Structured Response #2

Magda Borgarelli

The term civil society is rather relative and broad.  Depending on the situation and the place, civil society can mean and encompass a number of things.  Some may consider civil society as composed of people with a purpose, while others might only include “official organizations” who do not aim for power but for change.  In my opinion, civil society is a little bit of both.  The key word is society, which, if we think about it, includes all people and organizations that are part of it.  Civil society then is everything in a society which is outside the government (“civil”) and that promotes change of some sort.

I do believe that civil society can play a very important role in broadening political participation.  A strong civil society pushes people to change what they believe should be different, because it makes them feel part of a movement.  It is rather hard to go against the system as an individual and feel effective.  However, if that is done by a “society”, then the desired result is more likely achieved.  One can see this in the Arab revolts that took place in the past two years.  It would be naïve to think that before then nobody dared to go against the government, even though no tangible results could be seen.  However, as soon as people united and became part of a movement, the “civil society movement”, presidents and dictators were pushed out of power, and elections were held.  Civil society played a great role in all of that.

            However, it is true that civil society in the MENA region faces many challenges, one of them being the funding and the government control.  In Palestine, for example, the stricter Israeli control on the daily life of its citizens somewhat discouraged people to participate in NGOs that advocate change, since the political balance in the country is already fragile.  Because of this, funding to those same organizations has been decreased, inhibiting their growth and their influence.  It seems clear to me then that in order for civil society to be a strong actor in a country, its government must somewhat be stable itself and allow NGOs and their likes to expand.  However, that is not to say that the government must necessarily encourage the activities of its own civil society.  In the end, it is up to the people themselves to create the movements to change what they feel is wrong, just like we have seen in Egypt and Lybia.