Civil Society and the State: Rise and Fall of the State as the Bearer of a Moral Project?

1992 ◽  
Vol 13 (2) ◽  
pp. 5-30
Author(s):  
Victor Perez-Diaz
Keyword(s):  
Civil Society ◽  
Political Culture ◽  
The State ◽  
European Countries ◽  
Democratic Transitions ◽  
Relative Success ◽  
Democratic State ◽  
Western European ◽  
Crucial Test ◽  
The Way

Democratic transitions depend on prior societal traditions and the emergence of a new political culture, but the crucial test for the consolidation and the institutionalization of democracy is the (relative) success of the new democratic state in the task of handling the basic problems of the country. This is a challenge for both the state and civil society, and the way this challenge is met has important repercussions on the relations between them. This test was particularly difficult for Spain due to the fact that it took place at a time of profound transformations (economic, social and cultural) in those Western European countries Spain was so eager to be part of.

scholarly journals (Re)assembling the ‘normal’ in neoliberal policy discourses: tracing gender regimes in the age of risk

2015 ◽  
Vol 6 ◽  
Author(s):  
Katarina Giritli Nygren ◽  
Siv Fahlgren ◽  
Anders Johansson
Keyword(s):  
Civil Society ◽  
Social Policy ◽  
Feminist Theory ◽  
The State ◽  
Policy Document ◽  
Gender Regime ◽  
Gender Neutral ◽  
Gender Regimes ◽  
Modes Of Governance ◽  
The Way

The purpose of this article is to explore through a reading of an official Swedish policy document what questions and challenges such a document poses for feminist theory by the way the ‘normal’ is (re)assembled in accordance with what others have called the risk politics of advanced liberalism.  The intensified focus on risk in neoliberalism has seen responsibility move from the state to individuals, and old divisions between society and market as well as between civil society and state are being refigured. The argument put forward here is that current modes of governance tend to neglect the complexities of present-day life courses when using a gender-‘neutral’ approach to social policy that is in fact the work of a gender regime.

Democracy and Civic Culture

2009 ◽  
Author(s):  
Filippo Sabetti
Keyword(s):  
Political Culture ◽  
Subject Matter ◽  
The State ◽  
Civic Culture ◽  
Future Research ◽  
The Subject ◽  
State Of Research ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
The Way

This article attempts to take stock of the state of research on democracy and culture by providing answers to several sets of questions. It seeks to improve the understanding of the relationship between culture and action, and between political culture and democratic outcomes. The article begins by exploring the way the literature has dealt with the possible meaning of culture and political culture and their relationship to action. It also suggests why there has been little contribution to democracy derived from political culture research, and identifies how the efforts to rethink how and why the subject matter is approached in certain ways led many analysts to break out of established epistemological demarcations. This eventually led to the reinvigorated tools of investigation and research on democracy and civic culture. The article concludes with a discussion on the implications of improved tools of investigation for future research.

Beyond Contestation

2015 ◽  
Vol 7 (2) ◽  
pp. 215-246
Author(s):  
Holly Snape
Keyword(s):  
Civil Society ◽  
Empirical Research ◽  
Service Provision ◽  
Mainland China ◽  
Holistic Approach ◽  
The State ◽  
The Way

This paper draws on empirical research undertaken in mainland China spanning five years to examine the role of a quiet, incremental, and holistic approach adopted by grassroots ngos as they attempt to carve out greater governance and service provision roles for themselves and influence the state. In light of this approach, it also questions the way we conceptualize the autonomy of ngos and the search for contestation between ngos and the state which clouds our view of more subtle yet powerful interaction. It goes on to suggest that by adjusting the lens through which we interpret the transformation of the state-society relationship, we may be able to form a clearer understanding of the wave-like development of civil society in China as the space for social organizing expands and contracts on an upward trajectory.

State Policies toward Islam in Twenty Countries in Western Europe: The Accommodation of Islam Index

2017 ◽  
Vol 14 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Serdar Kaya
Keyword(s):  
Western Europe ◽  
State Policies ◽  
The State ◽  
European Countries ◽  
Policy Decisions ◽  
Halal Food ◽  
Country Differences ◽  
Western European ◽  
Muslim Communities ◽  
Regional Governments

AbstractThis study creates an index that reveals the extent to which Western European countries accommodate Islamic traditions and practices. The index covers six realms in which Muslim communities seek accommodation: (1) education, (2) chaplaincy services, (3) mosques, (4) cemeteries, (5) Islamic attire, and (6) halal food. The study examines and quantifies the state policies in twenty Western European countries on both national and municipal levels with a particular focus on actual implementation. Results indicate that Western European countries vary widely in terms of their accommodation of Islam. There are also notable within-country differences, due in part to regional governments, as they also make and/or implement policy decisions. Both between- and within-country variations in the accommodation of Islam reveal a variety of nuances, and blur dual categories, such as ethnic-civic and assimilationist-integrationist.

scholarly journals Nazione e Stato nella storia d'Italia

2010 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sandro Rogari
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Civil Society ◽  
First World War ◽  
The State ◽  
The Political ◽  
World War ◽  
The First World War ◽  
Post War ◽  
First World ◽  
The Way

The book delineates the emergence of a unitary state from the bedrock of a nation formed over centuries. It retraces the major advances in the integration between the state and civil society achieved in the first fifty years after unification, and the disastrous consequences wrought by the First World War and by Fascism. It underscores the way in which the post-war democratic revival rewound the virtuous process of construction of a state capable of expressing the Italian "plural nation". Despite this, it also stresses the way in which the ethical deterioration and the corruption of the political and administrative class that came to a head during the last twenty years of the twentieth century have again brought to the fore the problem of the construction of shared institutions.

scholarly journals POLITICAL SYSTEM AS A CONDITION FOR DEVELOPMENT OF STATE AND LAW

2019 ◽  
Vol 26 (6) ◽  
pp. 1803-1805
Author(s):  
Dimitar Spaseski
Keyword(s):  
Civil Society ◽  
Political Culture ◽  
Political System ◽  
Strong Relationship ◽  
The State ◽  
The Political ◽  
Political Processes ◽  
The People ◽  
Democratic Societies ◽  
The Government

The state has a central place in the political system. Through its structure and positioning the country has the strength to be a unifier of society against its overall division of the various classes and layers, ethnic, cultural and other groups. The legitimacy of all these processes is given by laws that determine the trajectory of all processes and the conditions under which the processes take place. The state, by adopting the highest legal acts such as: the constitution and the laws, achieves one of its most important functions, which is the management of society. The state directs society to promote development, but also punishes and sanction infringements and mistakes. Depending on who exercises power in the state, i.e. whether it belongs to the people, to an individual or to a powerful group, the political system can be determined. The political system in itself includes the overall state relations, the relations in society and the guidelines for the conduct of the policy of the state. A state in which the government is elected by the people through direct elections certainly fulfills the basic requirement for the development of a stable civil society. The political system is one of the sub-systems of the entire civil society. The political system is specific in that all the activities and relations of which it is composed are directed to the state and its functions. The structure of the political system is composed of political and legal norms, political knowledge, political culture and political structure. These elements confirm the strong relationship between the state, the law and the political system. Developed democratic societies can talk about a developed political system that abounds with political culture and democracy. It is the aspiration of our life. Investing in democratic societies we invest in the future of our children. If we separate the subjects of the political system, we will determine that the people are the basis of the political system. All competencies intertwine around people. Political systems are largely dependent not only on the political processes that take place in them every day, but also on the economic performance and the economic power of the states. Economic stagnation or regression in some countries often threatens democracy and its values. We often forget that we cannot speak of the existence of a functioning and well-organized democratic political system without its strong economic support. In conditions of globalization, it is necessary to pay special attention to international positions as the main factor of the political system, for the simple reason that the functions of the state in this process are increasingly narrowing.

scholarly journals TARPTAUTINĖ BENDRUOMENĖ PRIVALO RŪPINTIS KIEKVIENO ASMENS BIOETIKOS APSAUGA – SUFORMUOTI BENDRĄ TARPTAUTINIŲ IR NACIONALINIŲ BIOETIKOS TEISMŲ SISTEMĄ

Teisė ◽  
2013 ◽  
Vol 87 ◽  
pp. 231-2360
Author(s):  
Victoria Grygoryevna Tretiakova
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Civil Society ◽  
The State ◽  
Specific Nature ◽  
Democratic State ◽  
Core Value ◽  
Judicial Protection ◽  
Intensive Development

The author made a research on the state of development human rights bioethical legislation and judicial protection of bioethical rights under intensive development of civil society, in which everybody’s life, health, physical and mental integrity and dignity are core value for the latter, and thus require immediate attention of every democratic state. The author makes her proposals for unified specialized bioethical justice and unified system of specialized bioethical courts at the international, regional and national levels, justifying necessity of them by specific nature of bioethical legal relations and socially based prioritisation of the protection of bioethical rights.

On Selected Issues Concerning Foundation Law in Poland

2019 ◽  
Vol 78 ◽  
pp. 280-295
Author(s):  
Edyta Litwiniuk
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Civil Society ◽  
Case Law ◽  
The State ◽  
Democratic State ◽  
Constitutional Tribunal ◽  
Legal Position ◽  
The Republic ◽  
Statutory Regulation

This paper is an attempt to assess selected aspects of the state of foundation law in Poland in relation to the legal position that the Constitution of the Republic of Poland has granted them. The text analyses selected statutory solutions in the light of separable patterns for reviewing their compliance with constitutional principles and values. In the author’s opinion, the provisions of the Polish Foundations Act and the regulations concerning the financing of foundations violate the constitutional standards of the Republic of Poland. In particular, it has been found that foundation law contains many loopholes, the filling of which requires the use of complicated interpretation techniques, which makes it impossible to ensure that the institution of the foundation is being and will be used properly as an element of civil society in a modern democratic state. Moreover, the opinion was presented that the functioning of foundations is excessively influenced by executive bodies, run by active politicians. This concerns, first of all, the unclear principles of supervision over foundations’ activities, and excessive powers to issue the executive regulations included in the Foundations Act, as well as the principles of the allocation of funds towards grants by the National Freedom Institute, based on a disproportionate freedom of decision making. For these reasons, the author postulates the adjustment of the Polish statutory regulation, dating back to the period of the Polish People’s Republic, to the constitutional standards introduced by the Constitution of 1997 and enshrined in the case law of the Constitutional Tribunal.

Democracy and Islam in the Arab World: Lessons from Algeria

2006 ◽  
Vol 5 (4) ◽  
pp. 327-352 ◽  
Author(s):  
Carlos García-Rivero ◽  
Hennie Kotzé
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Political Culture ◽  
General Public ◽  
Arab World ◽  
The State ◽  
Religious Influence ◽  
The Public ◽  
Low Level ◽  
Level Of Satisfaction ◽  
The Way

AbstractThe study of Arab political culture has been developed extensively in recent times in an attempt to test whether the lack of democracy in the Arab world can be ascribed to its political culture, in which religion plays a major role. There are divergent conclusions with regards to this question. In this article, using quantitative techniques, we have analyzed satisfaction with the way democracy is implemented in Algeria at the elite and general public levels. More specifically, we have looked at whether the demand for more religious influence within the state affects levels of satisfaction with the way democracy is being implemented within Algeria. Our results indicate that the low level of satisfaction with the way democracy is implemented in Algeria amongst elites and the public is not driven by political culture or religion specifically – but by a perception of a lack of respect for human rights in the country and, in the case of the general public, also by a lack of confidence in the Algerian state.

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