The social power of religious organization and civil society: The Catholic Church in Uganda

Abstract

The socio‐political role of civil society organisations depends in large part on their internal organisational resources and capacities. Current work in the social sciences often focuses on the critical importance of civil society in explaining liberalisation and democratisation in Africa and other parts of the developing world. While authors taking this perspective would not deny that the power resources and internal dynamics of the organisations making up civil society influence their effectiveness, more systematic attention needs to be paid to such factors. Otherwise, analysts will continue to make presumptions about social organisations that, however ‘civil’, lack the capacity to effect political change. In this paper, the author uses the example of a Ugandan religious organisation to address this issue, specifying the kind of power and influence that the Catholic Church possesses in Uganda, and exploring to what extent its social power correlates with the assumptions of conventional civil society approaches.