Peace Corps

The Peace Corps is an independent U.S. federal agency designed to promote mutual understanding between Americans and the outside world. Established by executive order in 1961 and approved by Congress as a permanent agency within the State Department later that year, the program was an outgrowth of the Cold War designed to oppose the Chinese and Soviet political-ideological challenge to Western influence in the widely open Third World arena of superpower competition. More than 168,000 Americans have served in the Peace Corps since its inception. Gaddi H. Vasquez is the current director.

Purpose & function

The program officially has three goals:

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• To help the people of interested countries and areas in meeting their needs for trained workers;
• To help promote a better understanding of Americans on the part of the peoples served;
• To help promote a better understanding of other peoples on the part of Americans.

The Peace Corps works by first announcing its availability to foreign governments. These governments then determine areas in which the organization can be involved. The organization then matches the requested assignments to its pool of applicants and sends those volunteers with the appropriate skills to the countries who first made the requests.

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