Global learning through child sponsorships? Findings from research on young sponsors in Germany

Author(s):

Marina Wagener(presenting / submitting)

Conference:

ECER 2016

Network:

30. Environmental and Sustainability Education Research (ESER)

Format:

Paper

Session Information

30 SES 12 A, ESE in Non- and Informal Contexts

Paper Session

Time:

2016-08-26

09:00-10:30

Room:

NM-A105

Chair:

Jutta Nikel

Contribution

This project deals with the learning experiences of young people in Germany who engage in child sponsorship programs for children in the Global South. Child sponsorships are a common option for people in so-called industrialised countries who wish to permanently support a non-governmental developmental organization in their work for a child and its environment in the Global South. In response to paying monthly contributions the donors – in this study young people in Germany who sponsor a child as part of their school activities – receive information about the child, the superordinate development project and also the child’s country. In addition, sponsors can communicate with the sponsored child via letters.

By connecting people from different parts of the world through a specific combination of encounter and action, child sponsorships are an essential way of engaging with developmental questions: They convey images of the Global South, shape the donor’s understanding of development and, in a broader sense, influence worldviews as well as attitudes concerning global challenges. For many people in the Global North sponsoring programmes are an influential resource for dealing with aspects of globalisation and more specifically the development of a world society (see Luhmann 1997 for information on world society theory). For that reason child sponsorships can be considered informal learning opportunities in the global context (Scheunpflug 2005).

Due to its thematic focus, the educational aspect of child sponsoring is located in the discourse concerning development education, global learning, global citizenship education and education for sustainable development. These closely linked concepts are of great importance in the era of globalisation and fundamental global challenges, the solutions to which will shape life on earth in the near and distant future. A central challenge for learning in this respect is the immense increase of complexity (in a factual, spatial, temporal and social dimension) that individuals have to deal with (Scheunpflug 2004, 2011). The international educational scientific community as well as the organised civil society are engaged in an intensive discussion about theory and practice of global learning, often with a focus on young people (e.g. Andreotti 2006, 2011, Asbrand & Scheunpflug 2006, Bourn 2008, 2014). For the European context the Global Education Network Europe is an expression of a discourse conducted regarding research, practice, policy and conceptual development (see for example Forghani-Arani et al. 2013). In some European countries national strategies concerning global learning were developed: In Germany, for example, a framework for learning in the context of global development was installed to give curriculum guidance for formal learning institutions.

Child sponsoring is a highly controversial matter in this respect since sponsorship programs are often accused of conveying simplified concepts of “development as charity” (Smith & Yanacopulus 2004, p.661) and disguising global causes of poverty (e.g. Jefferess 2002, Scheunpflug 2005). Research on sponsoring is still very limited but findings point in a similar direction (e.g. Ove 2014, Scheunpflug 2005). Findings from research on global learning in different action formats furthermore suggest that charity-based activities encourage dichotomous and paternalistic world views (e.g. Asbrand 2009, Andreotti 2011, Tallon 2011). There are therefore concerns that sponsoring fosters simplistic understandings of and oversimplified approaches to global challenges, thusly counteracting important learning processes regarding the complexity of the world society. Learning in sponsoring, however, has not yet been the subject of empirical research. And despite its popularity, school engagement in sponsoring programmes and in particular accompanying learning experiences have not been paid much scholarly attention either. This project therefore develops a comprehensive picture of the sponsorship-related learning processes with regard to global orientations in the context of the world society.

Method

Since so far only very little research concerning sponsorship has been carried out (e.g. Ove 2014, Rabbitts 2014, Scheunpflug 2005) and only little is known about learning experiences of sponsors, this research project focuses on generating hypotheses. In a qualitative design the so-called documentary method of analysis (Bohnsack 2010) is used to analyse data gathered in group discussions with young people in Germany who as a group sponsor a child in a country in the Global South. A total of 32 group discussions were conducted, out of which 13 were included in a detailed analysis. According to the idea of theoretical sampling (Glaser & Strauss 1967) groups were chosen bit by bit according to sampling criteria that were developed in the course of the (comparative) analysis. The basic idea of the group discussion method (Bohnsack 2010) is to listen to what the participants have to say without influencing them in any way. They are therefore not asked pre-formulated questions but are encouraged to express whatever is important to them. Therefore not questions but stimuli are given in order to initiate narrations and discussions about the child sponsoring programme the participants are engaged in. The documentary method was developed by Ralf Bohnsack (2010) and is based on the sociology of knowledge of Karl Mannheim (1952, 1982). The aim of using this method is the description of patterns of orientations. In order to achieve this, data are analysed in a two-step-interpretation: the first deals with what participants said and therefore focuses on explicit knowledge while the second part of the interpretation concentrates on how participants discussed different issues and consequently explores tacit knowledge structures. The underlying assumption is that by eliciting this kind of knowledge implicit patterns of fundamental orientation can be studied. The specific value of the documentary method of data gathered in group discussions is the focus on collective (and not individual) orientations. In this research project it is therefore supposed that the shared activity of sponsoring a child together leads to the development of collective global orientations. A key principle in applying the documentary method is the comparative analysis: by comparing and contrasting different groups and therefore different orientation patterns, the characteristics of each of these can be worked out very precisely (Bohnsack 2010).

Expected Outcomes

By drawing on a well-established methodology, this qualitative research project develops extensive knowledge of the learning processes within child sponsorships in terms of global orientations in the world society. The question as to whether child sponsoring as an informal learning opportunity supports learning concerning the world society is one focus of the project, the aim of which is to shed light on an under-researched educational phenomenon. The comparative analysis of the data led to the development of a typology of orientations within child sponsoring: While all groups share the perception of being in an asymmetric relationship based on authenticity, three types of orientation patterns in dealing with asymmetry and authenticity were reconstructed. The first is characterized by processes of generalisation through which Global North and South appear as total contrasts with the former being superior to the latter. The second pattern is coined by processes of concretisation in which the construction of a personal connection towards the individual sponsored child is central. The third pattern is defined by dissociation processes through which the sponsorship itself and therefore also the asymmetric context in general is perceived as inauthentic and therefore rejected. In the presentation these findings will be discussed against the backdrop of the aforementioned discourse on global learning and the concerns that child sponsoring, in the course of a strong reduction of complexity, might inhibit central learning processes regarding the complexity of the world society and its developmental challenges. The different types reconstructed in the analysis will be looked at with regard to the question as to whether and to which extent they indicate processes of global learning.

References

Andreotti, V.(2006): Soft versus critical global citizenship education. Policy & Practice: A Development Education Review (3): 40-51. Andreotti, V.(2011): Actionable postcolonial theory in education. New York: Palgrave Macmillan. Asbrand, B. and Scheunpflug, A. (2006) Global Education and Education for Sustainability. Environmental Education Research 12 (1): 33-47. Asbrand, B.(2009): Wissen und Handeln in der Weltgesellschaft. Münster: Waxmann. Bohnsack, R.(2010): Documentary method an group discussions. In: R. Bohnsack, N. Pfaff & V. Weller, Wivian (eds.): Qualitative analysis and documentary method in international educational research. Opladen: Budrich. Bourn, D. (ed.)(2008): Development education. Debates and dialogue. London: Institute of Education. Bourn, D.(2015): The theory and practice of development education. Abingdon: Routledge. Forghani-Arani, N., Hartmeyer, H., O'Loughlin, E. & Wegimont, L. (ed.)(2013): Global education in Europe. Policy, practice and theoretical challenges. Münster: Waxmann. Glaser, B. & Strauss, A. L.(1967): The Discovery of Grounded Theory. Chicago: Aldine. Jefferess, D.(2002): For Sale - Peace of Mind: (Neo-)Colonial Discourse and the Commodification of Third World Poverty in World Vision's 'Telethons'. Critical Arts: A South-North Journal of Cultural & Media Studies 16 (1): 1–21. Luhmann, N.(1997): Die Gesellschaft der Gesellschaft. Frankfurt a.M.: Suhrkamp. Mannheim, K.(1952): Essays on the sociology of knowledge. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul. Mannheim, K.(1982): Structures of thinking. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul. Ove, P. (2013): “Change a life. Change your own”: Child sponsorship, the discourse of development, and the production of ethical subjects. University of British Colombia, Vancouver. Rabbitts, Frances(2013): "Nothing is whiter than white in this world": Child sponsorship and the geographies of charity. University of Exeter, Exeter. Scheunpflug, A.(2004): Learning for a global society. In: E. O’Loughlin & L. Wegimont (eds.): Evaluation and quality in global education. Proceedings of the Global Education Network Europe Conference, London 23-25 September 2003, 39-45. Scheunpflug, A.(2005): Die öffentliche Darstellung von Kinderpatenschaften. Nuremberg: University of Erlangen-Nuremberg. Retrieved December 30, 2015, from http://www.presse.uni-erlangen.de /infocenter/presse/pressemitteilungen/forschung_2005/06_05/Kinderpatenschaften.pdf. Scheunpflug, A.(2011): Global education and cross-cultural learning: A challenge for a research based approach to international teacher education. International Journal of Development Education and Global Learning 3 (3): 29-44. Smith, M. & Yanacopulus, H.(2004): The public faces of development: an introduction. Journal of International Development 16 (5): 657-664. Tallon, R.(2011): Creating "little sultans" in the social sciences: learning about the other through benevolent eyes. International Research in Geographical and Environmental Education 20 (4): 281-286.

Author Information

Marina Wagener (presenting / submitting)

University of Bamberg

Frau

Kassel

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