How it Works
What is ethical travel?
How we make a mindful, meaningful impact.
What is ethical travel? Spoiler alert: we’re not going to be able to answer this question. Not in a way that everyone can agree on, or that will resonate with everyone’s priorities or values. Travel is the intersection of many industries and issues. A globalized industry by nature, our impact as consumers can be far reaching and hard to decipher. Instead of prescribing a way forward, we’ll tell you the principles that guide our approach, and the concepts that have informed our perspective.
We work with what we know.
Sometimes admitting your expertise can feel just as vulnerable as admitting your shortcomings.
In early conversations about Sororal, the mission was broadly to support organizations that foster women’s equality. However, as conversations with local women unfolded on the first pilot trips, founders Linsey and Megan were struck by the prevalence of conversations about safety from violence.
With their respective backgrounds in family law and diplomacy, and having met as volunteers at a women’s shelter, this narrowing of focus felt like the way that Sororal was best equipped to make a difference. The principles of effective altruism helped to guide our focus, selecting an issue that is tractable, big in scale, and largely neglected. With experience in this arena, we are better equipped to assess, track and reassess our impact as we evolve than we might be on other issues where we have less expertise.
What we know about violence against women is its negative impact is felt throughout communities, and for generations to come. This is guided by the principles of longtermism, an aspect of effective altruism, the belief that we all have a responsibility to future generations, but also possess a huge amount of optimism for the future. Sororal strives to not only provide support for survivors of violence, but also promote economic independence in women around the world so that they have more autonomy to escape or prevent unsafe situations.
We know what we don’t know.
We’re not medics, builders, or wildlife experts. The premise of volunteering abroad, while motivated by honourable intentions, can create detrimental economic incentives for people and communities.
Frequent turnover of unskilled labour is an inefficient route to community support, especially in communities where unemployment is a problem in the first place.
We’re not here to discard voluntourism as a concept, but we acknowledge that motivations of the facilitating organizations can get complicated, as well as the personal motivations of participants. Could volunteer trip fees be better utilized in support of organizations that are community-led and operated? In the case of Sororal: definitely. We’re streamlining our contribution by supporting grassroots organizations led by locals, employing local talent. We believe that their ability to assess and address the needs in their community far exceeds what we can achieve as visitors.
We engage in mindful cultural exchange.
Experiencing other cultures is one of the most unique and exciting aspects of travelling. However, where culture may be a tourist attraction, people are not.
Just as it’s not appropriate for our desire for usefulness to supersede the efficient use of resources or the employment of locals, it’s not appropriate for our desire to take on new perspectives to supersede people’s right to dignity and privacy. We try to approach cultural tourism with nuance and avoid voyeurism/ “poorism”
We seek out cultural exchanges where people can consent and be compensated fairly
We seek partners that facilitate disadvantaged women’s access to tourism capital through strategies like training, web access and participation in fair trade.
We emphasize low impact on visits to heritage sites so they can be enjoyed for generations.
We are always listening.
Borrowing from the principles of restorative travel, we focus on both the supply and demand side of the travel. What you see on our site is really just the tip of the iceberg of the research, communication and trips we have explored in determining the goodness of fit of a location as a destination.
We plan to measure our success in the feedback from women, both local to our destinations and travelling with us.
We’d love to hear from you: what are your experiences with ethical travel?
What are some women-led companies abroad that might make a great partner for Sororal?
Where would you like to travel if you felt that your visit would make a positive impact on the local community?
Send us an email at hello@sororal.travel and have your say!