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The Anti-Communitarian League: Grassroots Research & Analysis of the Ultimate Third Way
Civil Society
by Niki Raapana
"A Civil Discussion
Precise definition of 'civil society' eludes faculty on panel, but they agree academia has a large role to play", By Mark Sullivan.
What Is Civil Society? posted by BBC.com: "Civil society is a term that's increasingly popular with government ministers, academics, diplomats, aid-workers, international agencies, teachers and a host of other professions. It's an idea that affects everyone in every nation. What Is Civil Society? aims to discover what the term actually means. In a 12-part series, Rahul Sarnaik sets out to explore the many different aspects of the concept and investigates how it has been put into practice in both the developed and the developing worlds."
Civil Society is another term used to define communitarianism and the Third Way (Milbank 2001).
An Essay on Civil Society by Brian H. Massam (includes an interesting perspective on communitarianism)
Latest News
CIVIL STREETS PROPERTY TAX February 17, 2005, KIRO7 news in Seattle posts: "Seattle City Councilman Nick Licata is proposing a three-year "civil streets" property tax. It would raise more than ten million dollars that would be spent for more bike and foot police officers in crowded neighborhoods. It also would restore four-person fire crews that have been reduced by budget cuts." We know Licata personally. His contribution to Rebuilding Community in Seattle is well documented on our Roosevelt Neighborhood Plan page. This is a tax for communitarian police enforcing communitarian laws. Good job Nick.
PRIMA News-The Moscow Human Rights News Agency
explains the history of the term CIVIL SOCIETY: "The phrase “civil society” was developed in the 17th and 18th centuries by English and French philosophers and, partly, by the Freemasons. It was they who brought the triad “Liberty, equality, fraternity” into general use. The poet Joseph Brodsky saw a contradiction in this. “Equality, brother, excludes brotherhood. You must understand this”, he wrote in his poem “Speech on spilt milk”. At the time of the French Revolution the term “civil society” had a new lease of life. What, though, did the slogan “civil society” lead to? In just ten months between 1793 and 1794 some 16, 000 people died at the guillotine. And a year later civilian rule gave way to the cult of the commune. Grackh Babef had a hand in this, turning “social accord” into “barrack-room communism”. During the twentieth century in the West the concept of “civil society” took a back seat. It was brought back in Eastern Europe in the early 1980s by leaders of the Polish “Solidarity” movement. It is possible that at that time it was essential in the recovery of understanding. But now, when human rights activists in Russia and Ukraine are serving in the structures of government or in opposition parties, it has has gradually become less necessary to use such hopeless phrases."
The FINAL DRAFT of the "GUIDE FOR CIVIL SOCIETY ORGANIZATIONS FOR THE IMPLEMENTATION OF THE HABITAT AGENDA" was published in February, 1998. This United Nations' Guide # 4 includes: "Promote political and legislative means that will allow organizations of the civil society to influence national programmes to implement the Habitat Agenda." # 5 is advice to influence, at appropriate levels, institutional and legal frameworks that facilitate.." and on page 6, #5 continues with "collect, analyze and disseminate gender-disaggregated data and information on human settlements issues."
Civil Society aims described by the World Federalist Association of Northern California: This worldwide organization has a 2020 Global Peace Initiative whose aim is to create a culture of Peace by the year 2020. "This Initiative reflects a global vision of unity: one heart, one mind, working toward one goal. We are many races which form One race: the human race. Each and every one of us has a different place we call home: but ultimately this planet is our Home. While the name 2020 is symbolic, thereby working with and reinforcing positive mass conscious thought forms, it has also been chosen as a practical time-frame for humanity to work towards creating a culture of Peace. Princeton University's 'Great Experiment' which relates to measurement of emotion and directed thought appears to support what metaphysicians have claimed for years: our thoughts impact our reality.
The 2020 Initiative calls on UN member-states and non member-states to support the 2020 Initiative through action, specifically:
2. Formulating a global constitution supporting this Initiative, 3. Opening the borders-i.e. allowing free movement and residence of all Beings."
Interacting Fruitfully with Un-Civil Society:
the dilemma for non-civil society organizations Presentation to a World Bank workshop on Civil Society in the FSU and East/Central Europe (Washington, 16th October 1996)
Published in Transnational Associations, 49, 1997, 3, pp 124-132 [begin quote] "Having worked with and documented "non-governmental organizations" for several decades, it has been interesting to note how research under headings such as: NGOs, voluntary associations, community organizations, third sector organizations, humanitarian organizations, non-profit bodies, and the like has been continually reframed. Different academic disciplines or approaches to development seem to have associated themselves with particular takes on what has only recently acquired a neutral label as "civil society". This term was seldom used a decade ago by many who choose to use it now. The blossoming of studies is associated with the transformation of the U.S.S.R. with few dating prior to 1989.
"The debate amongst those influenced by the methodology and political constraints of the intergovernmental system was severely constrained by the UN terminology of "nongovernmental organization" as specified in Article 71 of the Charter of the United Nations. It could even be argued that "civil society" acquired currency as a concept only with the transformation of the U.S.S.R.
"With the cessation of the Cold War, the pressures from environmental groups resulted in major procedural changes with respect to acceptance of a wide range of bodies at the Rio Earth Summit in 1992. These precedents have encouraged rethinking of the whole question of how non-governmental bodies relate to the UN system and have raised many questions about how they may be better associated with official development programmes. This has become especially acute as a consequence of negative assessments of the capacity of official programmes to deliver development at the field level." [end quote, emphasis added]
2004 Masonic Spring Workshop Poster. Advertising: "How can Masonry's core value of tolerance become the basis for a pluralistic civil society? Keynote speaker Bro Karim Aly-Kassam is the Director of the Theme School in Northern Planning and Development Studies which he developed and established in 1994. Professor Kassam was the first to hold the prestigious Murray Fraser Chair of Community Economic Development at the University of Calgary."
Mill Valley Mason's Show A Film Festival on Freemasonry. This is an interesting series about the connections between Scottish Rite freemasonry and the American founding fathers who, according to historian Anton Chaitkin, were not members of the Scottish Rite, they were instead members of Free and Accepted Freemasonry. Today there doesn't appear to be any difference at all between the two sects.
World Goodwill-Lucis Trust, formerly Lucifer Publishing.(Forbidden Knowledge.com presents a series called Revelations where they claim "FREEMASONRY PROVEN TO WORSHIP LUCIFER.") "World Goodwill is an organised movement founded in 1932 to help establish right human relations and solve humanity's problems through the constructive power of goodwill. World Goodwill's activities are essentially educational... World Goodwill is an accredited non-governmental organisation with the Department of Public Information of the United Nations. It maintains informal relations with certain of the Specialised Agencies and with a wide range of national and international non-governmental organisations. World Goodwill is an activity of the Lucis Trust, which is on the Roster of the United Nations Economic and Social Council. " See also We the Peoples.
Community-arianism, a biblography and internet resources list from Ashton Charities, UK. (This link is dead as of December 2003 since Ashton merged with Mansfield.
What Is Civil Society? posted by BBC.com: "Civil society is a term that's increasingly popular with government ministers, academics, diplomats, aid-workers, international agencies, teachers and a host of other professions. It's an idea that affects everyone in every nation. What Is Civil Society? aims to discover what the term actually means. In a 12-part series, Rahul Sarnaik sets out to explore the many different aspects of the concept and investigates how it has been put into practice in both the developed and the developing worlds."