Bridging Research, Policy and Action in Civil Society

Strengthening Initiatives: Lessons from a decade of

CIVICUS Civil Society Index Implementation

By

Jacob M. Mati CIVICUS CIVIL SOCIETY INDEX

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Introduction

• Despite an immense body of work and the advances in knowledge on civil society, its heterogeneity, and of the dynamics of actors occupying this terrain knowledge on some aspects of civil society is still limited.

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Why?

• Scepticism directed at the dominant Eurocentric theoretical frameworks used in the study of civil society.

• Difficulty in conceptualising and operationalising civil society for the purposes of empirical research, because of its multifaceted and therefore elusive nature. This means that while growing efforts to understand civil society have resulted in an empirically grounded realisation that civil society has ‘diverse historical roots, as well as widely varying current usages, interpretations and perspectives’ the term has remained conceptually fuzzy, extremely complex and contested.

CSI• A participatory needs assessment and action-

planning tool aimed at: 1) knowledge generation 2) strengthening civil society and its contribution to

positive social change.

• CSI methodology is triangulated and includes both quantitative and qualitative aspects as well as a consultative approach among stakeholders, to provide nuanced assessment of the state of civil society at country level.

• The CSI approach emphasises putting civil society at the centre of the generation of knowledge about its status and the subsequent actions for its own development.

10 years of CSI implementation

• Documentation/publication: CSI’s contribution to the understanding of civil society and its strengthening, has been documented in multiple publications (country reports, working papers, conference papers, and comparative volumes).

• But how has CSI faired in those 10 years in its quest to meet the dual objectives of knowledge generation and actions to strengthen civil society?

• How has CSI operationalised the tenets of participatory action-research in an effort to contribute to the strengthening of civil society and its contribution to positive social change?

• What have been the empirical strengths and challenges of the CSI’s approach?

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CSI approach: Definition and operationalisation

• The CSI defines civil society as ‘the arena, outside of the family, the state, and the market, which is created by individual and collective actions, organisations and institutions to advance shared interests.’

• This definition is informed by:a) value neutrality and objectivity b) recognition of the complexity and variegated nature civil society and therefore the need for the tool to ‘capture’ its many hues, shades and functions observed across different societies, cultures and countries. c) The tool should yield data that allows robust empirical comparability between countries, as well as providing civil society stakeholders with practical knowledge and mechanisms for its strengthening.

Achievements and challenges

• CSI findings have challenged some of the popular orthodoxy that civil society is only possible within ‘Western type’ democracies (Malena:2008).

• In the 2003-2006 implementation phase there were, however, challenges in operationalising the definition. This emanated principally because despite CSI’s placement of citizens (as opposed to organisations) as the basic unit of civil society and including non-organised forms of citizen action, most CSI country teams were unable to go beyond the organisations.

Operationalisation:Indicators and dimensions

• A multi-layered methodology of the CSI identifies a set of core or generally applicable indicators used in the assessment.

• The indicators are then aggregated into sub-dimensions and later into five thematic dimensions (civic engagement, level of organisation, practice of values, perception of impact and the external environment) which are graphically represented in what is called the CSI Diamond.

Diamond

CSI Dimensions• Civic Engagement: Includes formal and

informal activities and participation (social and political) undertaken by individuals to advance shared interests at different levels in society.

• Level of Organisation: CSI looks at the organisational development, complexity and sophistication of civil society, and the relationships among the institutional and organisational actors within the civil society arena.

Dimensions cont…• Practice of Values: The values that civil

society, within its diversity, portrays and represents as a whole towards society at large, and decision-making governance practices; labour regulations; code of conduct and transparency; environmental standards; and a perception of values practices by civil society.

• Perception of Impact: The responsiveness of civil society to important social and political concerns within the country.

• External Environment: CSI gives consideration to the social, political and economic environment in which civil society exists this directly and indirectly affects civil society.

Relationships in the implementation process

Reflections&

Action plans

Actions for

strengthening civil society

Assessment (knowledge

co-production) that leads to

Evidence

Actors in CSI implementation:-CIVICUS-The National coordinating organization-National advisory committee (CS, Media, Academia, government, donors etc)-Civil society and citizens

Contributions:• By co-generating knowledge and actions, the CSI has

contributed to new and innovative modes of governance of knowledge and development for accountable policies (UNESCO, 2007).

• Re-affirmation that policy making is neither linear nor rational and that evidence does not always feed into actions that may lead to some pre-determined outcomes thus the need to a symbiotic and dynamic relationship between producing knowledge and using it (Macedonian example).

• Research (participatory assessment) and reflection and action need not be completely distinct phenomena.

• Need for spaces for different stakeholders to come together to reflect on the state of civil society especially with the increasing body of work questioning/disillusioned by the civil society’s assumed role in development and democratisation processes given its own accountability and democratic challenges.

CSI’s implementation process:

1.Call for expression

of interest

4.CSI Training Workshop

6.Setting up of AC, and

1st AC meeting

5.Trainings of the

National Implementation

Team (NIT)

7.Quantitative Primary Research (PS, EPS, OS)

8. Qualitative Primary

Research

9.Regional Focus

Groups

11. National Workshop

10.2nd AC meeting

2.Application and

selection

3.Preliminary steps

Monitoring and

Evaluation

A. Analytical Country Report

B. Policy Action Brief C.

Indicator Database

Outputs

Major Tools

Is CSI contributing to change?

• CSI has helped demonstrate that it is possible for policy-makers and academics and civil society and many other social actors to constructively work together.

• CSI partners have successfully used CSI as a stimulus for their and their partners’ programmatic development (UNDP and SIDA).

• BUT: Elusive harmony between social actors: Continuing challenges with the continued passing of laws deemed to be counterproductive for the development of civil society (Venezuela, Ethiopia, Zambia, Russia, Egypt several of the post-Soviet Central Asian countries). But all is not lost especially if successes of initiatives like the CSI are replicated in other countries and situations.

ConclusionThe CSI experience demonstrates the following:a) the role of civil society as knowledge producers in their

own rightb) it is possible for social science research by actors outside

of the state, to inform policy and actions without necessarily having to go through the bureaucratic rigours

c) it is possible for social research to become relevant without losing its rigour.

• These have been possible because of knowledge co-production and co-governance of policy and actions that CSI approach has applied.

• Collaboration/trust between civil society and other actors, in this case through the CIVICUS Civil Society Index, can offer unique pooling of key competencies, roles and expertise, and can therefore serve as a remarkable resource in attempts to strengthen civil society and its role in good governance and development.

Conclusion cont.• Ten years after the first CSI results were published,

we still do not have a clear picture of the state of civil society in all the different countries of the world despite the robust initiatives spread across the globe.

• Our recommendation would be for different social actors to channel efforts at the level of programming and funding to enhance the policy relevance of the type of action research that CSI engages in as well as the usage of the research findings. The key point for discussion should therefore be the nature of the institutional mechanisms that can facilitate such appropriate processes and the steps required to bring them into being.