Expectations about the contribution that volunteering can make are at a new high. This book aims to meet this interest by bringing together in one volume what is known about the phenomenon of volunteering; the principles and practice of involving volunteers, and the enduring challenges for volunteering in today's world.

COLIN ROCHESTER Honorary Research Fellow in the Department of Social Policy and Education at Birkbeck College, University of London, UK. He has previously held posts at Roehampton University and the London School of Economics. He has co-edited three books: An Introduction to the Voluntary Sector (with Justin Davis Smith and Rodney Hedley); Voluntary Organisations and Social Policy: Perspectives on Change and Choice (with Margaret Harris); and Understanding the Roots of Voluntary Action (with George Campbell Gosling, Alison Penn and Meta Zimmeck).
ANGELA ELLIS PAINE Research Fellow at the ESRC Third Sector Research Centre (TSRC) at the University of Birmingham, UK. Prior to joining TSRC, Angela was Director of the Institute for Volunteering Research, where she spent ten years undertaking numerous research projects into different aspects of volunteering. Angela has authored several reports and book chapters, including co-authoring Helping Out: A National Survey of Volunteering and Charitable Giving (with Natalie Low, Sarah Butt and Justin Davis Smith).
STEVEN HOWLETT Senior Lecturer in the Business School at the University of Roehampton, UK, where he teaches on the business management course and convenes the Masters in Human Rights Practice. He was previously Senior Research Fellow at the Institute for Volunteering Research and researcher at the Centre for Institutional Studies at the University of East London, UK. He co-edited Volunteers in Hospice and Palliative Care: A Resource for Voluntary Service Managers (with Ros Scott and Derek Doyle).
META ZIMMECK Partner in the Practical Wisdom R2Z Research Consultancy and the principal author of Use it or Lose it - a summative evaluation of the Compact between the Government and the Voluntary and Community Sector. She is also co-editor of Understanding the Roots of Voluntary Action (with Colin Rochester, George Campbell Gosling and Alison Penn). She was head of the Voluntary and Community Research Section in the Home Office for six years and was responsible for a complex portfolio of research and evaluation.