and challenges. They generally run the potential of being damaging due to several issues, such as a lack of coordination, knowledge, and skills; security issues; and legal liabilities. These factors make professional responders reluctant to work with these volunteers, and they refer to them as "disaster with disaster" [66].

Fernandez et al. [53] identified two main categories of risks: emergency and disaster response volunteers are not used effectively and they are unorganized and do not have adequate training. The first of these risks, ineffective use of spontaneous volunteers by emergency and disaster managers, may create a poor public perspective of emergency and disaster response and increase the probability of deaths, serious injuries, and financial loss [12, 53]. The second risk is that unorganized and untrained spontaneous volunteers can hinder the efficient use of resources and endanger both

professional first responders and disaster victims as well as themselves. The rescue of 800 individuals from the debris following the earthquake in Mexico City in 1985 by untrained, spontaneous volunteers—100 of whom died in the process—is one of the most commonly mentioned instances of this situation in the literature [20, 30]. Another illustration is that after the Hebei Spirit oil spill in South Korea in 2007, physical harm and infections were brought on by volunteers taking part in the response operations without having the proper personal protective equipment and not knowing the toxic effects of the oil [67]. Integrating spontaneous volunteers into the current emergency and disaster management systems can reduce the abovementioned risks. As a result, professional organizations do not have the time during a crisis to identify who has the necessary abilities and to train them for field response activities [25]. On the other hand, if they can be integrated, both these human resources and other resources will be used efficiently, easing the burden on professional organizations that work in the disaster area.

Particularly for the people affected by a disaster, the first hours after it strikes are crucial. After a disaster, there is less chance of people being rescued as time goes on. Therefore, given the importance of professional rescue teams reaching and responding to the area as soon as possible, the presence of numerous individuals, equipment, support materials, and vehicles in the area can cause obstructions and hinder professional responders [25]. With more than 22,000 deaths, the 1999 Marmara earthquake (also called Gölcük) in Turkey is one of the deadliest disasters in history. International recovery was necessary because this disaster struck the most populated region of the country, which at the time had a crisis management-focused disaster management system. Spontaneous volunteers who arrived from the disaster's area and other parts of the country were crucial to many operations, including search and rescue. However, professional disaster responders were unable to access the area due to a 32 km-long traffic jam caused by spontaneous volunteers who arrived in the area after the earthquake [24]. Nearly 20 years after this earthquake, on October 30, 2020, an earthquake hit in Izmir, one of the largest metropolitan cities. Since then, the country has adopted an integrated disaster management system and improved its organization and coordination of disaster response. However, as in the Marmara earthquake, the access of the emergency response teams was delayed as the volunteers came to the disaster-affected area with their vehicles and caused a traffic jam. These experiences demonstrate the requirement of incorporating spontaneous volunteers into the current disaster management system in order to provide the quick and efficient response strategy that is essentially intended.

According to Orloff [22], there are three drawbacks to using spontaneous volunteers during emergencies and disasters: *"liability," "physical and emotional concerns,"* and *"the potential lack of internal readiness within agencies"*. First, liability is viewed as a drawback in many studies in the literature because of the legal uncertainties surrounding the use of spontaneous volunteering in emergencies and disasters. According to Twigg and Mosel [25], this circumstance is as follows. "There may be uncertainty about legal liability of volunteer responders (or official organizations they assist) for deaths, injuries or damages suffered by volunteers, or by disasteraffected people as a result of their actions. A related issue is lack of insurance cover for volunteers." Liability is one of the reasons professional emergency and disaster managers are reluctant to engage spontaneous volunteers. In the study conducted by Daddoust et al. [13], emergency managers indicated *"liability issues"* as one of the most problematic and challenges, while *"sued for spontaneous volunteer actions"* and *"sued by spontaneous volunteer"* were the subjects they saw as the most potential risks. Additionally, the literature also discusses the problem of security [12, 13, 25, 39].

#### *Spontaneous Volunteers in Emergencies and Disasters DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.109330*

While spontaneous volunteers create a security problem for themselves and those affected by the disaster, they can also be seen as abusing the disaster situation. In addition to looting materials of economic value, they can also abuse the current situation differently. For instance, after the 2010 Haiti earthquake, a group of Baptist missionaries from the US who had gone to the disaster area was apprehended at the Haiti-Dominican Republic border with 33 children [12, 68]. Later, this group claimed in their statements that they had taken orphaned and abandoned children to give them the opportunity to rescue, care for, and adopt. Eventually, it was confirmed that the children were not abandoned nor orphaned [68]. The dimension of physical concern is the situations that can hinder the work of professional organizations because spontaneous volunteers are typically unorganized and uneducated and can pose a risk of death and injury to both themselves and those affected by the disaster. On the other hand, the emotional component, the involvement of people who have already experienced emotional harm before an emergency and disaster or as a result of this event, and the work to overcome these feelings can both worsen one's situation and cause emotional harm to those who are affected by the disaster. Emergency and disaster managers will need to be more careful about using spontaneous volunteers at this stage because their appearance on the scene is almost inevitable. Following the September 11 attacks, response and recovery operations involving 30,000–40,000 volunteers posed security risks, and a large number of the first volunteers who came on the spot to offer help were emotionally exhausted during the search and rescue operations [12]. A study on the management of spontaneous volunteers after the attacks found that emergency managers rarely take spontaneous volunteers into account when planning, and because they do not self-care, spontaneous volunteers may be traumatized, become victims of disaster, and need services [69]. Finally, it was stated that the potential lack of internal readiness within agencies, which is seen as a disadvantage, will be ensured by the inclusion of spontaneous volunteers in the studies and their use, if they are compatible with the current institutional structure. At this point, within the institutional structure, there may be preparation issues such as limited formal staff to manage spontaneous volunteers, limited affiliated volunteers to work with and mentor these volunteers, limited time to create and implement a management plan, language barriers between employees and the affected community, and existing organizational culture [22].
