The Blackwell Companion to Sociology (23 page)

in their attempts to secure basic rights, goods, and services, they will join

associations which can protect their particularistic rights (Reis, 1998). As the 82

Barbara A. Misztal

example of affluent and racially homogeneous residential community associa-

tions illustrates, this type of organization does not support civic virtues, distinguishes between insiders and outsiders, and may even have potentially

destructive outcomes for democratic systems (Bell, 1998). Therefore, it can be

said that not only can a decline in associational life jeopardize civic values, but the emergence of particular types of associations can determine generalized

reciprocity and social trust. As not all kinds of associations are worthy of

encouragement in a liberal democracy, so only an active state, ready to protect

individual rights (including welfare rights) and ready to be attentive to the

dangers embodied in civil society, although without interfering with the inde-

pendence of the civil sphere, provides a real condition for the democratization of civil society.

The realization that civil society associations can not only mediate but also

generate conflicts has brought the end of the dichotomy of ``bad'' state and

``good'' civil society and the realization that the proper functioning of democracy depends on a particular interaction between society and political institutions,

and not simply on the maintenance of societal activity per se, and that the

evaluation of the benefits of civil society in any given context depends, in turn, on a prior assessment of the political ends embraced by a particular community.

So it is not enough to ask whether institutions arè`macro'' or `ìntermediate,''

one must also ask what ideas they ``carry'' and what interest they represent: civil±

state institutions are good to the extent that they are animated by civic virtues (Berger, 1998, p. 362).

Consequently, we need to focus our attention on an examination of the

conditions which ensure the translation of private particularistic identities and obligations into public universal civic solidarities. Solidarity and trust produce socially beneficial effects only among some groups, while among others they

have exactly the opposite effect, such as a reduction of the privacy and auto-

nomy of individuals, restrictions on access to opportunities, exclusion of out-

siders, or downward leveling norms (Portes, 1998). Moreover, under certain

circumstances a robust civil society may not produce positive political conse-

quences but instead signal and accelerate a democratic regime's degeneration, as the disintegration of the Weimar Republic's democracy illustrates (Berman,

1997). So, to establish the sociological usefulness of the term ``civil society,''

we should examine not only the formation of social capital but also the ends to

which those assets are to be directed and the nature and strength of the political institutions. We need to go beyond the facile equation of solidarity and trust with the level of ``civicness'' in communities and to analyze particular societies by combining an analysis of societal and cultural factors with the study of political institutions (Hefner, 1998).

At present there are many perspectives on the age-old dilemma between

diversity and solidarity. Some writers see civil society as `à signifier of plurality''

(Keane, 1998, p. 53) and reject the need for a socially shared definition of the good, while others, such as communitarians, point to the need for some normative frameworks of shared purposes and consensus. A more pluralistic interpreta-

tion of democracy, which sees civil society as ``based on a recognition of

Civil Society

83

difference and diversity'' (Hall, 1998, p. 34), criticizes calls for the moral

reconstitution of civil society as realms of mutual trust for underestimating the importance of individualism and pluralism and for assuming that the perception

of an attainment of solidarity and unity occurs ``naturally,'' due to the existence of self-evident mutual obligations and common purposes. Understanding of civil

society as a homogeneous unity or a harmonious community may result in

considerable social and political losses, as illustrated by developments in post-1989 Poland, where the overunification of society has inhibited the emergence of a competitive pluralism and has made the differentiation of democratic institutions more difficult. However, seeing civil society as only a battlefield where

interest meets interest can cause us to overlook the existence and sociological

implications of shared identities that bind people as well the persistence of some boundaries. So, just as it ``makes little sense to universalize a permanent particularity, it makes little sense to particularize a universal end result'' (Wolfe, 1992, p. 315), and there is a need to understand that not all boundaries are the same

and that not all types of solidarity produce the same effect. In the same vein, new debates stress the need for a plurality of structures of civil society and the

preservation of some sense of wholeness.

Since there is a growing need to come to terms with the tensions inherent in

democracy, sociological inquiry into the nature of civil society should be focused on how both the plurality of structures of civil society and the preservation of a sense of wholeness are realized. Such a reconciliation is always only incremental and never stable, since the balance of forces underlying a civil compromise shifts (Hefner, 1998). Seeing civil society as a space that opens the way for public

participation, while preserving individual difference and diversity (Touraine,

1997), brings to center stage investigations into how both `ìnclusive democracy

and exclusive group centeredness,'' as the necessary conditions ``for a rich but just social life'' (Wolfe, 1992, p. 311), are possible. It can be argued that the actualization of civil society means the reconciliation of tensions between democratic ideals and sociologically informed accounts of individual versus group

obligations, or refers to a situation in which the acceptance of individual differences does not prevent the development of more universalistic identities of

communicative rationality.

This can be realized when civil society becomes `à sphere of solidarity in

which abstract universalism and particularistic versions of community are

tensely intertwined'' (Alexander, 1998b, p. 97). In order to identify conditions for the realization of civil society, we need to understand how inclusive citizenship rights actually are and how widespread is social acceptance of a normative

framework of shared purposes and consensus within which diversity can be both

cultivated and contained. This requires an examination of the relationship

between universal individual rights and the particularistic restrictions on these rights, as well as general levels of civility and sociability. Civility, which underwrites pluralism, demands ``that in all life outside the home we afford each other certain decencies and comforts as fellow citizens regardless of other differences between us'' (Bryant, 1992, p. 111). Sociability creates a feeling of belonging

and is necessary in democratic civil society, since informal bonds and

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Barbara A. Misztal

communication, as the conditions of public opinion and identity formation, are

essential for self-reliance, responsibility, and collective action. For civil society to be a realm of freedom, solidarity, and plurality it needs to be placed within the framework of a democratic welfare state and to be capable of nurturing civility

and sociability, which assists the individual responsibility and participation

demanded for democracy.

Stress on the crucial role of civility and sociability in democratic societies is based on the assumption that ``Democracy depends upon the engagement of

individuals, not only with the state, but with each other'' (Hansen, 1997, p. 289).

Due to the importance of these links between informal discursive sources of

democracy and formal decision-making institutions, the revitalization of the

complex world of civility and sociability requires overcoming the inadequacy

of the public±private dichotomy as an analytical framework for the understand-

ing of modern societies. Thus, to establish sociological usefulness of the term

``civil society,'' we need to understand the overlapping nature of the private and public sphere. This means moving beyond Habermas's definition of the public

sphere as based on the separation between the state, the private sphere, the

market, and the public sphere (Calhoun, 1997; Wolfe, 1997).

Habermas's historical account of the rise of à`discursive public sphere'' shows

how ``private people come together as public'' (1989, p. 27), and describes the

public sphere as the arena in which civil liberties and universal values could be expressed. Habermas's reliance on the distinction of private±public unnecessarily reintroduces a dichotomous vision of society and does not provide an

adequate empirical description of the major contemporary institutions (Wolfe,

1997). In reality, the public is not separated from private, as it was assumed in the eighteenth-century model of the liberal public sphere, on which Habermas's

ideal-typical construction is based (Calhoun, 1997, p. 82). Critical discussions of Habermas's treatment of identities and interests as settled within the private

sphere and brought ready made into the public sphere show that such a theory

does not take into account, for example, the gendered nature of the public sphere (Benhabib, 1992).

Habermas's claim that today's public sphere is under threat from the invasive

logic of commodification leads him to insist on the importance of à`discursive

ethic'' in the process of democratization, as well as to identify the core of civil society as consisting of `à network of associations that institutionalizes problem-solving discourses of general interest inside the framework of organized public

spheres'' (Habermas, 1996, p. 367). Furthermore, the realization that the public sphere can no longer be contained within national boundaries informs his more

pragmatic recent evaluation of the feasibility of a solidarity and cohesion in a modern, complex, functionally differentiated, and media-saturated global

society. Although under such conditions civil society is highly fragile, the reshaping of relations between states and their more communicatively competent

citizens and the structuring of a communicative sphere into à`sphere of publics''

(Calhoun, 1996, p. 457) can, nonetheless, offer new hopes for further democrat-

ization ± provided that the public sphere is underwritten by civility and protected by a stable state able to contain conflicts.

Civil Society

85

Conclusion

From its origin as `àn invention from the conditions of European modernity''

(Tester, 1992, p. 124), civil society has been a complex and contested concept.

Now it is commonly recognized as a basis for democratic legitimacy and as an

important ingredient in any effort to understand the conditions of modern

democracy's cross-cultural possibility (Hefner, 1998).

However, while the discourse of civil society is `àt the heart of a sea change in contemporary political culture'' (Cohen and Arato, 1992, p. 3), its overly normative tone raises doubts about this notion's potential as an analytical concept.

To secure a place in social theory and research, the term ``civil society'' needs to be converted into a more historically and sociologically informed concept. While undertaking efforts to maximize the level of ``concreteness'' of this idea, we

should be aware of the impossibility of constructing a unifying category for all sociological analyses. So placing the idea of civil society in a particular tradition and developing the awareness of its actual usage and status in a particular

presentation can be the first step to assist mutual understanding and exchange

between different approaches to civil society. The second step in improving the

usefulness of the notion should focus on enlarging its heuristic value. Civil

society, to be the proper subject matter of sociology, should be operationalized in a way which allows us to examine it as a process securing democratic

inclusiveness and social exclusiveness. To grasp the nature of a civil society

means to understand its role in supporting and constraining the institutional

spheres of the economy and the polity, and to reveal the extent to which it

genuinely accommodates civility and sociability.

While it remains to be identified exactly how and by what mechanisms a

program of revitalization of the public realm can be achieved, any project of

reinvention of active citizenry as the basis of social solidarity needs to include the cultivation of a sphere of autonomous social actions valued for their ability to foster sociability and civility as well as nurture civil society's democratic dialogue with political institutions. The theory of civil society, understood as ``the realm of fragmentation and struggle but also of concrete and authentic solidarities''

(Walzer, 1992, p. 97), holds that a democratic civil society depends on finding a balance between social diversity and a sense of wholeness. Since people's opportunities for autonomy and participation depend on macrostructural factors, the

promotion of such a compromise, which is neither easy to achieve nor stable, is

one of the main functions of a democratic state.

7

Human Rights

Abdullahi A. An-Naìm

Human rights is not commonly accepted as a field in sociology, despite the clear overlap in subject matter and possibilities of mutual conceptual and methodological influence. In terms of the organization of this volume, for example,