Concepts and conceptions of civil society

Civil society participation in EU governance

“…11 But they invoke the notion of civility which crystallized as common denominator of these classical accounts: Civil society had come to be perceived as a well-ordered social arrangement which demarcates civil from 'uncivil' society and represents the departure from a state of nature (see Jensen 2006;Richter 1997). Civility as basic ingredient of civil society stimulated the imagination of political philosophers and, later on, political scientists and EU integration researchers.…”

“…and that] most civil society theorists offer intuitive, ostensive, or paradigmatic accounts of it rather than something more rigorous" (Jensen 2006: 39). However, there is an increasing body of literature which seeks to define the concept of civil society (see Jensen 2006;Smismans 2006b;Fung 2003;Klein 2001;Richter 1997). This literature has, among other things, highlighted the practical and theoretical origins of civil society and identified different conceptions according to their perception of state-society relations which, on their part, result in different democratizing functions assigned to civil society.…”

Postaje li civilno društvo u Hrvatskoj čimbenikom društvenih promjena?

“…Jedan od središnjih koncepta koji obilježava moderno civilno društvo polazi od prava građana na slobodu udruživanja (Jensen, 2006.). Civilno društvo se prepoznaje kao određeni prostor koji je duboko utemeljen u tradiciji i kulturi pojedinih društava (Salamon, Anheier, 1998.).…”

Citizenship in Civil Society?

“…The idea of civil society was popularized when communist or totalitarian states collapsed in the 1980s (Cohen & Arato, 1992;Keane, 1988;Kumar, 1993;Walzer, 1992). It became the subject of extensive debate when it appeared that scholars theorized civil society in different ways, according to different intellectual perspectives and moral commitments (Chambers & Kymlicka, 2002;Hann & Dunn, 1996;Jensen, 2006;Taylor, 1995). Instead of arguing about the elements and boundaries of the social organization of civil society, discussions in the 1980s focused on the idea of civil society itself, as embedded in different currents of political philosophy (Heins, 2004).…”