scholarly journals The State and the Securitization of Civil Society Organizations in Nigeria

2021 ◽  
pp. 089976402110032
Author(s):  
Emeka Thaddues Njoku

While debates on the effects of the post-9/11 counterterrorism measures (CTMs) on civil society organizations (CSOs) exist, there is a paucity of data on how CTMs are shaping the spaces and actors of CSOs in Nigeria. Using a mixed-methods design, this article analyzes CSOs’ perceptions on the effects of counterterrorism financing measures, the countermeasures that CSOs are taking, and the government’s views on the security threat posed by CSOs. The findings show that although counterterrorism financing were not as constraining, it appears to increase the administrative cost of CSOs and disadvantaged the less prominent CSOs forcing them to close down or merge with more prominent CSOs. Besides, the result shows the state’s increasing interest in the activities of CSOs on the grounds of national security imperatives. Thus, I argue CTMs are evolving, and thus CSOs will experience increased financial regulations. Also, CTMs expansion will threaten CSOs’ sustainability and polarize them.

Author(s):  
Mona Ali Duaij ◽  
Ahlam Ahmed Issa

All the Iraqi state institutions and civil society organizations should develop a deliberate systematic policy to eliminate terrorism contracted with all parts of the economic, social, civil and political institutions and important question how to eliminate Daash to a terrorist organization hostile and if he country to eliminate the causes of crime and punish criminals and not to justify any type of crime of any kind, because if we stayed in the curriculum of justifying legitimate crime will deepen our continued terrorism, but give it legitimacy formula must also dry up the sources of terrorism media and private channels and newspapers that have abused the Holy Prophet Muhammad (p) and all kinds of any of their source (a sheei or a Sunni or Christians or Sabians) as well as from the religious aspect is not only the media but a meeting there must be cooperation of both parts of the state facilities and most importantly limiting arms possession only state you can not eliminate terrorism and violence, and we see people carrying arms without the name of the state and remains somewhat carefree is sincerity honesty and patriotism the most important motivation for the elimination of violence and terrorism and cooperation between parts of the Iraqi people and not be driven by a regional or global international schemes want to kill nations and kill our bodies of Sunnis, sheei , Christians, Sabean and Yazidi and others.


Author(s):  
Barbara Arneil

Colonization is generally defined as a process by which states settle and dominate foreign lands or peoples. Thus, modern colonies are assumed to be outside Europe and the colonized non-European. This volume contends such definitions of the colony, the colonized, and colonization need to be fundamentally rethought in light of hundreds of ‘domestic colonies’ proposed and/or created by governments and civil society organizations initially within Europe in the nineteenth and first half of the twentieth centuries and then beyond. The three categories of domestic colonies in this book are labour colonies for the idle poor, farm colonies for the mentally ill, and disabled and utopian colonies for racial, religious, and political minorities. All of these domestic colonies were justified by an ideology of domestic colonialism characterized by three principles: segregation, agrarian labour, improvement, through which, in the case of labour and farm colonies, the ‘idle’, ‘irrational’, and/or custom-bound would be transformed into ‘industrious and rational’ citizens while creating revenues for the state to maintain such populations. Utopian colonies needed segregation from society so their members could find freedom, work the land, and challenge the prevailing norms of the society around them. Defended by some of the leading progressive thinkers of the period, including Alexis de Tocqueville, Abraham Lincoln, Peter Kropotkin, Robert Owen, Tommy Douglas, and Booker T. Washington, the turn inward to colony not only provides a new lens with which to understand the scope of colonization and colonialism in modern history but a critically important way to distinguish ‘the colonial’ from ‘the imperial’ in Western political theory and practice.


Author(s):  
Alla Orlova ◽  

The article considers a set of issues related to the formation of sustainability in the state at different levels of government: national, regional and local, with an emphasis on the sustainability of territorial communities. The concept of "sustainability" is defined, the criteria of sustainability for national security and its components at the local level are analyzed, in particular, in the formation of affluent communities. Sustainability is considered in various aspects: as a component of national security and defense of the state, in relation to the concepts of "cohesion" and "national security". Financial stability is justified as an important sign of the viability of local communities. The role of civil society in shaping the sustainability of communities is revealed, as well as different views of scientists on the impact of civil society on sustainability are analyzed. The foreign experience of implementation of the basic principles of sustainability in the life of communities is studied. The most important component of sustainability is the ability of the community to consolidate to counteract harmful and dangerous external and internal influences. Open partnership of public authorities with business structures and the public should be a prerequisite for this. It is proved that in the conditions of decentralization and various internal and external challenges, civil society (active citizens and civil society institutions) can and should be a driver of community sustainability. It is assumed that the implementation of state policy to promote the development of civil society should create a solid foundation of democracy in Ukraine as a component of national sustainability. Since the systemic mechanisms for ensuring national sustainability in the Ukrainian state at both national and local levels are not yet fully formed, the development and implementation of comprehensive strategic decisions in this area requires proper scientific substantiation, which is why the author’s contribution to this topic.


Author(s):  
К. В. К. В. Захаренко

In our state there are a number of complex problems in the field of information security that require urgent and radical solution. That’s why theoretical, methodological and political research of the problem of information security in Ukraine, which is experiencing a crisis phase of its development, is becoming especially relevant today. In order to develop an effective system of national information security, a detailed study of the experience of the leading countries of the world, which carry out effective information protection of their states and citizens, is necessary. Today there are national information security systems that have really proven their effectiveness and structural and functional perfection. Indeed, the successful development of a democratic state and civil society is possible only if the information resources are properly used and the state policy is implemented, which would ensure a high level of national information security. In the modern world, the basic principles and tools for the formation of effective information protection of the national security space have been developed already. At the same time, Ukraine needs to apply adequately the foreign experience of the most successful countries in this regard, correctly transforming it taking into account national specificity and the unique role of Ukraine in modern geopolitics. As an important indicator of the protection of citizens, society and state, information security is an integral part of national security. Therefore, its determination mainly focuses on preventing harmful effects that may result in various information threats, as well as eliminating and overcoming those effects with the least possible harm to society and humans. In this aspect, the study of not only the philosophical and phenomenological and socio-psychological determinants of information security of citizens, but also political and legal resources and mechanisms of protection of the information space of the state in the conditions of the functioning of the global information society acquires a special significance. А content analysis of the notion «information security» as a form of national security aimed at ensuring human rights and freedoms in relation to free information access, creation and implementation of secure information technologies and protection of the property rights of all participants of information activities, includes consideration of possible diversions in this area, especially at the international level. Today there is a situation of incompleteness of formation and fragmentary filling of the information space content of the country and the legislative base in our society. The efficiency of the information weapon itself has increased too quickly due to the rapid information circulation and the spread of information networks. As a result, mass media forms the «mass» person of our time, in turn this fact displaces traditional direct contacts, by dissociating people and replacing them by computers and television. At the same time it gives rise to apathy, uncritical attitude and indifference, it complicates the adequate orientation, causing the social disorientation. Informative safety has the human measuring. Therefore an important role in opposition to destructive external and internal informative influences is played by education of citizens. Her proper level called to provide the state and civil society. An in fact uneducated population easily is under destructive influence of informative threats of the modern global world. Unfortunately, Ukraine, does not have sufficient resources and technologies for adequate opposition to the external threats. Taking into account it strategy of forming of the national system of informative safety of our state can be only the maximal leveling of destructive influences from the side of external informative threats. To the end it is necessary to carry out democratic reforms Ukraine, generate civil society, to provide functioning of the legal state and increase of political and civil culture of population. At the same time it is necessary to bear reformers in a mind, that global nature of informative society predetermines rapid transformation of external threats in internal, converting them into permanent calls which are opened out within the limits of national in a civilized manner-informative and socio-political space. Besides modern global informative systems, mass medias, network facilities do a limit between external and internal threats almost unnoticeable.


2011 ◽  
Vol 39 (2) ◽  
pp. 181-203 ◽  
Author(s):  
Timofey Agarin

Strong civil society provides individuals with arenas to bring their interests to the attention of policymakers. In so doing, civil society organizations (CSOs) can support state policies, but can also criticize policies. This paper argues that most minority rights advocacy CSOs in the Baltic states have little say in the crafting of policy and are compartmentalized into the existing agendas, with only a few groups able to evaluate policies independently. It concludes that the Baltic civil society is weak because the CSOs working on minority issues ask policymakers either too much, or too little. The findings suggest that policymakers quell criticism of their work from the side of the CSOs by ignoring their activities. Alternatively, by funding the CSO that shores up the state agenda, policymakers delegate their responsibilities to civic actors, keep critical voices from public debates and claim that their policies have the full support of a vibrant civil society. This paper investigates the options available for civil society actors to relate to policymakers in a nationalizing state by drawing on the data collected in 77 semi-structured interviews with the CSOs working with Russian and Polish minorities in the Baltic states between 2006 and 2009.


2019 ◽  
Vol 24 (1) ◽  
pp. 117-135 ◽  
Author(s):  
Georgia Jewett

Abstract Civil conflicts are more intractable and complex than ever before. In these conflicts, civilians are increasingly targeted and weaponized. Yet, because civilians are disproportionately affected by the ensuing violence and instability, they also have a larger role to play in the peacemaking process. This stems from the fact that local civil society organizations (CSO) assume new responsibilities vis-a-vis their communities as the state disintegrates. They often became the coordinators and providers of basic security and services. Unsurprisingly, CSO leaders often emerge as the only credible and authoritative actors in this complex environment, trusted by both the disputing parties and the affected communities. This article argues that CSOs are necessary to any international mediation process; however, they must be leveraged in conjunction with conventional third party mediator resources (that is, financial, technical and military assistance) to maximize the potential of an enduring peace deal.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jamie Bleck ◽  
Jessica Gottlieb ◽  
Katrina Kosec

How does women's engagement in civil society organizations (CSOs) differ from that of men, and what factors predict women's willingness to hold the state accountable? We analyze these questions in the context of rural and urban Mali, leveraging face-to-face data collected as part of a civil society mapping project during February -- March 2020 and December 2020, and an in-depth survey conducted with leaders from a randomly-selected subset of these CSOs during January -- March 2021. First, we explore the characteristics of women's groups compared to other CSOs. Second, we explore their likelihood of sanctioning a hypothetical corrupt mayor. We use an embedded survey experiment to try to understand these groups' willingness to report on the mayor as well as the payments they expect to receive from the mayor in order to not share information about the mayor's corruption. We find that women in Mali are often highly organized at the local level---frequently in self-help groups or organizations related to gendered economic activities. However, these more economically-focused groupings of Malian women frequently do not translate into civic activity. They are not typically recognized by outside actors as viable CSOs that could incentivize better governance; their strong networks and group infrastructure represent untapped social capital. We also find that CSOs comprised of women have lower informational and technical capacity, especially due to lower levels of political knowledge, and incur a higher cost of sanctioning public officials---though they have greater mobilization capacity. Women's engagement in decision-making in the home also predicts one's CSO being more hierarchical and having greater technical capacity, as well as having higher expected transfers from the mayor---findings that do not vary with respondent or CSO gender. Turning to the extent to which women involved in CSOs are willing to sanction the state, we find that they are generally less willing than men to sanction, but become more likely when their CSO is less hierarchical, when their technical capacity is higher, and when their political knowledge is greater. However, priming their importance as a CSO (by telling them they were identified by well-connected citizens as being influential) actually reduces sanctioning---perhaps by making them fear that those recommending them will engage in reprisals. Overall, our findings provide useful evidence on the organizational capacity of women and how it is likely to affect the state.


2018 ◽  
pp. 36-38
Author(s):  
M. S. Islam

Сivil society is a group of people excluded from the government and the army and providing a counterbalance and control of the state at the national and local levels in the country. In Bangladesh, since independence in 1971, civil society organizations have been successfully involved in social development, but they have been criticized not to be able promote democracy in Bangladesh because of their support for political parties. Therefore, it impedes strong opposition to corruption and non-democratic activities in the country. In this article, using the historical method, the author analyzes the features and role of civil society in Bangladesh.


Author(s):  
Артем Цирин ◽  
Artem Tsirin ◽  
Сергей Матулис ◽  
Sergey Matulis ◽  
Марина Молчанова ◽  
...  

The article outlines the positions expressed by the participants of the VI Eurasian Anti-Corruption Forum “Social Control as a Key Factor of Anti-Corruption”, held on April 26—27, 2017. The work of the Forum is aimed at understanding the actual theoretical and practical problems of ensuring social control in the sphere of anti-corruption, searching for new ideas, forms and effective ways of institutionalizing anti-corruption control by society in Russia and abroad. The discussed questions: the regulation of social control in various legal orders; criminological characteristics of corruption crime; main trends in the development of international anti-corruption cooperation; corruption offenses of organizations and the attitude of society towards such offenses; the role of the institution of commissioners in protection of the rights of entrepreneurs in anti-corruption; issues related to improving the effectiveness of social control, including anti-corruption education. The participants of the Forum came to the conclusion that the fight against corruption is a task not only for state authorities and local self-government, but also for civil society, organizations and citizens. At the same time, the improvement of the state anticorruption policy assumes conducting interdisciplinary scientific research of the state, trends and dynamics of corruption, as well as anti-corruption legislation and practices. Based on the results of the work, recommendations were approved.


Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document