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Abstract
Our aim is to problematise the dominant discourses and practices around civil society from a Southern perspective. We first examine critically, from a broadly Gramscian perspective, the way in which the concept of civil society has been deployed in development discourse. This highlights its highly normative and North-centric epistemology and perspectives. We also find it to be highly restrictive in a post-colonial Southern context insofar as it reads out much of the grassroots social interaction, deemed ‘uncivil’ and thus not part of duly recognised civil society. This is followed by a brief overview of some recent debates around civil society in Africa which emphasise the complexity of civil society and turn our attention to some of the broader issues surrounding state-society relations, democracy and representation in a Third World context, exemplified through our case study research in Mozambique, Inhassunge district (Zambézia Province). The privileging of Western-type Non-governmental organizations (NGOs) as drivers of democracy and participatory development in Mozambique have considerable implications for current debates around good governance, civil society strengthening and social accountability programmes and strategies.
Acknowledgements
This work was carried out in collaboration with the Catholic University of Mozambique (UCM), the Faculty of Political and Social Sciences in Quelimane (Zambézia Province, Mozambique) as well as local Mozambican NGOs, traditional and religious leaders and faith-based associations. The research was also supported by Irish Aid in Mozambique. The authors would like to thank all people and institutions involved for their support and collaboration in this work.
Notes
1. World Bank, Defining Civil Society.
2. Munck, “Global Civil Society.”
3. Habermas, see Theory of Communicative Action.
4. Lewis, “Civil Society in an African Context”; and Howell and Pearce, Civil Society and Development.
5. Avritzer, “Civil society, participatory institutions and representation.”
6. Berman, “ Ethnicity, Patronage and the African State,” 339–40.
7. Weiss, “Governance, good governance and global governance.”
8. Lewis and Kanji, see Non-Governmental Organisations and Development.
9. Munck “Global Civil Society.”
10. Ferguson, Global Shadows; and Bond, “Africa Rising?”
11. Gramsci, Prison Notebooks, 169.
12. Thomas, Gramscian Moment, 194.
13. Petras, “Imperialism and NGOs in Latin America.”
14. Kasfir, Civil Society and Democracy in Africa; Chandhoke, Conceits of Civil Society; Hearn, “‘Uses and ‘Abuses’ of Civil Society”; Muchie, “Critique of Civil Society”; Necosmos, “Civil Society, Citizenship and the Politics”; and Zinecker, “Civil Society in Developing Countries.”
15. Osaghae, “Colonialism and Civil Society in Africa.”
16. Mamdani, Citizen and Subject: Contemporary Africa.
17. Assimilado is a term given to African subjects of the colonising Portuguese Empire who had reached a level of "civilisation,” according to Portuguese legal standards during colonial times.
18. Fatton, “Africa in the Age of Democratisation,” 73.
19. Virtanen, “Democracy, poverty and civil society,” 93–4; and República de Moçambique, Inquérito aos orçamentos familiares.
20. Pitcher, Transforming Mozambique, 264.
21. Pfeiffer, “Civil Society, NGOs and the Holy Spirit.”
22. CIVICUS and Liga de ONGs em Mocambique/JOINT, Enabling Environment Assessment of CSOs.
23. Topsøe-Jensen, Mapping Study of Civil Society.
24. Hearn, “‘Uses and ‘Abuses’ of Civil Society”; and Williams and Young, “Civil Society and the Liberal Project.”
25. Cunguara and Hanlon, “Whose Wealth Is It Anyway?”; Hanlon and Smart, Do Bicycles Equal Development in Mozambique? and Galinhas e cervej; and Castel-Branco, “Growth, Capital Accumulation and Economic Porosity.”
26. Follér and Johansson, “Collective Action and Absent Civil Society; and de Brito et al., “Hunger Revolts and Citizen Strikes.”
27. Part of a personal e-mail exchange about civil society and conflict with a European donor representative, October 2015.
28. e.g. Francisco et al., Mozambican Civil Society Within; CIVICUS and Liga de ONGs em Mocambique/JOINT, Enabling Environment Assessment of CSOs; and Topsøe-Jensen, Mapping Study of Civil Society.
29. República de Moçambique, Inquérito aos orçamentos familiares.
30. Interview with an INGO employee in Mucopia, April 2015.
31. People interviewed referred to ‘associações dos 7 milhões’ when talking about associations that were created in order to access funds from a local district investment fund which was created from the government to support local economic development. Usually those associations are led by public service or government administrative staff who aim to gain more income through the establishment of an association and elaboration of a project to access money from the district investment fund.
32. AVODEMO is the abbreviation for ‘Association of the voice of the desert of Mozambique’.
33. Hanlon, “Mozambique – the Panic and Rage of the Poor.”
34. Hanlon, Mozambique Newsletter.
35. Lubkemann, “Where to be an Ancestor?”
36. de Carvalho, Doença e cura em África.
37. Serra, Linchamentos em Moçambique.
38. Serra, Diário de um sociólogo.
39. The presence of the religious-magical army and movement ‘Naparama’ influences the people of Inhassunge and their beliefs in witchcraft and magic (feitiçaria e bruxaria) even today. The Naparama movement started around 1986 as a response to the increase in brutal violence during the civil war and had several tens of thousands members in the provinces of Nampula and Zambézia. Naparamas fought without modern weapons and used magic medicine which, according to those interviewed, made them invulnerable and immortal. Naparama began as a community self-protection movement with the aim of establishing war free zones but towards the end of the war it joined FRELIMO and, hence, lost its neutrality.
40. Hanlon, Mozambique Newsletter.
41. Nicolini, Witchcraft, Magic, War and Peace.
42. Buur and Kyed, “State Recognition of Traditional Authority.”
43. Ekeh, “Colonialism and the Two Publics.”
44. Geschiere, Sorcellerie et Politique em Afrique.
45. Nicolini, Witchcraft, Magic, War and Peace.
46. Jacobs and Schuetze, see “Justice with our Own Hands.”
47. Bourdieu and Thompson, Language and Symbolic Power.
48. Mamdani, Native as Political Identity.
49. Cf. Fanon, Die Verdammten dieser Erde.
50. Fatton, “Africa in the Age of Democratisation.”
51. Jacob and Schuetze, “Justice with our Own Hands.”