In much of the Western world, civil society is considered an important antidote, even a panacea, to societal woes. These non-profit organizations -- often portraying themselves as apolitical -- bring people together, help to redeem governments gone astray, act as watchdogs against waste and maleficence, and are ideally the "thousand points of light," as President George H.W. Bush once put it, in the darkness of social troubles.
In the early 19th century, the French political thinker Alexis de Tocqueville wrote of them as a unique and positive American phenomenon. Most recently, President Barack Obama lauded their potential during his summit with the Association of Southeast Asian Nations in California in February. In a sense, these organizations are the "monitors" of democratic governance. But increasingly, they are being treated unrealistically as a critical element in, or even potential savior of, the democratization processes -- as if they were the U.S. cavalry coming to the rescue of beleaguered settlers in some American B-movie. (Courtesy of Nikkei Asian Review)
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