An Uncivil Approach To Civil Society

"In his first year in office, President Dmitry Medvedev has done little to reverse the Russian government's deliberate weakening of key institutions of a pluralistic democratic society, which marked the presidency of Vladimir Putin. One key aspect of this growing authoritarianism has been increasing, excessive government scrutiny and control of nongovernmental organizations, mainly through the 2006 law regulating NGOs. This report describes how the law and current rules allow the state to interfere arbitrarily in NGOs, by conducting intrusive audits, imposing onerous reporting requirements, and impeding NGO registration on non-substantive, insignificant grounds. It documents how the law allows the Ministry of Justice to take disproportionate, punitive measures in response to minor administrative violations by NGOs. The report also describes how the deeply negative operating climate for NGOs is exacerbated by new restrictions on grants and subsidized office space, and a growing number of physical attacks and hostile statements directed at NGOs and activists. President Medvedev in April 2009 acknowledged the difficulties faced by NGOs, including restrictions 'without sufficient justification,' occasioning some optimism that Medvedev will break with restrictive policies instituted under Putin. Soon thereafter, Medvedev initiated a limited process for reforming the troublesome law; initial reforms will affect only a fraction of NGOs and are limited in scope. Human Rights Watch calls on the Russian government to expand the reform to all organizations, and end and desist from further arbitrary limitations on the work of independent civil society groups."--P. [4] of cover.

The Routledge Handbook of Civil and Uncivil Society in Southeast Asia explores the nature and implications of civil society across the region, engaging systematically with both theoretical approaches and empirical nuance for a systematic, comparative, and informative approach. The handbook actively analyses the varying definitions of civil society, critiquing the inconsistent scrutiny of this sphere over time. It brings forth the need to reconsider civil society development in today’s Southeast Asia, including activist organisations' and platforms' composition, claims, resources, and potential to effect sociopolitical change. Structured in five parts, the volume includes chapters written by an international set of experts analysing topics relating to civil society: Spaces and platforms Place within politics Resources and tactics Identity formation and claims Advocacy The handbook highlights the importance of civil society as a domain for political engagement outside the state and parties, across Southeast Asia, as well as the prevalence and weight of 'uncivil' dimensions. It offers a well-informed and comprehensive analysis of the topic and is an indispensable reference work for students and researchers in the fields of Asian Studies, Asian Politics, Southeast Asian Politics and Comparative Politics. The Open Access version of this book, available at www.taylorfrancis.com, has been made available under a Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial-No Derivatives (CC-BY-NC-ND) 4.0 license. Funded by The Research Foundation for State University of New York, USA and The Stockholm Center for Global Asia, Sweden.

Civil society is one of the most hotly debated topics in contemporary political theory. These debates often assume that a vibrant associational life between individual and state is essential for maintaining liberal democratic institutions. In Uncivil Society, Richard Boyd argues-through a careful reading of such seminal figures as Hobbes, Locke, Burke, Mill, Tocqueville, and Oakeshott-that contemporary theorists have not only tended to ignore the question of which sorts of groups ought to count as "civil society" but they have also unduly discounted the ambivalence of violent and illiberal groups in a liberal democracy. Boyd seeks to correct this conceptual confusion by offering us a better moral taxonomy of the virtue of civility.

This open access book focuses on the role of civil society in the creation, dissemination, and interpretation of knowledge in geographical contexts. It offers original, interdisciplinary and counterintuitive perspectives on civil society. The book includes reflections on civil and uncivil society, the role of civil society as a change agent, and on civil society perspectives of undone science. Conceptual approaches go beyond the tripartite division of public, private and civic sectors to propose new frameworks of civic networks and philanthropic fields, which take an inclusive view of the connectivity of civic agency across sectors. This includes relational analyses of epistemic power in civic knowledge networks as well as of regional giving and philanthropy. The original empirical case studies examine traditional forms of civic engagement, such as the German landwomen’s associations, as well as novel types of organizations, such as giving circles and time banks in their geographical context. The book also offers insider reflections on doing civil society, such as the cases of the Umbrella Movement in Hong Kong, epistemic activism in the United States, and the #FeesMustFall movement in South Africa.

Twenty years ago, the Berlin Wall fell. In one of modern history’s most miraculous occurrences, communism imploded–and not with a bang, but with a whimper. Now two of the foremost scholars of East European and Soviet affairs, Stephen Kotkin and Jan T. Gross, drawing upon two decades of reflection, revisit this crash. In a crisp, concise, unsentimental narrative, they employ three case studies–East Germany, Romania, and Poland–to illuminate what led Communist regimes to surrender, or to be swept away in political bank runs. This is less a story of dissidents, so-called civil society, than of the bankruptcy of a ruling class–communism’s establishment, or “uncivil society.” The Communists borrowed from the West like drunken sailors to buy mass consumer goods, then were unable to pay back the hard-currency debts and so borrowed even more. In Eastern Europe, communism came to resemble a Ponzi scheme, one whose implosion carries enduring lessons. From East Germany’s pseudotechnocracy to Romania’s megalomaniacal dystopia, from Communist Poland’s cult of Mary to the Kremlin’s surprise restraint, Kotkin and Gross pull back the curtain on the fraud and decadence that cashiered the would-be alternative to the market and democracy, an outcome that opened up to a deeper global integration that has proved destabilizing.

This open access book focuses on the role of civil society in the creation, dissemination, and interpretation of knowledge in geographical contexts. It offers original, interdisciplinary and counterintuitive perspectives on civil society. The book includes reflections on civil and uncivil society, the role of civil society as a change agent, and on civil society perspectives of undone science. Conceptual approaches go beyond the tripartite division of public, private and civic sectors to propose new frameworks of civic networks and philanthropic fields, which take an inclusive view of the connectivity of civic agency across sectors. This includes relational analyses of epistemic power in civic knowledge networks as well as of regional giving and philanthropy. The original empirical case studies examine traditional forms of civic engagement, such as the German landwomen’s associations, as well as novel types of organizations, such as giving circles and time banks in their geographical context. The book also offers insider reflections on doing civil society, such as the cases of the Umbrella Movement in Hong Kong, epistemic activism in the United States, and the #FeesMustFall movement in South Africa.

This book pursues a dual objective: on the one hand, it focuses on the actual and potential roles of civil society in developing new forms of political, economic, and socio-cultural cooperation between the European Union and its neighbours. On the other hand, through this investigation of civil society networks we will contribute to debate on the EU’s role as promoter of greater regional co-operation. The rationale for this collection is thus defined by changing political relationships between the 27-member European Union and countries in its immediate vicinity. These transformations include the ongoing but by no means straightforward process of Turkey’s EU membership, an evolving (and complex) partnership with Russia and the development of deeper political, economic and social relationships with many other neighbouring countries. More specifically, the work presented here involves comparative studies of how the EU is perceived by civil society actors both within and outside the EU. We ask whether the EU’s promotion of cross-border co-operation (e.g. though the European Neighbourhood Policy) is empowering civil society within member states and in neighbouring countries such as Russia, Moldova, Turkey and Morocco. This book was based on a special issue of Journal of European Integration.

Broadly speaking, The Oxford Handbook of Civil Society views the topic of civil society through three prisms: as a part of society (voluntary associations), as a kind of society (marked out by certain social norms), and as a space for citizen action and engagement (the public square or sphere).