scholarly journals COVID-19 and shrinking civic spaces: patterns and consequences

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Felix S. Bethke ◽  
Jonas Wolff
Keyword(s):  
Civil Society ◽  
Health Care Systems ◽  
Civil Society Organizations ◽  
Political Rights ◽  
Civic Spaces ◽  
Multiple Data ◽  
Global Trend ◽  
Care Systems ◽  
Civic Space ◽  
Do So

Abstract In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, a majority of countries worldwide have introduced severe limitations on the freedom of assembly, if not an outright lockdown, in many cases complemented by restrictions on further civil and political rights. Although restrictions were generally considered necessary to save lives and protect health care systems from overburdening, they also pose the risk of government overreach, that is, governments may use the pandemic as a convenient opportunity and justification to impose restrictions for political purposes. In this sense, COVID-19 may give yet another substantial boost to a global trend that has been unfolding since the early 2000s: the shrinking of civic spaces, which is characterized by an increase in government restrictions that target civil society actors and limit their freedoms of assembly, association, and expression. The aim of the paper is to assess civic space restrictions that have been imposed in response to the COVID-19 pandemic with a view to exploring their immediate consequences as well as their potential mid-term implications for civil society organizations in general and contentious civic activism in particular. We do so by, first, providing evidence from multiple data sources about the global spread of COVID-19-related restrictions over time and across countries. Second, we identify key dynamics at work in order to assess the immediate consequences and the potential mid-term implications of these restrictions. These dynamics are illustrated by looking at experiences from individual countries (including Cambodia, Germany, Hungary, and Lebanon).

Democratic Rollback in Africa

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lise Rakner
Keyword(s):  
Civil Society ◽  
Rule Of Law ◽  
Private Life ◽  
Civil Society Organizations ◽  
Political Rights ◽  
Radio Stations ◽  
Dominant Party ◽  
Global Trend ◽  
Participation Restrictions ◽  
Development Goals

There is a global trend of democratic retrenchment across the world, in both new and more established democracies. The African continent is part of the trend, although there are distinct regional variances on the continent. Yet, despite democratic gains in some states and along some dimensions of democratic rights, the overall trend is that the democratic gains won in the period after 1990 are now eroding. Democracy is challenged in ways that pose threats to freedom of speech, association, and information, the ability to choose political leaders, protection of personal integrity and private life, and the rule of law with recourse to independent courts. As part of a global trend of democratic backsliding, African states have adopted legal restrictions on key civil and political rights that form the basis of democratic rule in a range of countries, from dominant party regimes such as Zimbabwe, Rwanda, and Tanzania to competitive electoral democracies like Zambia, Senegal, and Malawi. In South Africa, where democracy and rule of law appear deeply institutionalized, the succession battles and exposed levels of corruption under President Zuma, now removed from the leadership of the ANC party, suggest a weakening of the institutions intended to check executive powers. The September 2017 court annulment of the Kenyan elections suggests that the courts were able to perform an important accountability function and safeguard free and fair elections. Yet, the aftermath of the 2017 Kenyan elections culminated in early 2018 with President Uhuru Kenyatta closing down television and radio stations. Civil society actors, policy makers, and scholars warn against the democratic backlash and its negative implications for domestic and international politics. Internationally, the African democratic backlash challenges global actors who have long pressured developing countries to politically liberalize. Yet, following what appears to be a global trend of democratic backsliding, space for international influence and the spread of liberal norms is closing rapidly. Domestically, the observed backlash against democracy may pose further social and political threats with wide-reaching implications for development. This may, in turn, challenge the implementation of Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Whereas closing space for civil society impacts first and foremost on voice and participation, restrictions on civil society ultimately may curb even the most seemingly apolitical activities such as humanitarian relief. At present, there is limited understanding of possible response mechanisms to the conscious attempts at democratic rollback from political elites. How do activists come together to advocate for particular rights? When are activists more effective in generating mass citizen support for their campaigns? How can researchers, international actors, and domestic civil society organizations work together to disseminate and use knowledge about organizational resilience in these circumstances? These will be pressing questions for scholars and activists going forward.

The Widening and Narrowing of Egypt’s Civic Space

2020 ◽  
pp. 50-78
Author(s):  
Catherine E. Herrold
Keyword(s):  
Civil Society ◽  
Political Reform ◽  
Civil Society Organizations ◽  
Organized Activities ◽  
Philanthropic Foundations ◽  
Civic Space

Chapter 2 begins in the wake of Hosni Mubarak’s overthrow when Egyptian citizens expressed a newfound desire to participate in bringing freedom and democracy to the country. It goes on to show how Egyptian NGOs and foundations perceived an opportunity to play an important role in harnessing that energy and involving activists in organized activities related to democratic political reform. Yet by late 2011, Egypt’s transitional government began to crack down on the NGO sector even more harshly than the Mubarak regime had. In addition, Egypt’s economy declined precipitously. Chapter 2 lays out the opportunities and challenges that the 2011 uprisings created for Egyptian civil society organizations and briefly describes how two sets of donors—Western aid organizations and Egyptian philanthropic foundations—responded in the months following Mubarak’s removal.

Killing a Cabby

2020 ◽  
Vol 36 (1-2) ◽  
pp. 127-149
Author(s):  
Benjamin T. Smith
Keyword(s):  
Civil Society ◽  
Civil Society Organizations ◽  
Taxi Driver ◽  
The Real ◽  
Partido Revolucionario Institucional ◽  
Do So

This article looks at civil society in 1950s Mexico. To do so, it examines the popular responses to the murder of a local taxi driver, Juan Cereceres. It argues that both newspapers and civil-society organizations took the murder seriously, interrogated government findings, attempted to discover the real culprits, and sought a degree of justice. In all, the story asks historians to reassess both the extent and the force of civil society under the Partido Revolucionario Institucional (PRI).

scholarly journals Reversing the Shrinking of Civic Spaces: Insights for Strategies to Expand and Strengthen Activism and Organizations in Mozambique

2020 ◽  
Vol 13 ◽  
pp. 49-66
Author(s):  
Marcio Pessôa ◽  
◽  
Keyword(s):  
Civil Society ◽  
Rural Areas ◽  
Legal Framework ◽  
Contentious Politics ◽  
Civil Society Organizations ◽  
The Past ◽  
Civic Spaces ◽  
Starting Point ◽  
State And Market ◽  
Urban And Rural Areas

How can the shrinking of civic spaces be reversed? This article suggests an analytical approach to identify mechanisms that cause the shrinking of civic spaces in Mozambique, and presents a starting point for building strategies to react to this process. Based on interviews and participative observation in the field, it explores events and episodes where crucial issues or activists’ groupings were neutralised, and visits the theory of defiance in civil society, power and contentious politics to explain how the shrinking of civic spaces has been taking place in Mozambique in the past ten years. It is reasonable to state that activists need to cope with cultural and cognitive barriers in order to face the various expressions of state and market power in Mozambique. Civil society organizations need to work with their donors to create new forms of relationship together, where issues such as accountability, for example, do not put at risk civic spaces and projects that have made a positive difference to people’s lives. In addition, activists need to establish a joint lobbying focus for constructing a legal framework that facilitates the emergence of new civic spaces in urban and rural areas.

scholarly journals Social prescription for those living with dementia; does MedTech have a role to play?

2021 ◽  
pp. 75
Author(s):  
Keyword(s):  
Primary Care ◽  
Social Determinants Of Health ◽  
Social Determinants ◽  
Social Engagement ◽  
Health Care Systems ◽  
Determinants Of Health ◽  
Biomedical Model ◽  
Positive Health ◽  
Care Systems ◽  
Do So

Ageing is the major risk factor for dementia and nearly every country has seen its life expectancy rise from the beginning of the 21st century. Remaining socially connected has positive health and social implications and may be even more significant for marginalized group of people like those living with dementia. If appropriately used, social prescriptions can help deliver value-based social engagement and primary care by maximising the utilisation of resources and addressing social determinants of health, decreasing dependency on the biomedical model and thus providing a way for health care systems to deal with social determinants of health. More frequently, however, those seeking access to these programmes do not tend to do so simply due to lack of understanding and knowledge of the availability of such services. So, provision of social activities involves more than developing a program and hoping people will attend, and considering the particular situations of those living with dementia as marginalised group of people, and taking into account that there is no treatment for dementia, societies need to move toward social prescription, integrating appropriate MedTech support- targeting on those living with dementia- into such programs.

Cuba's New Cooperatives

2017 ◽  
Vol 69 (6) ◽  
pp. 52 ◽  
Author(s):  
Cliff DuRand
Keyword(s):  
Health Care ◽  
Human Development ◽  
Health Care Systems ◽  
Socialist Society ◽  
Monthly Review ◽  
Education And Health ◽  
Care Systems ◽  
Shared Culture ◽  
Do So

Historians have long documented the ways that capitalism drew its early accumulation from the dispossession of commonly owned resources—a process that continues to this day. Building a socialist society and economy can be thought of as a reversal of this process—a reclaiming of commons. The resources that contribute to human development do so best when shared and governed democratically. This includes not only the forests and fields of the pre-capitalist past, but also education and health care systems, parks and streets, waterways, and the shared culture, knowledge, and productive resources of a society.Click here to purchase a PDF version of this article at the Monthly Review website.

scholarly journals Collaboration, Co-Optation or Navigation? The Role of Civil Society in Disaster Governance in India

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Reetika Syal ◽  
Margit van Wessel ◽  
Sarbeswar Sahoo
Keyword(s):  
Civil Society ◽  
Disaster Risk Reduction ◽  
Disaster Risk ◽  
Civil Society Organizations ◽  
State Agencies ◽  
Individual State ◽  
Close Attention ◽  
Organization Level ◽  
Civic Space

AbstractExisting research on civil society organizations (CSOs) facing restricted civic space largely focuses on the crackdown on freedoms and CSOs’ strategies to handle these restrictions, often emphasizing impact on their more confrontational public roles. However, many CSOs shape their roles through collaborative relations with government. Drawing on interviews with state agencies and CSOs, this article analyes state–CSO collaboration in the restricted civic space context of disaster risk reduction in India. Findings are that the shaping of CSOs’ roles through collaboration under conditions of restricted civic space is only partly defined by the across-the-board restrictive policies that have been the focus of much existing research on restricted civic space and its implications for CSOs. Interplay at the level of individual state agencies and CSOs, based on mutual perceptions, diverse organization-level considerations and actions, and evolving relations, shape who collaborates with whom and to what effect. This article thus stresses interplay and agency, moving away from simple understandings of co-optation, and calling for a more differentiated approach to the study of state–civil society collaboration under conditions of restricted civic space, with close attention to navigation.

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