Summer 2004 Pages 280–296 doi:10.1093/sp/jxh036 Social Politics, Volume 11, Number 2, Oxford University Press 2004; all rights reserved. JOHN MICHAEL ROBERTS AND FIONA DEVINE Some Everyday Experiences of Voluntarism: Social Capital, Pleasure, and the Contingency of Participation Abstract In this article we report on some initial findings of an ESRC-funded qualitative study of 120 individuals across the United Kingdom involved in voluntary activity for 20 hours a week or more. We sug- gest for these individuals voluntary activity should be understood as pleasurable everyday activity within a community. This being the case, voluntary activists may find it hard to explain their individual sense of enjoyment to others to get them involved as well. This fail- ure can prove frustrating for some and can cause a decline in the pleasure they gain from voluntary activity. The article explores some of the implications of these findings for policies seeking to develop social capital. In this article we report on some initial findings of an ESRC- funded qualitative study of 120 individuals across the United Kingdom involved in voluntary activity for 20 hours a week or more. Like Moyser and Parry (1999), we found that respondents were involved in numerous forms of voluntary activity that included occupationally based activity, educational activity, community-orientated activity, recreational activity, and political activity, and many were active