"Jag var tvungen att göra någonting"

The aim of this study is to deepen the understanding of how a grass root initiative evolves to become a Non-Governmental Organization based on the example of Refugees Welcome to Malmö and to explore how and why people become volunteers, how the volunteers describe their motivation and experiences of becoming and to be a volunteer in this context, and finally how they think and reflect upon their engagement four months later. Based on semi-structured interviews with ten volunteers who helped asylum seeking refugees in the fall of 2015 in Malmö, this study shows that the main reason for how and why they became volunteers was a combination of an inner motivation and will to help and the possibility to easily get engaged in voluntary action with others. The theoretical framework in the study is Christoph Spurk’s identification and characterization of the seven functions of civil society, and the analysis of the empirical material includes a dialog with relevant findings in previous research. By using a narrative design and a thematic analysis the empirical material has been analyzed, organized and presented. The results speak of a perceived humanitarian purpose even though the volunteers’ engagement could be interpreted as political, in the context of a polarized political climate with racism and political violence against refugees. Refugees Welcome to Malmö fulfilled civil society functions such as service delivery, building community, socialization and intermediation and facilitation between citizens and state. The study shows that volunteering and aiding asylum seeking refugees have been a positive personal and emotional experience, and that the civil society action resulted in new social networks between individuals, organizations and official actors. However, alongside cooperation over religious and political boundaries social processes of conflict and prestige existed in the background