New Series, Vol. 2, No. 17
Much like paid work, the nature of volunteer labor has shifted dramatically due to rapid evolution of digital technology. Increased digital connectivity has afforded individuals more accessible and flexible volunteer opportunities given that individuals can provide their labor from any place at any time. However, although networked activism provides more accessible opportunities for deep involvement in social movements, many remote volunteers also experience feelings of lacking control, isolation, and do not receive real-time feedback or hands-on assistance that might be more easily afforded from gathering in a physical space.
This ethnography explores paradoxical decision-making tensions and experiences of remote volunteers at a feminist nonprofit organization committed to reproductive justice in the U.S. The organization under investigation in this study is an abortion fund hotline that provides callers with financial support for abortion procedures. However, although aided by organizational policies and paid staff to identify priority callers, due to the “fluid, flat design” of the organization’s postbureaucratic (i.e., defying traditional bureaucratic norms like rules, rigidity, and hierarchy) structure, remote volunteers often face the burden of deciding who and how to disperse limited funds (i.e., funding for only 18-30% of callers).
When organizational members are faced with such difficult decisions, they often experience tensions, characterized by a variety of sensations including stress, anxiety, discomfort, constraint, paralysis, uncertainty, and frustration. In this case, making decisions about which callers to fund, and not fund, felt antithetical to the organization’s values of feminism, justice, and postbureaucracy, rendering these decisions paradoxical and sometimes seemingly impossible. Over time, unresolved tensions that are not adequately addressed by organizational leadership may lead to organizational members developing their own micro-practices to navigate the tensions and even member disillusionment and broader organizational confusion. A central tension that emerged for volunteers in this context was trying to balance competing interests of caring about the reproductive justice movement broadly and caring for callers, other volunteers, and themselves as they tried to make the best funding decisions possible in real-time following organizational protocols.
A total of 26 semi-structured interviews were conducted with nine organizational leaders (i.e., paid staff and board members) and 17 volunteers, all of whom identified as women except for one who did not disclose their gender identity. This work was conducted prior to the Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization decision in 2022 and all organizational activity was legal at the time of this investigation. Interview transcripts were analyzed using Craig and Tracy’s (2014) model of grounded practical theory which approaches the study of communication problems in everyday life in terms of goals, challenges to meeting goals, and practical strategies for addressing these challenges. Specifically, this study sought to identify strategies that volunteers themselves used and broader organizational strategies to address the caring about and for tension described above.
Some organizational efforts to prevent volunteer burnout included priority policies and hotline protocols that identified callers based on factors such as access to necessary reproductive healthcare, stage of pregnancy, and bodily autonomy to streamline decision-making. This was somewhat effective in that it offered a starting point and removed some of the decision-making burden, but the budget was frequently not enough to fund all priority callers. Organizational leaders also set a daily budget to dispense on the hotline so that volunteers would have a clear stopping point and also tried to encourage volunteers to hold boundaries, focus on joy in their work, and frequently reminded volunteers that there are “no wrong decisions.” However, some volunteers noted that callers’ funding needs greatly exceeded the amount they were permitted to give and thus questioned the efficacy of giving an insufficient amount of funds and reported that this in part would impact their funding decisions. Volunteers also factored callers’ social identities, emotions, and individual experiences into their decision-making process to manage their stress.
The author discusses bounded rationality and emotionality, two strategies typically used in organizations to manage decision-making tensions. Bounded rationality prioritizes efficiency and is a traditional, hierarchical model of decision-making based on authority in organizations where decisions are made almost exclusively by leaders with little input from other organizational members. Bounded emotionality, on the other hand, is more tolerant of ambiguity and feedback and rejects decision-making based on status.
In light of this study’s findings, the author recommends feminist bounded rationality as an alternative decision-making strategy to manage tensions in feminist volunteer organizations. Although bounded emotionality is more feminist and egalitarian in nature, remote volunteers in this context were not explicitly encouraged to provide feedback on decision-making processes, at least at the time of this study. This would, however, require additional labor and may lead to burnout among both paid staff and volunteers. A bounded emotionality approach intends to empower organizational members, but such empowerment to make paradoxical decisions about vulnerable people in this context was extremely stressful for some remote volunteers. The author argues that a feminist bounded rationality approach would put the burden of paradoxical decision-making on organizational leaders as an act of care for volunteers. Volunteers would then focus on communication and execution, hopefully leading to increased feelings of efficacy and empowerment while still affording autonomy in a less complicated manner and prioritizing volunteer sustainability and harm reduction.
Communication Currents Discussion Questions
- Think about a time you volunteered (in person or remotely). Have you ever been asked to make a decision as a volunteer that felt uncomfortable or conflicted with your values? How did you handle it? In the essay, volunteers had to balance caring for the movement, callers, other volunteers, and themselves. If you were in their position, which value would you prioritize and why?
- What strategies have you used (or could you use) to maintain your energy and motivation when working in emotionally demanding situations? If you were a leader in this organization, what policies or structures would you put in place to protect your volunteers from burnout?
- The author recommends a “feminist bounded rationality” approach, where leaders take more of the decision-making burden. What might be the advantages and disadvantages of this approach in a volunteer-based organization? Do you think shifting more decision-making to leaders could make volunteers feel less empowered, or could it actually make them feel more effective? Why?
For additional suggestions about how to use this and other Communication Currents in the classroom, see: https://www.natcom.org/publications/communication-currents/integrating-communication-currents-classroom
ABOUT THE AUTHORS
Jessica Gantt-Shafer is an Assistant Professor in the School of Humanities and Social Sciences at University of Missouri – Kansas City.
This essay, by R. E. Purtell, translates the scholarly journal article, J. Gantt-Shafer (2025). Paradoxes and postbureaucracy: Volunteer decision-making at remote feminist nonprofit organizations. Communication Monographs. Advance online publication. https://doi.org/10.1080/03637751.2025.2470767
The full copyright and private policy link is available at natcom.org/privacy-policy/
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