Exporting Civil Society: The Post-Communist Experience

A. Relevant PDT Hypotheses

Civil Society

• While the PDT argues that a strong civil society is central to building democracy and is especially critical in early transition years, Matveeva argues that civil society is neither central nor effective in the short-term.
• Civil society is a “supplement to political institutions and practices, not a substitute for them (1)”
• “…it is not realistic to regard its [civil society’s] role as central, nor can it serve as a tool to solve short-term political problems. (12)”
• Development of civil society should be a long-term goal; state building and good governance is a prerequisite to an effective, representative civil society
  • Only with a capable and functioning state in place can civil society develop: “A ‘good’ civil society cannot develop and flourish in an ivory tower isolated from a ‘bad’ state. (12)”
• There are still critical questions that present civil society has yet to fully confront, such as how it relates to the state, its connection to the local community and social fabric, the perceptions of civil society having a foreign or political agenda, and the increasing professionalization of NGO’s

Role of the State

• Building state capacity and institutions is crucial to long-term political transformation in post-communist countries
• State building must be conducted not only by pressuring governments, but also by coaching and supporting them

Western Governments and NGO’s

• Western support for NGO’s and civil society development has created the perception in some post-communist countries that the civil society agenda is foreign or political
  • There is a sense that Western support of civil society is “more about the entrenchment of an international liberal agenda than about engaging in people’s self-expressed concerns. (4)”
• Western aid has overly focused on civil society development and neglected state-building efforts
• Professional NGO’s set-up by the West in post-communist countries do not represent the “agents of change” that the West envisions in civil society; rather, they disconnected from the community, dependent on foreign grants, and dictated by short-cycle project funding. Public recognition and participation in these NGO’s is often limited.
  • While these types of NGO’s are useful for certain projects, they are not sources of citizen empowerment or enhanced representation (12)
  • Furthermore, to the extent that any NGO relies on Western funds, it is not forced to create its own base for popular support and build social assets locally.  NGO’s without domestic support are less connected locally and have less legitimacy and local accountability.

B. Article Summary

 Introduction

• Civil society has generally been considered essential and central to post-communist political transformation and been seen as a panacea for problems as diverse as accountability, corruption, and service delivery
• However, some analysts have begun to criticize this view of civil society and the approach to civil society development that western governments and international organizations have taken
• The West has overestimated civil society’s ability to affect serious and lasting political transformation
• Questions about the impact and centrality of civil society still remain regarding civil society’s relationship with the functioning of the state, its connection to the indigenous social fabric, perceptions of a hidden foreign or political agenda, and the professionalization of NGO’s

Civil Society Needs a Functioning State

• In the 1990’s, the international community often chose to channel aid through NGO’s rather than to states themselves, as states were seen as an obstacle to development, rather than a tool for it
  • The belief was that it was possible to build a civil society first and good governance second
• However, “civil society cannot develop where institutions are weak and basic acts of governing are an uphill struggle (5)”
• There is no substitute for a functioning, capable state – Mantveeva describes such as a state as capable of: “re-allocating resources in growth-enhancing ways, taxation systems to finance social priorities, and fair judicial systems to secure citizens’ rights (6)”
  • “There must be a functioning state framework against which it [civil society] can define itself (6)”
• Further, in dealing with weak states and institutions, civil society must be realistic about state capacity to fix problems and deal with the issues raised by NGO’s
• Civil society was effective in the Baltics and new EU members because it had a capable with which to relate and respond
• International organizations that are too over-reliant on civil society in their aid may undermine indigenous efforts to govern

Civil Society Needs an Appropriate Social Fabric

• In some post-communist countries, the traditional societies based on networks of kinship, regional affiliations, religion, or patron-client relations are not conducive to Western style civil society and community organizing
• Matveeva gives the example of the Tulip Revolution in Kyrgyzstan, during which NGO’s only “reacted rather than acted” because the society lacked the civil society networks through which ordinary people could be mobilized
• International NGO’s and donors viewed these sorts of social fabrics negatively and dismissed the “real society” of these post-communist countries

Civil Society Needs to Find a Political Role

• Western governments’ advocacy for civil society, in combination with foreign funding of NGO’s, has led to a perception that political and foreign agendas lie behind the encouragement and development of civil society
• Especially after the wave of colored revolutions, post-communist governments are more likely to suspect all NGO’s, rather than only the politically-oriented ones, of “serving Western puppet-masters”

Civil Society Needs to Address Hard Issues

• When Western governments do not want to take a firm stance on controversial post-communist issues, but still want to appear to be “doing something,” they use sponsorship of civil society as a mechanism to avoid confronting hard issues
• “Although NGO’s are often prepared to raise their voices against unpopular rulers, very few challenge the prevailing opinions in society (10)”
  • This is especially true regarding issues of nationalism, frozen conflicts, and ethnicity
• In order to combat hard issues, the West would have to directly target existing networks of power.  Since this is an unappealing prospect for the international community, they are more comfortable channeling their efforts towards safe civil society that “glosses over” these hard realities.

Builders of Civil Society: A New Profession

• Foreign donors and NGO professionalization have created a civil society that is often not representative of the society as a whole; in reality, civil society recognition and participation is limited (11)
  • Professional NGO employees do not reflect the community, but rather are totally dependent on foreign grants and priorities
  • Foreign donations and grants mean that the NGO does not need to have a local base of support in the community
• The NGO profession also drives away talented people from state employment and deprives government bureaucracies of skilled and intelligent workers
• While professional, internationally funded NGO’s can be useful in some areas that the international community finds important but are neglected by the public, for example in human trafficking, HIV/AIDS, or the environment, such NGO’s should not be “built on false premises of citizen empowerment and enhanced representation (12)”

Conclusion

• Civil society can play “a long-term role in the development of political pluralism and modernization by promoting norms and values (12)”
• “However, it is not realistic to regard its role as central, nor can it serve as a tool to solve short-term political problems. Civil society is a supplement to the development of political institutions and practices, not a substitute for them. (12)”
• More efforts have to be directed toward state building in the short term; good governance needs to come first and civil society development may have to be a longer term objective
• Civil society is “not a magic key to solving pressing political issues, nor is it a short-cut to state-building (12)”