Civil society building under adverse political conditions

Author(s): Julie Ferguson
Publication date: Tuesday 27 September 2005

Latin America, Africa and Asia are three continents enveloped by conflict and opportunity as diverse as their histories and cultures, in vastly different stages of development. But it is precisely this diversity that allows for valuable lessons to be learned and shared; the wealth of experiences across the different contexts show a wide range of strategies employed to achieve similar goals – broader associational space for civil society.

Below, three keynote introductions to the seminar have been summarised. Jenny Pearce (University of Bradford) analyses the specificities of civil society building in Latin America, particularly in Guatemala and Columbia, where internal strife and conflict augment the challenges imposed on civil society by oppressive government. Patrick Chabal (King’s College, London) provides a reflection on the relationship between state and civil society in post-colonial Africa where formal state structures have become the arena for informal priorities – and, as a result, have collapsed. Pedram Moosavi Shandi (NGO Training Centre, Iran) explores the difficulties of civil society building in Iran – a context whereby the navigation of associational space is a delicate balancing act between co-operation and co-optation.  

Civil society building and conflict in Latin America
A perspective, by Jenny Pearce

In ‘the post-civil society euphoria mode’ we are forced to unpack the concepts, look at heterogeneity, and analyse how to strengthen the arena of the state, civil society and the market, to bring about transformation.

Deeply divisive political and civil conflicts have marked Latin America over the past forty years. Civil society has been forced to develop in the shadow of dictatorial governments, provoking oppressive ethnic, class, and gender conditions in political cultures of corruption. Unequal land, poverty and exploitation underpin an unfinished task of nation building in many countries. As a result, civil society has seen a long and uneven history of engagement with the state. Meanwhile, Latin America’s social movements, whilst largely ignored and even discredited by multi-lateral institutions, persist in their struggles for social change in a region of continued adverse political conditions. The examples of Guatemala and Colombia illustrate how people will use spaces at critical moments, against every odd.

Guatemala
Guatemala’s current-day patriarchal state power structure is hardly discernable from that of thirty years ago when the country basked in the expectation of peace and social and economic justice. In the struggle to bring about a new and democratic state, peasants in Guatemala fought for control of their lives and livelihoods. Thousands perished in violent conflicts that hardly lack the potential for occurring again. Despite continued mobilisation of civil action in confronting the state, the idea of a liberal democracy has proven a farce, rejected even by popular change agents.

In its pursuit of a liberal democracy, the state failed to harness the country’s indigenous values, traditions and cultural richness which could have allowed it to flourish. As the collapse of the coffee market made clear in the 1980s, economic policies undermined cohesiveness which could give associations the means of engaging with the state. Further, the state has ignored the rule of law and regard for human rights, embracing impunity and corruption.

This heavy shadow clouds the history of civil society and social organisation, which is further amplified by internal polarisation: the cultural, social and economical marginalisation of the indigenous Maya population. Lynching, violence and conflict are on the rise, especially in these indigenous communitieswhere inadequate social and economic conditions persist.This strife within the population itself further weakens civil society’s capacity to advocate effectively for change and democracy.

The state has been administratively and structurally challenged to such a degree, by forces of conflict and strife both from within and without, that it impedes basic governance. In this context of internal disarray, civil society is a marginal force, viewed merely as a ‘technical project’ associated with urban NGOs.

Colombia
Colombia has been characterised by three decades of exceptional levels of violence and civil conflict. Run largely by a wealthy elite, subversive armed groups in Colombia predate the countries rich history of social movements, preventing these from gaining an autonomous character. As a result, a civil society has developed only in limited corners.

For instance during the early 90s, in response to the inadequately regarded constitutional system and the ensuing political violence, social and political groups unified to create a new political constitution. Associational space opened up and civil society engagement grew, amidst deep polarisation, whilst conflict became further entrenched. Leftist groups expanded operations, backing armed paramilitary forces. The complex relation between the drugs industry, the armed forces and the state has gradually led to the take-over of associational space by uncivil paramilitary forces. This can be articulated as narco-paramilitarismo. Rigid socio-economic adjustment measures and privatisation processes have surged with the conflict, making income distribution all the more uneven.

These adverse conditions have further amplified civil hardship, but spaces for public action continue to emerge even so. Women in particular are main agents at the heart of civil resistance in Colombia. Civil society organisations provide support to women, helping them gain self-esteem and the dignity which they need to keep associational life alive. Thanks to these agencies and their own bravery, many women have entered the political realm, despite the oppressive armed forces that have to grant them permission to do so.

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Weak states, civil society and democracy in Africa
A perspective, by Patrick Chabal

The dichotomy between state and civil society, which is substantially taken for granted in most current interpretations of African politics, does not reflect realities on the continent.

Post-colonial Africa has been marked by the overlapping of formal and informal layers of state. Whereas the former refers to the nation state with multi-party system, parliament, election, etc., the latter comprises the networks of personalised and vertical relation between rulers and citizens, between political elites and the population. Examples of functioning neo-patrimonial states like Jomo Kenyatta’s Kenya or Houphouët-Boigny’s Côte d’Ivoire show an integration of the formal and informal, maintaining a minimal social structure. Moreover, whilst a balance between the formal and the informal may have been maintained in the early post-independence period, it did not induce sustainable economic growth on the continent, and most current-day African states still do not reflect this structure. Rather, formal or political layers are characterised by patrimonial rulers who derive their legitimacy from an ability to deliver resources, putting them in a position of patronage and inducing them to utilise disorder instrumentally. Informal layers have come to depend on these patrons as clients, or in other words, the formal sphere is used to address informal needs.

As a result of the collusion of the formal and informal, civil society in Africa has come to be regarded as that which is left over, becoming almost synonymous with activist, militant and ‘not the state’. Further, though fundamental to identity and to politics in Africa, cultural aspects of African societies including ethnicity are not taken into consideration. Yet to understand the evolution of the relationship between the state and civil society in Africa since the 1960s, such phenomena cannot be disregarded.

These views are reflected in strategies adopted by the aid industry and Western donors, and have had major consequences particularly in donor-dependent states. Namely, seeking to measure ‘good governance’ within the formal sector, means of measurement deriving from the informal sector do not suffice in the eyes of Western donors. As such, the logics of the formal and informal were proving incompatible. This resulted in foreign debt spiralling out of control between the early 80s and 90s, with state leaders frantically seeking to account for formal revenues by exporting and taxing the agriculture sector and pursuing other foreign income through increased dependence on donor aid. Diminishing resources led to the crumbling of the state, corruption increased, politics became more violent, resources were increasingly exploited and the formal sphere collapsed, under the pressure of being used towards informal purposes. Today, there are in Africa few states that have managed to avoid this circle of debt and bureaucratic erosion.

So, what does the future hold in the face of this erosion? Western economists of the 1990s offered a vision of a future with no historical precedence – a bleak picture of weak and failing states. In considering the structural weakness of African politics and failure of the state, two points are important. First, state decline is more than administrative corrosion: negative effects do not grow gradually, but beyond a certain threshold the state disintegrates rapidly. Second, where the state fails, the informal dominates. Eroded governance cannot simply be counterbalanced by renewed institutionalisation. Where the state is ineffective, administrative and technical functions are assumed by individuals serving only informal purposes: bureaucrats charge fees to discharge their duties, politicians seek transfers from outside.

Beyond the fact that upon state decline administration ceases to function properly, there is a danger than people’s perceptions of the state, and of politicians, will fall below a psychological threshold of distrust and disillusion. A vast percentage of the current generations of Africans have grown up to see the state as a predatory body, and as a result they have lost their expectations in modernisation and hope for progress. Ordinary Africans are cynical of democracy reforms, with prospects for restoration seemingly remote. This tide will only turn where political will exists, and only then can better governments begin to re-emerge.

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Civil society building: practice in Iran
A perspective, by Pedram Mooshavi Shandi

Our main strategy under the circumstances is: self-confidence, open, transparent, and legal presence and logical defence of our programmes.

Iran is characterised by severely restricted associational space, whereby state power moreover is overshadowed by secular power. In such a context, navigating this space is a careful balancing act for civil society organisations. By addressing non-controversial topics, working in concert with state actors, building trust and forging alliances, the margins of associational space can be carefully explored and slowly expanded.

Iran’s civil society has evolved through tumultuous bouts of revolution and reform that date from early in the last century. The civil society spectrum is broad, encompassing social and political movements which strive to achieve multi-polarity. Civil society can be regarded as the outcome of organised forces: the reformists on one side and the republicans on the other.

Modern civil society in Iran can be characterised by three decisive crossroads in the history of the state and society: first, the Constitutional Revolution of 1933, which at its height saw growth of the press, the women’s movement and political parties. First generation associations relied on political knowledge, and had the features of NGOs, but operated with little experience. Revolutionary women and freedom fighters topped the constituencies of organisations who were dependent on the state, with which interactions were friendly and often based on family ties. Second, during the Islamic Revolution of 1979, social movements were ultimately assumed by religious leadership. And third, the Reformist Movement of 1997, which saw the re-emergence of civil society. In the wake of the Beijing Women’s Conference two years earlier, feminist mandates echoed the ideologies of the revolution and a second generation of NGOs emerged.

Against the background of a country in the throes of privatisation and reconstruction, new NGOs were encouraged by the state to join existing groups for collaboration. Associational space was available – as long as human rights were not part of the agenda. State technocrats trusted a limited few, and allied themselves with health and environmental NGOs, considering these as private consulting organisations whose expertise could help realise public services. These organisations were able to define themselves more transparently and independently. Weaning themselves slowly away from government intervention, a third generation of NGOs emerged, overcoming legal obstacles to their registration and participating in international networks.

In the recent development of civil society however, a number of deeply influential shifts have occurred: first, a renewed preoccupation by the political environment of civil society (leading to a crackdown on newspapers and press). Further, the degradation of the political arena, especially of the leftist political parties. Next, this marked a shift in the activities of NGOs, from the political environment to the social sphere. And finally, the confrontation of radical Islamists with the social section of NGOs.

The space for public action by civil society in Iran remains tightly bound. Vigorous political changes prevent long-term planning by organisations whose operational territory is limited. Despite these limitations, civil society has developed an identity within a new paradigm in Iran. NGOTC, an Iranian training centre at the forefront of the civil movement, believes that NGOs are the only existing chances for the perpetuation of democracy and spread of the democratic culture, and as such, NGO capacity needs to be fostered. Main strategies employed under these difficult circumstances are self-confidence, open, transparent, and legal presence and logical defence of programmes, all within the delicate margins imposed by the state.

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