| Rethinking civil society, democracy and development |
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Although South African’s access to services have improved over the last decade and a half, poverty and inequality are still apparent enough that it is clear that as a society we haven’t yet dealt with these issues in a substantial way. Over the last 15 years, the role of civil society in the struggle to end poverty has shifted as we have moved from the honeymoon period of a democratically elected government that epitomised responsibility towards its citizens, to a period where government didn’t seem as responsive and where civil society voices were sidelined. Currently, there is a resurgence of hope that once again civil society will be brought into mainstream discussion by a government newly devoted to conversations with all ‘stakeholders’. However, the question about the role of civil society in our democracy has not yet been fully resolved. Naidoo argues that the biggest obstacle to civil society affecting change is its inability to unite on common issues, and agree to disagree on smaller issues. The Minister of Social Development reflected this view of civil society at a recent roundtable discussion when she suggested that civil society was not unified and advocated for vastly different things – a point of view that creates the space for issues that civil society raise to go unchallenged. Naidoo suggests that to be effective and work in the current global context, civil society needs to get better at collaboration and coordination; it needs to become more strategic in its partnerships which should include other organisations, parliament, local government and business; and, civil society should rethink its engagement with government. It also needs to engage at a global level, particularly around environmental challenges as way of creating consensus between North and South. The dominant form of democracy which emphasises the ballot box (the casting of votes every five years) over genuine participation is not able to address the shift of power to a global level either. Naidoo’s final argument around the role of civil society is that it should encourage participation in budgeting processes. He argues that budgeting processes are critical to re-establishing the democratic contract, arguing that a nation’s budget is a ‘real-time’ indicator of a government’s values. Naidoo’s assessment demonstrates that there are still numerous challenges that civil society faces, but that collaboration is fundamental in the current climate if these challenges are to be met. At the end of the lecture the situation of many impoverished South Africans was brought home by a young student who vocalised his inability to pay university fees and, the types of social challenges he faces that make his study environment that much more difficult to achieve in. Ironically, none of the university representatives present chose to respond to the crisis experienced by this student and, no doubt, many others. Words by Karen Peters Bookmark this article:          |
“Rethinking civil society, democracy and development: a global perspective”, Helen Joseph Memorial Lecture delivered by Kumi Naidoo
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