Today we celebrate International Volunteer Day, with the awareness that this is not, nor has it ever been, just an altruistic gesture. In November this year, volunteering gained a new place in contemporary social architecture after being adopted at the Second World Summit for Social Development, a global meeting promoted by the United Nations in Doha, as a central piece in the development of communities and social cohesion. This international recognition confirmed what we were already feeling on the ground: volunteering stopped living on the margins and began to occupy a structural space in the future of societies, a path that will gain new momentum with the International Year of Volunteering, in 2026.
The most complete public data dates back to 2018, which leaves part of the recent evolution of the phenomenon unfilled, but according to INE, around 7.8% of the Portuguese population aged 15 or over participated in volunteer activities that year. We continue to lag behind several countries on the old continent, but these numbers reveal a stable growth trend. At a European level, civic participation and volunteering have been gaining centrality on public agendas, reinforcing the idea that we are not dealing with an occasional welfare gesture, but rather a structuring social force.
In parallel, corporate volunteering has established itself as an unavoidable dimension and as a process of mutual transformation, where the volunteer gives, but also receives and evolves psychologically, behaviorally and in terms of their convictions. Behavioral neuroscience confirms this dynamic, showing how exposure to experiences and contexts outside the usual “comfort zone” generates new learning, challenges prejudices and deepens empathy. Companies today recognize this potential and volunteering is no longer a reputational adornment, becoming part of talent, social impact and human development strategies, reinforcing teams that are more empathetic, collaborative and aligned with their mission. However, despite the evidence, corporate volunteering continues without formal recognition in national statistics, which leaves a significant part of the social impact produced annually in the country invisible.
Therefore, it is urgent to create a Corporate Volunteering Observatory, which allows collecting consistent data, mapping practices, understanding motivations, measuring developed skills and monitoring trends. It is this knowledge that will allow us to take the missing leap in the construction of public policies capable of integrating volunteering in a full and strategic way. Realizing this potential requires collaboration between sectors: the State, local authorities and companies must work in concert, integrating volunteering into their strategies and creating cooperation platforms that unite public policies, civil society and private initiative in a common agenda. Only in this way will we consolidate volunteering as an agent of social cohesion, as the UN recognizes in the Doha Political Declaration.
Finally, it is important to remember that volunteering and social impact are perhaps the most natural stages for achieving SDG 17 (Partnerships for the Goals). Here, competition dilutes and collaboration emerges. In a fragmented world, volunteering continues to be one of the few spaces where we can practice, and not just imagine, the true sense of common good.