Challenges to Volunteerism in the 80s

In June 1979, Pennsylvania’s “First Annual Symposium on Volunteerism and Education” was convened in Harrisburg.  The keynote address was delivered by Gordon Manser, co-author of the 1976 book, Voluntarism at the Crossroads.  We dust off and republish his speech here, allowing us to look back through the prism of 31 years at the issues he predicted would affect our field in the coming decades.  Some – such as the impact of the gasoline shortage at that time or Proposition 13 in California – have evolved into somewhat different challenges.  Other themes continue to be very pertinent today.