6.4. Global Civil Society and Global Governance
While interest in the relationship between emerging global civil society and
global governance is growing, it is still unclear in what ways civil society can be
institutionalized in new global governance structures. Global governance is not an
embryonic form of a world government modelled after the modern nation state.
Instead, global relations are regulated in a “poststatist” fashion with no single center
of authority. Civil society, therefore, serves a different function than in the previous
periods and has to find new ways for establishing itself within the new global, post-
national constellation. If realized, the engagement between civil society and
regulatory mechanisms could enhance the respect and legitimacy that citizens accord
to global governance. Civil society could affirm and guide global governance
arrangements and when necessary constrain their behavior. Civil society can also
provide the space for expression of discontent when arrangements are regarded as
illegitimate.
During the 1990s, both the engagement and the representation of civil society
organizations and networks shifted from monitoring to active participation in
governance. Signs of an emerging internationalism built around global social
movements and a world public opinion can be viewed in the context of the
associational revolution of the 1990s. JOHN FOSTER (2001) emphasizes that the
development of social movements, NGOs and civil society organizations is uneven
worldwide, but their growth in numbers and in reach around the world is
unquestioned. We can employ the elaboration of globalization in terms of extensity,
intensity, velocity and impact to the evolution and development of civil society since
the 1990s. FOSTER has a strong argument when he claims that the associational
revolution is extended by an organizational revolution on the part of civil society.
79