Global Civil Society Actors Research Articles

Mind the Governance Gaps: Harmful Corporate Strategies Leading to Avoidance of Responsibility and Civil Society Counter-Strategies

AbstractThe ‘Mind the Gap’ project has created a toolkit for civil society to hold companies to account for their adverse impacts. The toolkit sets out two distinct but interlinked frameworks: harmful corporate strategies resulting in the avoidance of responsibility for adverse impacts, and civil society counter-strategies to overcome these harmful strategies. Both frameworks capture the unique experiences of the Mind the Gap project’s global consortium partners and civil society actors focused on corporate accountability. The project responds to a need to close governance gaps that arise in the context of the current global economic system. It is only by identifying and understanding harmful corporate strategies that civil society can effectively advocate for corporate accountability and the closure of governance gaps.

Introduction: Communication Rights in the Digital Age

Introduction: Communication Rights in the Digital Age

A People vs. Corporations? Self-determination, Natural Resources and Transnational Corporations in Western Sahara

Since the mid-1970s, the Western Saharan conflict has defied both resolution and understanding, as an entire people, split between refugee camps in the Algerian desert and the Moroccan occupied territory, has been waiting for the international community to effectively enforce its right to self-determination. Through a combination of legal and geopolitical perspectives on the issues related to the exploitation of the rich natural resources in the last African territory still to be decolonised, this research paper will argue that transnational corporations (TNCs) can directly affect the welfare and the self-determination of a people, while the means to enforce corporate accountability remain limited and poorly adapted to the current global realities. The recent media campaigns led by NGOs against TNCs active in this area demonstrate the key role of global civil society in the emergence of corporate accountability and in reminding individuals, corporations and governments of their ethical and legal obligations towards indigenous peoples such as the Saharawi’s. This paper will first consider the historical and socio-economic context of the conflict and the importance of natural resources in this dispute (chapter I) before addressing the legal dimension of the exploitation of these resources by the occupying power and third parties (II). I will then argue that the decision of Morocco to involve Western oil and gas TNCs in the Western Sahara represents a complicating factor to the conflict and has created a new, corporate playing field for the conflicting parties (III). The last chapter of this analysis will address the current political and legal mechanisms for ensuring the accountability of such TNCs and assess whether campaigns by global civil society actors provide an effective, alternative avenue for corporate accountability (IV).Published online: 11 December 2017

Global civil society as shepherd: Global sexualities and the limits of solidarity from a distance

This paper critically argues that in the debates on international sexuality rights, global civil society actors assume leadership to represent the voices of those who are seen as marginalized or voiceless due to diverse injustices. This process, however, itself creates a layer of power relations within civil society which in turn leads to an under-representation of the voices and demands of people who don’t appear in the global register of sexuality politics. The paper unpacks the nature of global civil society actors’ claim to represent others and the implications of these claims for those who are being represented. The particular focus here is the ongoing debates on the position of sexual minorities in Africa with special reference to Uganda and Malawi. An analytical framework is also developed to understand the underlying mechanisms of global civil society advocacy. This is done by considering Michel Foucault’s work on pastoral power and Gayatri C. Spivak’s work on post-colonialism.

Transnational political action and ‘global civil society’ in practice: the case of Oxfam

AbstractThe term ‘global civil society’ has taken on increasing significance within scholarly debate over the past decade. In this article we seek to understand transnational political agency via the study of a particular transnational actor, Oxfam. We argue that various schools of thought surrounding the global civil society concept, in particular the prevailing liberal‐cosmopolitan approach, are unable to conceptualize transnational political action in practice – due largely, in the case of liberal‐cosmopolitanism, to a shared normative agenda. We also assess what contribution literature on development and civil society has made to the analysis of groups such as Oxfam. In investigating Oxfam's own perceptions of its context and the meanings of its agency, we discover an anti‐political perspective derived from an encounter between Oxfam's longstanding commitment to liberal internationalism and globalization discourse. Existing scholarship has insufficiently identified the local or parochial nature of the identities of global civil society actors.

Does the Involvement of Global Civil Society Make International Decision-Making More Democratic? The Case of the International Criminal Court

The negotiation and contents of the Statute for an International Criminal Court (ICC) were strongly influenced by global civil society actors. After examining definitions of global civil society, this article will consider whether and why such involvement of non-governmental actors in international negotiations should be considered desirable. In particular it will assess, in the light of the ICC negotiations, to what extent global civil society democratizes international decision-making processes, considering as elements of democracy: transparency, equality and deliberation, representation and participation. While concluding that this is only very partially the case, the final section will suggest that the tortured democracy question is not the only justification for global civil society involvement in international fora. It will discuss the much overlooked and by no means unproblematic ‘ethical contribution’ of global civil society and offer a qualified defence of more international law, with more global civil society participation, on this basis.

Justification and legitimacy in global civil society

As some thinkers have sought in the concept of global civil society an ethically driven site of deliberation and even resistance, so others have criticized global civil society for its lack of legitimacy and representativeness. This article attempts to answer these criticisms – at least in part – by invoking a moral commitment to the value of justification. I argue that the idea of justification, when examined, offers us a particular understanding of legitimacy which would be attainable for global civil society actors. The article begins by setting out the case for concern about the legitimacy of global civil society. I then outline a certain understanding of justification, showing how a commitment to this conception provides both a response to critics of global civil society and an ethical baseline for humane actors within global civil society. I move on to trace the significance of the moral relevance of justification for actors' strategies. Lastly, however, I highlight the difficulty of justification in a diverse world. This is to say that the issues of legitimacy and strategy facing global civil society are only made more tractable, not dissolved, by an appeal to the importance of justification.

Values and Ethics of Global Civil Society Actors: Insights from a Survey and Content Analyses

This study examines values, ethics and principles of conduct that underlie activities of global civil society organizations. It uses an international web-based survey, and a content analysis of the codes of conduct for exploring views of global civil society actors active on global issues and participating in global civil society events. The findings of this analysis highlight many similarities in the ways global civil society organizations of different forms and origins define their goals, values, ethical standards and responsibilities. The normative consensus discerned in this research is limited in scope, however. It revolves around a particular, liberal, view of civil society. The study discusses results of the survey and content analyses in light of the current debates on the nature of global civil society and its relation to the system of states and the global market.

The Porto Alegre Consensus: Theorizing the forum movement

The World Social Forums and corresponding Forum movement marks a shift in transnational social movement methodology and solidarity. The Forums work to thicken linkages between global civil society actors, liberate communicative action, and horizontally integrate the struggle for global social justice. This article outlines a theoretical dialogue linking the concepts of transnational public spheres, political opportunity structures and cosmopolitan democracies to the Forums' process. The article also discusses the idea of a Porto Alegre Consensus evolving to challenge the economic logic of the Washington Consensus. This Consensus coalesces around agreed-upon methodologies guiding the Forums' development partly laid out in its Charter of Principles, but, more importantly, interpreted and re-negotiated by participants engaged in the Forums' many diverse manifestations. I contend that this reflexive process between Forum incarnations and the participatory assessment and corresponding revisions of Forum methodology is at the heart of the movement's success.

Realization or Deprivation of the Right to Development Under Globalization? Debt, Structural Adjustment, and Poverty Reduction Programs

The human right to development provides a potentially powerful tool for reducing poverty and advancing sustainable development. More generally, rights-based development is gaining adherents and becoming more fully articulated and integrated into national and international development polices and practices. Yet these efforts are made in the context of globalization of economic activities which has tended to effectively negate the principles of rights-based development. Recent changes toward 'service apartheid' exclusion of the poor from access to basic life-sustaining resources such as water through privatization of public services suggest even greater deprivation of the right to development on a global basis, especially in countries affected by debt, economic structural adjustment, and formalized poverty reduction programs. In response to this situation, the burgeoning global social justice movement is gaining both an increased international profile and coherence in its articulation of viable and comprehensive development alternatives to the present global order or disorder. The purpose here is to enhance understanding of the potential significance of human rights for human development, taking into account the larger framework established by patterns of globalization and state transformation, and the alternatives being proposed and enacted by civil society actors locally and globally. I begin by presenting the essential elements of the human right to development and related social, economic and cultural rights. This is followed by assessment of the potential contribution of these rights to poverty alleviation and development. Then, debates on the right to development and the state's capacity to support this in the context of globalization are reviewed, based on an in-depth examination of economic structural adjustment programs and formal poverty reduction strategy programs. The experiences of Mozambique and Uganda are discussed to highlight the problematic nature of these economic policies and changes. Finally, proposals articulated by global civil society actors who are part of the burgeoning global justice movements for restructuring economic structural adjustment and poverty reduction programs according to a human rights approach are presented and assessed. Human rights and their development potential

Constructing global civil society actors: An anatomy of the environmental coalition contesting the tropical timber trade regime

(1998). Constructing global civil society actors: An anatomy of the environmental coalition contesting the tropical timber trade regime. Global Society: Vol. 12, No. 3, pp. 343-361.

Cave 'Cave! Hic dragones' : a neo-Gramscian deconstruction and reconstruction of international regime theory

The author reviews the theoretical history of the international regime concept and its deployment within neorealist, neoliberal and institutionalist IR conceptual frameworks. He argues that the five criticisms or 'dragons' levelled by Susan Strange at the concept in her 1982 article 'Cave! Hic dragones' simultaneously underestimated the concept's theoretical originality and exaggerated the degree to which it committed theorists to a static, ordered and statist conception of the global political economy. The author shows how the concept, stripped of its neorealist and neoliberal heritage, can be deployed within a critical, neo-Gramscian theoretical framework to analyse meso-level structures and the role that global civil society actors are playing in contesting the normative structures (rights and rules), procedures and compliance mechanisms of existing and prospective international regimes.