联合国可持续发展目标框架下的日本政府与NGO互动关系分析

日本在设定与实施可持续发展目标(SDGs)进程中表现出了积极姿态,并强调加强与NGO等市民社会力量的合作。通过自身实力、共同目标、信任度、制度保障四个指标,本文将政府与NGO二者互动关系划分为相互独立、补充促进、对等协作、同化吸收与对立五种理想化模式,认为日本政府更多地是从功能性的角度选择与NGO建立合作关系策略,但双方在SDGs框架下合作效果不明显,并未建立起真正的"合作伙伴关系"。     

日本发展循环经济的成功经验及对我国的启示

我国建立资源节约型国民经济体系和资源节约型社会,实现可持续发展和小康社会的宏伟目标离不开循环经济的发展。从国际循环经济发展来看,日本的经验值得借鉴。日本出于实现经济可持续发展、保持国际竞争力、赢得市场的战略动机,从法律体系、政策扶持、微观运行体系和促进公众参与等方面大力促进循环经济的发展,其成功经验值得我国借鉴。由此得到启示,我国应从建立法律体系、实施有力政策、推进企业化和提高公民意识四个方面入手来发展循环经济。     

公民社会对尼日利亚民主化的影响

公民社会一直被认为是国家的一种制衡力量,是政治与经济改革的核心动力,因而常常被用来研究一个国家的民主化问题.但是,公民社会必然会促进民主的发展吗?通过考察公民社会与民主化关系的一般理论,以及尼日利亚公民社会与民主化的现实,可以认为,公民社会对民主化可能起到促进作用,也可能对其产生不利影响,因此并不必然促进民主化的发展;关键是要对所研究的公民社会的确切内容进行深入研究.     

亚太妇女跨国迁移及其性产业与公共治理——菲律宾NGO的社会行动探析

20世纪90年代以来,亚太地区的人口迁移与性产业相互推动,促使越来越多的女性移民卷入性产业。如今,性产业的蔓延与繁荣已经成为亚太地区社会经济发展面临的一个严重问题,引起各国政府与相关非政府组织的极大关注。因此,治理性产业的法律与公共政策也成为亚太地区国家与公民社会讨论的重要内容。本文以菲律宾妇女海外性工作者与菲律宾NGO的社会行动为例,探讨发展中国家的妇女移民在跨国迁移中的角色、地位与社会、性别危机,以及公民社会参与性产业的社会治理行动与策略。     

俄罗斯缺乏"公民"的公民社会:从非政府组织向度

新俄罗斯诞生10多年来,随着俄罗斯民主宪政体制的逐步确立以及相关保障公民和独立社团自由、权利的法律的出台,各种非政府组织纷纷建立,俄罗斯公民社会得到了初步的发展.普京上台后,逐渐认识到公民社会的发展对民主进程的重要意义,并采取各种措施以推动公民社会的发展.但从俄罗斯非政府组织的视角考察,俄罗斯公民社会仍处于其发展的初级阶段,还是一个"发育不良的"或"不成熟的"、缺乏"公民"参与的公民社会.     

俄罗斯非政府组织在社会经济发展中的作用

非政府组织(NGO)的活动作为全球公民社会建设的三大支柱之一,其发展和结构不仅影响着传统的政治治理结构,同时其对于经济发展与社会结构重建也同样产生着巨大的作用.研究与分析俄罗斯非政府组织在俄罗斯今天经济发展与社会生活中扮演的角色,并进行国际比较,可以使我们更清楚地了解俄罗斯在政治、经济与社会转型过程中,其非政府组织发展的现状、存在的问题以及产生问题的根源,而这可以使我们更全面地了解俄罗斯社会力量结构变化与非政府组织发展在俄罗斯经济发展中的作用.     

浅析查韦斯政府执政以来的委内瑞拉社会组织

委内瑞拉查韦斯政府在执政期间积极促进各类社会组织的发展.以社区委员会、合作社和社区媒体为代表的委内瑞拉社会组织成为公民参与公共事务的重要渠道,并与政府形成良性互动的趋势.查韦斯政府把社区委员会视为建设参与式民主的主要组织形式.作为一种地方自治机构,社区委员会使公民对公共事务的直接参与走向制度化.查韦斯政府还大力促进合作社的发展,把合作社视为委内瑞拉实现"内生发展"的关键途径.在委内瑞拉,社区媒体是一种具有替代色彩的信息传播渠道,通过深入挖掘和揭示民众对于国家和国际事务的感受,为民众全面了解国家发展进程提供一条替代渠道.     

从公民社会走向全球治理的探索--《全球公民行动》介评

20世纪90年代,随着全球化进程的深入,公民社会在世界舞台的影响加强,公民社会概念的内涵进一步丰富与深化。不少人对公民社会与国家关系形成了更全面的认识,"全球公民社会"、"国际社会运动"等概念越来越多地进入西方学者的视野。     

论日本核政策的走向与影响

当前日本核政策的主要特点包括:坚持"无核三原则",但为拥核埋下伏笔;反对横向核扩散,积极参加国际核不扩散和促进核裁军进程;大力发展民用核能项目.从技术上说,日本具有发展核武器的能力,但要造出核武器还需相当的资金和时间.日本国内在政治和法律上对拥核仍有很大限制因素,但这些因素正受到某些挑战.国际环境与国际机制对日本拥核的制约作用远大于刺激作用.从长期来看,日本是否发展核武器,主要取决于三大矛盾的发展趋势:日本广大民众反对发展核武器与极少数右翼政客企图核武装之间的矛盾;日本"无核三原则"国策与成为"普通国家"国策之间的矛盾;日本依赖美国核保护伞与要求全面彻底消除核武器之间的矛盾.日本坚持"无核三原则"将有助于亚太地区的和平与稳定.日本核武装将严重损害日本国家利益和地区安全.日本拥有发展核武器的技术和材料,引起国际社会担忧.     

日本的环境NGO

当前 ,在解决全球环境问题的过程中 ,致力于环境保护的非政府组织 (环境NGO)具有重要的影响 ,并在推动环境保护和实现可持续发展中发挥着多方面的作用。日本环境NGO活动具有若干特点。     

Universities,NGOs, and civil society sustainability: preliminary lessons from Ecuador

The context for NGOs in the Global South – delegitimising discourse, restrictive policies, and decreasing international funding – leads to major concerns about the sustainability of organised civil society. As a result, NGOs are exploring new means to contribute to social development. This article explores developing university–NGO collaborations through the case of Ecuador. It contributes to development research on two fronts. First, it examines the role of the university in the South and their collaborations with NGOs. Second, it situates university–NGO collaborations within concerns about civil society sustainability. The article presents lessons learnt by Ecuadorian NGOs.     

NGOs: between buzzwords and social movements

The associations that the term ‘NGO’ has acquired in development discourse need to be critically analysed in relation to practice on the ground. Drawing on an analysis of the rise of NGOs in Palestine, the author suggests that the development of the NGO movement served to demobilise Palestinian civil society in a phase of national struggle. Through professionalisation and projectisation brought about by donor-funded attempts to promote ‘civil society’, a process of NGOisation has taken place. The progressive de-politicisation of the women's movement that NGOisation has brought about has created a vacuum that has been increasingly filled by the militancy of the Islamic Movement (Hamas). As this case shows, ‘NGOs’ may be a development buzzword, but they are no magic bullet. Rather than taking for granted the positive, democratising effects of the growth and spread of NGOs as if they represented ‘civil society’ itself, this article contends, a more critical approach is needed, one that takes greater account of the politics of specific contexts and of the dynamics of institutionalisation.     

Civil society and local activism in South Korea's local democratization

Recent studies on causes of intergovernmental transformation in old and new democracies have found that decentralization is often the outcome of negotiations between national and local political interests. South Korea is commonly believed to be an exception because local elections and institutions introduced in the early 1990s were, by and large, the product of negotiations among political elites at the centre, without significant inclusion of local actors. However, this article attempts to explicate a hitherto ignored aspect of decentralization reform in Korea: the role of civil society and local activism in the politics of decentralization. In the 2000s, several ‘triggering events’ such as economic instability, democratic consolidation, emergence of civilian leaders, and the growth of civil society provided a strong momentum for the decentralization movement. We demonstrate how civic organizations at both national and local levels have played significant roles in proposing and pushing for decentralization, and argue that the bottom-up movement for decentralization under the Roh Moo-hyun administration was surprisingly well mobilized and institutionalized, especially at the agenda-setting stage.     

Pursuing gender-transformative change in customary tenure systems: civil society work in Zambia

This article examines activities undertaken by civil society organisations in Zambia to create gender-transformative change in customary tenure systems. It is based on primary data collected through interviews and group discussions with NGO representatives, lawyers and women’s rights advocates, chiefs, women leaders, and local community members. The findings show that organisations pursue change by leveraging global and national frameworks and discourses and working with traditional authorities, local magistrates, men and women at the village level. Promoting gender transformative change requires multi-level networking and working across hierarchies of power that extend from the household to the state.     

EU assistance for civil society in Kosovo: a step too far for democracy promotion?

EU assistance for Kosovo is the most ambitious external relations venture embarked upon by the Commission to date. Not surprisingly, much of the aid is framed in terms of ‘civil society’ and channelled through a handful of local non-governmental organizations (NGOs). But attempts by foreign donors to promote civil society exogenously across post-socialist Eurasia are deemed to have achieved little in terms of stimulating individual participation and civic engagement. In response the EU appears to have refined its approach by combining the usual support for larger NGOs with more basic assistance for grassroots networks and community-based initiatives. Whilst such a twin-track strategy is arguably appropriate in the context of Kosovo where civil society participation is particularly low, in terms of maximizing the critical development of transactional capacity the approach may fail to target resources most effectively. It is argued here that there is a danger that normative concerns about liberal pluralism, enriching civil society and ensuring that assistance is widely dispersed may ultimately detract from the imperative of deploying limited resources first and foremost to secure a core of sustainable NGOs with developed capacity to engage government, the international community and other non-state actors in the process of policy reform. Indeed, drawing on the experience of civil society assistance in new member states of Central and Eastern Europe, it would seem that although NGOs are often criticized for their detachment from community organizations and campaigns, they perform a critical ‘behind the scenes’ role in policy change and state transformation. They can, if donor funding is appropriately targeted, facilitate the emergence of civil society networks through which small community organizations are then linked with larger, established and capacity-endowed organizations.     

Building civil society through partnership: lessons from a case study of the Christian Reformed World Relief Committee

Civil society is seen increasingly as a necessary element of sustainable human development. Some Northern NGOs hope to contribute to the development of civil society by partnering with Southern NGOs. However, recent scholarship shows that such partnerships are frequently dominated by the Northern NGO, thus inhibiting the establishment of vibrant, locally owned and locally managed civil society organisations. This paper explores some of the practical reasons for this imbalance and suggests strategies for working within what Alan Fowler calls ‘authentic partnerships’. Such partnerships prevent the domination of Northern NGOs and thus help foster a climate more amenable to the growth of civil society. Suggested strategies for promoting authentic partnerships address funding, working relationships, phase-out, advocacy, and evaluation of the partnership itself. The paper draws on a case study of the partnership work of the Christian Reformed World Relief Committee (CRWRC), a North American faith-based NGO.     

Reassessing the Role of Civil Society Organizations in the Transition to Democracy in Spain

Spain's democratization process has mainly been described as a settlement between political elites in which civil society organizations played little part. Yet the literature on Eastern European democratization sets great store by the role of civil society, both for transition and consolidation. Does this different treatment reflect the approach adopted by analysts or the actual contrasting presence of civil society organizations in the relevant periods? The question prompts this re-examination of the role of civil society organizations in the Spanish transition. It finds that the answer depends in part on definitions of civil society, but mainly on the approach taken by authors in presenting their accounts. It finds that the elite settlement perspective silences or removes agency from the Spanish civil society organizations active in the transition.

An alternative view is developed through an in-depth review of the events following the death of the dictator General Franco in 1975 and a textual analysis of Spain's actual definitive settlement, the 1978 Constitution. The research demonstrates that civil society organizations were responsible for disrupting the dictatorship's intention to maintain an authoritarian regime, leaving it no option but to negotiate with civil society organizations such as political parties and trade unions, which were pursuing their own strategic goals towards co-construction of a socially advanced democracy. The article's approach bridges the gulf between top-down and bottom-up accounts of political change in Spain at the end of the Franco regime.     

The securitisation of civil society: a case study of NGOs–State Security Investigations (SSI) relations in Egypt

This paper explores the changing role of the State Security Investigations apparatus in the context of an authoritarian regime faced with external pressures to democratise. It argues that in Egypt the State Security Investigations (SSI) has played a dual role of repressing opponents while creating and mediating political space for citizen voice and participation, eliciting a positive external image without representing a genuine threat to the regime. The SSI's role in civil society has expanded significantly, in particular since the mid-2000s, and its power is now exercised not only in a hidden form but also in a very visible manner. An increase in the SSI's visibility has increased its exercise of a more pervasive form of invisible power, as is evident from the examination of current SSI–NGO relations.     

Civil society and democratization: a counter-case from India

This article assesses whether civil society promotes democratization, as has been argued implicitly or explicitly in the political discourse, following the publication of Putnam's Making Democracy Work. The theorists of “third-wave” transitology have advocated civil society as the indispensable instrument for the survival and sustenance of democracy. This article, however, argues that civil society is not necessarily a democratic force. It may or may not have positive implications in regard to democratization and the functioning of democracy. Based on ethnographic fieldwork in the tribal-dominated south Rajasthan, this article analyses the case of Rajasthan Vanvasi Kalyan Parishad (RVKP), a Hindu(tva)-oriented non-governmental organization (NGO), to demonstrate how civil society could also be anti-democratic. It shows that by utilizing development as a medium of entry, the RVKP has not only successfully presented itself as a counter-force against the “threatening others”, such as Muslims and Christians but also mobilized electoral support for the Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). In return, the BJP-led state government has provided economic, political and legal support to the RVKP and facilitated the Hindutva politics at the grassroots level. The article concludes that in the context of Rajasthan, a conservative state has collaborated with an exclusivist civil society organization – the consequence of which has not just been the spread of violence and demonization of religious minorities but also a serious undermining of cultural pluralism and democratic values of Indian society.     

Government co-option of civil society: exploring the AKP’s role within Turkish women’s CSOs

Mainstream academic and policy literature emphasizes the nexus between an active and vibrant civil society sector and greater political accountability. As a result, support for civil society has become central to international policy efforts to strengthen democracy in the Middle East North Africa (MENA) region. However, the empirical evidence presented in this article questions the validity of this assumption. Drawing on information gathered through 38 in-depth qualitative interviews with women’s organizations from across the seven administrative regions of Turkey, and key representatives from the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP), this article analyses the role of the AKP government in co-opting and influencing women’s organizations in Turkey. The results that emerge demonstrate that the government is actively involved in fashioning a civil society sector that advances their interests and consolidates their power. Independent women’s organizations report that they are becoming increasingly excluded from policy and legislative discussions, as seemingly civic organizations are supported and often created by the government to replace them. These organizations function to disseminate government ideas in society and to provide a cloak of democratic legitimacy to policy decisions. These findings and their implications have significant consequences for theory and policy on civil society and its role in supporting democracy.