Transnational Society – Take Home Mid-term Test (2011)

Name : Andhyta Firselly Utami

Department /NPM : International Relations / 0906550373
Resource : Rupert Taylor, “Interpreting Global Civil Society” in Voluntas:
International Journal of Voluntary and Nonprofit Organizations Vol.13,
No.4 (December 2002), pp. 339-346
Question : “What are the strengths, weaknesses, limitations, and opportunities of global civil society?”

Global Civil Society: The Undefined Heroes and Their Contributions

Despite the existence of ‘global civil society’ term for decades, Rupert Taylor still believes that
there is a quite long to-do-list faced by international relations academia in this area. In “Interpreting Global
Civil Society”, he mentions the importance of clear description as well as adequate theorization towards this
concept. This idea is also upheld by Martin Shaw and Mary Kaldor who state that a division of factual and
normative senses is impossible1 since the core concern lies on aspects of the same relationships. 2 The global
civil society, hence, requires to be perceived as a progressive multiorganization field with innovative
network forms and transformative purpose in the future. This review is going to further elaborate how such
condition constitutes certain strengths, weaknesses, limitations, and opportunities for the discussed topic,
concluded with the challenges that need to be encountered.
Between scholars, mass media, and amongst a broader public, the phrase ‘global civil society’ has
been very commonly used. However, as quoted from Waterman, “the provenance of the term is apparently
not well grounded and has not yet passed through the forge of theoretical clarification or the sieve of public
debate”. Martin Shaw also argues that the conceptualization of global civil society is not “the novelty it
might appear at first glance” but rather the known national sociology frameworks that are brought to the
international level.3 One of several available dubious meanings, proposed by Anheieris as “the sphere of
ideas, values, institutions, organizations, networks, and individuals located between the family, the state, and
the market and operating beyond the confines of national societies, polities, and economies” is considered
too wide and is going to include almost a universe of players that are not necessarily tied to progress a better
world. The yet-to-be-agreed most accepted definition, on the contrary, belongs to ‘non-governmental
organizations (NGOs) or social movements, of all shapes and sizes, operating in the international realm’. 4
This is actually a rather too shallow designation for all intricate actors behind the term and therefore, is very
debatable and may lead to several circumstances.
First, such loose explanation benefits the ‘global civil society’—although we have not really
reached an agreement on who they are—in boundlessly involving crucial stakeholders. This is one of the
foremost strengths of global civil society, both in the form of organizations and movements, since they have
no tight borders in creating wide, global networks. Such privilege is not possessed by the states because they
have to bump into the gate of ‘sovereignty’ and ‘bureaucracy’ before establishing any form of cooperation.

1
Mary Kaldor, “The Idea of Global Civil Society” in International Affairs, 79, Vol.3 (2003), page 590
2
Martin Shaw, “The Theoretical Challenge of Global Society” in Global Society and International Relations—Sociological Concepts and Political
Perspectives (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1994), page 11
3
Ibid., page 14
4
Robert Taylor, “Interpreting Global Civil Society” in Voluntas: International Journal of Voluntary and Nonprofit Organizations Vol.13, No.4
(December 2002), pp. 339
The huge and increasing scope of global civil society’s involvement, participation, and networking in almost
all issues including human rights, environment, international trade, as well as core labor standards give them
the maximum prospects to create positive changes for the planet and the society. Their empirical
contributions can be measured from the quantitative and comprehensive approach, seeing its increasing
number of activities as well as by assessing its success in creating social changes. 5 Thenceforth, the most
distinctive property of the global civil society is its innovative network forms and transformative purpose.
However, this situation leads to the second characteristic of global civil society: the perceived
degree of conceptual conflation about the relation between ‘state’ and ‘non-state’ actors within the concept.
This weakness, according to main stream political sociologists, comes from the lack of sociological
preconditions, i.e. a ‘global state’, and limits resources to infrastructure in supporting global civil society
organization as well as required networks for transnational identity formation and collective action. On such
basis, several scholars maintain that the likelihood for global civil society developments is weak. It is found
that the dynamics of global civil society is very much influenced by many aspects, including environment,
technology, economy, social, as well as internal and external politics applied in certain countries. This can
be seen from the volatile quantity of NGOs and movements during the past century. During World War II,
for instance, the number of social movements and NGOs dropped until a very small number of hundreds,
while today we have more than 25.000 registered non-governmental bodies and institutions. 6
Third, the limitation for ‘global civil society’ derives from the main approach utilized in studying
the concept through descriptive nature and paradigmatic predilection, hence cannot be significantly
developed. The method, as Paul Nelson argues, is too restrictive in that it only covers specific issue areas
and forms of INGO political action but does not holistically applicable to financial policy and trade issues; it
is “biased towards middle-class activism” (Waterman) with “labor issues very much in the background”
(Evans).7 Little attempt has been done to articulate a systematic understanding of the multiple overlapping
organizations and movements that progressively promote global civil society through an emphasis of
developments in mix of descriptive empiricism and pregiven theory that actually hinder insights.
Limitation to the global civil society actors also comes from the nature of ‘inherited’ structures of
power that they work in.8 Although one of their objectives is to actually transform this condition, they stop
on the level of modifying or altering. This can be understandable if we locate global civil society in its
constitutive context: a state-centric system of international relations that is dominated by a narrow section of
humanity and within the structures of international capital that may permit dissent but do not permit any
transformation of their own agendas. 9 On the theoretical level, it is the belief of realists that such structure
can never be changed and thus become an inevitable limitation for the global civil society.
Additional to the aforementioned problems, there are still a lot of principal inquiries that need to be
answered by the global civil society: (1) Who are they fighting for? (2) Realizing that their existence does

5
Dwi Ardhanariswari, Transnational Society Lecture at E203 on Wednesday, 23 February 2011, at Faculty of Social and Political Science
Universitas Indonesia
6
Robert Taylor, Op Cit., page 339
7
Ibid.
8
Neera Chandoke, “The Limits of Global Civil Society”, page 35
9
Ibid.
not link to a certain geographical region, where did the legitimacy and justification to struggle for issues
attached to certain regions come from? (3) Who is responsible to decide and create internal policies for their
own organizations or control over the implementation of their policies? 10 These questions often become the
hindrances for the global civil society in performing their activities.
Lastly, the fourth point on the list, there are several opportunities for ‘global civil society’ which
are mostly a result of their ‘innovative network forms’. Simultaneous with formal assemblies or conferences,
the global civil society acknowledges the importance of virtual interaction through the internet in promoting
effective mobilization than direct face-to-face interaction. 11 New technological advances have altered the
nature of social ties in regards to the meaning of copresence. This implies that an INGO can work even
without a bank account or a street address. Thousands swarms of NGOs are decentralized and fluid, as the
multidriven clusters of NGOs are linked and mobilized through the internet. Therefore, convergence is
easier to be made especially because of their similar goals and objectives.
Furthermore, the emerging progressive global consciousness also supports and makes it easier for
the global civil society to take proactive measures. The wider public sphere is now more aware of how social
issues are interpenetrated and interdependent. As Robert Taylor mentions, the global civil society is gaining
their momentum since each and every action is building on the next with increasing interconnectedness as
well as strengthening synergy.
The first task—or challenge, I might prefer—offered by Robert Taylor is to offer a global approach
for studying a global phenomenon that embraces interpretative and contextual research methods to probe
people’s subjective experiences, perceptions, and feelings. It should encompass both organizations that tend
to work ‘within’ the INGO (lobbying with WTO, IMF, World Bank) and those movements committed to
street protest and other forms of direct action. Researches on how these different measures are interrelated
have barely begun. “All told, this is a major task, best pursued through collaborative research—including
both academics and practicioners—at a global level.” After such duty has been accomplished and the
limitation of global civil society has been answered, the next job is indeed to interpret global civil society as
a progressive multiorganization field with innovative network forms and transformative purpose. However,
such tasks shall not stop the ‘real actors’ from creating actions and movements to create more progresses to
the betterment of the world.

10
Kenneth Anderson and David Rieff, “Global Civil Society: A Skeptical View”
11
Robert Taylor, Op Cit.