Civil Society in Bangladesh: Vibrant but not Vigilant

A Dissertation

Submitted to the University of Tsukuba In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of

Doctor of Philosophy in Political Science

Farhat TASNIM

2007

ii

Dedicated to My Father—Professor Muhammad Shahjahan

and Mother—Mrs. Shirin Maqsuda

With love and gratitude for raising me in the way I am

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Abstract Grassroots development in Bangladesh gained world recognition with the 2006

Nobel Peace Prize being awarded to Professor Yunus and his Grameen Bank. On the

other side of the coin, Transparency International rated Bangladesh as the World’s most

corrupt country for five successive years from 2001-2005. Why then, can civil society

be so successful at the grassroots level, yet not have any strong role in producing good

governance and consolidating democracy? The present study particularly addresses this

problem and attempts to uncover the causes to such contradictory outcome of civil

society in Bangladesh. In this connection, the present research also qualifies the

normative assumption on the positive relation between civil society and democracy

asserted by the main stream Neo-Tocquevillean School that has profound influence on

donor policies on good governance and programs for strengthening civil society.

For investigation into the civil society of Bangladesh the study first develops a

simple analysis model where civil society is considered as a form of collective functions

distinct from state, market and family. Civil society organizations are taken as the basic

units of such civil society. Overall characteristics and functions of civil society are

divided into two broad aspects— vibrant and vigilant. Vibrant refers to density,

collectiveness and activeness while vigilant refers to the interactions of civil society

with the state and market, its participation in governance and strength to monitor state

actions. Civil society must be both vibrant and vigilant to be able to contribute to

democratic consolidation. The analysis model places civil society in constant interaction

with the other actors in the political system and democratic consolidation is achieved

together with a participatory civil society, political institutionalization, economic

development and democratic culture. Dahl’s Polyarchy is the ideal goal for democratic

consolidation. The thesis has made use of both survey data and secondary materials and

iv

has combined comparative, quantitative and qualitative method for analysis.

From a comparative discussion on contemporary India, The Philippines and

Pakistan with that of Bangladesh, it is the political actors that have been found to be the

determining factor to the strength of civil society and dimension of democracy. Further

investigation into the factors that influence the nature and strength of civil society in

Bangladesh has revealed that donor policy, economic situation and philanthropy culture

and simple registration rules have contributed to its vibrant nature which is marked by

density of collective functions, activeness in providing service and success so far in

social development. Thus far, from the Neo-Tocquevillean assumption, there exists a

reasonable condition for improving democratic institutions in the country. On the other

hand, political structures, particularly political parties, along with historical background

and vertical social relationship—clientelism, patronage, nepotism, corruption etc. have

contributed to low performance of civil society in relation to politics and democracy.

Empirical observation and survey on civil society organizations have supported

the inference on high civil society involvement in social service and welfare. Such

empirical data have also revealed a low rate of participation by civil society

organizations in actions like advocacy, policy making, lobby, exchanging opinions with

the government, sending representative to local councils etc. and their high tendency to

keep contacts with political parties. This implies that the civil society is hardly involved

in participatory actions concerning politics and democracy on the one hand, and on the

other hand, has a partisan tendency. Naturally their prospect in contributing to

democracy or emerging as a strong vigilant force is not encouraging.

To understand the reasons for low participation and partisan tendency of the civil

society, further analyses on their political relation in contemporary Bangladesh have

been conducted. The research reveals that instead of influencing the government and

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political actors, civil society itself has been penetrated, co-opted, politicized and divided

by the political parties. As the civil society organizations are vertically organized and

not democratic internally, they are easily prone to such politicization and polarization.

This has reduced their ability to generate democratic norms, articulate interest or

monitor state actions. So the civil society is yet to emerge as a vigilant force to uphold

good governance and consolidate democracy.

The study not only answers questions regarding the weak performance of civil

society in relation to democratic consolidation but also indicates the impracticality of

the donor policies for placing high targets for civil society in a political system that still

lacks political institutionalization, democratic consensus and economic development.

International and national policies on civil society should be formulated accepting the

social and political reality. Though the civil society may not be able to completely

overcome the influence of politicizations, lure of patronage, and vertical social relations

it has the possibility to improve and gain a stronger position. In this way, whatever

positive outcomes are produced may be considered as achievements.

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Acknowledgement I would like to take this opportunity to express my debt and thanks to a number

of individuals and institutions, continued support and encouragement of whom helped

me shape this thesis through its different stages.

Academically, I am specifically indebted to my Academic Advisor Professor

Yutaka TSUJINAKA for his continuous guidance and advice for the preparation of this

thesis with keen interest, stimulation and patience. I am particularly indebted to his

expert supervision in the field of civil society and survey-based analysis and for his

confidence in me to do such research on civil society in Bangladesh. Moreover, he

extended generous support from his special project–Civil Society, the State and Culture

in Comparative Perspective (CSC), to conduct my survey on civil society organizations

in Bangladesh.

It is my great pleasure to acknowledge my gratitude to three other members of

my Thesis Committee. Special thanks to Professor Shigeo OSONOI for his kind advices,

generous support that helped me upgrade the standard of my research. I extend sincere

thanks to Professor Motoko SHUTO for her scholastic comments which helped me

improve my thesis to its present form. I am obliged to Professor Charles Covell, for his

intellectual cooperation, constant encouragement and assurance that gave me the moral

strength and academic confidence to continue my endeavor on civil society.

I would also like to show appreciation to all the members of the project team of

CSC under the leadership of Professor Tsujinaka. Particularly I am grateful to Dr. Jea

Young CHOE and Mr. Hiroki MIWA who helped me at all stages from organizing the

survey plan to analyzing the data in SPSS. I also thank the Japanese NGO –Shapla Neer

for extending their help to conduct the survey in Bangladesh and become the official

partner of the project in connection to the survey. While conducting the survey at the

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field, I received genuine support and cooperation from a good number of individuals,

particularly from my twenty sincere and dedicated surveyors—all graduate students of

University of Rajshahi. Among them I would like to mention the names of Momen

Khan, Jahangir Alam, Mustafizur Rahman, A.S.M. Sarwar and Selimuzzaman. They

also helped me in collecting newspaper reports on civil society from different libraries

in Dhaka.

Among other academicians who encouraged me greatly with my research

project, I would like to particularly mention the name of Professor Robert Pekkhanon of

Washington University, and Professor Nathan Gilbert Quimpo of Tsukuba University

for their constructive comments and suggestion on my thesis and also to Professor

Joseph Galaskiewicz of Arizona University and Professor Kazuko KOJIMA of Tsukuba

University for their constant encouragement.

I convey my heartfelt thanks to the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports

Science and Technology of Japan for awarding me the Munbukagakusho Scholarship,

which has supported my study and stay in Japan.

I am grateful to my friends and fellow mates at the Public Policy Study Room

and Tsujinaka Seminar for their encouragement, support, intellectual comments on my

research and extended help in solving various difficulties I had to encounter being a

foreign student in Japan. Here, I would like to mention the name of Dr. Leslie M. Tkach

KAWASAKI, Dr. Lee JIYONG, Lee HYUNJU, Huang MEI, Pei Jung YANG, Hiromi

NAKAMURAH, Isamu OAKADA, Shahidul Islam and Shakil Ahamed.

I thank my teachers and colleagues of the Department of Political Science,

Rajshahi University, Bangladesh, for their cordial support during the study period.

Lastly, I would like to express my deep gratitude to my husband Dr. Tofael

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Ahamed without whose constant support, cooperation, understanding and motivation it

would have been impossible for me to finish the journey. I also convey special thanks to

our unborn child for being the source of all my inspiration during the process of writing

and revising this thesis. I owe much gratitude to my parents— Professor Muhammad

Shahjahan and Mrs. Shirin Maqsuda and my elder sister Dr. Wardatul Akmam and her

husband Dr. Fakrul Islam for being a constant source of help, support and inspiration

throughout the entire research work. Besides, their dedication, contribution, advice and

guidance towards building my life are simply incalculable.

Above all, all praises to acknowledge immeasurable grace and profound

kindness of the Almighty Allah, the supreme ruler of the Universe to complete this

research work.

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List of Contents

Abstract iii Acknowledgement vi List of Contents ix Abbreviations xiv List of Tables xv List of Figures xvii Chapter 1 Introduction 1 1.1 Statement of the Problem 1

1.2 Research Question and Objectives of the Study 4 1.3 Critical Arguments 6 1.4 Conceptual Framework 8 1. 4.1 Civil Society Discourse 9

1.4.2 Analysis Framework 14

1.4.2.1 Operationalizing a Vibrant and Vigilant Civil Society 14 1.4.2.2 Steps of the Investigation 18 1.5 Implication 19 1.6 Brief Introduction to Civil Society in Bangladesh 22 1.7 Definitions 26 1.7.1 Participatory Civil Society 26 1.7.2 Politicization of Civil Society 27 1.7.3 Democracy 27 1.7.4 Transition to Democracy 29 1.7.5 Democratic Consolidations 31 1.8 Chapter Arrangements 34 Chapter 2 Literature Review and Methodology 38 2.1 Literature Review 38 2.1.1 Theories on civil society leading to the study of Third

World States 38

2.1.1.1 Neo-Tocquevillean School

38

2.1.1.2 Neo-Gramscian School 40

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2.1.2 Relationship between Civil Society and Democracy and Development Policies

42

2.1.3 Studies on Third World Civil Societies from different Perspectives

47

2.1.3.1 John Hopkins Comparative Nonprofit Sector Project 47 2.1.3.2 CIVICUS Civil Society Index 50 2.1.3.3 Project on Asian Civil Society 52 2.1.4 Researches on Civil Society in Bangladesh 54 2.2 Methodology 59 2.2.1 Use of Survey Method in Studying Civil Society 59 2.2.2 Description of the Survey Method Used 62 2.2.3 Application of Data 64 2.2.3.1 Quantitative Analysis Model 64 2.2.3.2 Qualitative Analysis Model 67 2.2.4 Description and Justification for Selecting the Study

Area for Survey 69

2.2.4.1 Rajshahi District 70 2.2.4.2 Justification for Selecting Rajshahi District as the Study

area 71

2.3 Limitations of the Study 75 Chapter 3 Political Structural Influence on Civil Society 78 3.1 Introduction 78 3.2 Influence of Political Structures upon Civil Society from

a Comparative Perspective 80

3.2.1 Stable but Partly Illiberal Democracy-India 84

3.2.2 Elitist Democracy- The Philippines 88 3.2.3 Failed Democracy- Pakistan 91 3.2.4 Position of Bangladesh Civil Society and Democracy in

Comparison to other Asian Countries 95

3.3 Bangladesh Civil Society from Vibrant and Vigilant Perspective

99

3.3.1 Level of Vibrancy of Civil Society in Bangladesh 99 3.3.1.1 Philanthropy Culture 100 3.3.1.2 Donor Policy 101 3.3.1.3 Registration System 105 3.3.2 Level of Vigilance of Civil Society in Bangladesh 107

xi

3.3.2.1 Confrontational Democracy in Bangladesh 108 3.3.2.2 Elite Composition-Politics and Civil Society 110 3.3.2.2.1 Civil Society Elites 111 3.3.2.3 Internal Characteristics of Civil Society Organizations 113 3.3.2.4 Political Party System in Bangladesh 116 3.3.2.4.1 Nature of Party Rule in Contemporary Bangladesh 119 3.3.4.2.2 Third Parties 121 3.3.4.2.3 Nature of Building Social Support 122 3.3.2.5 Political Parties Penetrating Civil Society 123 3.4 Conclusion 130 Chapter 4 Rich Grass-roots Actions but Poor Participation 134 4.1 Introduction 134 4.2 Nature of Civil Society in Bangladesh as Revealed

through the Survey Data 137

4.2.1 Self Categorization by the Civil Society Organizations 137 4.2.2 Policy Interest 139 4.2.3 Objectives 140 4.2.4 Geographic Level 141 4.2.5 Member 142 4.2.6 Resources 144 4.2.7 Volunteer 146 4.2.8 Employee 148 4.2.9 Budget 150 4.2.10 Cooperation with Other Actors 152 4.3 Civil Society Involvement in Grass-roots Action 155 4.3.2 Evaluation of CSOs and NGO Performance 159 4.4 Civil Society Involvement in Participatory Functions 161 4.4. 1 Relation with government 161 4.4.2 Advocacy 164 4.4.3 Policy Making 169 4.4.4 Lobby 173 4.5. Summary and Conclusion 178 4.5.1 Summary 178 4.5.2 Concluding Remarks 181

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Chapter 5 Civil Society and Political Relation in Bangladesh 184 5.1 Introduction 184 5.2 Civil Society and Political Relation as Revealed in the

Survey Data 188

5.2.1 Most Influential Actors 188 5.2.2 Personal Relation with Actors 190 5.2.3 CSO’s Relation with Political Parties 194 5.3 Civil Society and Politics: Qualitative Analysis 197 5.3.1 Civil Society and Politics from News Paper Analysis 198 5.3.2 Sector Wise Analysis of Civil Society and Political

Relation in Bangladesh 205

5.3.2.1 NGO Sector 205 5.3.2.2 Primary School Teacher’s Movement 2006 210 5.3.2.3 Labor Unions and Trade Organizations 215 5.3.2.3.1 Labor Union 215 5.3.2.3.1.1 Rajshahi Sugar Mill Labor Union 217 5.3.2.3.2 Trade Organizations 218 5.3.2.3.2.1 Rajshahi Chambers of Commerce 220 5.3.2.4 Cooperatives and Small Welfare Groups 221 5.3.2.4.1 Cooperatives 221 5.3.2.4.2 Local Social Welfare Groups and Cultural Sports Club 226 5.3.2.5 Intellectuals, Think Tanks and Citizens’ Group 229 5.3.2.5.1 Intellectuals 230 5.3.2.5.2 Think Tanks and Citizen Groups 232 5.3.2.5.2.1 Rajshahi Rakkha Shangram Parishod-RRSP (Movement

to Protect Rajshahi) 233

5.4 Summary and Conclusion 235 Chapter 6 Conclusion 242 6.1 Introduction 242 6.2 Answer to the Research Question 243 6.3 Ability of Civil Society in Consolidating Democracy 248 6.4 The Neo-Tocquevillean Theory and Donor Policies:

Implication of the Case of Bangladesh 252

6.5 Matters Remain Uninvestigated 255 6.6 Conclusion: ‘Vibrant but not Vigilant’ 257

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Appendices 263 Appendix -A Map of Bangladesh 263 Appendix -B Map of Rajshahi District (Survey Area) 264

Appendix -C Survey Questionnaire 265 Appendix -D Survey Report on Civil Society Organizations in

Bangladesh, Rajshahi District 279

Appendix E-I List of Designation of Resource Persons Interviewed 286 Appendix E-II

List of Observatory Notes used for the Describing and Analysis the Cooperatives and Small Welfare Groups in Chapter Five

287

Appendix E-III List of Libraries visited for Newspaper Searching 288 Appendix-F Case Studies of Civil Society Organizations 289 Appendix- G Profile of two Major Political Parties 301 Bibliography 305

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Abbreviations

ADAB Association of Development Agencies in Bangladesh

AL Bangladesh Awami League

BNP Bangladesh Nationalist Party

BRDB Bangladesh Rural Development Board

BRAC Bangladesh Rural Advancement Commission

BGMEA Bangladesh Garments Manufactures and Exporters Association

CBA Collective Bargaining Associations

CSO Civil Society Organization

CSI Civil Society Index

CPD Centre for Policy Dialogue

FNB Federation of NGOs in Bangladesh

NGO Non-governmental Organization

PKSF Palli karma sahayak foundation (Foundation for Assisting Rural Activities)

PO Peoples Organizations (a prominent form of civil society organization in the Philippines)

RRSP Rajshahi Rakkha Shangram Parishod (Movement to Protect Rajshahi)

RSS Rastriya Swamsewak Sangh (National Volunteers Corps)

TNO Thana (Sub-district) Executive officer

TMSS Thengamara Mahila Shobuj Shongho

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List of Tables Table 1.1 Statistics of Registered CSOs in Bangladesh 24 Table 1.2 Statistics of CSOs and Total Population of Selected

Countries in Asia

24

Table 2.1 CSOs targeted and surveyed 63 Table 2.2 Indicators of basic nature, grass-roots action and

participatory action of CSOs 65

Table 2.3 Methods used to sample newspaper reports 68 Table 2.4 Sector wise discussion on civil society and political relations 69 Table 3.1 Comparative table showing democracy and civil society

level in four countries 96

Table 3.2 Freedom House rating for four countries in 2006 97 Table 3.3 Professions of parliament members 1973 to 2001 110 Table 3.4 Percentage of share of seats and votes secured by parties in

general elections 117

Table 4.1 Objective of the Civil Society Organizations (CSO) 140 Table 4.2 Funds providing sources for CSOs other than membership

fees 145

Table 4.3 Cooperation ranking with other social, political and market actors

153

Table 4.4 Nature of involvement in grass-roots actions 156 Table 4.5 Selected grass-roots action among foreign funds receiving

and non-receiving CSOs engaged at the local and national level

158

Table 4.6 Grass-roots performance evaluation 160 Table 4.7 Nature of formal relation with government 162 Table 4.8 Selected government relationship among foreign funds

receiving and non-receiving CSOs engaged at the local and national level

163

Table 4.9 Nature of advocacy among different types of CSOs 166 Table 4.10 Democracy related advocacy among foreign funds receiving

and non-receiving CSOs engaged at the local and national level

168

Table 4.11a Success in policy making and policy breaking among different CSOs

170

Table 4.11b Participation in PRSP Policy process by different CSOs.

170

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Table 4.12a Policy making and breaking among foreign funds receiving and non-receiving CSOs engaged at the local and national level

171

Table 4.12b Participation in PRSP policy process among foreign funds receiving and non-receiving CSOs engaged at the local and national level

172

Table 4.13 Nature of lobby by different CSOs. 174 Table 4.14 Selected lobby performed by foreign funds receiving and

non-receiving CSOs engaged at the local and national level 176

Table 5.1 Influence ranking of different actors upon the political system

189

Table 5. 2a Personal relation between different CSOs and important actors

192

Table 5. 2b Personal relation existing between important actors and CSOs of different sections

193

Table 5.3a CSOs having contact with political parties 194 Table 5.3b Political party relations with CSOs belonging to different

sections 195

Table 5.4 Sampled news papers 199 Table 5.5 CSOs types and mention of different attributes in the news

reports 202

Table 5.6 Politicization, corruption and violence among labor unions as revealed in news paper reports

215

Table A-1 Sampled civil society organizations belonging to different categories

280

Table A-2 Questionnaires filled in each day 281 Table A-3 The statistics of all three steps-Population, sampling and

interviewed CSOs 283

Table A-4 The CSO under affiliated ministry of institutions 283 Table A-5 CSO’s classification 284

xvii

List of Figures

Figure 1.1 Integrated model to study civil society in developing countries

17

Figure 1.2 Democratic transitional phases towards consolidating democracy

30

Figure 1.3 Simplified model of democratic consolidation taking place through the combined forces

33

Figure 3.1 Model for Comparison 97 Figure 3.2 Rise of NGOs receiving foreign funds since 1990s in

Bangladesh 102

Figure 3.3 Flow foreign grant through NGO Affairs Bureau in Bangladesh

103

Figure 3.4 Year of establishment of Civil Society Organizations(CSO)

104

Figure 3.5 Vertical reciprocal relationship between civil society and political parties (elaborated model)

125

Figure 3.6 Simplified picture of the civil society and Political Party Relation in Bangladesh 

127

Figure 4.1 Self categorization by the civil society organizations 138 Figure 4.2 Policy Interests of Civil Society Organizations(CSO) 139

Figure 4.3 CSOs acting at different geographic level 142 Figure 4.5 The pattern of individual members of the CSOs surveyed 143 Figure 4.6a Pattern of volunteer among local and national CSOs 147 Figure 4.6b. Pattern of volunteer among foreign assistance receiving

and non-receiving CSOs 147

Figure 4.7a Pattern of employee among local and national CSOs 149 Figure 4.7b Pattern of employee among foreign assistance receiving

and non-receiving CS0s 149

Figure 4.8a Amount of budget among local and national CSOs 150 Figure 4.8b Amount of budget among foreign funds receiving and

non-receiving CSOs 151

Figure 4.9 Lobby through political parties and coalition formation –five country comparison

178

Figure 5.1 Relationship with ruling party and opposition 196

1

Chapter 1

Introduction

1.1 Statement of the Problem Grassroots developments in Bangladesh gained world recognition with the 2006

Nobel Peace Prize having been awarded to Professor Yunus and his Grameen Bank1. On the

other side of the coin, Transparency International rated Bangladesh as the World’s most

corrupt country for five successive years from 2001-20052. Why, then, can civil society be so

successful at the grassroots level, yet not have any strong role in producing good governance

and consolidating democracy? Not only Bangladesh, but also other developing countries that

have embraced democracy during the 1980s and 1990s (e.g., in Thailand, The Philippines,

Indonesia, Nepal and other parts of Central Asia, Latin America and Africa) are experiencing

frustrating outcomes and political instability. However, international development

organizations and donor countries influenced by the Neo-Tocquevillean school, regard civil

society as the best instrument for good governance and democratic consolidation in third

world countries. The policy of applying Western experiences and theories in non-Western

societies while neglecting indigenous settings, local circumstances and histories has

provoked controversy. Often civil societies with large number of associations, having good

reputation in social development and staging mass protests for democratic change have been

1The Norwegian Nobel Committee awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for 2006, divided into two equal parts, to Muhammad Yunus and Grameen Bank for their efforts to create economic and social development from below (source: http://muhammadyunus.org/NobelPrize/press_release.html internet access 10 February, 2007). Grameen Bank is the pioneer institution for the modern practice of micro-credit often used in development programs for poverty alleviation. The Grameen Model of Bangladesh is currently used to financially empower the poorest families in more than a hundred countries across the globe through savings and loans (Dowla and Barua, 2006). 2 Corruption Perception Index, 2006, Transparency International Bangladesh, available at http://www.ti-bangladesh.org/CPI2006.pdf (internet access on 12 June, 2007).

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found to be ineffective in influencing government policies and consolidating democracy.

High profile of NGOs and the large number of development projects may partially lead to a

vibrant civil society but not necessarily guarantee a participatory vigilant civil society.

Prominent scholars like Robert Putnam, Larry Diamond have emphasized on

associational culture to make democracy work. They have argued for the strong relation

between the autonomous, local based, citizen groups and democracy. Higher the number of

associations in a country, the higher the likelihood that, democratic institutions will improve.

So they pursue that efforts should be made to strengthen such groups to bring democratic

transition where there is none and consolidate democracy where there is already an existing

one. Efforts to produce democracy through civil society and civic engagement is believed to

bring changes in three ways, (a) changes at the micro social level will produce macro-

political results, (b) in a society, disposition and practices shaped in one association will have

spillover effects in other circumstance and (c) the same associational structures will operate

in similar ways in different socio-historical contexts (Armony, 2004:7).

The idea that strong civil society fosters democracy3, holds the state in check, and in

turn contributes to development (Howell and Pearce 2001: 40), has influenced formation of

donor policies on good governance4 and greater cooperation with NGOs in the third world.

3 After the failure of the policy of state reform during 1980s-commonly known as structural adjustment, donors became more interested in civil society to overcome the problems in the developing world. The neo-Tocquevillean school supplied the necessary arguments about how active associations and civic engagement contributed to democratic polities and how this facilitated economic progress and prosperity (Howell and Pearce, 2001,41). 4Theoretically, good governance involves an efficient public service, an independent judicial system and legal framework to enforce contracts; the accountable administration of public funds; an independent public auditor, responsible to a representative legislature; respect for law and human rights at all levels of government; a pluralistic institutional structure, and a free press (Leftwitch 1994). Good governance marries the new public management to the advocacy of liberal democracy (Rhodes, 1997: 50). Through their good governance agenda, World Bank, ADB and other development agencies seek to encourage competition and markets; privatize public enterprise, reform the civil service, introduce budgetary discipline; decentralize administration, and greater use of non-government organizations in the third world. Good-governance agenda suggested that a virtuous circle could be built between state, economy and civil society which would balance growth, equity and stability. To

3

International aid policy embracing such liberal, organizational view of Neo-Tocquevillean

school intend to promote an ‘ambitious vicious’ circle between state, economy and civil

society in developing countries. Civil society organizations have been highlighted both as

service providers and as promoters of good governance and democratization.

However, the notion of civil society that has been accepted by the donors is

normative and based on Western experiences overlooking the political and social background

of the developing countries. In most cases, third world states are weak, limited in their

capacity and have social relations that are embedded in a vertical clientelistic manner.

Imposition of a new idea in a very different social-historical setting may lead to ramifications.

Often third world political systems and societies have been found to be immature in institutional

development, lacking necessary conditions for proper functioning of civil society. Despite the

fact, Neo-Tocquevillean scholars, particularly Diamond (1989, 1996) have emphasized civil

society for the development and maintenance of secure democracy in developing countries.

Diamond has mentioned several functions of civil society in consolidating democracy and

particularly for developing countries—check and balance the power of the state, ensure

pluralism, increasing political participation, teach democratic norms, recruit and train new

political leaders and resist authoritarian rules (Diamond, 1992: 6-12). For all these functions

civil society requires necessary democratic atmosphere where the market needs to be stable

as well as the other state institutions to be well institutionalized. Diamond has pointed out

conditions for civil society groups— they must have democratic goals as well as internal

democracy, organizational institutionalization, pluralism with out fragmentation etc.

this end civil society has been considered as the best tool to balance the state and the market in political terms by reducing abuse of power, and in economic terms as by becoming a third source of social service provision (Lewis, 2004:302-303).

4

(Diamond, 1996:212, 1999). These conditions are also normative so as the democratic tasks

that have been expected from civil society.

No society, particularly in a developing country can conform to these conditions. In

fact, where political institutions have emerged in a non-democratic atmosphere and social and

political relations are based on kinship and clientelism, civil society can hardly emerge as an

autonomous, pluralistic force. On the other hand, they may be found to be weak, polarized and

controlled by the more powerful political forces. If the civil society organizations (CSOs) act in a

clientelistic manner, if they are dependent on and are placed under the powerful local elites and

politicians in the social stratification, if their organizational strength is overpowered by the state

and political forces and autonomy is compromised, vigilant civil society can never be achieved.

Foreign donations and loans and supporting state policies can easily encourage and lead to large

number of civil society organizations, this may bring development and vibrancy but not

necessarily vigilance. Only when vibrancy and vigilance together is found in a civil society it

may contribute to democracy. Practically combination of both the attributes is hardly found in

civil societies in developing countries.

1.2 Research Question and Objective of the Study

Bangladesh represents the most likely case to show the simplicity in the Neo-

Tocquevillean assumption and impracticability in the donor policies to strengthen civil society to

ensure democracy. Bangladesh society and state which is a formal democracy possess least the

important caveats5 that Diamond has warned about (1996:213). At present there is free market

5 Diamond (1996: 213) has mentioned a good number of caveats that may impede the democratic role of civil society. They are – history of authoritarian state corporatism, low level of economic development or the absence of a fully functioning market economy, lack of state autonomy; a hyperactive, confrontational and relentlessly rent seeking civil society; angry, anomic civil society; civil society trying to substitute coherent political parties.

5

system in Bangladesh. Formal parliamentary system of government has been reintroduced here in

1991. The state does not lack any autonomy in relation to other internal actors or institutions

within the political system. Moreover the civil society here is not hyperactive and relentlessly

rent seeking, trying to penetrate the state. Civil society organizations are also not alienated from

the state and the interest groups do not have the power or objectives to substitute the political

parties. Rather the state and political forces have emerged as the most powerful actors. In spite of

a clientelistic, kinship-based social setting, there is a vibrancy of social organizations most of

which may be considered as civil society organizations from a broad definition. These

organizations are mainly local based and welfare oriented. However, contribution of civil society

in democratic consolidation is hardly observed. Though they have strong presence in the service

providing sector and social welfare, civil society organizations have been found to be rather weak

and ineffective in relation to politics, policy making and democracy. The important role by civil

society may not be denied in different movements for democracy before and after independence

in 1971; however, in the day to day life, influence of civil society in government policy and

protecting and representing people’s interest and rights can hardly be observed. The present

research tries to find the answer to the core question— despite its well recognized contribution in

social development why the civil society in Bangladesh can hardly contribute to democratic

consolidation?

With the aim to answer the research question, the present study is based on three

broad objectives:

The first objective is to explore factors that influence the nature, strength and actions

of civil society, to identify the most influential factor that contributes in impeding civil

society’s vigilant role in contemporary Bangladesh.

6

The second objective of the study is to empirically investigate civil society

organization—basic units of civil society, to reveal types of their functions and nature of

activities that are related to politics, participation and democracy.

The third objective is to investigate the civil society and political relation to verify the

inferred causes to the weak and less participatory role of civil society which is found to be

hardly contributing to democratic consolidation in Bangladesh.

The study starts its journey by taking the civil society in Bangladesh as the dependent

variable and the factors that contribute to the development and participatory nature of civil

society as the independent variable in their broad senses.

1.3 Critical Arguments Neo-Tocquevillean scholars and donors have emphasized organizational activities

and group work through forming associations, particularly at the community level. Such

policies have lead to proliferation of grass-roots organizations, i.e., NGOs in the third world

societies. However, proliferation of civil society organizations generated through internal and

external pressure and policies, just like in Bangladesh, may not always lead to democratic

success. The present research attempts to argue with empirical observations that unless the

civil society is autonomous, enjoying strong network and is participatory that is, involved in

formal interaction with national and local governments, taking part in policy making,

advocates on important issues and lobby to form pressure on the government, it can hardly

contribute to democracy though it may have a high profile of success in social development.

In case of Bangladesh, though social development activities of civil society are significant,

its participatory rate is low.

7

Strengthening civil society may be a policy of the donors or international

development agencies, parliament may also legislate laws to regulate CSOs. Such internal

and external institutional matters do shape the nature of civil society to some extent, but may

not be considered as the prime influencing factors. Present research through exploring most

of the external and internal dynamics, shows that nature and function of civil society in

developing countries, like Bangladesh is determined through combinations of factors like

globalization, donor policies, as well as historical development, social culture, and political

institutions. Though the influencing factors act in a combined way, they may differ in their

intensity at different levels of political development and vary from country to country. In

most cases political and vigilant strength of the civil society is highly influenced by the

political actors.

CSOs developed at the community level are mostly concerned with the local

problems of the area. In developing countries poverty is one of the biggest problems;

naturally most organizations are concerned on welfare and economic empowerment.

Financial assurance from donors, lead to more civil society organization and better non-

governmental services which is ultimately thought to bring better citizenry and more

participation in political decision making. Such participation related goals often remain

unrealized. In case of Bangladesh too, large number of civil society organizations active at

local and meso levels is mostly concerned with social welfare and poverty alleviation.

Majority of CSOs are engaged in service related functions than advocacy and other

participation related matters. In spite of its vibrant nature, civil society is mobilized at a very

low rate towards political and democracy related matters.

8

From the political perspective, with the Bangladesh case, the study argues that,

instead of influencing the government and political actors, the civil society itself has been

influenced by the powerful social political factors that have weakened its potentials to

generate democratic norms among the citizens, articulate interests and watch on government

actions. Only a few civil society leaders, elites and a few factions have personally gained

from such politicization.

1.4. Conceptual Framework

The present study relies on two overlapping approaches— Comparative Politics and

New Institutional Approach, to study and explain the civil society in Bangladesh.

Comparative politics explains different political systems and their institutions and norms,

through identification of similarities and differences. It helps us develop explanations and

test theories on the way in which political systems work and in which political processes

occur. Political scientists cannot design experiments to control and manipulate political

arrangements and observe the consequences. However, it is possible to describe and explain

the different combinations of events and institutions found in the politics of different

societies (Almond and Powell, 1966:26). One of the important questions to apply on political

systems is the attitude of the principal organized groups toward each other and toward the

system itself. The answer may be found in the studies under the broad heading Political

Dynamics as termed by Brown and Macridis (1996:197). It basically includes the

performance of political parties and other institutions that influence the public policies. Civil

society has been brought under this broad heading. Naturally, studying civil society under

such umbrella approach provides flexibility to understand the empirical fact in comparison to

other countries as well as to other institutions within the same political system.

9

For a further understanding and explanation of the role of civil society in political

system and influence of the state and other actors on civil society, this study also takes help

of multi-faceted Institutional Approach. Contemporary Institutionalism in political science is

concerned with the political collectivities. It studies reciprocal relations between politics and

socio-economic environment, that is, both the options of politics shaping the society as much

as society shaping politics. Institutions may be formal or informal structural features of

society or polity. Institutions transcend individuals to involve with groups of individuals in

some sort of patterned interactions that are predictable based on specified relationship among

the actors. Such institutions are stable, based on some shared values and meanings, and affect

individual behavior (Peters 1999:17-18). Institutional Approach provides the convenience to

study the actions and interactions of formal structures like legislature, bureaucracy, legal

framework as well as informal or popular structures like political parties, interest groups, or

even a set of shared norms or cultural traditions under the same heading as institutions. This

provides scope for explaining combined influences of structures on the other structures. So

under the one institutional approach, international trends, state policies, laws, historical

events as well as social norms and cultures may be explained in analyzing the reciprocal

interaction civil society has with the political and social system in its own process of

development.

1.4.1 Civil Society Discourse

The roots of the idea of civil society are various and scattered and its history may be

traced in different streams of Western political thought over the past two millennia—for

example in classical liberalism, liberal egalitarianism, critical theory, pluralism, Marxism,

and democracy. Again, civil society has found its place in the religious traditions of the East

10

and the West- Christianity, Islam, Buddhism and Confucianism (Allagappa 2004, 27). In the

thoughts of Aristotle (384-322 BC) as well as of Marcus Tullius Cicero (106-43 BC), John

Locke (1632-1704), Jean Jacques Rousseau (1712-1778) and Immanuel Kant (1724-1804),

civil society was considered as synonymous with the state or political society. Civil society

in this conception expressed the growth of civilization to the point where society is civilized.

Nonetheless, there was always a connection between citizenship and society in the early

thoughts (Kumar, 1993: 376-377).

In the later half of the 18th century ideas, society has been distinguished from the state

by thinkers including Adam Ferguson (1723-1790), Adam Smith (1737-1809), Thomas Paine

(1805-1859) and Alexis de Tocqueville (1805-1859). While they continued to use the term

civil society in its classical sense, their arguments in fact established the separation that

brought radical transformation in the meaning of the concept. Among them, Adam Smith

came closest to identifying civil society with the market while reserving an essential role for

the state. Civil society was founded on self-interested economic activity and the division of

labor with a separate minimal but active role for a sympathetic state (Davis and McGregor,

2000: 49). Ferguson argued for a commercial state to end feudal system and ensure liberty

and personal freedom. He relied on moral sentiment of the society to defuse to the negative

effects of the market (Allagappa, 2004: 26).

Later on, G. W. F. Hegel (1770-1831) conceptualized civil society as a sphere of

market relation, regulated by civil law, intervening between family and the state (Alagappa,

2004: 28, Hegel, 1991:220). It is more a market mechanism, where material interest is the

center of associations of members as self-subsistent individuals. Moreover, it also includes

classes and corporations concerned with social, religious, professional and recreational life

11

(Kumar, 1993:378). As opposed to Hegel, Marx saw civil society and the state not as

counterbalancing forces but implicated together in promoting the interest of capital (Davis

and McGregor, 2000:50). For Marx, therefore civil society was a problem that had to be

overcome, not by the state, which was its captive, but through a revolution that would put the

proletariat in the driver’s seat. With the workers’ party in power, civil society would dissolve

into state, which would represent the true public good (Alagappa, 2004:29).

Contemporary civil society and democracy studies on Asia mainly comply with two

civil society arguments Neo-Tocquevillean school (liberal democratic model) and Neo-

Gramscian School (New left-model). Though they differ in diagnosis, purpose, and strategy,

both new left and liberal democracy school share a positive take on civil society (Alagappa,

2004: 28). Alexis De Tocqueville (1805-1859) crafted his conception of civil society as a

sphere of mediating organizations between the individuals and the state. He showed that

associationalism and civil activity preserves individualism, act against despotism and foster

democratic culture (Howell and Pearce 2002, 44). Mostly American scholars for example,

Robert Putnam, Larry Diamond, Lester Salamon belong to Neo-Tocquivellean School. They

advocate that coexistence of liberal market and civil society ensures and enhances democracy.

The Gramscian (1891-1937) Model argues that civil society is the arena, separate from but

enmeshed with the state and market, in which ideological hegemony is contested, implying

that civil society contains a relatively wide range of organizations which both challenge and

uphold the existing order (Lewis 2004, 303). Such civil society is capable of energizing

resistance to a tyrannical regime. European scholars like Andrew Areto, Jean Cohens belong

to this group. Bangladesh civil society may be discussed in a combination of these two

models. Traditional civil society in Bangladesh is always honored for its glorious

12

contribution for the social political movement for independence and democracy (Gramscian

model). Again, new modern western modeled NGOs are contributing to generate social

capital and bring empowerment and social development (Neo-Tocquevillean Model). Both

arguments, lead to assume that, the combination of the traditional and modern civil society

organizations in Bangladesh are to contribute enormously in democratic consolidation.

However, recent studies on civil society in Asia, Africa and other non-western

countries do not support such thesis and show that, nature of civil society is socio-politico-

specific and the boundary between the civil society and political society is porous. Though it

is a necessary condition, it is not sufficient for democratic development in these non-Western

countries (Lele and Quadir, 2004; Allagappa, 2004: Armony, 2004). Every region and

country has its indigenous political norms and social relations that influence the political

institutions as well as the nature and performance of civil society. Donor policy to assist civil

society programs ignoring such local circumstances may bring some social development but

may not be able to ensure democracy in the developing nations.

Nonetheless, researches done so far, have hardly addressed the problem in its full

scale. Western scholars and development agencies are more interested to inquire the out

come of their aid projects contracted to the NGOs. On the other hand, Asian researchers are

more concerned with the indigenous nature of civil societies in Asia and the developing

world. The case of, Bangladesh has attracted researchers from both sides. While a group of

scholars are interested mainly with the NGOs and donor projects in Bangladesh (Stiles: 2002,

Holloway:1998, Amin: 1997, Ahmed:2000, Blair: 2000, 2005, Davis and McGregor:2000, S.

C. White: 1999, Lewis: 1998, 2001, 2004) others prefer to trace the development and role of

the traditional civil society from the perspective of local movements and political

13

developments excluding the modern trend of NGOs (Mamoon:1998, Siddiqui: 2001 ). In

most cases researches are based on historical documents, secondary data, or empirical

observation, case study surveys. Some are based on urban areas while others on rural society.

There is hardly any research on labor unions (Azam and Salmon, 2003), cooperatives, small

welfare groups (Ahmed and Jahan, 2002), business organizations or professional groups as

parts of civil society. Lewis (2004:301, 318) admits that there has been little research on civil

society in Bangladesh, either as an idea or as an empirical reality, through ethnographic work,

theoretical analysis or historical study. This study attempts to contribute to minimize the

existing gap and develops a more integrated model to study civil society empirically,

focusing as far as possible on all relevant factors that contribute to a participatory civil

society and analyzing different dimensions of civil society, including its different segments.

The present study accepts a broad definition of civil society that has given the

opportunity to target civil society organizations of different types both rural and urban,

national and local, traditional as well as Western oriented, both service providing and

advocacy groups. Small local clubs, cooperatives, as well labor unions; interest groups have

been studied as part of the same civil society in Bangladesh. The investigation has been done

empirically with the help of a large N scale survey on civil society organizations first of its

type in civil society studies in Bangladesh. The survey data analysis is also complemented by

interviews, case studies and news paper reports. These all make the study unique and new in

comparison to civil society researches done so far on Bangladesh. However, ultimate goal of

the study is to understand the participatory nature of civil society in relation to democratic

consolidation.

14

1.4.2 Analysis Framework

With the aim to identify the important factors influencing civil society and its

participatory nature and democratic potential, the present study develops a framework for

analysis that tries to investigate civil society empirically identifying it in the interactive

setting with other international, social, political and economic actors (figure1.1). The

analysis framework forms its simplified model of civil society to contribute to democratic

consolidation, identifies its characteristics and the actions, and then fixes the strategy for

investigation.

1.4.2.1 Operationalizing a Vibrant and Vigilant Civil Society

Civil Society: Present research accepts the broad and contemporary definition of civil

society by Susan Pharr (2004), referring to that section of the society consisting of sustained,

organized social activity that occurs in groups that are formed outside the state, the market

and the family. However, civil society is not confined within a non-political, non-market,

non-family atmosphere; rather, a constant interaction between the state, market and civil

society is taken for granted. That is a sort of function within the political system which is at

the same time separate as well as interrelated with the different sectors of the system. Such

civil society must be both vibrant and vigilant to be able to contribute to democratic

consolidation.

Civil Society Organizations: Civil Society Organizations are considered as the basic

units of civil society. The definition used for the present research includes a variety of

organizations as civil society organizations (CSOs), such as, clubs, local cooperatives, labor

unions, sports associations, trade organizations, business groups, charity groups, social

welfare groups, religious groups, citizens’ organizations, professional groups etc. Civil

15

society organizations are considered active in both types of functions—service providing and

advocacy. This notion of civil society complements to Neo-Tocquevillean school and

Gramscian School as well as the idea of civil society adopted by the International

Development agencies and donors.

Vibrant and Vigilant Nature: It is very rare for a civil society to possess all the

democratic, vibrant 6 and strong characteristics that have been depicted by the Neo-

Tocquevillean scholars such as density, autonomy, self regulation (Feinberg, 2006:22) as

well as internal democracy, compromising attitude, institutionalization, pluralism (Diamond,

1999: 227) etc. Presence of a few expected characteristics like density, collectiveness,

pluralism may also bring about some positive outcomes to some extent, for example in social

development or empowerment of the citizens, but may not ultimately lead to democratic

consolidation. The present study divides the overall nature of an ideal civil society in two

broad attributes—vibrancy and vigilancy. These two characteristics together are considered

to give the civil society the ability to bring democratic consolidation with other necessary

conditions being active.

Vibrancy refers to rich associational or group activity. Here the number of different

types of CSOs at the periphery, meso and central levels, irrespective of their objectives shall be

high. In their own arena, these CSOs shall try to play a dynamic role to achieve their goals and

act for the interest of the people they represent and generate social capital. These few

characteristics may bring positive results to society on particular matters.

6 That is in the commonly used meaning- strong, active, autonomous, horizontally networked, dense etc. by the civil society experts, particularly those belonging to the Neo-Tocquevillean school. The present study has its own operationlized meaning of vibrant nature of civil society from the context of developing countries in Asia, particularly for Bangladesh.

16

Vigilant attribute refers to the political dimension of the civil society. CSOs in the

process of civic engagements, network building and interaction with political and market

actors are expected to contribute to democracy. A vibrant civil society in a developing

country may contribute to democratic consolidation in mainly four ways, civic education,

interest articulation, monitor state apparatus and market and ensure better participation and

representation of all segments of society in decision making, besides the polls. These are

more related to the participation related actions and advocacy functions of the civil society.

Though civil society is the prime target, present study, considers it in a broader

setting, as this sector has constant reciprocal interaction with the state, market, culture and

society. The model also reveals the fact that civil society alone cannot lead to democratic

consolidation (figure 1.1). What it can do is generate the process, influence other sectors

towards such goal as well as involve in more participatory activities and ensure

accountability of the state. Naturally in its process of interaction, the civil society itself is

also influenced by the total socio-economic and political environment which may enhance its

functions and influence towards democratic achievements or vice versa.

To understand the situation of civil society in Bangladesh and in its relation to

democratic consolidation the present study proceeds in three broad steps.

17

Figure 1.1 Integrated model to study civil society in developing countries

Internal Factors

(c) Market

External Factors a. Globalization b. Donor Policy

C

onso

lidat

ed D

emoc

racy

(a) 1. State 2. Constitution & Law 3. Political Structures

and Institutions

(b) 1. History of Colonial Rule and autocratic regimes 2. Cultural Norms & Social Tradition

Low level of economic development but began economic reform accepting free market system

Legal & Political Institutionalization

Democratic Culture

Stable economic growth

Civil Society Working through service & advocacy

Active in both vibrant and vigilant dimension

Participatory Civil Society

(c) Market

18

1.4.2.2 Steps of the Investigation

At the first level the study identifies the most important group of factors that

influence civil society in developing countries. With the aim to understand the situation in

Bangladesh, it comparatively discusses the relation between civil society and politics in

India (stable democracy), The Philippines (elite democracy) and Pakistan (failed

democracy) with that of Bangladesh. The study argues that development and performance

of civil society is determined by a combination of historical, international, cultural and

institutional factors. In the case of Bangladesh, since 1990s, political parties have

emerged as important institutions in determining the participation of civil society and

their role in consolidating democracy. Personalized clientele and corrupt, non-

democratically behaved political parties have been found to be playing a negative role

through penetrating the society and co-opting and dividing the civil society to achieve

their own political ends.

After identifying the group of factors that influence the nature and development of

civil society as well as the most important factor that contributes to the participatory

function of civil society, at the second level, the study empirically investigates the nature

of civil society organizations—the basic units of civil society, their basic attributes,

objectives and types of their functions, both service and advocacy and rate of their

involvement in participatory activities, besides their endeavor for social welfare and

service. Through such investigation directly at the field level in a wide scale, it is possible

to infer more precisely how participatory the civil society is in relation to democratic

consolidation.

Through the empirical investigation of civil society organizations it had been

found that, participatory rate of civil society organizations are comparatively very low in

19

contrast to their welfare and service providing actions as well as their network activities.

Moreover, they have a tendency to seek help from the political parties directly on

organizational matters. This is incongruent to democratic consolidation. So lastly, to

understand the reason for such low participatory rate of civil society and tendency to have

direct contact with the powerful political actors, the present study investigates further into

the civil society and political relations. This time the analysis is based on interviews,

observations, and newspaper reports on civil society. Consistent with the inferences made

about the powerful role of the political parties upon civil society and survey output

revealing low rate of civil society participation in politics and democracy related matters,

at this stage of analysis it becomes evident that civil society in Bangladesh has become

politicized, divided and co-opted by the political parties. This is impeding the civil

society to play any effective role in interest articulation, state monitoring as well as

ensuring the representation of all segments of the society in policy making. At all stages

of analysis, tendencies of civil society revealed have been compared and contrasted to the

Neo-Tocquevillean school as well as the Gramscian School.

1.5 Implication The nature of civil society has often been explained through mono dimensional

factors. Putnam (1993) argues from a political cultural point of view to explain the

contrasting political performance of Northern and Southern Italy, Pekkanen (2006) argues

the prominent role of the state policies and laws in shaping the civil society in Japan, civil

society of developing countries have been explained through donor polices and

globalization (Stiles, 2002, Quadir and Lele, 2004 ) by a group of scholars, again, through

history and political development by others (Alagappa, 2004). While not underestimating

the value of such highly distinguished researches, my argument is that, in case of shaping

the nature and strength of civil society in developing countries, multi dimensional factors

20

like, donor policy, globalization, history, cultural norms as well as political institutions

(not only the state and law but also political organizations and political elites) have a

combined effect. Civil society and its nature is the reflection of all these factors. To

concentrate on one factor in expense of the other may not properly answer to inquiries on

civil society actions, strength and contribution to democracy. However, the proportional

combination of these factors and their influence may be time and country specific.

The present study clarifies Neo-Tocquivellean argument on the positive and

direct connection between civil society and democracy. Putnam’s theory has already been

contested and critically examined by scholars (Foley and Edwards, 1996; Putzel 1997,

Levi 1996, Tarrow, 1996); however, very few with case studies (Berman, 1997;

Mcilwaine,1998) and with empirical data (Armony, 2004) . Not only Putnam (1993) but

Diamond (1989, 1996) also advocates introduction of such Western style civil society in

the developing states. The present study points out the weakness in relating the theory to

the policy of development practitioners and uses the case of a South Asian State—

Bangladesh. It is based on the most recent data (year 2006) that is, after a decade and half

since such civil society strengthening policies have been adopted by the donors for the

developing countries. Naturally, it provides the opportunity to observe if there is any

effect of such policy on civil society and democracy along with other cultural and

institutional factors in Bangladesh.

The study does accept the advantages of horizontal associational relations through

trust, cooperation, reciprocity, social network generating from organizational

memberships (Putnam 1993, 2000) as well as the possibility for civil society to contribute

to democracy (Diamond, 1996) in the developing countries. However, it shows that,

unless civil society organizations are participatory, that is more involved in matters

related to politics, rights, state policies and democratic vigilance and act through

21

advocacies, lobbies etc. in a horizontal and peaceful manner, they are unable to contribute

to democratic consolidation in Bangladesh. If majority of the civil society organizations

remain politicized and divided by political actors, civil society cannot act autonomously.

Initiating and supporting only a few advocacy organizations overlooking the existing

traditional civil society organizations and other political institutions like the political

party may not ensure good governance and democracy as expected by the donors.

At the level of Bangladesh, this study is first of its type to be based on a large N

size survey on civil society organizations that targets a variety of CSOs under one study.

The study empirically inquires the status of civil society at the local and meso level and

their relation to state and politics. It inquires into the participatory nature of civil society,

while most of the prominent surveys on civil society organizations focus on the social and

economic welfare aspects. As the survey is also a part of the broad project named Civil

Society, State and Culture in Comparative Perspective, surveying on eleven countries of

different continents, the research has the potential to proceed into further comparative

study with other civil societies of the developing world, such as The Philippines, Brazil,

and Turkey etc.

Moreover the present study for the first time has studied and surveyed

cooperatives, small welfare groups, local clubs and labor unions as part of the civil

society. Though such organizations exist in a large number at the local level and meso

level in Bangladesh these traditional and indigenous CSOs have been kept outside the

study of civil society and social development. Inclusion of these organizations gives a

better picture of the nature and level of group activities in Bangladesh and brings the

study nearer to reality. Study and observation on such CSOs also reveals the fact that only

group activities are not enough to bring good citizenry. Economic solvency, education,

democratic norms in dealing group activities, and autonomy from the political powers

22

which often the local CSOs of Bangladesh lack, are also essential to generate civic

engagement that may lead to participation and representation of interests.

1.6 Brief Introduction to Contemporary Civil Society in Bangladesh

Bangladesh civil society is internationally recognized for its effort for poverty

alleviation and social development (Amin 1997, Dowla 2006, Dowla Barua 2006, Ullah

Routary 2003, Goon 2002). This is mostly due to the famous micro-credit system

introduced by Grameen Bank and the education and other welfare programs of BRAC

and other large NGOs. The success of Bangladesh in micro-credit and social development

at the grass-root level is the outcome of combined effort of indigenous initiatives and

donor assistance. The 1971 war marks the beginning of NGO activities in Bangladesh.

Moreover, since its inception in 1971, Bangladesh economy and politics is very much

dependent on donors’ aid and directions. She has gone through the donor prescribed

structural adjustment process and is adjusting policies to new good governance agenda

since the 1990s (Quadir, 1999). Bangladesh is often cited in description of large-scale

Donor-NGO relations (Stiles, 2002:34). According to International Development agencies

like UNDP, World Bank, now Bangladesh scores higher than India on several key

barometers of social development, e.g., infant mortality (5.6% in Bangladesh while 6.2%

in India), child vaccination (77% in Bangladesh 56% in India), employment of women,

enrollment in primary school (108% in Bangladesh, 116% in India) 7 . Government

policies and laws also provide necessary legal framework for NGOs and other social

welfare groups to register and function easily. Bangladesh ranks among the top Asian

countries in terms of intensity of NGO activities (Shigetomi, 2002:30).

7 Times, 3rd April, 2006, Websites of World Bank http://devdata.worldbank.org, access date 20 April, 2007 and UNDP, Micro-credit Summit, 2006.

23

Group based credit activities and large size of social welfare organizations; clubs

etc. in Bangladesh indicates the rich abundance of social capital generated through

horizontal membership. A few statistics of registered or enlisted civil society

organizations shown in Table 1.1 may give an idea of a large vibrant third sector in

Bangladesh. Besides these statistics, there are a good number of professional groups

registered with their respective institutions and ministries. Moreover, there are numerous

registered and unregistered regional groups and clubs. The NGOs that are registered with

the NGO Affairs Bureau are large and medium size NGOs that have national coverage or

at least cover a particular region of the country. These NGOs in each union8 organize the

formation of hundreds of groups made of 20 to 50 members among their beneficiaries for

providing services. The number will proliferate if unregistered and informal organizations

are included9. At all social levels and classes among different sections of the civil society

the tendency to form a group or small organization is very common in Bangladesh.

The relative vibrancy of Bangladesh civil society in relation to number becomes

more distinct if we compare the statistics with that of other developing countries in Asia.

Table 1.2 has been developed based on the statistics gathered from country profiles in the

website of ‘Philanthropy and Third Sector: In Asia and Pacific,’10 though exact and total

statistics of civil society organizations or non-profit groups in none of the countries were

available. It must be mentioned that this table may not provide the reliable statistics of

each country, but it does give us some idea of the facts.

If we compare the situation of Bangladesh to other countries considering the

number of civil society organizations and the total population of each country, then

besides The Philippines, 8 Unions are the smallest administrative units ranging 10 to 12 natural villages run by an elected council. Bangladesh is divided into 4484 unions at present. (Statistical Pocket Book of Bangladesh 2004). 9 Unfortunately, statistics of unregistered organizations is not available in Bangladesh. No census has been conducted in the late nineties and afterwards on the social organizations. 10 http://www.asianphilanthropy.org/countries/index.html access date 28th November, 2007.

24

Table 1.1 Statistics of registered CSOs in Bangladesh

Type of CSOs Number of registered

CSOs (2004 or 2005)

Affiliated Ministry or Institution

Foreign funds receiving

Development NGOs

1997 NGO Affairs Bureau- Prime Ministers Office

Voluntary welfare

organizations

45508 Ministry of Social Welfare

Registered women groups 8271 Ministry of Women and Children Affairs

Youth organizations 6607 Ministry of Youth and Sports

Trade organizations 465 Registrar of Joint Stock Companies and Firms

Labor unions 6,780 Ministry of Labor and Employment

Registered cooperatives 189,847 Ministry of Local Government, Rural

Development and Co-operatives

Chambers of commerce

and trade/ industrial

associations

299 Federation of Bangladesh Chambers of

Commerce and Industries

Total 259774 Registered CSOs

Source: The table is developed by the author, based on the Statistics on different types of civil society organizations that have been collected from the booklets of respective ministries and institutions and their websites. Table 1.2 Statistics of CSOs and total population of selected countries in Asia

Country Number of registered Non-profit Groups (Year)

Total Population 11

India 604800 (2002)12 1094600000

Bangladesh 259774 (2004) 145000000

The Philippines 249000 (2002)13 84600000

Pakistan 12000 (2001)14 155800000

Indonesia 12000 (2000)15 223000000

Source: The table formed by the author based on the information from the websites of http://www.asianphilanthropy.org/countries/index.html access date 28th November, 2007 and World Bank Data base http://devdata.worldbank.org access date 28th November, 2007.

11 World Bank Data base http://devdata.worldbank.org. access date 28th November, 2007. 12 The website based on PRIA 2002 mentions about 1.2 million non-profit organizations and also mentioned that 49.6% of them are unincorporated. So excluding the 49.6% from the 1.2 million the actual number comes to 604800. 13 In the website it is said that the non-profit groups of The Philippines ranges from 249000 to 497000, but it is not particularly mentioned whether these organizations are registered or not. So the lowest estimate has been accepted. 14 This is the statistics of CIVICUS (Sattar and Baig, 2001:6) the data of 45000 non-profit group as mentioned in the website includes unregistered organizations too. 15 Also supported by the statistics given by Shigetomi (2002: 164).

25

Bangladesh’s position seems to be in most vibrant position from the consideration of

number of civil society organizations comparing to its population.

So from the point of view of international acknowledgment of the performance of

NGOs and statistics of large number of different social organizations as well as

comparison with other countries indicate rather a vibrant image of the civil society in

Bangladesh.

Conversely, performance of the civil society from the aspects of politics and

democracy is rather insignificant. The civil society has been termed weak fragmented

(Westergaard 1990), poor (Holloway 1998) and partisan (Quadir 2003) in terms of

ensuring pluralism, political participation and democracy. Organizations that are

conventionally known as civil society in Bangladesh, like the labor unions, chambers of

commerce, professional groups, bar associations, student groups and even small local

clubs and recently development NGOs, have been accused of partisanship and being

engaged in manufacturing and maintaining an elite dominating hegemony rather than

advancing the genuine interests of the groups (Stiles 2002, Quadir 2003, White 1999,

Jahan 2005). Some of these organizations are also scarred by corruption, clientelism and

other misdeeds. The traditional civil society organizations may be superficially seen to be

working in a democratic way following formal organizational structure and

constitutions16; practically they are found to be run by the wish of the leader or group

leaders who are again blessed and controlled by the political parties. Horizontal

democratic norms may not always be found in the leader member relationship of such

organizations. Again the development NGOs that is the CSOs who claim to be the voice

of the poor in Bangladesh often don’t follow democratic practice in their relation with 16 For example in most cases, the executive body of labor unions or professional groups is formed through regular elections and there are a lot of campaign and competition before each election. These groups do exert their demand to the authority and sometimes appear in the press with their opinions. All these are done using the formal rules of the organizations. However, in practice, the panel which support the governing party wins most of the elected posts and implement the ruling parties control within the CSOs.

26

their poor beneficiaries. The relationship is more like a service provider or credit giver

and receiver than horizontal members possessing the same power to exert and implement

their opinions and wishes. The internal governance system of the NGOs are often accused

to be corrupt, non-accountable and influenced by nepotism, patronage etc.

Civil society seems to have reflecting the political and social situation of

Bangladesh. Beginning from the top political executives, administration, political parties

and down to the local government and informal social institutions in Bangladesh, it is

clientelism, patronage, nepotism, corruption that appear as the operative practices. Formal

democracy is yet to be institutionalized; rather it is facing interruptions and deadlocks

from time to time due to non compromising attitude of the major political parties. While

civil society is expected to fight against such negative forces within the society and

politics, they are practically found to be entangled within the current trend of politics. The

associational culture that exists in Bangladesh and the organizational strength that has

shown success in poverty alleviation, have not yet reached the level so as to act as the

watch-guard to state performance.

1.7 Definitions

To avoid ambiguity, this section defines the key concepts used in the dissertation.

1.7.1 Participatory Civil Society

Civil society becomes participatory only when it is able to enter the process of

political interaction and influence policy decisions and implementation through the

conventional, horizontal and formal ways. This study will consider four types of actions

of the civil society as indicators of participatory civil society—(1) Nature of formal

relations with the government; (2) Advocacy on different issues; (3) Influencing policy

making decisions and budgets; and (4) Lobby. Besides, information on nature of

membership, financial strength, geographic level of activity, policy orientation, objectives,

27

autonomy of civil society organizations determine the ability of a CSO to become

participatory and influence democratization process. Such participatory attribute of civil

society is directly related to its vigilant nature.

1.7.2 Politicization of Civil Society

Politicization is a common concept often used in a negative meaning to describe

the political involvement or exertion to control an institution, organization or an

administrative process, which is ideally thought to be neutral and free from political

influences. When a civil society organization takes politically motivated decisions as

directed by a party or government and is politically colored by the political affiliation of

its members, withholding original objective and interest on which it was formed, we may

term it as a politicized civil society organization. Partisanship of the members of the

organizations has a role to play in the politicization process. Partisanship is the party

identification of a citizen. Such identification has predictable relationships with their

perceptions, evaluations and actions of the political process. Faced by a new issue or

political controversy, the knowledge of what position is favored by one’s own party is a

valuable cue in developing one’s own position (Dalton and Wattenberg 2000, 20).

Moreover government dictates and strong party control upon the organization challenging

its autonomy is another feature of politicization. Most often, politicization takes place

through ideology, patronage, corruption and clientelism.

1.7.3 Democracy

Dahl’s (1971, 1991) Polyarchy is regarded as the ideal type democracy for the

present study. It is the target for the transitional or fledging democracies to achieve

through institutionalizing their democratic institutions and practices. The donor’s

28

concerned in democratic consolidation through the civil societies also recommend

polyarchy as the goal for the developing world. The most important seven features of

such democratic polyarchy are, 1. Control over government decisions on policy is

constitutionally vested in elected officials; 2. Elected officials are chosen and peacefully

removed in frequent, fair, and free elections in which coercion is absent or quite limited;

3. Virtually all adults have the right to vote; 4. Most adults also have the right to run for

public offices in these elections; 5. Citizens possess a right, effectively enforced by

judicial and administrative officials, to freedom of expression including criticism of and

opposition to the leaders or party in office. 6. They have access and effectively enforced

right to gain access to sources of information that are not monopolized by the government

of the state, or by any other single group; 7. They possess an effectively enforced right to

form and join political organizations, including political parties and interest groups (Dahl

1991, pp 73-74).

These seven conditions imply three main dimensions of political democracy—

competition, participation and civil and political liberties (Sørensen, 1993:13). In such a

democracy institutional power holders are elected by the people and are responsible to the

people (Vanhanen, 1997: 31). It ensures power sharing by all major groups where

common people have some kind of control over decision making (Quadir, 2004: 88).

Dahl (1971) emphasizes the responsiveness of government to the preferences of citizens

considered as political equals. Democracy with such a high value may be achieved only

through stages and transitions, particularly in a developing country.

So, democracy is concerned with political rights as well as the preferences and

interests of the people. Citizen’s preferences in a democratic state are not only the

political rights and liberty but also the fulfillment of their varied interests that may

include basic needs like food, clothes, shelter as well as a raise in salary, tax cut and other

29

public services from the government. So a democracy with responsive state may have two

broad aspects that can be termed as interests and rights.

From the aspect of interest and public service in democracy, civil society

organizations may be found in a positive position— acting for group interests, community

welfare and sharing in functions for public services. In this way, in the age of

privatization and liberal economy, civil society may be rather contributing to democracy

by helping the transformation to a smaller state, where different types of public services

are contracted out to different non-profit groups. This is also considered as a way of

private participation in state actions, particularly in the Western world like USA, UK and

other parts of Europe. Again in the developing countries, different welfare programs of

civil society organizations, particularly NGOs and welfare groups are making

constructive contribution by facing the immediate interest and need of the poor and rural

people for their economic empowerment and social development.

Interest and service may be crucial to citizen satisfaction and socio-economic

development. However, without the insurance of wide scale civic education, participation,

equality, political stability and accountability, a political system can hardly reach the goal

of polyarchy. For this, civil society organizations need to be not only welfare and service

providers but should actively participate in actions to protect, ensure and enhance the

rights of citizens and their control over the decision making process as well as on

governance.

The present study in its focus on democracy and civil society relation is concerned

with the aspect of rights which is more related to vigilant nature of civil society.

1.7.4 Transition to Democracy

There are rich literatures on democratic transition and consolidation (Przewoeski,

1991, Hansen 1996, Sørensen 1993, Gunther 1995, Power and Gasiorowski, Linz and

30

Stepan, 1996). Accepting the views of Hansen (1996) and Sørensen (1993), the stages for

democratic transition turns out to be the following four with democratic consolidation as

the last stage:

1. Background condition—Authoritarian regime where national unity is strong among the

political communities;

2. Early transition— Political opening where the authoritarian regime gives concessions

and a consensus has been developed among the citizens and leaders for democratic

change;

3. Late transition—At this stage the regime is more democratic than the pervious ones but

not fully democratic. Political actors and governance institutions are yet to fully conform

to the democratic rule and democratic consolidation. These changes in phases do not

occur in a negotiated and linear manner. Often democracies in developing countries are

found seesawing between authoritarianism and frail democracy (Sorensen 1993:41);

4. Democratic Consolidation—It is the last and final phase of democracy. In the ideal or

strict form, at this stage of democracy all the democratic institutions are formed and the

new democracy has proved itself capable of transferring power to an opposition party

(Sørensen 1993:45).

Figure 1.2 Democratic transitional phases towards consolidating democracy

Source: Based on George Sørensen’s (1993: 42) model on Transitions toward Democracy

Consolidated Democracy

Late Transition to Democracy

Early Transition to

Democracy

Back ground Condition

Time

31

Bangladesh in 2006 may be identified as being located at the stage of late democratic

transition. Bangladesh had gone through British colonial rule (1757-1947) and then had

been under the dictatorial rules of the Pakistani Military (1947-1971). During these

periods there have been movements for autonomy, democracy and independence where

civil society had played a significant role (Mamoon and Roy, 1998). Though Bangladesh

emerged as an independent democratic country in 1971, it soon went under authoritarian

rule. From 1974 to 1990 Bangladesh was directly or indirectly ruled by military (Tasnim,

2002: 62). During the last half of the 1980s, movements for democratic rule, lead by

political parties and supported by civil society gained voice and at the end of 1990 the

authoritarian regime was ousted by a mass-movement. Quadir (2004:95) terms the

process as a negotiated transition to democracy. Since 1990, Bangladesh began its first

phase of democratic transition. The fledging democracy is experiencing ups and downs

marked by political instability, confrontation and economic inflation. However, in the

meantime three peaceful free and fair elections had been held that always led to

ascendancy of the alternate political coalition to power. Now democratic rule of games

are understood by all political actors; however, the culture to adhere to democratic norm

and accept the uncertainty of the democratic institutions are yet to be reflected in the

performance of both the ruling power and opposition block, which often leads to political

deadlocks. So the democracy is still marked by instability and confrontation.

1.7.5 Democratic Consolidation

The challenge for democratic consolidation is to ensure the seven characteristics

of poliarchy not only through legislation and constitutional amendments but through

practices ensuring political stability, equality and representation of all segments of the

society in state governance. The idea is very broad and the process requires involvement

and coordination of a good number of actors and factors.

32

Gunther (1995: 7) is of the opinion that democratic consolidation is achieved

when a consensus is reached among the key political actors to adhere to the democratic

rules and accept political institutions as the only legitimate framework for political

contestation. This means an agreement towards democracy from above. Preworski

(1991:51) observes democratic consolidation in a situation where all political conflicts are

solved through democratic institutions and all players accept the uncertainty of the

democratic game. This means that not only decision by political elites, but also

democratic practice among the political groups are essential. Ultimately democratic

practices are to become an established part of the political culture (Sørensen, 1993: 42).

Democratic rules are to be transformed into democratic norms, that is, democracy

becomes the only game in town (Linz and Stepan, 1996: 14). Linz and Stepan (1996)

also discuss the five major arenas of a modern consolidated democracy that combinedly

contribute to a consolidated democracy— civil society, political society, rule of law, state

apparatus and economic society. All the five arenas have their specific influence and type

of interaction towards and within the democratic system. Such democratic consolidation

takes place in a combined way and is not dependent on only one factor. The Linz and

Stipan (1996) model is based on the experiences of democracies in Europe and Latin

America.

For the case of Bangladesh, I show that democratic consolidation may be achieved

through the combination of four major factors that is political institutionalization, stable

economic growth, development of a democratic culture and a participatory civil society.

33

Figure 1.3 Simplified model of democratic consolidation taking place combindly

None of these sections will work independently but together, where civil society interacts

with all sections. The present thesis shall concentrate on civil society in its ability in

consolidating democracy in Bangladesh. The four objectives or tasks for civil society in

consolidating democracy in Bangladesh are the following:

1. Civic education on political and human rights;

2. Generating interest and values of the civil society groups to the political society—

interest aggregation;

3. Monitor the state apparatus and economic society and

The State & Law and Political Institutions (Enabling legal and political institutionalization)

Civil Society (A better participatory civil society)

History, Tradition and Culture (Generating democratic culture)

Consolidated Democracy

Economic liberalization (Leading to stable economic

growth)

34

4. Ensure better participation and representation of all segments of society in

political decision making besides the poll and ensure better partnership between

government and civil society.

1.8 Chapter Arrangements

Following this introductory chapter, the present dissertation develops its research

base and reveals empirical findings, supplementary analysis and reaches to the conclusion

through five more chapters.

Chapter two covers literature review and methodology used in the research. The

literatures that have been reviewed have been brought under four broad headlines. It

begins with the liberal model of Neo-Tocquevillean theory and the new-left model of

Gramsci both of which have influenced the study of civil society in Third World states.

The second section critically examines research works and arguments for and against

Neo-Tocquevillean and donor policy that embrace such civil society arguments. The third

section focuses on research projects on civil society from different perspectives (John

Hopkins Third Sector Project, CIVICUS civil society Index, Project on Civil Society in

Asia) that included researches on civil society in Asia and developing countries. The

fourth section particularly focuses on literatures on civil society on Bangladesh analyzed

from different viewpoints by researchers from home and abroad and points out the

necessity for further research and investigation on civil society in its broad meaning and

in relation to mainstream politics and democracy and also taking into account the history,

culture, tradition that may be unique to Bangladesh or South Asian region. Second part of

the chapter discusses how this inductive empirical study has combined both qualitative

and quantitative method to verify the assumptions and establish its arguments on the

vibrant but not vigilant nature of civil society in Bangladesh. Detailed discussion is

35

provided on the survey conducted and the other supplementary information and

secondary data that were gathered.

Third chapter identifies factors that influence civil society of Bangladesh. This

chapter is mostly based on previous literatures, researches, reports, reviews and personal

observation and interviews. With comparative discussion on the civil society and political

relation in three other developing countries in Asia—India, The Philippines and Pakistan,

who have experienced democracy with various level of success— the powerful influence

of the political actors on civil society and democracy has been identified. For Bangladesh-

particularly the political party has been recognized as the prime influencing factor upon

the vigilant nature of civil society in Bangladesh. The situation has been discussed in the

last half of the chapter.

Chapter four is based on the survey data, numerically discussing the basic

attributes of civil society organizations, their grass-roots activities and nature of

participation. First section focuses on the basic characteristics like classifications,

organization objectives, policy interest, geographic level of activity, membership,

resource sources, budget, volunteers, employees etc. of the CSOs. Besides, structural

strength of the civil society has been compared between CSOs working at national and

local levels and CSOs receiving and not receiving foreign funds. The second section is

concerned with the grass-roots action of the civil society and reaffirms the prevalent

assumption about high tendency of civil society involvement in grass-roots actions. The

third section concentrates on the participatory role of the civil society by analyzing in

detail the involvement of CSOs in having formal relations with the government,

influencing policy making and budget, advocating for certain issues and lobbying for

certain interests. The chapter reveals high participation of the CSOs grass-roots activities

but a very low rate of involvement in functions that is termed ‘participation related

36

functions’ that are more related to politics and democracy. Moreover, high tendency

among the CSOs to rely more on political party contacts than forming coalition among

them has been pointed out in this chapter.

Chapter five concentrates on the relationship between civil society and politics in

Bangladesh. This chapter is a combination of both quantitative and qualitative analysis

using survey data as well as newspaper reports, observation note of the surveyors,

interviews with resource persons and other information gathered through annual reports

and formal and informal conversation with the members of civil society and government

officers. The first section of the chapter, using the survey data shows the powerful

existence of political parties in perception of the CSOs and their high rate of contact with

such parties as well as political leaders. The second section is based on a sample of

newspaper reports during 2001, 2006 and 2007 that reveal the evidences of civil society

penetration and politicization by the political party and party government through

patronage, corruption, pressure, violence etc. Third section combining news paper reports,

observations, interviews and other sources of information focuses on selected civil society

events and discusses the most important civil society sectors narrating how government

and politics have penetrated and divided civil society, weakening their horizontal strength

and negotiating ability.

The concluding chapter explains how each chapter has contributed to the

conclusion that civil society in Bangladesh may be well recognized for its contribution in

development and social welfare, but it can hardly contribute to democratic consolidation.

It also points out the implication of the study findings in relation to democratic

consolidation in Bangladesh and for the Neo-Tocquevillean assumption on civil society

and donor policies based on such assumptions. The research identifies political actors as

the decisive factor to democracy and emphasizes the need to have deep understanding of

37

local circumstances, history, culture and political trends before adopting development

policies that are related to civil society and democracy. Finally it argues for avoiding the

high expectation of democratic consolidation from civil society activities and trying to

formulate policies to improve its participatory functions accepting the social and political

facts. The chapter ends indicating the further researches that may be conducted for better

understanding and solving the problem.

38

Chapter 2

Literature Review and Methodology

Among the two objectives of this chapter, one is to review the studies and literatures

on civil society that have influenced the researches on civil societies in developing countries,

beginning from the contemporary notions of Tocqueville and Gramsci up to the research

trends on civil society in Bangladesh. The other objective is to discuss in details the

methodology used and their relevance to the present study.

2.1 Literature Review

Literatures in relation to the present research have been reviewed dividing them into

four broad sections. The first section focuses on the two modern formulations-- the Neo-

Tocquevillean School and the Neo-Gramscian School. The second section reflects on the

contemporary literatures along the Neo-Tocquevillean school that have influenced

development policies of international donor agencies. The third section reviews international

research projects that have also focused on third world countries along with other developed

countries in different continents. The fourth section particularly reviews the trends in the

study of civil society in Bangladesh.

2.1.1 Theories on Civil Society Leading to the Study of Third World States

2.1.1.1 Neo-Tocquevillean School (Liberal Democratic Model)

De Tocqueville crafted his conception of civil society as a sphere of mediating

organizations between the individuals and the state (Tocqueville, 1873:190). His conception

of civil society is based on the limited state that would confine itself to the political sphere

and guarantee the legal framework and other conditions (such as socio-economic equality)

39

necessary for the effective functioning of civil society (Alagappa 2004, 30). Tocqueville,

based on his observation of the 19th century American society established the importance of

free human association to a society that claims to be democratic not only in theory, but also

in practice. Though he did not mention the term ‘civil society’ in his two volume book on

‘Democracy in America’, he argued that associational culture and civic activity preserve

individualism, act against despotism and foster democracy (Howell and Pearce, 2001:44). He

found the associations participated by different sections of the society as the check to

supremacy of the majority, the direction towards mass society and end of political inequality.

Mutual interest among the members of the associations led to less reliant on the government.

This ultimately checked against despotism of the government and preserved individualism.

Associational culture also taught the peaceful means and arts for demanding material equality,

which ultimately nurtured democratic culture. Through such public civic engagement the

citizens of America actually became self-ruled (Howell and Pearce, 2001:44). Moreover,

Tocqueville had found the high potential in the right to association and practice of group

networks in forming strong political parties that may represent the people at the central

legislatures (Tocqueville, 1873:190).

Mainly American scholars like Robert Putnam, Larry Diamond, and Lester Salamon

espouse this doctrine. They advocate that coexistence of liberal markets and civil society

ensures and enhances democracy. Putnam (1993) in his distinguished research on Italy, has

reinforced the importance of social capital and its positive connection to democracy. Here he

strongly supports Tocqueville’s idea on associational life. Following Tocqueville he showed

how associations and civic relations have direct contribution to stable and effective

democracy. Internally, it is the cooperation, solidarity and public spiritedness that generate

40

through group activities and externally it is the network, enhanced process of interest

articulation and aggregation that contributes to democracy (Putnam, 1993: 11, 89-91). He

ultimately goes to the extent of saying, ‘Tocqueville was right: Democratic government is

strengthened, not weakened, when it faces a vigorous civil society’ (Putnam 1993:182).

Reflection of the same idea may be found in the writings and arguments of Larry Diamond

(1989, 1992, 1996). These two Neo-Tocquivellan scholars not only argued for the positive

link between civil society and democracy but also advocated for building civil society where

it was absent and strengthening civil society where it is existent in order to bring about

democracy and ensure good governance in third world countries.

However, there also remain some differences in the idea of Tocqueville and that of

the Neo-Tocquevillean school. While Tocqueville saw civil society as the key site for

governance, decentralization for democratic governance, Neo- Tocquevilleans see the civil

society as a supporting structure to democratize the state. Associational life is thought to

provide social infrastructure for liberal demcoracy, supply the means to limit, resist, and curb

the excesses of the state and market, present alternative when they fail, facilitate service

delivery at the local level, assist in conflict management, deepen democracy, offer a voice to

disadvantaged groups and promote economic development (Alagappa, 2004:41).

2.1.1.2 Neo-Gramscian School (Alternate model or New-left Model)

The alternate model or the European model for civil society is another attempt within

the civil society to retrieve the right of the people to reclaim how they should live. It includes

search for ways to reconcile socialist solidarity and self-management (Howell and Pierce,

2001: 55). It was Gramsci who had strong influence on European scholars and activists like

Jacek Kuron, Adam Michnik as well as Areto, Jean Cohen, Robert Cox and also in the

41

literatures on the process of redemcratization in Latin America. The core idea of the Neo-

Gramscian school is that civil society is a sphere of action that is independent of the state and

is capable of energizing resistance to a tyrannical regime (Foley and Edwards, 1996:38).

Drawing from but differing from Marx, Antoneo Gramsci (1891-1937) viewed civil

society not in counter to socioeconomic base of the state, but placed it at the political

superstructure. Gramsci’s hegemony means both the consensual basis of an existing political

system within civil society and advancement to a class consciousness where class is

understood not only from economic point of view but also in terms of a common intellectual

and moral awareness, and a common culture (Adamson 1980, 170-171). Gramsci’s conception

of civil society includes all social institutions that are non-production-related, non

governmental, and non familial, ranging from recreational groups to trade unions, from

churches to political parties. So there is both a separation and overlapping between the civil

society and political spheres. However, the Neo-Gramcian scholars in their way of

distinguishing between civil society, state and economy, see the civil society as an important

site for counter hegemonic struggle and assign it key role in defending society against the state

and market and in formulating the democratic will to influence the state (Alagappa, 2004: 29-

30).

Researchers studying the development, functions, actions and outcomes of civil

society in Asia have found relevance in explaining their studies from both the frameworks.

Most development policies initiated by the international agencies are based on the Neo-

Tocquevellian school. However, in assessing the applicability and outcome of such policies in

the developing countries, Neo-Tocquevillean model often becomes inadequate. A combination

of both the liberal democratic model and the new-left model provides a reasonable explanation.

42

This is because, the liberal democratic model has been found to be very normative, over

looking the local history, culture, norms and political circumstances while emphasizing civil

society and connecting it directly to democracy.

2.1.2 Relationship between Civil Society and Democracy and Development Policies

Putnam (1993) and Diamond (1989, 1992) are considered as the proponents of the

mainstream Neo-Toquevillean school who argue that social capital and organized citizenry

are the keys to make democracy work. Trust, cooperation, generalized reciprocity and

networks generated through civic engagement and association are the core ingredients to

economic and institutional success. These traits define civic community. Societies rich with

such traits have shown affluences and democracy, while other societies that lack such

attributes but marked by vertical networks, patron-client relation, force, kinship, patronage

etc. have shown lower performance in development and good governance (Putnam, 1993).

Diamond (1989) believed that developing countries require autonomous, local based

citizenry for the development and maintenance of secure democracy. Harbeson (1994:1),

another proponent of civil society in developing countries, went to the extent of identifying

civil society as the missing key to political reform, legitimacy and governance in those

political systems.

These ideas have provided the theoretical basis to the development paradigm called

good governance agenda where it is suggested that a virtuous circle could be built with the

state, economy, and civil society which will balance growth, equity and stability (Lewis 2004,

303). Since the 1990s International Development Organizations (IDO) have taken big

projects to foster development through civil society initiatives in the South. Researches show

43

donor initiative to support civil society has lead to grass-roots development, social

mobilization, and empowerment (World Bank reports, Fisher: 1998; Stiles: 2002, IOB: 1998,

Amin: 1997, Tasnim: 2005, Dowla and Barua: 2006). But donor projects have hardly

succeeded in pushing forward the issues like participation, democracy, and good governance

through civil society effectively. The very idea of the Neo-Tocquevillean school as well as

policy arguments of the donor agencies have been criticized and pointed out to be weak and

expedient.

Putnam’s idea to bring about macro-political outcome (democracy) through micro-

social effect (civic engagement) (Foley and Edwards, 1996: 6) has been criticized mainly

from three aspects— its simplicity, overlooking the political gap between civil society and

democracy and ignoring the other forces simultaneously active in the political system that

influence both civil society and democracy. Levi (1996:51) directly term Putnam’s image of

community generating social capital as romanticism. Historically it has been proved that

close network blocks, innovations reinforce traditionalism and create distrust about those

outside the social network. Another weak point of Putnum’s theory is down playing the

political associations and movements (Foley and Edward 1996). Development practitioners

have also been found to be ignoring the political institutions like political parties as well as

the traditional CSOs and concentrating only in forming and supporting new social

organization like development NGOs. Moreover, case studies have shown that often, political

institutionalization turns out to be more important for democracy than civic engagement and

political penetration may cause opposite effect through civic engagement (Berman, 1997).

Arnomy (2004:3), based on his empirical and historical observation, argues that, socio-

historical context influences the nature, dispositions, orientations, and impact of civic

44

engagement. Institutional and societal conditions establish the cost threshold and enabling

conditions that determine the democratic potential of associations and movements.

More the less, to avoid social cleavages, Putnam’s ‘civic associations’ do not advance a

cause, and rather pursues policy changes (Foley and Edward, 1996) that are more like choral

clubs, bird watching groups, soccer clubs. Democratic roles that citizens are able to play

from such non-political and often closed membership are under question. According to Max

Weber, the quantitative spread of associational life does not always go hand in hand with its

qualitative significance (Berman, 1997:407). Tarrow (1996:396) is concerned with Putnam’s

work as it goes beyond Italy and advices the policy makers the Tocquevillean idea as a

prescription to build social network and arrange cooperatives in the Third World states.

Tarrow (1996:396) also warns that such top down policy of encouraging associations for

social capital would be attacking symptoms but not the causes of problem.

In fact, this is what has actually happened. Since 1990s, civil society organizations

began to be highlighted both as service providers and in their role in promoting good

governance and democratization (Davis and McGregor, 2000:53). Such interest of the

international development agencies in social capital, civil society and participation may be

interpreted as another way of building on the micro social foundation of market solutions

(Angeles, 2004:187). With the end of the cold war, it had become necessary for the Western

donors to democratize the South as soon as possible to make away for the new thrust of trade

liberalization. They believed that a democratic and accountable state could foster economic

growth and development and allow the market to operate freely. To make a way for

accelerated entry of goods and services, financial services, protectionist or authoritarian

regimes had to be removed or forced to democratize. For the same cause they have attempted

45

to strengthen weak governments in the South emphasizing the policies for transparency, and

decentralization but against corruptions. Often they have equated democracy with capitalism

(Rocamora, 2004:199).

Donors began with the assumption that civil society was an important check on the

government; so civil society assistance could encourage external pressure on the states for

reform. With the falling budget for development this strategy had also been considered the

best way to achieve large-scale effect through low-cost projects. It is the Neo-Toquevillean

scholars who provided the necessary theory to such strategy plan of the western donors

particularly the USAID and World Bank in 1990s (Howell and Pearce, 2001:43). The

influence of such civil society theory and democratic assumption was pervasive upon the

development practitioners. However, questions arise about the applicability of such theories

developed from the experiences of the Western societies, in very different socio-political and

economic setting of the developing countries.

Researchers agree that associational revolution in developing countries is

significantly influenced by external factors including donor enthusiasm for NGOs as agents

of economic and political change. Nevertheless, criticisms to introduce such Western notion

of civil society in non-western settings have gained considerable attention in recent scholarly

writings due to the ramifications observed in different countries. This may be discussed from

two overlapping viewpoints, that is, imposition of a new idea in a very different social-

historical setting and from the consideration of immature institutional development or lack of

necessary conditions for proper functioning of civil society.

Without careful and sensitive prior analysis of needs in the social and political

contexts, donor intervention in local civil societies can end up distorting and weakening the

46

local processes of association and problem solution (Howell and Pearce 2001, 121). Such

projects based on preconceived notions of civil society and neglecting indigenous settings,

local circumstances, and histories, provoke controversy. There is no guarantee that the liberal

democratic model of civil society will necessarily bring positive outcomes across nations,

cultures, history and political system.

This may be considered as a similar endeavor of exporting modernization theory from

the developed North to the developing South. Sardamove (2005, 391-394) is of the opinion

that failed efforts of social modernization for decades, attempts to create Western-style

nation-states, and inter-communal conflicts have paradoxically produced; in his words, a

partial ‘retraditionalization’ of social life in the developing world. In these societies, most

individuals have remained embedded within face-to-face and quasi-kinship networks and

have tended to pursue social goals through informal associations based on personal or

factional loyalty. As a result, beneath the successive social and political changes, societies

have remained dominated by tightly-knit ‘mafias’ pursuing narrow agenda. Strong influences

of such trends have caused clientelistic and parasitic characteristics among the modern NGOs.

Civil society organizations have brought tangible benefits like social welfare, empowerment,

education etc. but they have been generally unable to exercise the multiplying effects often

expected of them like pluralism and democracy.

The necessary institutional development and environment for a civil society to move

for pluralism and democracy is in most cases absent in those societies. Often, high rate of

violence, marketization of rule of law, privatization of law enforcement, and the wide gap

between the poor and the privileged (Oxhorn: 2003), concentration of political power in the

highest political office constrain civil society’s democratic potential in Third World countries.

47

These have caused periodic setbacks to the democratic development in countries like

Philippines, Thailand, Indonesia that do have vibrant civil societies (Alagappa, 2004:493).

These constraints to the performance of civil society and ultimately democracy, remind the

strong presence and influence of indigenous vertical social forces such as clientelism,

patronage, nepotism, corruption, and violence all working within political system as well as

low level of political institutionalization.

The challenge for development practitioners is to understand the meaning and role of civil

society in specific cultural and political contexts.

2.1.3 Studies on Third World Civil Societies from different Perspectives

At this stage of our discussion, I would like to focus on the style, dimension,

methodology used by civil society researchers at the international level. Here I highlight

three noted international projects on civil society that have focused on Asian as well as

developing countries besides other developed countries. These projects differ in their

objectives, methodology and theories. None of these three projects to be introduced and

reviewed have targeted the civil society of Bangladesh for their research and analysis.

2.1.3.1 John Hopkins Comparative Nonprofit Sector Project

The most famous and oldest project on civil society in the third sector is the ‘The

John Hopkins Comparative Nonprofit Sector Project’ that began during the early 1990s and

continuing to date1. It is a systematic effort to analyze the scope, structure, financing, and

role of the private nonprofit sector in a cross-section of countries around the world in order to

enhance the contribution these organizations can make to democracy and the quality of

1 http://www.jhu.edu/~ccss/ website of the centre for civil society studies in John Hopkins University and http://www.jhu.edu/~cnp/ website of the comparative nonprofit sector project. Access date 16 August, 2007.

48

human life. This project also finds its theoretical base in the Neo-Tocquevillean Stream and

advocates liberalization and globalization considering civil society as the third sector that

mediates between the extreme of profit making market and unresponsive state in matters of

social, economic and environmental crises (Salamon and et.al., 2003:2). Up to 2003, the

project had published data and analysis on over 40 countries. The third sector, according to

this project includes not only NGOs, welfare groups, professional groups, pressure groups,

advocacy groups and grass-roots organizations but also hospitals, clinics, universities,

schools, day care centers, religious congregations. The project concentrated in gathering data

mainly on structural and particularly economic side of the nonprofit organizations like their

volunteers, paid employee, source of income, budget, contribution in the national economy,

percentage in the economically active population etc. Though empirical, the data is mostly

collected indirectly from different census and surveys, only in the case where data was not

available from reliable sources, surveys were conducted.

Among the 40 countries, 14 are from the developing world. In an overview analysis

of the 40 countries, the project reports the third sector as a major economic force taking its

social and political importance granted. Another finding is that the number of paid staff is

higher than volunteers and the higher the number of paid staff, the higher is the number of

volunteers. The study compared the situation with both developing and developed countries,

showing that developing countries have fewer volunteers. In case of types of functions, it has

been found that service providing actions are much higher in number than expressive

functions 2 and it is same for both developing and developed countries. However, in

developed countries the paid staff is engaged in providing services while the volunteers do

2 By expressive functions, the project not only means advocacy for rights and politics related matter but also expression of cultural, religious, professional values interests and beliefs.

49

the expressing activities. In developing countries it is mostly service functions that claim a

lot of volunteer workforce other than that of the paid staff. The fourth key finding of the

research in 2003 was that private philanthropy accounts for a smaller share of finance while

fees are the dominant source of revenue. And in the developing countries large share of the

third sector revenues is spent for development in comparison to other developed countries.

The study has also attempted to compare the third sectors of both the developing and

developed countries using the same simplified structures and definition developed in the

context of developed countries, particularly USA. Analysis in Western framework have lead

to the inferences on less voluntary activity rate in developing states where the society

structure and connections are very much different from the Western nations and are based on

informal relations and networks. Volunteer participation also takes place in rather informal

fashion than it happens in the Western countries. In its regional discussion on the third sector,

from the same analytical framework, the socio-economic settings and historical development

of the developed countries have been termed as infertile for the growth of civil society

institutions.

Though the data may have been gathered from the viewpoint of the local

understanding of the civil society as it is explained in the project reports, the analyses have

been done based on an American framework. This may give an over all idea on the Third

World’s civil societies and their comparative position in relation to the Western block but

may not reveal genuine tendency existing in particular regions that may lead to further

analysis. Moreover, the project is mostly concerned with gathering data on the economic and

structural side of the civil society. Unless the civil society is studied in the context of other

two sectors-state and market and focuses on the interaction that takes place between the civil

50

society and state and market, democratic contribution of the third sector can hardly be

assessed.

2.1.3.2 CIVICUS Civil Society Index

A more advanced and recently finished project on world civil societies is the

CIVICUS Civil Society Index on 44 countries. The first volume of CIVICUS Global Survey

of the State of Civil Society: country profiles have been published at in May 2007, based on

the project reports and findings revealed from 2003 to 2006. The project was conducted by

CIVICUS: World Alliance for Citizen Participation— an international alliance of civil

society organizations centered at South Africa. The organization is dedicated to strengthening

citizen action and civil society throughout the world. Though CIVICUS has good relation

with other Western, particularly American research organizations and development agencies,

its approach may be considered as post-liberal democratic model. It has almost come out of

the spell of Neo-Tocquevillean model of early 1990s where civil society has been considered

as a myth to ensure democracy. With grave concern about the performance and effects of

unchecked civil society in development and democracy and the growing call for

accountability of civil society organizations and lack of agreement on the definition of civil

society, the Civil Society Index (CSI) has aimed at self-critical assessment about civil society

actors throughout the world. Directed towards exposing the real world of civil society, the

CSI is the result of rigorous self-examination by civil society actors around the world.

To assess the civil society it has utilized Anheier’s (2004) civil society diamond tool

that analyzes the state of civil society into four key dimensions: structure, environment,

51

values, and impact3. The implementation of the project at country level had been conducted

by local prominent civil society organization or research institutes focusing mainly on five

types of primary and secondary data—secondary data review, consultation with regional

stakeholders, population surveys, media reviews and desk studies.

Specific themes, patterns and trends have been revealed through such comprehensive

research. A wide diversity in civil society organizations that satisfy the broad definition of

civil society— an arena that exists outside of the family, the state, and the market where

people associate to advance common interest, with community driven forms of civic life--

has been found. The problems of legitimacy, accountability and transparency of the CSOs

have been highlighted across nations. Contrary to the Neo-Toquevillean theory, the research

has revealed that often volunteering, charitable giving or any non-partisan community

participation are not coupled with a strong organized civil society in terms of levels of

organizations, networks, infrastructure, and resources, and vice versa in many countries in

the South (Heinrich, 2007:xxvi). Alike the findings of John Hopkins centre, CSI also found a

global pattern in stronger civil society roles in service providing than advocacy which

indicates that participatory governance was yet to become a reality at the national level. It

mentioned the inability of civil societies in influencing policies. Ultimately the strong

influence of the state has been reinstated. It had been found that a strong civil society

coexists with a well-governed and strong state. A more comparative analysis based on the

findings is yet to be published in the forthcoming second volume of the book.

3 The indicators for structure-were nature of citizen participation, diversity within civil society, level of organization, inter-relations, resources; environment- political context, basic freedoms and rights, socioeconomic context, socio-cultural context, legal environment, state civil society relations, private sector civil society relations; Values-democracy, transparency, tolerance, nonviolence, gender equity, poverty eradication, environmental sustainability; Impact-influencing public policy, holding state and private corporations accountable, responding to social interests empowering citizens, meeting societal needs.

52

CIVICUS CSI project provides information on 44 countries belonging to the North

and South, Eastern Europe, Asia, Africa as well as Latin America. So the tendencies of civil

society noted here represent the whole non-western block. Civil society index measured

through the civil society diamond model only provides an over view or summary of the real

situation of the civil societies in those countries. However, unless there are further

investigations into the state-civil society relation and democracy, the underlying causes to

such tendencies revealed in the findings can hardly be understood. More in depth study into

the civil society and political relation as well as on democracy has become essential if any

effective way to ensure participatory democracy is to be ensured through civil society.

2.1.3.3 Project on Asian Civil Society

Alagappa’s (2004) project on civil society focuses on civil societies particularly in

Asia and its political and democratic dimensions. Due to the diversity of culture, religion and

political ideals in Asia, often it had been argued that, civil society study has hardly any

relevance in Asia. However, Alagappa’s project on civil societies in twelve Asian countries

begins with the assumption that civil society, albeit weak and penetrated, does exists and

does affect political development in those countries (Alagappa, 2004:15). Unlike, John

Hopkins Centre or CIVICUS Project, Alagappa uses qualitative case studies for each country

strongly grounded on conceptual framework with comparative perspective to develop

inferences. Civil society is the independent variable while democracy is the dependent

variable. The analysis is based on both Neo-Tocquevillean framework as well as the

Gramcsian model. It has been found that, when the state goes through revolutionary periods

and movements for democratization the Gramcsian model shows more relevance in

explaining civil society. The more the state and democratic transformation finds peaceful

53

means and proceeds in a stable way, the better the Neo-Tocquevillean framework finds

relevancy in explaining civil society. Though this study also fails to lead to a general theory

on civil society and democracy in Asia, it does develop a good number of overlapping

propositions, which begin with arguing that there is no necessary connection between civil

society and democracy. CSOs have both expanded and contracted democratic space. Civil

society may be necessary but is not a sufficient condition for democraic development. The

boundary separating the political and civil society is porous. On state-civil society relations,

the findings reveal that the state had a strong impact on the development of civil society and

state and civil society relation may not always be confrontational. Though the state continues

to be placed in a dominant position in relation to society, civil society activities have been

able to limit its power to some extent. A good number of conditions have been mentioned for

civil society to emerge as a strong force and contribute to democracy. For example, the

dominant discourse of civil society must be rooted to democratic ideals with pro-democratic

CSOs. Political opportunity and constrain, stage of political development and strength,

orientation, role of the state and political society influences the democratic potential of civil

society. Deepening of democracy requires a strong and responsive state, strong issue based

political parties and independent and effective judiciary as well. Nonetheless, the project is

based on two or more in depth case studies for each country, which may not always reflect

the total civil society of the respective countries. Wider database, formed on empirical

observation may have lead to more concrete inferences and a strong conclusion.

All the three international projects on civil society are concerned with the relation

between civil society and democracy though with varying approach and methodology.

Certain, trends and style in civil society and its influence on state and democracy have been

54

revealed through the wide researches with some of the findings confirming each other, like

low participation and performance of civil society in developing countries, higher service

providing functions than advocacy, strong civil society goes with strong, democratic state etc.

Moreover, Alagappa (2004) in his in depth case studies has shown that for Asia, civil society

may not necessarily lead to democracy or enhance democratization; it is contingent to other

internal and external conditions.

Therefore, it has now become necessary to study why the civil society is often unable

to contribute to democracy in Asia and particularly in developing countries, despite the

strong reliance and huge effort of the international donors to strengthen the civil society in

those countries. Simply studying civil society and its direct, indirect influence may not

always guarantee a satisfactory answer. Civil society needs to be understood within the

political system where it not only influences other sectors but is often influenced by the

market, state, political institutions, history and culture. Further investigation into its nature of

functions and political relations and dealings may provide a better answer to our query on

civil society and democratic relations in developing countries in Asia.

As I have mentioned before, none of the three large projects on civil society have

focused on Bangladesh. Though the country receives, high international attention in

development literatures and by international agencies, for certain policy reasons the country

has been left out from these studies. However, from different perspectives, the civil society

of Bangladesh has attracted researchers at home and abroad.

2.1.4 Researches on Civil Society in Bangladesh

As pointed out in Chapter 1, a good number of research works on civil society have

been carried out in Bangladesh. However, they have been conducted from different

55

perspectives and with very different objectives and in most cases have addressed only a

section of civil society. Very few researches on Bangladesh 'civil society' accept the term in

its broadest meaning. This section shall focus on the findings and ideas revealed by four

national and international scholars on civil society in Bangladesh that have relevance to the

present study. Among them Kendal Stiles (2002) and David Lewis (2004) are Western

scholars, specialists on South Asia, civil society and particularly NGOs. Though their

researches are mostly on NGOs, they have interpreted the NGOs in relation to other civil

society actors, the state and the traditional social structure and political culture based on their

field visits, observation and qualitative analysis. Fahimul Quadir (1999, 2003) is a

Bangladeshi scholar specialized in civil society and arguing against the positive relation

between political democratization and economic liberalization. Professor Rehman Sobhan

though an internationally reputed Bangladeshi economist, fighting against aid dependency

and donor directions on national policy, is also a prominent figure in the arena of civil

society. His writings, speeches and the programs of Centre for Policy Dialogue (CDP) he

chairs are often considered as the voice of the civil society by the media. Though standing in

against donor domination, CDP proceeds in the New Liberal ideology. Critical assessment of

research finding and comments by these scholars on civil society in Bangladesh is the main

concern of this part of literature review.

For a good number of civil society researchers in Bangladesh, for a long time, NGOs

were the synonym to civil society. The four scholars under review also have contributed to

NGO research. They have exposed through their findings that the NGO sector in Bangladesh

is large and powerful, though donor dependent. Most of these NGOs are actually indigenous

though nurtured by foreign donations. Naturally, foreign donation is an important factor for

56

Bangladesh civil society. But it also have been revealed that only handful of large NGOs

enjoy the lion share of foreign donation (Stiles 2002, Lewis 2004). Moreover, though the

NGO sector is active and often successful in bringing social development it has very little

contribution in policy making as the state is very sensitive in advocacy and politics related

participation of the NGOs. This is why NGOs are seen mostly as aid contractors and

concerned only with micro-credit and welfare services (Sobhan 2004, 2006). Fahimul Quadir

(1999) in his empirical study has termed the NGO activities and projects to be rigid,

hierarchical and commercial. Moreover, it has been found that without economic assistance,

NGO projects for people’s awareness and advocacies do not show any positive effect. Lewis

(2004) has further commented that, modern NGOs have the potential to become new patrons

to the poor beneficiaries.

In fact literatures on NGO activities and projects are rich in Bangladesh. However,

the researches on the participation and influence of NGOs in policy paradigm are rare and

mostly based on observation and comments. Rigorous analysis and field observation or

surveys on the participatory nature of NGOs as well as other CSOs are yet to be conducted.

NGOs are only a part of the civil society, which may be termed in the words of Lewis

(2004) as the 'new civil society' of Bangladesh. He terms the political social movements as

the old civil society that emerged before independence and against the authoritarian regimes

for autonomy and democracy. However, such movement led by the intellectuals, students’

groups, professional organizations, trade unions still exists in Bangladesh. Movement

orientation of the civil society is often reflected in the activities of such civil society

organizations (Sobhan 2006). This section of the civil society has been termed as politicized,

co-opted by political power (Stiles 2002, Lewis 2004, Quadir 2003). So the boundary

57

between the civil society and political society is always changing. Again though not based on

hard evidences, Lewis (2004) thinks that patronage is a dominant force in Bangladeshi

society and politics.

However, there is hardly any analysis or discussion on what led the political actors to

politicize the civil society in Bangladesh, in spite of adopting the ideologies of democracy

and liberalism. CSOs have been just hinted in the previous researchers to be linked to the

political actors through patronage, nepotism, corruption. Albeit, these matters are facts of the

day, no research based on concrete data with hard evidences is yet to be conducted. Intra civil

society relations and network among the CSOs have also been found to be weak by all of the

observers of Bangladesh civil society.

Moreover, a large portion of the civil society, remain outside of the researcher’s

attention till date. Though Stiles (2002), Lewis (2004) have mentioned the high potential of

local level community groups and philanthropy, such organizations have hardly been

investigated as part of the civil society. Traditional voluntary and religious groups, village

clubs, sports clubs, cooperatives etc. working at the local level attract civic engagement, are

outlets to form public opinion and on the other hand are considered valuable units to control

vote banks by the political parties.

To sum up in a few sentences about civil society in Bangladesh, first it is to be said

that though Bangladesh has a notable history what can be readily described as civil society, it

can hardly fit in to the Neo-Toquevillean model of civil society powered by horizontal social

capital and civic engagement contributing to democracy. This fact has also been observed by

other researchers like Lewis (2004), Davice and Mcgregor (2001). Practically the civil

society organizations, except a few large NGOs, are not well organized internally and lack

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institutionalization. Moreover, Bangladesh fails to provide the necessary conditions for

proper functioning of the civil society, e.g., strong responsive state, independent judiciary,

and widely represented issue based political parties etc. In the administrative system, there

are very few regularized mechanisms for the CSOs to lobby or influence the politicians and

administration. As a civil society leader, Sobhan (2006) has also commented that the citizens

of Bangladesh at the grass-roots level are unaware of policy regime and have no participation

in policy making.

In reality, civil society is country specific. All the scholars have stressed the need to

understand the civil society in Bangladesh from its local circumstances, history, political

development, state society relations and composition from their real and practical aspect that

has not been done in its full scale. Rather than using a presumed framework for analysis, it is

necessary to find a new model to study civil society accepting the vertical social relations,

blurring boundaries between civil society and family life as well as political life and on the

on going conflict and contestation of these forces. It has been urged to study civil society not

only as a system of structures and practices but also in relation of values and beliefs.

In order to succeed in forming a new model, to analyze, the civil society in

Bangladesh more perfectly and that of other developing countries in Asia and other parts of

the world, first it is necessary to systematically answer why the civil society do not fit in to

the presumed models and are unable to contribute to democracy. For this we need to focus

not only on the civil society but the factors that influence the civil society and interaction of

civil society with other actors and sectors in the political system. Moreover, comprehensive,

methodical and authentic information on the actual state of the civil society organizations and

their activities are essential to assess its potential in democracy and development.

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2.2 Methodology

Present research on civil society in Bangladesh uses both primary and secondary data

and makes use of both quantitative and qualitative methods for analysis. The factors that

influence the nature, development and strength of civil society in Bangladesh have been

based on previous literatures, researches, reports, reviews and personal observation and

interviews. Moreover, comparative discussion on other civil societies has been added to

develop and strengthen the arguments made on the influential factors of civil society. The

basic characteristics of civil society organizations in Bangladesh and their nature of activities

and relation with different political and social actors have been investigated empirically with

the help of a large N-scale survey and analyzed quantitatively. Moreover, supplemented data

gathered through interviews, field visits, observations, and from newspaper reports have been

collected focusing on civil society and its political relations. These data have been processed

and analyzed in a qualitative manner.

2.2.1. Use of Survey Method in Studying Civil Society

Survey is a widely used tool for gathering primary data in empirical social science.

Through a survey new data are created through surveying or inquiring directly at the field. A

survey design provides a quantitative or numeric description of some fraction of population-

the sample-through the data collection process of asking questions to the people. This data

collection, in turn, enables a researcher to generalize the findings from a sample of responses

to a population (Creswell: 1994, 117). In most of the inductive studies, enough information

and data may not be available at the data resource centers like statistical bureau, national

archive etc. In such cases, it becomes necessary to create fresh data from a sample population.

Moreover, to test a theory or to prove a new hypothesis survey on a sample population

60

becomes indispensable. Researchers usually ask about things at one time in surveys, measure

many variables (often with multiple indicators), and test several hypotheses in a single survey

(Neuman, 2004:162). Survey may be conducted using a structured questionnaire or open-

ended questions. Again it may be conducted by personally approaching the respondents or

through telephone conversation or by sending the questionnaire by postal mail service. In the

recent days internet surveys have become popular in the developed countries.

Survey in civil society research is a widely accepted method. Though civil society is a

very old term, research on civil society, particularly on civil society organizations is

relatively contemporary phenomenon. Often necessary information and data are not available

from reliable data sources. Again, as civil society, its activity and influences are changing

from time to time, to keep trace to such changes, periodic survey becomes essential.

Moreover, in case of developing countries, feedback and success of different NGO projects

are often inquired and assessed through surveying the NGO beneficiaries. So, different

aspects of civil society and CSOs may be surveyed. Survey may be conducted upon the

participants/beneficiaries of civil society organizations, the members or the CSOs themselves

or their umbrella organizations. In the large worldwide projects of John Hopkins Centre on

comparative nonprofit groups as well as CIVICUS civil society index, the survey method has

been used extensively. The John Hopkins project is mostly based on gathered data from

government and other private sources around the world. But when existing data sources

could not be tapped to locate relevant information, special surveys were carried out. Those

surveys became essential mostly in case of civil society sectors with less developed data

system and with less formal organizations. In Africa and Southeast Asia, hyper network

sampling and snowball sampling were used where surveyors visited from house to house and

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from organization to organization in a particular area to build a sample list and gather

necessary data (Salamon, 2003:11). Again in case of CIVICUS CSI project, among the

multilevel process of information gathering, a population survey was conducted in each

country asking the respondents about their involvement in civil society and their experience

with CSOs in their community.

In case of Bangladesh survey on NGOs and particularly on NGO beneficiaries is a

common phenomenon (Amin, 1997, Ullah and Routary 2003, Tasnim 2005 and so on);

besides every NGO for their self-assessment conduct regular survey on the beneficiaries. The

NGO beneficiaries have become used to respond to such structured questionnaire and

interviews by researchers and consultants from time to time. However, such surveys on

particular section of the civil society and their beneficiaries have not been able to contribute

in developing any large data base on CSOs of all categories along with other necessary

information that are often inquired and analyzed in academic civil society studies. Except

NGOs, integrated or systematically organized information on the profile and activities of

CSOs like community groups, cooperatives, social welfare groups at the rural level and labor

unions, trade organizations, professional groups, citizens and cultural groups at the meso or

urban level are not available in Bangladesh. The name and address of only those

organizations that have registered themselves with a ministry or enlisted them with any

umbrella organization do exists, though may not always be accessible by the researchers.

Under this situation, for conducting any comprehensive study on civil society in its broadest

meaning it becomes necessary to conduct direct survey on CSOs of different types, inquiring

about their basic information, activities and relation with state and other actors.

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2.2.2 Description of the Survey Method Used

The present research is first of its type covering a broad portion of civil society, new

and traditional, urban and rural in Bangladesh. Naturally, the survey conducted for the

present research has focused on a sample that represents civil society organizations both

small and big, active at local and national levels, famous and infamous, representing different

sections of society far from the capital.

504 civil society organizations (CSO) in Rajshahi district in Bangladesh were

surveyed in September and October, 2006. Rajshahi district was selected as it best represents

Bangladesh civil society at the periphery and local level, from urban rural distribution, social

composition, education, economy, and administrative importance. All registered or enlisted

CSOs of eight categories (cooperative, voluntary social organizations, NGOs, youth groups,

labor unions, trade organizations, professional associations and Rajshahi University centered

organizations) totaling 3,768 in the district were regarded as the total population. The sample

size was selected through random sampling process; 1,227 organizations were selected

randomly representing 30% of each category. Ultimately representatives of 504 CSOs were

interviewed making the return rate 41%. The following table 2.1 precisely shows the

statistics of the sample.

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Table 2.1 CSOs targeted and surveyed

Categories Total

Population

Sample Size Interviewed CSOs

(% to the total

population)

1 Different Types of Cooperatives 2540 838 193 (7.6%)

2 Registered Voluntary Social Welfare

Organizations

793 260 243 (31%)

3 NGOs based on ADAB Directory

2003 and updated from the

government office

129 35 22 (17%)

4 Organizations listed under Youth

Department

108 33 13 (12%)

5 Labor organizations listed under

Labor Directorate

99 32 9 (9%)

6 Chambers of Commerce and trade

organizations

45 6 6 (28%)

7 Professional Groups 21 11 6 (18%)

8 Rajshahi University based cultural,

educational and professional groups

33 12 9 (20%)

Total (Answer rate 41% ) 3768 1227 504 (13.5%)

Moreover, informal interviews were conducted with resource persons— scholars, experts,

civil society leaders, NGO officials, politicians, government administrators concerning civil

society in Bangladesh in April and September, 20064.

It is to be mentioned that, this survey is a part of a multi-country survey on civil

society organizations (known as JIGS Project) sponsored by a Special Project of University

of Tsukuba named Civil Society, the State and Culture in Comparative Perspective, (2003-

2008) directed by Professor Yutaka Tsujinaka and funded by the Japanese Ministry of

4 List of the persons interviewed with open ended questions (recorded and documented) have been given in the Appendix E.

64

Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology. The project has already completed

survey on CSOs of eleven countries located in different continents of the world using almost

similar type of questionnaire along with country specific special inquiries. The project had

been instituted to face the challenges in the age of globalization. It aims to establish shared

values and public policy frameworks adequate to bringing the different nations and societies

together under globally applicable terms and conditions of co-existence, at the same time

respecting the individual social and cultural tradition and history of each nation5.

The collected data has been processed using descriptive statistics and applying SPSS

program. The database now provides wide range of statistical information on civil society

organizations-their strength, participation, and relation to government, politics and other

actors. The next section describes a model that has been followed to analyze the data for the

present dissertation.

2.2.3 Application of Data

2.2.3.1 Quantitative analysis model

The data gathered from the survey have been numerically analyzed to identify the

basic characteristics, and actions and functions of civil society as well as their political

relations. The actions and functions of civil society had been divided into two types—grass-

roots actions which is almost synonym to service providing actions and related to its vibrant

nature and participatory actions that are more related to politics and democracy and its

vigilant nature. Table 2.2. shows the indicators that have been used to identify the four basic

aspects of CSOs surveyed.

5 For details about the project visit the project website http://csc.social.tsukuba.ac.jp/en/index.html.

65

Table 2.2 Indicators of basic nature, grass-roots action and participatory action of CSOs Indicators Basic nature Grass-roots action Participatory

Action Political perception and contacts

1 Self Categorization Joint projects with government in grass-roots project

Formal relations with the government

Rank different actors in relation to their power and influences

2 Policy interest Developing group network

Advocacy functions

Personal contact with different political actors

3 Objective of CSOs Active in Women Empowerment

Influencing government decision, policy and budget

Relation with particular political parties

4 Geographic Level of Activity

Active in local representation and ventilation of grievances

Lobby the government through different means

5 Number of Members Active in education and literacy

6 Source of Financial Resources

Health Education and health service

7 Number of Volunteers Human, political and legal rights

8 Number of Employee Economic empowerment

9 Budget Active in social and political awareness

10 Rank the level of cooperation with other actors

The second objective of the present research is to empirically investigate the nature of CSOs,

their types of actions and how participatory they are. Chapter four aims at fulfilling this

objective and makes use of survey data to identify and examine basic nature, grass-roots

actions and participatory nature of the CSOs. To understand the basic nature of the CSOs, 10

indicators have been used, such as, category, policy orientation, organizational objectives,

geographic level of activity, membership, sources of financial resources, budget, volunteers,

employees of CSOs. Such structural strength of civil society organizations has been

66

compared among CSOs working at the national and local level and among those receiving

and not-receiving foreign assistance. As the present study considers the civil society within

the political system, always interacting with other two sectors-- the market and the state, the

cooperation that exists between the CSOs and other social, political and economic actors

have been considered as an important attribute to understand the basic nature of CSOs.

There have been a good number of researches on service providing functions of the

civil society. Through the survey data, this study just verifies the prevalent assumption that

CSOs are mostly engaged in grass-roots development and also aims to measure their

engagement rate in civic education and citizenry training at the grass-roots level. The main

target for this quantitative data analysis is to identify the tendency of CSOs on participatory

actions. This is done using four broad indicators—formal relation with the state, advocacy,

policy making and lobby. In case of formal relations with the state, mainly the interactions,

influence and participation of CSOs in government functions and decisions have been

targeted. For advocacy, data on civil society organizations involvement on different

important issues in Bangladesh have been inquired and analyzed. For policy functions, the

participation of CSOs on a particular poverty reduction policy, and their success in pursuing

or blocking any policy decision or budget they favored or were against, have been considered.

For understanding the nature of lobby, data have been gathered and analyzed on participation

rate of CSOs in lobby using means that are horizontal and vertical, as well as partisan and

non-partisan. To avoid influences of different attributes of the civil society organizations,

participation rate of civil society organizations in different activities has been cross-checked

on the basis of three types of attributes—categories, geographic level of activity and on the

point of receiving and not-receiving foreign assistance. The political contact has been

67

analyzed in chapter five along with other data and information gathered from other sources

besides the survey.

2.2.3.2 Qualitative Analysis Model

The third objective of civil society is to examine the political relation of civil society to

verify causes to its weak and less participatory role in relation to democracy. This has been

partially done through quantitative analysis by showing the perception of the CSOs about

influence of different actors in the political system, the rate of personal contact the CSOs had

with important actors in the society and the rate of direct contact the CSOs had with each

political party in Bangladesh. However, such data are not enough to prove politicization of

civil society and to identify the causes and nature of such politicization that contribute to a

weak and less participatory civil society. At this stage, I enter into qualitative analysis using

very different data gathered from newspaper reports and editorials and through interviews,

field visits and observation notes written by the surveyors. The qualitative analysis is done in

two particular ways. First is the systematic search and simplified content analysis on a

sample of newspaper reports, the second is the sector wise discussion of different civil

society groups based on both the newspaper reports and primary data collected through

interviews, observations and field trips.

First, newspaper analyses have been made only to reveal an overall view of the

political relation of civil society. The three Bangladeshi news dailies had been selected for

their neutrality, high circulation and longevity. Only issues of these three dailies from

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January to June of 2001, 2006 and 2007 had been separated for the present research. These

newspaper issues then had been rigorously searched6 for news and analyses on NGOs, trade

Table 2.3 Methods used to sample newspaper reports

Selected News paper Dailies Sample Year (January to June) Search key concepts

The Daily Ittefaque (Bangla)

[oldest daily as well as neutral]

20017

(last year of AL regime)

NGOs, trade unions,

cooperatives, professional

groups, social and citizens

groups, seminars and press

conferences held by CSOs,

international organizations,

government moves on CSOs,

corruption related to CSOs

The Daily Star [nationally and

internationally acceptable

English daily]

2006

(last year of BNP regime)

The Daily Jugantor (Bangla)

[presently the most circulated

daily]

2007

(State of emergency period when

all the political corruptions have

began to be investigated)

unions, cooperatives, professional groups, social and citizens groups as well as seminars held

by civil society organizations, international organizations, government moves on CSOs,

corruption related to CSOs (Table 2.3).

The news reports and editorials gathered in this fashion had been analyzed based on the

information and discussion items in the text. The information that have been expressed and

mentioned about civil society types, political links, bureaucratic links, vertical links, violence,

interest articulation etc. have been coded one by one and had been brought under simplified

numerical form for further interpretation. Detailed description of using this method has been

discussed in the second section of chapter five. It is to be made clear that, though the

newspaper reports had been coded, and systematically presented, it had not been done

6 With the help of four research assistants, searching and copying the reports at different public and private libraries in Dhaka, Bangladesh. 7 Only issues of Daily Ittefaque of 2001 was available for searching and for photocopy.

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following any quantitative content analysis method. Because it is not only the physical words

and texts but the latent massage, information and concepts that have been described in the

news reports that have also been considered for coding.

Table 2.4 Sector wise discussion on civil society and political relations

Civil Society sector

Nature of Data used

Development NGOs

Previous literatures, News paper reports, Interviews and Field visits

Primary School Teachers movement

41 News reports and follow ups from May to August 2006

Trade Organization Trade Unions

News paper reports, interview and case study of Rajshahi Sugar Mill and Rajshahi Chambers of Commerce

Cooperatives and Small Welfare Groups

Based on information gathered through recorded and unrecorded interviews and conversation with local government executives, BRDB official and head of the cooperative directorate of Rajshahi Division, survey reports and observation notes of the surveyors.

Intellectuals, Think Tanks and Citizen Groups

News paper reports, personal observation, interview and case study upon a citizen group

Table 2.4 shows the sectors of the civil society in Bangladesh that have been

highlighted and nature of data and information used for discussion on those civil society

organizations and their relation with politics, nature of interaction with the state and society.

Combining the different types of information gathered in multiple ways, a modified but

complete description has been made about these sectors, particularly their relation to

government and politics. The aim of this section was the same—revealing the weakness of

the CSOs and their causes and nature of politicization.

2.2.4 Description and Justification for Selecting the Study Area for the Survey

Rajshahi District, the centre of the Northern Zone of Bangladesh has been selected for

carrying out the survey as it is considered to be the best in representing civil society from

periphery and meso levels in Bangladesh. As the present study qualifies the Neo-

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Toquevillean school where emphasis has been given on civic engagement and associational

functions at the community level, the survey also collected data from the civil society

organizations active at the local level of Bangladesh. First we shall focus on some basic

information on the district.

2.2.4.1 Rajshahi District

Rajshahi district is the central district of Rajshahi division located at the Northern

side of Bangladesh. With an area of 2407.01 square kilometers it has a city corporation, four

thana, seven municipalities, nine Sub-districts, 70 unions and 1,858 natural villages. Names

of the nine sub-districts are, Bagha, Bagmara, Charghat, Durgapur, Godagari, Mohonpur,

Paba, Puthia, and Tanore. Population of the district is 2,274,340; male 51.20%, female

48.807%; Muslim 93%; Hindu 5%, Christian 1.5% and others 0.5%; indigenous nationals—

Santals—who constituted 2.34% of the total population and had their own language. The

main occupation among the people of the district is agriculture (farmers 38.73%, agricultural

laborer 23.64%). Rajshahi district is rich in educational institutions—it has a public

university, private universities, a government medical college, an engineering university, 110

colleges, 2 teacher's training colleges, a good number of technical colleges and research

institutes. A good number of newspapers and dailies are locally published here (Banglapedia,

Internet Edition: 2003).

Rajshahi is well connected with the capital and other parts of Bangladesh by road and

railway. After the opening of the Jamuna Multi purpose bridge-that has connected the

northern region with the rest of country by road in 1998, there has been a boost in the

economic activities in the district. The district sends 5 parliament members to the national

parliament. In 2006 one of them was also a member of the Cabinet. The elected mayor of

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Rajshahi City Corporation who enjoyed the status of a state-minister was also a parliament

member.

Rajshahi district is rich in various kinds of civil society organizations-- there are

2,540 registered cooperatives, 788 registered voluntary social welfare organizations, 100

youth organizations, 107 NGOs, 99 labor organizations, 50 professional groups, a district

chamber of commerce and hundreds of trade organizations, 45 cultural and educational

organizations exist with the affiliation of University of Rajshahi. Besides, there exist

numerous unregistered and informal local clubs, neighborhood associations and other groups.

Rajshahi City – the divisional town, stands on the bank of the river Padma-last part of

the international river ganga. The metropolitan area is 96.69 sq km. It consists of 39 wards.

Population of the city is 383,655; male 52.91%, female 47.09%. Density of population is

3,968 per sq km (Population Census 2001, Preliminary Report). Rajshahi, which is both a

district and a divisional city, flourished in the seventeenth century (Banglapedia, Internet

Edition: 2003). Rajshahi is famous for its silk industry.

2.2.4.2 Justification for Selecting Rajshahi District as the Study Area

Among six divisions, Rajshahi division is the second largest in respect of population.

The divisional district- Rajshahi, occupies 1.63% of the total area and 1.8% of the population

of Bangladesh. It has been found to represent best the society and civil society at the

periphery and meso level in Bangladesh. As Dhaka is the capital, concentration of civil

society organizations as well as business, industry and political activities is the highest there.

So it does not represent the situation of the periphery, sub-urban and rural societies of

Bangladesh. So is the case with the port city—Chittagong. Economic development of

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Chittagong district does not represent the national economy. Again, the second port city

Khulna, another divisional town is rich in economic activity but seems to be in the periphery

due to underdeveloped communication system with Dhaka. Moreover Khulna’s balance of

urban and rural area does not represent the national ratio. Rajshahi district has been selected

on the following considerations:

1. Rajshahi is a blend of rural and urban characteristics. It is a divisional city with all

urban facilities but not as developed and busy as the capital city-Dhaka and the port city-

Chittagong. Besides the metropolitan area, most areas of the district are rural. More than two

thirds of the population lives in rural areas. In Rajshahi district 33% of the households were

non-farm while 67% were farm households 8 . Moreover, among 87,319 villages of

Bangladesh, Rajshahi district covers 1,858 villages; it is 2.1% of the total villages while

Dhaka and Chittagong and Khulna districts cover 1863, 1319 and 1106 villages respectively

though being geographically and demographically much larger than Rajshahi. On the other

hand, among 223 municipalities and city corporations in the country 8 are in Rajshahi district

while Dhaka, Chittagong and Khulna covers 4, 8, 3 respectively (2002, SYB).

2. As Rajshahi is a divisional city, divisional head quarters of all government

department and ministries are found here as well as those of private companies. District

branches of many national and international NGOs and institutes are present here. Local

chapters of nationwide federations of labor unions, chambers, cooperatives, professional

groups, women’s groups are also found here, in addition to local civil society organizations.

However, such condition is common for the other three districts too. Moreover, among the

economically active population of Bangladesh 22% live in the urban areas while the 8 2002 Statistical Year Book of Bangladesh, 23rd edition, Dhaka: Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics, Government Peoples Republic of Bangladesh, 2004, from now on (2002 SYB).

73

remaining 77% live in rural areas. But in capital Dhaka 82% of the economically active

persons work in urban area, so is the case in Khulan with 81% urban economically active

population. In Chittagong too 65% people work in the urban area. On the other hand though

Rajshahi is a divisional district only 55% economically active people work in Urban area

while 44% worked in the rural areas. So, rural segments are highest in the economy and

employment in Rajshahi.

3. The economy of Rajshahi is more agrarian and less industrial, representing the over

all economy through out Bangladesh. In the year 1999-2000, Agriculture and Forestry

contributed most (19.51%) to Bangladesh’s national production followed by industry

(15.59%), Transportation and communication (9.42%). Financial intermediation (like banks,

insurance) contributed only 1.57%. In the year 1999-2000 the gross product of Rajshahi

district in agriculture and fishing was 9,359 Million Taka that is about US $137 million 63

thousand9 which is 15% of the total production income of the district. In industry 6,780

million taka that was a bit less than US $99 million, 706 thousand (8.33% of the total

production). Highest was in services including business, 24009 million taka that is about US

$353 Million, 074 thousand (58% of the total income). So service providing activities are

highest in Rajshahi district. But the GDP was US $343, very near to the national GDP rate

(361 US $) (2002 SYB) while the per-capita GDP in the more busy districts of Dhaka,

Chittagong and Khulna is 872 US $, 559 US 460 US$ respectively. All are much higher than

the national GDP rate and don’t represent the actual economic situation of Bangladesh.

4. Education or literacy of the citizens is considered as an important factor for civil

society development. Rajshahi city is known for its large number of higher educational

9 1 US $ = 68Taka, and 1 Taka = 1.7 Yen (According to Yahoo currency converter http://finance.yahoo.com/currency? On 15 May, 2007.

74

institutions. Though Rajshahi district covers 1.8% of the national population, 5.8% of the

total primary schools in Bangladesh, overall literacy rate of Rajshahi (47.4%) are rather low

in comparison to Dhaka (64.3%), Chittagong (54.9%) and Khulna (57.4%). But this literacy

rate of Rajshahi district represents the national literacy rate which is 45.3% (2002, SYB).

5. As mentioned earlier in the introduction to the Rajshahi district and city, it is the

centre for education, mainly higher education for the people of north zone as well as other

parts of the country. Citizens from all walks of life and region (even Chakma, Murma tribals

from far Chittagong)10, send their children for education purposes. Besides, people belonging

to different social strata and professions, live in Rajshahi for occupational purposes. Rajshahi

is also land of migrated people who came and settled here from India after 1947 that marked

the end of British rule and the division of British India. So people with different background

and locality dwell here together that leads to both horizontal and as well as vertical social

relationships. Naturally, presence of different formal and informal associations, organizations

and institutions representing different sections or levels of civil society of Bangladesh can be

observed in Rajshahi district.

So from the point of view of demographic and social composition, education,

economy, urbanization and administrative importance, Rajshahi district has been selected as

the study area for conducting the present survey that analyzes the national civil society from

a local perspective.

10 Among the tribal population that constitutes only 1.13% of the national population, 2.34% lives in Rajshahi District.

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2.3 Limitations of the Study

1. The present research tries to form a better understanding of civil societies in

developing countries in relation to consolidating democracy using the case of Bangladesh.

However, a single study in civil society in Bangladesh cannot make a generalization about

civil societies in developing countries or the prime reason behind their weak democratic

performance. The lessons from Bangladesh civil society can only show directions and hints

about studying other developing countries experiencing associational boom but fledging

democracy. Hence much research is to be done on civil societies and their relation to

democracy for forming a general theory of on civil society and democracy nexus in the

developing world.

2. The present research focuses only on contemporary civil society of Bangladesh

(Mainly from 1991 to 2006) using contemporary theories on civil society and democracy. A

broad historical analysis on the civil society based on classical political theories would have

had given better understanding and strong basis to the arguments. However it was not

possible in the limited time and resources.

3. In the survey on civil society organizations, the numerous unregistered CSOs have

not been considered as target groups because of the unavailability of the reliable lists of such

organizations. These unregistered local organizations also have important role in the

functioning of civil society and democracy which this survey is unable to measure. As

religious organizations, specially madrasas, are registered under the Ministry of Education,

they have also not been included in the population list. However, religious organizations that

were registered with the Ministry of Social Welfare have been counted for the survey.

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4. Due to the confrontational socio-political situation, the respondents were very careful

in answering questions related to politics and state as well their financial resources. Often,

they tried to confine their political identity and links. However, the surveyors in their

observation notebooks had noted such matters.

5. The large N size survey method is very effective in revealing the tendency and

dimensions of the civil society representing broad range of civil society actors and policies.

However, through such survey it is hard to reveal the state and civil society relation in details.

This requires complimentary case studies. But such case studies are limited to particular area

or policy. So several in depth observation based case studies representing different sections

of the civil society would have become essential to give complementary support to the

arguments established through survey. Such complementary case studies have not been

possible at this phase of the research due to limited time and resources. However,

supplementary in depth interviews have been taken with stakeholders, scholars, politicians

and activists and administrators concerning civil society and filed visits have been made to

few civil society organizations for better understanding their activities and collecting detailed

information. Moreover, newspaper reports and editorials on civil society news have been

systematically collected and analyzed to supplement the findings of the survey results.

Nevertheless, such newspaper reports and editorials had to be sampled for restraint of time

and resources and some old issues were not available with the facility to photocopy at the

libraries in Bangladesh.

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6. Using the case of Bangladesh, the present study has shown the simplicity of the Neo-

Tocquevillean assumption on civil society and democracy which have provided a weak

theoretical base to donor policy to strengthen civil society. Main focus of the thesis has been

on civil society organizations while politics and other socio-economic situation came in

connection to analyzing those basic units of civil society. However, it has not been possible

to satisfactorily prove the simplicity of the theory from all its aspects such as from the

consideration of politics, society, political actors, citizens etc. one by one using the data on

Bangladesh, through this single research.

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Chapter 3

Political Structural Influence on Civil Society

3.1 Introduction

In the traditional literatures and researches on democracy, political actors have

been considered the primary or most important force in making, shaping and

consolidating democracy. Importance of the public voice, the non-elite substance came in

the afterward literatures in the 1990s. Civil society is considered to represent voice of the

society and public and influence the process of achieving and maintaining democracy

acting at the roots level of the society. Most literatures on civil society are occupied with

the nature and influence of the civil society towards the state and society. Moreover, the

Neo-Tocquevillean literatures are always considering civil society in an ideal term—

autonomous, democratic and rich in social capital and civic engagement, always

enhancing democracy. It is rare to find civil societies in the practical world to posses all

the qualities as expected from them to contribute to democracy. Moreover, in practice, the

performance and influence of civil society particularly for democratic consolidation, is

very much influenced by the environment in which it functions. The history, culture,

economic situation, political structures all in a combined way contribute to the nature and

performance of civil society in a particular country or nation. However, dimension and

magnitude of influence may differ from factor to factor. In fact, having all the factors

active, in most cases, it is political structures consisting the powerful elites who

ultimately exert the highest influence in determining nature of civil society and also as it

had been discussed in the previous literatures the level of democracy.

These political structures may be the state, political party, bureaucracy, even

military as long as political decisions and strategies are concerned. The political

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institutional actions may be consciously directed towards civil society organizations or

taken for other political purpose that ultimately affects the civil society. Such influence of

the political institutions upon civil society, also determine the participatory and

democratic role of civil society in developing countries. The influence from such political

structures and institutions upon civil society may be profound and multi-dimensional.

Pekkanon (2006:15) in his study on Japanese Civil Society, divides the influence of

political structures into three basic sections—a. regulatory framework like, law,

regulations etc. b. political opportunity structure—bureaucratic dominance, influence of

the political actors etc. and c. Other indirect influences. His model does not claim that

civil society is a product of what state agencies or politicians want to happen, but

institutions have effect through structuring actions. Among the three parts, the first-

regulatory framework has immediate and clear impact on civil society organization’s

viability such as legal status, direct financial flow and tax benefits etc. The second part of

institutional influence-political opportunity structure, is the consistent—but not

necessarily formal, permanent, or national-dimension to the political environment which

either encourage or discourage people from using collective action. The term was first

coined by Sidney Tarrow (1994:85) to the study of collective action and social movement.

Pekkanon’s model broadens it to include the study of the institutions and the opportunity

political actors provide for collective action. The third part of Pekkanon’s model-other

indirect influence has been developed particularly in the context of Japanese civil society,

pointing out important state actions that indirectly have contribution in shaping civil

society.

Present study is concerned mainly with the second section of Pekkanon (2006)

model— political opportunity structure that functions along with influences of the

external and internal factors upon the civil society of Bangladesh. Through the political

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opportunity structure present study shall investigate the influences of political structures

upon the style and strength of collective actions of the civil society in Bangladesh. By

structures, I don’t mean just the formal machines like cabinet, legislature or

administration but also political parties, political leaders and elites and other political

practices, inconformity to the Institutional Approach as discussed in the Introductory

Chapter.

From the consideration of contemporary 1 civil society and democratic

consolidation this chapter argues that political structures particularly political parties and

their leaders in Bangladesh have the most influence on civil society, however, not

excluding the other external and internal factors like donor policy, history, cultures, social

norms, state institutions that have also a profound influence in shaping the vibrant and

vigilant nature of the civil society.

The chapter first enters a comparative comparison of the civil society and

democracy in other developing countries in Asia to understand the most common factors

that determine civil society strength in relation to democracy. After identifying the

political actors to be common in all cases, the chapter proceeds in a more detail

investigation upon civil society in Bangladesh and the factors that have influenced its

vibrant and vigilant nature.

3.2 Influence of Political Structures upon Civil Society from a Comparative Perspective

To establish the arguments that political structures and powerful political actors

do matter in Bangladesh for civil society and democracy, the chapter first takes a

comparative approach. It focuses on the situation of other developing democracies in Asia.                                                             1 Up to the year 2006

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The influence of political structures upon the society and civil society is not a new

phenomena but rather a hard fact that can hardly be avoided. It is not only formal rules

and registration laws with which the state and administration may regulate the

development and strength of civil society but through different informal means, pressures,

favoritism and even corruption, civil society is often controlled by the political forces.

The problem is very common and a big one in developing countries where the economy is

poor, state is weak and citizens lack the necessary political education. However, it may

not be a setback particularly of the developing countries.

Even in the Tocqueville’s nineteenth century USA the problem was evident which

is known as machine politics found in the big cities. In the presence of political

democracy and voting rights and poverty as well as the absence of well organized state

programs for citizen’s welfare and employment security, hierarchically organized party

machine had become the all controlling social organization having strong influence in

every sector of the local government and society. The machine provided the favors, jobs,

necessary welfare to citizens in exchange of political support and votes from them.

However, the interaction took place in a vertical way through patronage and corruption

(Greenstein, 1965).

Though it is said that with the introduction of welfare state and civil service

reform that reduced patronage available to the political parties, urban party machine

declined, they still endure in different forms in USA. Democratic clubs based on the

support of politicians scattered through out cities like New York in the last 20th century

functioned in the classic machine style. In return for helping with problems like

threatening landlords, broken street lights, finding a lawyer etc. the club asked the people

to circulate nominating petitions and distribute campaign literatures, which most did

willingly. So the clubs gained workers and voters by providing legal assistance and using

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their political connections (Tager, 1988: 31). Vertical machine politics still remain as a

valuable resource for the politicians as well as citizens.

In contemporary age, it is the non-profit community organizations that are found

in the core center for distribution of public services to the needy in USA. Such non-profit

groups form an important section of the American civil society. These organizations have

been found involved in reciprocal service with their clients and government executives.

Through exchange of basic services to the community they engage in producing reliable

voting constituencies. Naturally, government officials (Mayor, Governor) are interested to

allocate public service funds to particular community organizations that can ensure their

necessary votes. It is a three way indirect exchange among the community organizations,

their clients who are also voters and the elected officials (Marwell, 2004: 178). In this

way the non-political, non-profit groups in America also serve as the fulcrum through

which patronage resources are distributed and voters are organized.

Besides, particular political party’s control over specific types of civil society

organizations is evident in USA politics. For example, religion and religious groups have

always played an important role on politics and elections. In the 2004 Presidential

elections, it has been seen that the Churches though officially non-profit, non-political

organizations, have been used as an important mean to raise voter’s support for the

Republican candidates (The New York Times, June 13, 2004, October 26, 2004). In the

election, President Bush and Republican campaign officials cultivated conservative

leaders belonging to Evangelicals and other religious traditionalist from Mainland

Protestant and Catholics and sought to link their communities with the electoral machine

(Guth and others, 2006: 224). Despite of their non-partisan and tax-exempt status

churches in America are found actively involved in registering their members as voters,

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driving them to the polls, distributing bumper stickers and campaign materials and

inviting Republican speakers (New York Times, 9 August, 2004).

On the other hand, for long it was taken for granted that major votes from the

labor unions will go to the Democrats (Prewitt and other, 1991). Labor unions in USA

have completely subordinated themselves to the Democratic Party. In the same 2004

Presidential election when churches campaigned for the Republican candidate, the labor

unions contributed sixty five million dollars to the Democratic campaign (Arnowitz,

2005: 276-277). Naturally, the labors and their unions can hardly execute their different

demands for labor reform or minimum wage raise etc. under a Republican regime.

Not only in USA but in Great Britain the labor union members are found to be

bound to pay the Labor Party in the name of political levy. Political levy means the

contribution the labor union members pay to the union’s political fund separately or as

part of the normal union subscription2. Though each union member has the right to

personally contract out from paying such political levy, due to collective interest and his

personal interest from the union and its leader, can hardly come out from such obligation

to pay a political party. So through rules and norms, union members in Britain have been

found to be compelled to pay a part of their hard earned wages to the Labor Party, besides

their vote. In an old estimate, ninety percent income of the national headquarters of the

Labor Party comes from the trade union affiliation fees (Delury, 1983:1095). Under the

contemporary situation after Labor Party ran into debt in 2006, the contribution of the

trade unions have become vital. However, there is no guarantee that the labor party will

always go for policies that assure the interest of labors in the age of liberalization and

privatization.

                                                            2 Website of the Department for Business Enterprise & Regulatory Reform, http://www.dti.gov.uk/employment/employment-legistlation/emplyment-gudance/pa. access date 24 December, 2007.

84  

So the socio-political democratic environment that is considered to be the ideal for

the emergence of autonomous, vigorous CSOs face the same type of vertical political

controls directly or indirectly.

The situation becomes severe and distinct in developing countries where the

political institutionalization is in a low level, so is the capacity of the state. This chapter

compares the situation of that in -India, Philippines and Pakistan, and tries to relate with

the case of Bangladesh. All the four countries have colonial legacies; experience the

presence of strong kinship and clientelism, corruption in the social and political life and

they have multiplicity of registration and regulation laws (specially in South Asia). In all

four cases, donor policy to strengthen civil society has shown both success and failure

with ramifications. But they vary in their performance in achieving democracy, with India

often termed as world’s largest democracy while Pakistan as a failed democracy and

Philippines position is in the middle but more relevant to the situation in Bangladesh.

Political institutions have played different role in shaping the civil society and influencing

the nature of democracy. The comparative focus on other three developing democracies

demonstrates how political actors in different guise or form hold the actual control of the

civil society and democracy. This helps to proceed further with the analysis of political

structural influence that civil society of Bangladesh faces with in combination with other

factors.

3.2.1 Stable but Partly Illiberal Democracy-India

In comparison with the experience with other South Asian countries, democracy in

India has proved resilient (Hasan, 2002: 1). Since independence, there is a stable

parliamentary system of government. So far, 14 general elections for the lower house

followed by peaceful hand over of power, have been conducted. Though India lacks a

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homogenous population, an advanced industrial economy, high level of education, shared

civic culture—generally expected preconditions for democracy, democracy had been

endured and grown in the country since 1950s. The most important political institutions,

state and political parties are well institutionalized so are the Indian citizens politically

cultured. Such combination is said to have brought democratic stability in India (Hasan

2002). Though democratic, India remains a developing country with a poor human

development index and low literacy rate. Again the gap between the rich and poor, social

stratification, communalism, ethnic and religious violence all reflect the existence of

uncivil elements in the society. Zakaria (2003: 110-114) also mentions corruption,

control of the judiciary and taking opportunity of social divisions and went to extent to

term it an illiberal democracy. A common prediction is that the Indian National Congress

Party3 has been able to bond and bring unity among heterogeneity existing in the different

provinces that ultimately brought stability and democracy in India.

Among the prominent researchers on political parties in India, Chibber (1999),

terms the Indian democracy as a democracy without associations. His way of analysis

follows the Neo-Tocquevillean model. Naturally, he terms the associational life in India

as weak. The traditional associations like trade unions and student groups are often

directly linked to political parties. To him rural organizations are few and are outcome of

state policies and have no influence on rural or agricultural policy of the state. Though the

business organizations are large in number they are not the outgrowth of interest group

activity. There are strong informal caste organizations but Chibber (1999) do not consider

those as associations and have mentioned that other religious sects and associations have

stayed out of the electoral politics. He considers most of the civil society organizations in

India as adhoc—lacking bureaucratic organizations, with a tendency of excessive                                                             3 Present ruling party of India. Congress at the beginning of 20th century pioneered the movement against the British that brought independence to India in 1947. 

86  

multiplication and fragmentation. As the associations were weak, the Congress Party’s

links to social cleavages were constructed via the distribution of state resources rather

than by establishing links to associations of social groups. As Congress Party was not tied

with any association, it easily turned in to a catchall party (Chibber, 1999:58-62). Weak

associational life made room for patronage politics and provided the parties larger role in

Indian politics. So from a democratic liberal model the civil society situation in India is

not satisfactory and to some extent resembles with that of Bangladesh which is rather an

unstable democracy.

However, it also must be admitted that, Indian has associational culture long before

the Indian state came into being. The modern organizational forms began to emerge

around 1870s in form of social movements (such as Brahmo Samaj, Arya Samaj),

naturally they had political and social contents. Gandhism generated peaceful political

protest and independence movement. The Congress Party itself was a civil society

organization during the last half of the 19th century. It is only in 1980s and 1990s; India

saw the predominance of the non-political NGOs (Sen, 1993:11). And contemporary

researchers consider Indian civil society to be robust, occupying significant space in the

dynamic of political landscape of the country (Behar and Prakash: 2004). It is not only

religious philanthropy or charity organizations and development NGOs, but, Indian civil

society is rich in indigenous welfare organizations, cooperatives and they are supported

by research organizations formed and nurtured through local initiatives. Nonparty social

movements like Narmada Bachao Andolon, Chipko Movement, are also found at local

level of the society in different parts of the country. The identity movements, which often

turn violent and enter the political realm, in most cases originate in civil society arena.

Vibrancy in associational tradition was present in India before. The vibrancy is also found

today in different forms.

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Opposite of the coin, the same democratic India, posses very uncivil elements in

the civil society that had the strength to penetrate the society and control the state and

political power. A hierarchically ordered communal social organization named Rastriya

Swamsewak Sangh or National Volunteers Corps (RSS) through their social, cultural,

religious, military and political programs gathered massive support from the majority

Hindus in Northern India, resulting in electoral victories in several states for its political

wing—Baratiya Janata Party (BJP) which formed the national government in 1998. RSS

have formed its mass support and mobilized public opinion to their chauvinist aim,

mainly through building bonding capitals— through holding religious mass procession,

working through affiliated welfare groups in the guise of NGOs, consolidating Hindu

block vis a vis the minorities and developing a non-Indian identity for the Muslims, and

ultimately mobilizing their supporters to vote for BJP (Behar and Prakash, 2004: 211-

218). RSS can hardly be termed a civil society organization from its modern definition

nor just a political organization. Rather such uncivil force is termed as ‘dark side of civil

society’.

However, through a fully democratic process in the 2004 general election BJP lost

to Congress Party and Congress lead coalition formed the new government. In spite of it

communal and uncivil character the RSS respected the national consensus on democratic

and peaceful way of changing power and accepted the democratic rule of the political

game. A democratic culture has developed among the political actors that have brought

stability.

In a strong and stable democracy, the civil society is expected to be strong, vigilant.

However, the fact reveals that partially the civil society is politically controlled as shown

by Chibber, moreover, it contains uncivil forces. But at the same time, there are the

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presence of associational culture among the society and presence of autonomous non-

partisan civil society movements and NGOs working for social development.

Such civil society can hardly be given the major credit to the democratic stability in

India. Rather the political consensus that exists among the political actors may be

considered the main reason. On the other hand, civil society, in spite of historical tradition

of associations have turned weak, politicized and even communal due to the political

forces.

3.2.2 Elitist Democracy- The Philippines

The Philippines is well known for its vibrant civil society as well as for mass

democratic movements. However, democracy is yet to be institutionalized in the country.

Rather it is often termed as Elitist Democracy (Franco, 2004) or Undemocratic

Democracy (Rocamora, 2004: 1996) by the scholars. Elite domination in politics has

contributed to weak state and low level of effective political participation. Strong landed

capitalist and financial interests and other political rent-seekers have penetrated the

Philippine state and influenced the national and local government policies (Angeles,

2004:196). They enjoy monopolistic control over both coercive and economic resources

within given territorial jurisdictions. Corruption is rampant among the public officials that

have ranked the country 11th most corrupt nation by Transparency International (Quimpo,

2004: 2).

In contrast to India and even Bangladesh, the major political parties of The

Philippines are not well organized rather found under oligarchic control. Political parties

have been rather considered as vast national coalitions of local political organizations,

bound together by the vertical hierarchy of public offices and their rewards and social

hierarchy of wealth. Many parties in fact are just vehicles for presidential ambitions and

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turncoatism (Rocmora, 2004:207, 211). It is only the left that constitutes significant

organized political force resisting the rule of the oligarchic elite (Quimpo, 2004).

However, they are also divided, some times co-opted and have often reentered into

politics in the form of civil society to confront the state, mobilize the public and also

assist development.

In the absence of well organized, programmatic and national based political parties

in The Philippines and with the opportunity of the 1991 Local Government Code4 and the

Party List act 1995 (RA 7941)5, it is naturally expected that the civil society in The

Philippines shall come out in the front line as an important political actor (Kawanaka,

2002). The Philippines is reputed to have the world’s densest NGO network. Not only in

numbers but the vigor and scale of activities is also vast. Moreover, large group of NGO

coalitions do have actually entered electoral politics in here. However, the civil society

can hardly be termed successful in consolidating democracy or bringing political stability

in the country.

Mostly two broad formation of civil society are observed in The Philippines—

indigenous left based movement and foreign funded associations. Left based people’s

organization have been actively involved in the struggles for peasants issues, agrarian

reform, land grabbing, recognition of land titles, and land conversion besides their direct

moves for democracy. But in the process they have been found to be factionalized and

some sections became co-opted by the political elites. Foreign funded NGOs were meant

                                                            4 1991 Local Governmental Code (LGC) operationalized the provision for strengthening local autonomy through decentralization. It devolved power and resources to local government units at the provincial, city, municipal and barangay level and allowed for people’s participation in local government and development. Civil society groups saw the law as a real opportunity to influence the local political process. (Franco, 2004:115). 5 It is a complicated law that introduced proportional representation (Franco, 2004: 116). The law attracted or rather provided a legal opportunity for the civil society groups to enter electoral politics. The most glaring instances is the Akbayan political block formed by like minded civil society groups including the progressive development NGOs and also some factions of the left politicians.

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for advocacy work and were considered as non-partisan, which was opposite of the fact.

The two different formations of civil society groups have moved on simultaneously but

not in parallel way but through alignment and contestation. A distinct section of the

foreign funds receiving PO/NGOs were aligned to the left.

Since 1990s, the PO/NGOs have become increasingly assertive not only in

development effort but also in the democratization process acting as powerful interest

groups. Along with different left parties, the progressive NGO coalitions formed

themselves into Akabayan, as a loose non-party formation but acting as a precursor of a

party. Based on the party list law 1995, Akbayan began electoral politics (Rocamora,

2004:218; Quimpo, 2004: 7-8). A project for electoral movement of NGO community

was launched in 2001, where it was proposed that the NGO alliances and block shall

intervene in four ways—raising political awareness, lobbying for electoral reform,

developing people’s platform and giving actual support to specific candidates. However,

Quimpo (2004) consider such electoral movement of civil society as faulty as it became

divided and factious and has not been able to emerge as an important political force

against the corrupt politics and elite democracy. Fact is multi layered, fractious civil

society has been both bane and boon to democratization in Philippine. Civil society

interactions have helped to extend the reach of democratic rights and freedoms to

previously excluded populations and have expanded political competition. But

unintentionally they have also served to revive or reinforce anti-reform elite interest.

(Franco, 2004:127).

Moreover, though the civil society has entered electoral politics in The Philippines,

the capacity building and strengthening organizations at the grass-roots level are still in

their infancy. Their intervention are limited with low sustainability and marred by petty

politics (Angeles, 2004: 199).

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From the brief discussion, it becomes clear that, The Philippines is very rich in

different types of civil society organizations and enjoys strong network. Though such

civil society is successful in staging movements to topple down corrupt regimes it fails to

influence the state policies in day to day politics. In the absence of well organized and

competitive parties and with the introduction of new laws for widening people’s

presentation, civil society coalitions have entered the electoral politics and earned a

significant position in the political society. However such process is also not free from the

strong elite influence that have divided and factionalized the civil society. Moreover the

state is weak and also controlled by political elites and society is marred by nepotism,

patron-client relations, violence etc. So the relatively free, well networked and politically

advanced civil society in The Philippines, have a long way to go to contribute effectively

to change the brand—from elite democracy to liberal or participatory democracy. And

again, though not in the form of political party or national leaders but as oligarchs, the

elite community controls the nature and level of democracy and also the strength and

success of civil society in The Philippines. The civil society strength, network and

political environment of The Philippines in contrast to Bangladesh is in a much better

position however, from the consideration of democratic stability, both the countries face

all most similar types of unrest, upheavals and instability. Again the from the

consideration of the political actors, Philippine state, bureaucracy and society under the

Presidential system of government is controlled by the political elites while in case of

Bangladeshi parliamentary system, it is the political parties who control the prime power

of the state.

3.2.3 Failed Democracy- Pakistan

Pakistan is an instance of failed democracy among the modern nation states in the

developing world. All attempts for democratization since its independence in 1947 have

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failed and always the state power went back in the hands of the autocratic rulers. The

country had been under long spell of military rule with only a short period of

democratically elected governments (1988-1999) which were again scarred by instability,

corruption, misrule, political confrontation and regional violence. The political system

poorly differentiates between political democracy and autocratic rule. It is the feudal lords,

military generals and bureaucrats that form the political elite structure in Pakistan. They

may have apparent modernist outlook but too often have resisted measures such as

decentralization, accountability, media freedom, land reform and independence of the

judiciary (Malik, 1996: 681). Anti-pluralism and rigid administrative machinery have

contributed to the undemocratic development in Pakistan.

Political parties in Pakistan are ideologically and organizationally weak (Malik

1996) and never had been well-integrated to be able to mediate between the state and

society (Adeney, 2004:11). These parties remain desperate to maintain their traditional

bases of support, always under the domination of the old feudal and big business interests

(Shah, 2004:378). Alike the political parties of Bangladesh, political parties in Pakistan

prefer to engage in conflict, making use of populist political appeals for street agitation

tress passing the parliamentary norms. They are vulnerable to official manipulation and

are always accused of impotence and corruption by the central state authorities.

Lack of democracy and constitutionalism have also kept the various regional and

ethnic forces outside of the main stream politico-economic institution while often co-

opted and used by the state for political gains. The state policy is of imposing and

establishing one Pakistani identity than ensuring autonomy and pluralism. Naturally

under such centralized autocratic rule where political process is often suspended and

opposition is suppressed, civil society can hardly gain strength to influence political

change and democracy.

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Civil Society in Pakistan from consideration of the number of NGOs, associations

and voluntary groups, do not fall behind other developing countries, how ever, they are

mostly urban-based and are not spread across the country in a balanced way (Sattar and

Baig, 2001:6-7; Shah, 2004:367). Low levels of institutional development, weak

organizational skills, and poor internal transparency characterize most of the prominent

NGOs which are often foreign funded (Shah, 2004:367-68; Satter and Baig, 2001).

Membership is low for all types of organizations. Just like Bangladesh and India, there

exists multiplicity of registration laws. The nature of application of the law by the

authorities is more important than the nature of rigidness or flexibility in the rules

themselves. Unlike The Philippines, NGOs in Pakistan lack strong network and coalition

among themselves. While considering the case of Pakistan, local religious organizations

like madrasas, shrine, seminaries, jirgas need to be included in the mapping of civil

society, as these organizations are pretty large in number and have profound influence in

the society and politics in both positive (voluntarism) and negative (violence) ways. Such

civil society has failed to play any important role in promoting harmony among

multiplicity of religions, castes, ethnicities and cultures (Sattar and Baig, 2001). Overall

civil society participation and impact on state policies are insignificant. However, it has

been observed that the faith based organization have higher influence on government

policies than the NGOs and advocacy groups. Along with their alliance with national

security elites, religious groups, continue to restrict the socio-political space available to

weaker civil organization and often try to replace and subvert opponents in civil society.

Bangladesh is also a Muslim majority country like Pakistan and numbers of religious

groups- like Madrasa or charity groups are also not less. In the beginning of 2000s it has

experienced some religious militancy, however, they have not reached the strength or

position to win in their clashes with the secular and modern form of CSOs.

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Necessary political institutionalization and social flexibility for the development

of both vibrant and vigilant nature of civil society is absent in Pakistan. It is only the bar

association and the press who often unite, gain strength to protest violation of

constitutional norms. Moreover, in contrast to Bangladesh, civil society in Pakistan is

non-partisan (Shah, 2001:378, 386). In fear of losing autonomy, civil society groups

hardly collaborate with political parties. This has been further reinforced by the

depoliticization of the society by the military rulers. Moreover, these civil society

organizations both NGOs and advocacy groups partly depend on the state for their

economic survival. Far from resisting autocratic rule or altering the political system, large

section of this depoliticized civil society has taken the policy to derive privilege and

benefit from the authoritarian state. The civil society that avoids political parties to avoid

loosing autonomy, give up their independence and economic freedom to the state

apparatus. Civil society is rather embedded in the state via both cooptation and coercion.

During the short lived democratic regimes under the party rules in Pakistan(1988-

1999) civil society organizations did have some opportunity or space to act freely and

even protest against the party regimes (Shah,2004: 363, 371). Nevertheless, Shah (2004)

also have mentioned about the state-civil society friction during this period for example,

NGO Bill 1996 to control their activity, harassing the press etc. Relatively, the case of

Bangladesh shows a far better environment for civil society to function in. From 1990 to

2006 Bangladesh was free from Military interference in politics and political parties ruled

the state and politics through formal democratic rules, though not through genuine

democratic competition. However, here also, civil society has been found to be rather

politicized and co-opted. What is different is that, civil society is not co-opted by the state

apparatus but by the political parties who often use their governmental powers. From the

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instance of Bangladesh, the possibility of Pakistani civil society to emerge as a strong

political force under Democratic Party rule also remains under question.

3.2.4 Position of Bangladesh civil society and democracy in comparison to other Asian countries

From the discussion above it may be observed that in all cases, civil society to

some extent has been directly or indirectly controlled and co-opted by the political

powers, whether it may be the political parties, or political elites or the state (in case of

Pakistan) itself. But the nature of civil society and democracy has been found functioning

at different stages and level in these countries. Further discussion on Bangladesh in the

present chapter shall also point out the strong influence of the political parties in

determining the nature and strength of civil society as well as the type of democracy that

may be termed confrontational. Table 3.1 gives a simplified idea of the nature of

democracy and the strength of civil societies of four Asian courtiers having political

actors as the prime influencing factor.

In case of India, civil society has been used by the parties in both ways for

democracy and communalism. Congress Party emerged powerful in the absence of strong

civil society organizations pushing for important strategic policies while BJP came to

political power by using the civil society for motivating the voters with their communal

sentiments. Only a few environment movements have been able to show their

independent strength and confronted the state and political power. On the other hand, in

The Philippines, a strong network may be observed among civil society groups which has

reached the extent to form political blocks, joined by left politicians and has entered

electoral politics.

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Table 3.1 Comparative table showing democracy and civil society level in four countries Countries Nature of

Democracy Vigilant Nature of Civil Society Prime Influencing Factors

India Stable but partly illiberal

Partially vigilant, partially politicized, partially uncivil

Political Party and uncivil forces

The Philippines Elite dominated Politically active with strong network but divided

Political elites-land owners, business class

Bangladesh Confrontational Less participatory, politicized and polarized

Political parties and political leaders

Pakistan Failed Weak and fragile Military rulers using state apparatus

However, they have also been found to be factious and influenced by political oligarchs,

thus yet to overcome the elite democracy.

In case of Pakistan it is the military state that has controlled the development and

nature of action of the civil society which never gained the strength to fight for

democracy. Bangladesh also shows the strong influences of political parties upon the

society where the citizens and civil society groups have become co-opted and divided and

acting for the political end of these parties. Though apparently, the country has a

parliamentary system of democracy with numerous civil society organizations active at

both local and national level. Based on the discussion on the nature of civil society,

democracy of the four countries it may be possible to draw to a simplified two

dimensional figure, where the political actors determine the level of democracy and the

strength of civil society in influencing the state and national policy.

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Figure 3.1 Model for Comparison (Political actors ultimately defines the level of democracy and the strength of civil society

The simplified figure gives us an idea of the position of Bangladesh in comparison

to other countries. It is in a much better condition than Pakistan in contrast to democracy

and civil society but after India and Philippines. Though the vigilant nature of Philippino

civil society is in a better position than India, from consideration of its democratic aspect

it is placed under the India. It is the political actors who have ultimately defined the

position of each country. If we consult the situation with the rating of Freedom House6

then we may find the same type of variation among the four countries (table 3.2).

Table 3.2 Freedom House rating for four countries in 2006

Score indicator India The Philippines Bangladesh Pakistan

Political Rights Score 2 3 4 6

Civil Liberties Right 3 3 4 5

Status Free Partly free Partly Free Not Free

**The rating is done on a scale from 1 to 7 where, 1 means highest degree of freedom and civil liberties and 7 means least degree of freedom and civil liberties. Source: Freedom house website http://www.freedomhouse.org/template.cfm?page=1, internet access 25th November, 2007.7

                                                            6 Freedom house website http://www.freedomhouse.org/template.cfm?page=1,  internet access 25th November, 2007.

7 The methodology of the freedom house survey is grounded in basic standards of political rights and civil liberties, derived in large measure from relevant portions of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

 

Stable

Democracy

India

Philippine 

Bangladesh

Pakistan

Weak Vigilant Civil Society Unstable

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The rating is based on the interplay of both governmental and nongovernmental

actors upon the political rights and civil liberties of the citizens of each country.

Democracy and civil society is concerned with both these political rights and civil

liberties and the rating do support the position of each country made in the comparative

figure. India has been termed free and its political rights as 2 that reflects the stable

democracy, the country posses, on the other hand, the civil liberties of India and that of

partly free Philippine is same (3), this refers to the almost same status of the citizens and

CSOs in performing their actions. The weak state and powerful political elites have

caused political rights of The Philippines to come down to 3. The rating for Pakistan

reflects the failed democracy and weak civil society as shown in table 3.1. and figure 3.1.

Bangladesh’s position from the point of political rights and also civil liberties is lower

than both India and Philippines. This naturally refer that the space for the civil society to

act independently and participate in government actions and influence policies is limited.

Despite the fact, Bangladesh is formally a democratic country with a constitution

that provides all the necessary civil freedom and political rights to its citizens. A better

idea of the nature and strength of civil society in Bangladesh, in relation to democracy,

may be understood, through a detailed analysis of its vibrant and vigilant nature tracing

the most important influencing factors to such attributes. The following section focuses

on the contemporary civil society and political situation in Bangladesh to reach to a better

                                                                                                                                                                                  These standards apply to all countries and territories, irrespective of geographical location, ethnic or religious composition, or level of economic development. The survey operates from the assumption that freedom for all peoples is best achieved in liberal democratic societies. The survey does not rate governments or government performance per se, but rather the real-world rights and social freedoms enjoyed by individuals. Freedoms can be affected by state actions, as well as by non state actors, including insurgents and other armed groups. Thus, the survey ratings generally reflect the interplay of a variety of actors, both governmental and nongovernmental (http://www.freedomhouse.org/template.cfm?page=351&ana_page=298&year=2006).

 

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understanding of the critical arguments made for the present research in the introduction

chapter.

3.3 Bangladesh Civil Society from Vibrant and Vigilant Perspective

The focus of the thesis is the civil society of Bangladesh, particularly in relation to

politics. The present section shall focus on the civil society both from its vibrant and

vigilant nature and in the perspective of the contemporary political situation in

Bangladesh.

3.3.1 Level of Vibrancy of Civil Society in Bangladesh

As discussed in the introduction chapter, Bangladesh civil society have been

termed relatively vibrant in contrast to other developing Asian countries from

consideration of density, activeness and its success so far in poverty alleviation and social

development. As mentioned before, in 2004 a rough estimate of registered civil society

organizations in Bangladesh was 259774 excluding the professional organizations,

religious groups and all informal, unregistered groups and associations. According to

another survey on non-profit groups in Bangladesh in 1997 the total number of such

organizations was 206142 8 excluding cooperatives but including religious groups.

Though these numbers are not comparable, this gives an idea of how the number of civil

society organizations in Bangladesh has increased (about 50,000 CSOs) in only five years

period. The number of such organizations and their nature of increase refer to an

associational culture in Bangladesh9. However, all these organizations may not be found

                                                            8 Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics, Survey of Non-profit Organization in Bangladesh, 1996-97, Dhaka 1999 9 If the statistics of informal or unregistered organizations were available then the number would increase in a higher rate. This is because the culture or trend of forming groups in Bangladesh is not only common among the urban middle class, but also among the people living in lower social stratification and among villagers. There may not be well organized neighborhood associations like Japan (chyonaikai), but in Bangladesh, in every village there are small societies formed by all the dwellers of the village, or a section of the village and led by the village head or local elite (elected member of the council or school teacher,

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active in the same pace. In a poverty ridden and disaster prone country like Bangladesh,

where the state have failed to provide the necessary social security to all its citizens,

naturally most of the CSOs are social welfare based, trying to solve the social and

materialistic needs in a private way or in cooperation with the state agencies. Such trend

of the civil society inspired the way for well organized NGOs and cooperatives, welfare

groups and so on. Density of such CSOs and success of the NGO sector gives Bangladesh

civil society a vibrant outlook. With the help of such initiatives of domestic and

international NGOs, the poor, uneducated, unaware rural inhabitants of Bangladesh have

gained economic empowerment to some extent, have learned to read and right and have

become aware about sanitation, health and social rights. Naturally this must be considered

as a progress for rural citizens of Bangladesh. It may be stated that, where there was

nothing, at least now there is something. Such welfare base success of the civil society in

Bangladesh attracts publicity and world recognition. It must be remembered that this is

just one side of the civil society function that have shown success which is termed as

vibrancy of civil society. Such vibrant nature of civil society organizations can be

explained mainly from three perspectives—Philanthropy culture, Donor Policy, Simple

registration process.

3.3.1.1 Philanthropy Culture

The existence of voluntary action, deepened through natural disaster and war have

contributed to the large size of welfare NGOs in Bangladesh and their service providing

character. The tradition of charity and voluntarism is deep rooted in the religious and

social culture of Bangladesh. Even today the family holds the primary responsibility for

kin in need (Robinson 1989: 391). Such trend is common in both the two prominent

                                                                                                                                                                                  Imam [prayer leader] of the Mosque etc.). These  informal Societies (shomaj) have full control over the social life of the dwellers living within their domain and often perform small arbitrations. Besides in the new urban areas neighborhood associations are also growing, however, they are often not registered.

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religions—Islam and Hinduism, in Bangladesh. Poverty and natural disaster also have

played a big role in encouraging voluntarism and proliferation of service based private

organizations. In Bangladesh 40% people live under poverty line and among them 25%

have been identified as extreme poor by DFID (Daily Star, June27, 2006). Naturally the

state alone cannot do for them. As Bangladesh is a delta, every year a good portion of the

country is inundated by flood. Besides, cyclone and hurricane often blow over the costal

belt. The modern NGO sector can trace its origins to two key events-the 1970 devastating

cyclone that left over half a million people dead and 1971 war of Independence (Goon,

2002: 142). Not only foreign aided NGOs but formal and informal community based

groups show their strength during emergency floods and disasters, as often the

government and NGO assistance are delayed (Stiles, 2002: 55)10.

3.3.1.2 Donor Policy

Developing countries rely on donor aid and loan for economic mobilization and

development. Donor policy and directions have profound impact on the economy, politics

and also civil society in a third world country. Since 1980s, International donors have

begun to cooperate with NGOs, by passing the government on issues like, social

development, health, educations etc. During 1990s, such civil societies have been targeted

by Western International development agencies with the aim to generate development and

consolidate democracy. This had an impact on their aid distribution and instructions to the

state and NGOs (Lewis 2004, Stiles 2002, White 1999). A substantial portion of

International aid money has been air marked for development of civil society (Alagappa,

2004:4; Hulme and Edward 1997: 7; Stiles, 2002:1).

                                                            10 The culture of Bangladesh, specially the vertical trend in social relationship has also deep negative effect on the strength of civil society. Discussion on such aspect will come later in relation to the vigilant nature of the civil society.

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Figure 3.2 Rise of NGOs receiving foreign funds since 1990s in Bangladesh

(Based on the statistics provided by the NGO Affairs Bureau Website http://www.ngoab.gov.bd/, on 3rd December, 2007)11

Since the 1990s with change in donor policy to assist NGOs, Bangladesh has seen

a mushrooming growth in its NGO sector. If we consider the statistics of only those

NGOs receiving foreign funds and registered with the NGO Affairs Bureau in Bangladesh,

then we may observe a constant high rise in the number of NGOs both local and foreign

since the 1990s. It has become more than 5 times higher than it was in 1990 (Figure 3.2).

The number of NGOs who enter into subcontract with big NGOs for implementing the

large development projects has also proliferated. Such indirect foreign funding is

sometimes considered as a lucrative opportunity to collect resources for these NGOs. In

the fiscal 2004-05, foreign assistant covered 15% of the national budget (113.3 Billion

Taka). Among this 113.3 Billion Taka, 13.7% (15.6 Billion Taka 12 ) was disbursed

through the NGO Affairs Bureau.

                                                            11 In Bangladesh the financial year begins on July and ends at June (the next year). 12 1 UD $ = 68 BD Taka (According to Yahoo Currency converter http;//finance.yahoo.com/currency? On May 15 2007.

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Figure 3.3 Flow of foreign grant through NGO Affairs Bureau in Bangladesh

(Based on the statistics provided by the NGO Affairs Bureau Website http://www.ngoab.gov.bd/, on 3rd December, 2007) 13

If we consider the flow of money, again, dramatic development may be observed, while

in 1990-91 the amount was only 106 million US $, it proliferated up to 323 Million US

$ in 2005 (Figure3.3). Such flow of foreign funds also had indirect influence in the rise of

other CSOs related to social welfare who do not directly receive foreign funds. In the

present research, a steady rise since 1990s has been found among the sample of CSOs

surveyed. Figure 3.4 shows the year of establishment of the CSOs.

                                                            13 In Bangladesh the financial year begins on July and ends at June (the next year).  

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Figure 3.4 Y ear of establishment of civil society organizations   

 

 N= 504, No Answer rate=1 (0.2%)

According to Governance Report 2006 (BRAC, 2006: 94), between 1995 to 2000

the proportion of rural communities with at least one NGO program doubled. There is

now an average of 15 NGOs or NGO branch offices in each sub-district across the

country. Such NGO activities are overwhelmingly micro-credit programs with education

and family planning14.

                                                            

14 Drawbacks: Foreign donors have prioritized social welfare, economic development and other service providing objectives for the NGO projects they finance. Naturally, most organizations grew here with such purposes of social welfare rather than for asserting citizen and human rights and for advocacy. Recently, few organizations have adopted right based advocacy projects as instructed by good governance agenda (Lewis, 2004:310), but are facing pressure from other actors in the political system. Critiques on foreign aid have pointed out that aid dependency and gradual privatization have enhanced political patronage and corruption (Sobhan, 1996:16). Sobhan (2004: 15) have also termed the foreign funded NGOs as aid contractors. Heavy dependence on external aid is compromising NGOs’ role as social mobilizers and advocate of the poor. Moreover, researchers have revealed different drawbacks and immature development through the welfare projects of such NGOs. They have mentioned the problems of commercialization of micro-credit, low level of education, inadequate leadership training, lack of independence among the credit groups from the NGOs etc. (Tasnim, 2005b: 92, 175, 177; Quadir 1999: 213; Ullah and Routery, 2003: 118; IOB, 1998: 251). Though there has been a good affluence of NGOs due to donor policies it has been found that they have not been able to provide further teachings, group networks and better autonomy to civil society that are necessary to contribute effectively to good citizenry, politics and democracy. Four basic impediments have been identified in this connection. First is the donor policy based on Western theory and experience, the second is the influence of the local elites and vertical norms upon the NGOs, the third is the

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3.3.1.3 Registration System

Constitutional rights and State Law for association formation and regulation has

been considered as an important determinate in the nature and shape of civil society in

any country. The constitution of Bangladesh guarantees the fundamental freedom to

assemble, participate in public meetings and processions (article 37), freedom to form

associations (article 38) and also the freedom of thought and conscience and freedom of

speech (article 39). Therefore, constitutionally, the basic rights for forming and

functioning of civil society organizations are well established in Bangladesh. The legal

framework for civil society organizations (CSO) in Bangladesh is based on a set of old

and new laws for incorporation, management structure, responsibilities and liabilities, and

regulations. There are diverse registration options and no harmonized non-profit

legislation procedure. Two distinct sets of laws in Bangladesh pertain to nonprofit

organizations. One set of laws concerns the formation of nonprofit organizations, among

them the most important are Societies Registration Act 1860, the Trusts Act 1882,

Voluntary Social Welfare Agencies (Registration) Ordinance 1961, and the Companies

Act 1994. The other set of laws regulates these organizations such as the Volunteer Social

Welfare Agencies (control) Ordinance 1961, the Foreign Donations (Voluntary

Activities) Regulation Ordinance 1978, the Foreign Contribution (Regulation) Ordinance

1982 (Khair and Khan, 2004:53-55). The NGO Affairs Bureau has also been established

in 1989 to facilitate the process of bringing foreign funds in a simpler way.

In addition to these laws, there are particular laws for certain category of civil

society organizations under the authority of concerned ministries. For example, all the

cooperatives are established according to the rules of Cooperative Act 1984 and 2001 and

                                                                                                                                                                                  politicization and bureaucratization of NGOs, and lastly, the neglect towards the local collectivity and voluntarism in the development policy (Tasnim 2007:176).

 

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registered under the Ministry of Local Government, Rural Development and

Cooperatives15. Trade Unions are formed, under the Industrial Relations Ordinance of

1969, registered with the Ministry of Labor in Bangladesh 16. Most of the registered

professional organizations are officially formed under the rules of the concerned

institutions and ministries.

Though it seems that there are a web of laws and regulations upon the civil society

in Bangladesh, practically, they are not unified and harmonized, this variety of law rather

ensure less government control and provides better independence to the non-profit and

philanthropy organizations. This has inspired a good number of social groups to register.

The conditions for forming groups and register in Bangladesh seem to be much easier

than that in Japan or other developed countries. It is the application of the law that is more

important to consider in the case of Bangladesh. The loopholes and archaic nature of the

laws often provide the opportunity to misuse those by both the government administrators

as well as the NGOs17.

                                                            15 Cooperative Law 2001 and Cooperative Rules 2004, collected from the office of the Joint Registrar Directorate of Rural Development and Cooperatives, Rajshahi Division. 16 Bangladesh Institute of Labor Studies website http://www.bils-bd.org/labour_law.html access date 23 June, 2007. 17 Although, existing laws and procedures seek to protect the public from abuse, registration officials exploit their positions to take advantage from those rules (Kair and Khan, 2005: 66). Moreover, with some controversial provision and rules prepared through circular for NGOs registered with NGO Affairs Bureau, the government can often impose its control on NGO activities and in sanctioning their foreign funds. For example, a circulation mentions that, ‘no such project would be approved if it offends the feelings of the people of any religion, had adverse effects in the culture and values of the country or if the project is based on a political programme’ (Ahmed, 2000: 389). The interpretation of such rule may be made in different ways. Often, social welfare and civic education programs of certain NGOs are identified as political or anti-cultural and accordingly prosecuted by the government when it thinks that NGO programs are serving against the political interest of the ruling party. After the 2001, general election, certain NGOs had been black listed by the government. These NGOs had experienced administrative harassment, even arrests of employee and executives and also blockade of foreign funds (Hossain 2006: 242-245). On the other hand, NGOs have also been accused of misusing the provisions (Ahmed, 2000) of the laws and taking opportunity of the weak man power of the NGO Affairs Bureau (Nobusue, 2002:46) and their strong backing from the donor agencies. For example according to Foreign Donations Regulations Law 1978, section 3(1), NGOs must receive state approval before accepting and spending foreign grants. Yet, another law named Exchange Control Regulation Act 1947, allows any person or organization to bring any amount of foreign currency into Bangladesh. Such dual, system has provided NGOs the opportunity to bring foreign money with out the knowledge of the government. Moreover, while 1860 Registration Act restricts societies to engage in business functions, the 1961 Ordinance allows organizations to gain profit in-order to create jobs. At present, both the Laws apply to same types of civil society organizations. As a consequence some large

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Rules and regulations are not strict but often used and selectively applied for the

interest of powerful sides whether it is the government or the big NGOs. Besides, civil

society does not consists only of big NGOs; there are other professional groups, small

NGOs, welfare groups, clubs, labor unions and cooperatives. Over all performance of the

civil society in Bangladesh has been found to be weak in relation to politics and

democracy. In this context, the present study identifies more powerful institutional

influence upon the civil society in Bangladesh, from political parties through their vertical

relation with the CSOs and their leaders. The following section of the chapter shall

explore the relation between civil society and politics from this aspect.

3.3.2 Level of Vigilance of Civil Society in Bangladesh

Civil society from its vigilant aspect is to be more concerned with interest

articulation, influencing policies, making demands, advocating for certain interest and

brining accountability to the government. These require civil society to come in more

interaction with the government upholding their autonomy, engage in more advocacy,

political educational activities and form strong network among themselves. From these

aspects, the CSOs in Bangladesh may be considered weak. As it has been mentioned in

introduction and literature review that network among the civil society organizations are

not strong, they hardly are able to influence policies and often work for the status-quo

than the people they represent18. From different perspective performance of civil society

                                                                                                                                                                                  NGOs in Bangladesh have flourished simultaneously as service providing and profit oriented organizations. Due to the loopholes in the regulations, the state is also deprived of large amount of tax (Ahmed, 2000: 385-386). Besides, researchers have found that NGO Affairs Bureau is far from strong enough to keep full control over all the NGOs. Even, after audit and inspection, if a complaint is lodged against an NGO virtually no appropriate actions are taken. Owing to the strong support for NGOs by their donors, the state has had to refrain from its desire to cancel the registration of a number of NGOs and had to even change the head of the NGO Affairs Bureau, who had appeared tough with those that had indulged in regulation at the beginning of 1990s (Hashemi, 1995). On the other hand, the officials of the NGO Affairs Bureau have been accused of corruption. 18 However, such comments of the about the civil society organizations are only based on few observation and reports, not based on any empirical investigation or intensive survey. The present thesis in its chapter 4

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in Bangladesh from vigilant aspect is not satisfactory. Answer to the weakness may be

found in the discussion on the contemporary political situation of Bangladesh, the party

rule and also to some extent in the history and vertical culture of Bangladesh.

3.3.2.1 Confrontational Democracy in Bangladesh

After a successful mass movement against the autocratic military regime in 1990,

parliamentary system of government had been reintroduced in Bangladesh. However, in

2006 that is after 15 years, democracy is yet to be consolidated in Bangladesh. Rather

behind the façade of democracy, exists, instability, weak political institutions, patrimonial

politics, personalized political parties, patron-client relation and absence of political

consensus (Kochanek, 2000: 530). Researchers and scholars have termed such democracy

rather partial or quasi-liberal or illiberal democracy (Kochanek, 2000; Hossian,2000;

Zafarullah, 2003). They have pointed out the personalistic rule of the political leaders of

two major parties and the existing confrontation among them, as well as the mentality of

playing zero-sum game in politics. During this democratic era (1990-2006), political

legitimacy rested on free and fair elections. However, democratic rule in Bangladesh had

been subverted by the majoritarianism of the winning party (or the coalition) and as well

as by the pique of the losing party (Zafarullah, 2003:288).

During the 1990s the major political blocks had become divided over conflicting

definitions of Bangladeshi identity, national heroes and liberation war symbols

(Kochanek, 2000:531). Such division did not remain confined within the political elites

but have influenced all social groups willingly or unwillingly. This division had become

compounded when dynastic political leaders of the two major parties engaged in bitter,

personal struggle to restore their patrimonial right to control over the state and polarized

the whole nation. Ultimately such polarization has been used for political expedience that                                                                                                                                                                                   and 5 investigate with mostly primary and secondary data into the matter and try to point out the causes for such weak nature of vigilance of the civil society organizations.

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affected the democratic growth of civil society. This was just the opposite to democratic

culture that was expected to develop through the reintroduction of democracy in 1990.

At the administration level, during this period, political factors often determined

the choice of people for key position in the governmental hierarchy, while personnel were

shuffled within the civil service and statuary bodies according to partisan agendas. Public

Policy domain has always been bureaucratized or maneuvered by the ruling party dictates

to serve vested political and economic interest. There is very little scope for the policy

networks integrating state and advocacy coalition (Zafarullah, 2003:285). Intrusion of

civil society into policy arena is looked on suspiciously.

Civil society organizations were discriminated based on their links to ruling party

or the opponents, and educational institutions, especially universities and colleges, had

been used by the major political parties to further their political objective. The press and

private electronic media were relatively free but each news paper had tilt to either side of

the political coalitions and often the private television channels were owned by the

political business magnets.

Though democratic, practically no regime have provided the enough space and

showed responsiveness to the participation of civil society organizations in Bangladesh.

The law, society, donor initiative, social tradition has led to the proliferation of civil

society organizations. However, confrontational politics played by the two major political

parties through the instruments of clientelism, patronage, nepotism corruption, violence

have co-opted, politicized, weakened and polarized the civil society groups and

undermined their ability to participate in political process, contribute to governance and

democracy.

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In a nutshell it may be agreed that, with the retreat of the army and subordination

of the bureaucracy, Bangladesh had entered Partyarchy19 (Governance Report 2006:20).

The winning party enjoys monopoly of power for the duration of their electoral term,

political decision making power centers around the Prime Minister’s office (the Prime

Minister herself and her closest political advisors). The society and civil society are

politicized according to political line. And such party-society relation is based on

clientelistic incorporation. The features are common in rule of either of two major

political parties and their coalitions who are constantly confronting each other.

3.3.2.2 Elite Composition-Politics and Civil Society

A brief introduction to the socio-political status of the political elites as well as

civil society elites may provide a clear picture of the democracy, politics and civil society

in Bangladesh. The four main actors in Bangladesh politics are the Political leaders,

bureaucrats, military and rural land owners.

Table 3.3 Professions of parliament members 1973 to 2001

Year Business Lawyers Landowners Politicians Other Total

1973 24 27 15 13 23 102*

1991 61 18 6 10 5 100

1996 49 19 10 7 15 100

2001 60 12 7 3 18 100

Source : State and Governance in Bangladesh. 2006. Dhaka: BRAC, page 14. *Due to round figure percentage, total did not add up to 100%. Table 3.3. shows the percentage of parliament members belonging to different

occupations in the year 1973 that is just after independence of Bangladesh and 1991—

beginning of the democratic age and also of 1996, 2001. The table shows a clear entrance

of the rich business class in politics and decline of the politics of the landholders and

                                                            19 A democratic political system in which political parties monopolize the formal political process and politicize society along party line (Coppedge: 1994:18), discussed in details in chapter five.

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lawyers. So the recent development among the political elites is the entrance of the

business class besides the politicians. Retired civil servants and high ranking army

officials have also entered the electoral politics, who also consider themselves as

businessmen (Maniruzzaman, 1994:151).

3.3.2.2.1 Civil Society Elites

Civil society in Bangladesh is rich in associations and group working both at the

local and national level. However, all civil society organizations, working at different

geographic level don’t have same power, influence, connection, or network, nor do they

receive same type of attention from the other actors in society and political system. Civil

society consists of elite and non-elite civil society groups. Naturally, intellectuals, large

development NGOs, apex organizations and their leaders form the elite section of civil

society. At national level, active civil society elites are group of intellectuals related to

the think tanks and citizens groups– like, Centre for Policy Dialogue or shujon (good

citizens), democracy watch, FEMA; different advocacy organizations like human rights

groups, environment groups formed mainly by lawyers practicing at the capital and

divisional towns; leaders or chairman of the Large NGOs like Grameen Bank

(Muhammad Yunus), BRAC (Fazle Hasan Abed), Proshika (Kazi Faruque Ahmed). As,

mentioned before business men are important force in Bangladesh politics and naturally

their national apex associations like Federation of Bangladesh Chambers of Commerce

and Industries (FBCCI) receive important attention from the government and political

parties. Moreover, the leaders of the apex organizations of trade unions and other

professional groups also emerge as powerful actors influencing the state and being

influenced by the political elites.

Both tension and cooperation exists among the different groups of civil society

actors active at the national level. However, the network among these actors is rather

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weak and factious. Apex body of each group is divided along party line albeit having

strong links to higher ups within the government, bureaucracy and political parties. In

case of large development NGOs powerful connection are also maintained with the

foreign donors. Nevertheless, in all cases, the relation is not as equal partners or

honorable stake holders or interest groups but in a vertical manner, where the civil society

leaders are considered as the less powerful and placed in a lower position and the

politicians, administrators and donors as the powerful, located in a higher position.

Furthermore, though the development NGOs are considered as apolitical and pro-market

and horizontally organized, the relationship between larger and smaller NGOs is more

like particularistic patron-client ties. Smaller local NGOs may receive funding through, or

on the recommendation of, or as a result of advice from, larger NGOs; and this

relationship may continue with broader ties of reciprocal but unequal exchange (White

1999: 314).

Elite presence may also be observed, among the civil society organization

working at the local level where their number is vast. Local civil society elite group is

rather a combination of NGOs active in the local area and rural elites who often are

landlords or businessmen. The local elites may also have membership in the local council.

While the NGOs at present are very much aligned with the local status-quo, the local

elites are again entangled in a reciprocal but vertical relation with political elites and

administration. They are the brokers between the urban political leaders and poor

villagers. NGOs specially those having development projects with foreign funds enjoys

an important position among the community and also administrators as they bring

resources to the area. On the other hand, local clubs and cooperatives are either

dominated by the political elites or their supporter and musclemen. Thus they become

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powerless and have no effect on the local administration, even if they may have upon the

community.

3.3.2.3 Internal Characteristics of Civil Society Organizations

After understanding identity of civil society elites, it is important to understand

how is the internal situation of CSOs in Bangladesh. Civil society organizations are here

of different types, so this sections will try to give general idea about the leader member

relationship of the most common types of civil society organizations.

Well known CSOs are the development NGOs working at the rural level of

Bangladesh having their head quarters at Dhaka or a metropolitan city. These NGOs act

as the service provider and micro-credit giver and collector to their beneficiaries. The

beneficiary groups and their members formed by these NGO are not regarded as member

of the NGOs but as beneficiaries or service receivers and NGO field worker acts in most

cases as office representative or banker to them. In a report on the internal governance of

the NGOs conducted by the Transparency International Bangladesh20 a few hard facts

about the internal situation of the NGOs have been revealed. The governing bodies are

formed by relatives of the executive officer, such members just attend meetings but never

visit NGOs, and beneficiaries are hardly included in the governing board. In case of

governance, the executive head often takes decisions unilaterally. NGO has no

accountability to the other officers and workers as well as the beneficiaries on matters of

financial management. Often NGOs are very rigid in providing information about their

                                                            20 Problems of Governance in the NGO Sector : The Way Out, Transparency International Bangladesh, October , 2007, on http://www.ti-bangladesh.org/research/NGO_Study_Report_Full_Draft.pdf, internet access, 13th November, 2007.

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organization to the public21. Besides, NGOs are involved in bribing the government

officers and they themselves are also corrupt22.

It is not only NGOs but at the rural level there are cooperative and small local

clubs. Here in the case of cooperatives, they are organized and often controlled by the

BRDB officials. Elections are regularly held for the central cooperative committee;

however, the BRDB officers conduct the process. This happens mostly in the case of

cooperatives formed by very poor farmers or destitute women who hardly understand the

whole system and are more interested in receiving the loans. In case of cooperatives for

landed farmers and small businessmen, members are more concerned about the system. In

this case, the leaders of the cooperatives with the help of the cooperative officer or a local

political leader try to keep his own control over the loan and savings of the cooperatives

and distribution of the loan. Cooperative members have not yet gained independency of

managing their groups by themselves. This is partly due to their ignorance and partly due

to the all controlling attitude of the leader. The same comments may be made about the

beneficiary group or micro-credit groups formed by the NGOs.

In case of local clubs and welfare groups, the situation differs from group to group.

There may be a few well organized clubs holding elections regularly and taking decisions

unanimously. However, more common is that these organizations run by a permanent

committee where there is hardly any rotation in the posts of chairman and members. So

internal environment of the group, solely depends on the organizing skill or wish of the

leader. Often leaders of such clubs are the local elites or their sons. In most cases the

                                                            21 The present researcher herself and other surveyors also had faced such problems while trying to interview the NGOs and collect more information from those organizations. 22 Corruption is (i) a hidden violation of a contract that, implicitly, states a delegation of responsibility and the exercise of some discretionary power, (ii) by a public agent (the bribee) who, against the interests or preferences of the principal (its public organization) (iii) acts in favor of a third part (the briber) from which he receives a reward (the bribe). The resources exchanged can be various: the gain can be a direct or indirect one, it can involve money but also other utilities and services, the exchange of commodities may be simultaneous or delayed, the value of goods may also differ (della Porta and Vannucci 1999, 16).  

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rural local elites belong to either of the two national political coalitions. Reflection of

such political support is found in the club’s activities.

In case of professional groups, interest groups and citizens association as well as

labor unions at the urban and meso level, elections are held regularly and the process

takes place so far in a democratic way. But often it becomes political. During elections

different panels of candidates contest and each panel represent each major political party.

This means that organization members are all divided into different blocks supporting a

political party or coalition. Naturally the panel that are elected to the executive committee

works for only those who voted for them and acts as the representative of the political

party it supports and introduce party ideology and agenda within the organization. In case

of, labor unions the circumstances are more complicated as the union leaders often act as

the muscle man for the political leaders and use violent means to negotiate with the

authorities and some times even misappropriate wages of the regular labors in name of

membership dues.

From our discussion on the internal relationship of CSOs there are hints of

corruption, nepotism, non-democratic mentality, clientelistic attitude23 and politicizations.

As the organizational structure and performance style of the CSOs are not horizontal or

democratic it has a high possibility to be influenced by the vertical social relations and

confrontational political atmosphere. Question arises how participatory can these civil

society be to earn a vigilant role in strengthening democracy. Further investigation into

                                                            23 Patron-client relationships are based on direct, face-to-face encounters between individual elites and poor people and are characterized by little or no formal structure. They may be explained as an exchange of relations between roles; a special case of two persons' ties involving a large instrumental friendship in which an individual of higher socio-economic status (patron) uses his own influence and resources to provide protection and/or benefits to a person of lower status (client) who, for his part, reciprocates by offering general support and assistance, including personal services, to the patrons (Scott 1972, 178). Through out this thesis, patron-client relation and clientelism has been alternatively used implicating same meaning.

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their nature of civil society activities has become essential to understand their democratic

potentiality.

Moreover, better understanding about the nature of political party and civil

society relation is essential as national politics has often direct contribution in forming

factions within the organizations and their nature of functioning. Before entering into

such discussion, an introduction to the contemporary party system of Bangladesh is

necessary to understand the circumstances.

3.3.2.4 Political Party System in Bangladesh

Since last half of the twentieth century we may observe a steady growth of rich

literatures on Political Parties-their types, system, organization (Duverger, 1978,

Kirchheimer, 1966, Lapalombara 1966, Sartori 1976, Panebianco, 1988, Gunther and

Diamond, 2003,). The nature and performance of political parties in Bangladesh are

transforming and often partially fit in and sometimes differ from established

classifications developed by experts on political party.

From the consideration of political opportunity structure, nature and performance

of civil society and level of democracy has been mostly influenced by the character and

activities of political parties in contemporary Bangladesh. Along with strong influence of

culture, autocratic rule and of course donor policies, and formal institutions of laws, it is

the political parties that have played an important role in shaping participatory nature of

civil society and style of its political involvement.

Bangladesh politics in the first 18 years of its independence have faced

government turnovers and military coups d’etats with no party competition. So there was

a monopoly of a section of politicians, bureaucrats, military and their parties. Insecure

political and economic institutions led the political parties to use patronage and

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clientelism to build and maintain organizational base. After the end of the autocratic rule

in 1990 and reintroduction of parliamentary system of government, a competitive but

confrontational party system may be observed in Bangladesh. Results of the

parliamentary election of 1991, 1996 and 2001 indicated that the party system has moved

towards a de facto two party system (Table 3.3.).

Table 3.4 Percentage of share of seats and votes secured by parties in general elections

Political Parties 1973 1979 1986 1988 1991 1996 2001

AL 97.7 13.0 25.3 - 29.3 48.7 19 Seat (%)

73.2 24.5 26.2 - 30.1 37.4 40.1 Vote (%)

BNP - 69 - - 46.7 38.7 65 Seat (%)

- 41.2 - - 30.8 33.6 41 Vote (%)

Jatiya Party - - 51 83.7 11.7 10.7 1.3 Seat (%)

- - 42.3 68.4 11.9 16.4 1.1 Vote (%)

Jamat Islami Bangladesh

- 6.7 3.3 - 6 1 5.6 Seat (%)

- 10.1 4.6 - 12.1 8.6 4.3 Vote (%)

Other Parties 0.6 6 9.7 8 5.3 0.6 6.3 Seat (%)

21.5 14 10.6 18 10.7 2.9 9.4 Vote (%)

Independents 1.7 5.3 10.7 8.3 1 0.3 2.3 Seat (%)

5.3 10.2 16.3 13.6 4.4 1.1 4.1 Vote (%)

Source: N. Ahmed, 2003:56 and statistical report on 8th general election 2001 from the website of the Secretariat of the election Commission of Bangladesh at http://www.ecs.gov.bd/report.php3 access date 6th August, 2007.

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Political parties in Bangladesh are divided in two major blocks -right centric and

left centric. The Major two party are Awami League (AL) the left centric party aligned

with other left minded small political parties and Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP)

aligned with other Islamic minded parties (Hossain 2000:520, N. Ahmed 2003:60). Both

the parties have the same probability to win general election and form the cabinet with

their coalition partners. Since 1991, BNP has served the government twice (1991-1996;

2001-2006) and AL once (1996-2001) with their coalition or supporting partners.

As both the major political parties’ are centrist, apparently they have converged

into catch-all parties 24 (Katz and Mair, 1995; Kirchheimer 1966) with no radical or

identifying ideology from each other concerning national and foreign policy. Both the

parties now attract supporters from all segments of the society showing allegiance to their

policies. The principle of market economy and democracy has been embraced by both the

parties. However, they differ fundamentally in their interpretation of the emergence of

Bangladesh and the identity of the nation. Awami League and the left block Communist

Parties believe in the national identity of Bangali for the citizens of Bangladesh and show

their faith to the fundamental principles of the 1972 constitution- Nationalism, democracy,

secularism and socialism, and also accepts capitalistic economy. On the other hand, BNP

and its other Islami religious based political party (Jamate-Islami- Bangladesh) and also

General Ershad’s Jatiya Party, believe in the national identity of Bangladeshi which

accepts the four fundamental principles of the present constitution- trust and faith in all

                                                            24 Kirchheimer (1966:185) argued that class line parties and integrating mass parties (Duverger, 1978) have gone through transformation and become more effective in electoral terms. These parties have turned into catch-all parties embracing nationwide clientele. They began to make broader appeals, trying to catch-supports from all classes (Katz and Mair, 1995:12). Only major-parties can become successful catch-all parties. The catch-all party finds its permanent clientele among the interest groups though they also represent citizens beyond group activities (Kirchheimer, 1966:194). In the Third World countries, often nationalistic mass parties have transformed into catch-all party as they gained victory over the colonial powers and became elected to the state power and engaged in state and nation building.

 

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mighty Allah (God), nationalism, democracy and socialism meaning economic and social

justice, and accepts capitalistic economy.

Therefore, the ideological difference is not on liberalism or socialism but based on

history and on the debate on including the religion in to politics or not25. However, such

use of national identity, and Islam in politics in most cases have only rhetoric and

strategic value to influence the society, penetrate social institutions and groups and win

elections and establish party dominance in all walks of social, economic and political life.

3.3.2.4.1 Nature of Party Rule in Contemporary Bangladesh

During their rule and as opposition, both the parties constantly infringed the rule

of the democratic game as partisan interests got priority over national concerns and

personalities were favored over principles. The ruling party had always persecuted the

opponent parties unjustly and arbitrarily. The ruling and opposition, irrespective of which

party was in position, were always confronting each other. Instead of resolving problems

and ventilating their grievances at the floors of the parliament, opposition parties have                                                             25 Historical fact to identity crisis: In Bangladesh, history instead of creating a common purpose and identity has created mutual antagonism and distrust among the various political groups (Huq, 1985:18). The role of different groups for and against the causes of Independent Bangladesh during the Liberation War in 1971 and their activities afterwards have provoked ideological division within the nation. Bangladeshi citizens are still in confusion and debate whether they should identify themselves as Bengalis or Bangladeshi. These two identities polarize the nation into two brand of groups. In the 1972 constitution, the citizenship of Bangladesh was defined as Bengali (article-6) and the Bengali nationalism was defined as the unity and solidarity of Bengali nation which deriving its identity from its language and culture, attained sovereign and independent Bangladesh through a united and determined struggle in the war of independence(article-9). Here language and culture which formed the nucleus of an identity separate from Pakistan was chosen the way religion was picked up by the same community from the Indian Hindus during the forties as at that time, religious differences was perceived to be crucial variables (Iftekharuzzaman and Rahman, 1986:18). In course of events Bengali identity based on only culture and language appeared inadequate at both elite and mass level perception. Doubts were raised as to the criterion of a separate identity as distinct from the millions of Bengali speaking people living across the border in West Bengal of India with undistinguishable culture. Obviously the choice was again religious factor. Thus secularism which formed one of the four state principles was replaced under the fifth constitutional amendment of 1979 by "Absolute Trust and Faith in Almighty Allah to be the basis of all actions". 25 The national identity was changed from Bengali to Bangladeshi to project the image of Bangladesh as a distinctive Muslim nation. The controversy whether we should call ourselves Bengali or Bangladeshi is still on fire as both the groups are equally strong and proceeding in a parallel way. It is the recede of historical conflicts tempered by ideological belief that appears to be a key variable affecting consensus building on such a fundamental issue. Besides, as, the beneficiaries in lingering this identity crisis which has polarized the nation, are political elites on both sides, it is observed that there is little possibility of resolving the problem and reaching a consensus in near future (Tasnim, 2002: 60-61).

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always gone to the streets and created disorder that had wide social and economic

ramifications. Both parties sheltered and nurtured law breakers to use them to realize

their political ends. Political culture or practice has yet to reach the level where the parties

are ready to engage in political games played within democratic rules and norms.

Therefore, these parties always underestimate each other’s political strength and urge to

establish their monopolistic rule by simply knocking out the other believing that the

losing party will simply fade away (Hossain, 2000:521).

A participatory democratic practice were absent in either AL or BNP since their

inception and always the policy of co-optation, patronage and charisma has been the force

of integration within these parties. Same policy has been used to build political support.

Dominant tendency of both the supreme leaders of AL and BNP is to define politics in

zero-sum manner. Historically, they have been each other’s rival; moreover they fail to

cooperate as they underestimate each other’s strength and urge to establish a monopolistic

rule by knocking out the other (Hossain, 2000:521). The political upheavals during 2006

and early 200726 , indicates, that there is hardly any scope for growing cooperation,

understanding and accommodative norms in their interaction in near future.

Moreover, internal organizations of each party and their decision making process

is neither democratic nor decentralized. Parties have official units at division, district and

sub-district and also at the union/ward level (Governance Report, 2006: 17). Their

                                                            26 On January 10, 2007 a state of emergency had been declared in Bangladesh and the 9th general election to the parliament had been called off. A non-political, non-elected, technocrat government, strongly backed by the army, is in charge of the state affairs in Bangladesh. Such outcome is the direct consequence of the politics of confrontation, politicization, corruption and nepotism. The incumbent party-BNP, had been accused by the opposition AL, for forming false voter list and politicizing the election commission and the interim government that were given the responsibility to conduct the due election— an allegation though partly true was always denied by the BNP government. The stubborn opposition during the deadlock situation has refused to compromise with any of their demands and took the fight to the streets that left 45 dead and hundred injured. They also decided to boycott the election. The good  faith from both the sides, to solve the problem was questioned. This has lead to a halt to the democratic process in Bangladesh (Times, 25th January, 2007, The New York Times, 12 January, 2007, The Economist 10 February, 2007, The Daily Star from October to December, 2006).

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informal link and control goes down to the grass-roots level. The local branches are just

extended agencies of the parties. Practically parties are organized centering the symbolic

leader using the charisma of her predecessor. Chairman of most of the parties enjoys

widespread powers, including the power to take unilateral actions (Ahmed, 2003:61).

The constitution of the each party provides huge control of power to the party chairman

that ultimately leads to concentration of power in one hand. Party councils are hardly held

in case of either BNP or AL and always the same leader is elected without any

contestation. Other members of the steering committee are often selected by the personal

choice of the chairman and her associates.

3.3.4.2.2 Third Parties

As both parties popular support among the citizens is equally strong neither AL

nor BNP has been able to form government on its own. They required alliance and

support from other political parties and blocks. The most important kingmakers that

emerged during the democratic age are— ‘Jatiay Party’ and ‘Jamat Islami Bangladesh’.

Jatiya Party is a personalistic party27 formed by General Ershad to give legitimacy and

civilian face to his military rule and did not differ with BNP in ideology or policy.

Despite the loss of power and imprisonment of General Ershad, the party managed to win

significant number of seats in the 1991, 1996 and 2001 election that gave it the power to

negotiate with the majority parties and gain strategic favors in turn of giving them support.

Up to, 2006, Jatiya Party had continued its tactics of changing its support to either AL or

BNP based on negotiation that were based not only on favors and promises to government

posts but also hard cash money. Using the same strategy of playing the role of the

kingmaker, Jamat Islami Bangladesh,- different from other secular political parties,

                                                            27 Personalistic party provides the vehicle for the leader to win an election and exercise power. Such party is constructed or converted by an incumbent or aspiring national leader exclusively to advance his or her national political ambition (Gunther and Diamond, 2003:187).

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aiming to establish an Islamic state, have emerged as a major political broker and since

2001, became a coalition partner to the BNP Governement. It is the continuation of the

Jamat Islami party of former East Pakistan, which finds it origin in the Jamat Islami Party

formed in 1941 under British India. Though the party have substantial support strength at

the grass-roots level and its student wing is quite strong in comparison to other parties,

Jamat Islami Bangladesh do not have acceptability to a large section, mainly centre-left

block for their controversial role during the independence movement. However,

accommodation, co-optation and integration of Islamist elements and forces in politics

have always been a strategy of expediency by the political leaders in Bangladesh to gain

legitimacy and popular support (BRAC, 2006).

3.3.4.2.3 Nature of Building Social Support

Jahan (2005:200) comments that political parties do not emphasize in building

party platform on the basis of specific socio-economic programs nor do they address their

party platform to specific socio-economic group. They never concentrate in developing

group of supporters genuinely dedicated to the party’s goal. This happens because of the

presence of patron-client network, factions, charismatic leadership in party organization.

The political leadership of the country irrespective of ideology and party belong to the

intermediate class that has links both at the urban and rural level28. They imply patron

client network in ensuring their political support at the grass-roots level. Political parties

co-opt patrons in various localities, who in- turn divert their client’s votes or support to

                                                            28 Historically, Roots to the modern political actors in Bangladesh may be found in feudal kinship based society. Agrarian society of Bengal was always a hierarchical society. The agriculture based vertical patron-client and kinship network that developed in the rural area was extended to the urban area. The same rural elites who had influence upon the social and economic life of the peasants also became the urban political leaders. During the British colonial period and after wards, the Bangladesh society has been  penetrated by the formal political institutions headed by these politicians who had used their vertical networks to maintain their reign upon the society. So the mobilization that has been taken place among the local and rural level has been for the causes of status-quo and urban politicians, not in favor of the rural poor (Broomfield, 1976).

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the particular political parties. Since, clients owe allegiance to the patron and not to the

party; various parties compete with each other to increase their support group of patrons

(Jahan, 2005:200). Who are these, patrons? In most cases local elite, local council

chairman or member and recently the civil society organizations and development NGOs.

They are the clients to the political parties, the brokers between the government and

people through the parties. In this manner every segment of the society is politicized both

at the rural and urban level. Civil society organizations are of no exception to the process.

3.3.2.5 Political Parties Penetrating Civil Society

Like India, civil society has always existed and often became strongly active in

Bengal long before the Bangladesh state came into effect. Since then, there has been

strong aligning relationship between the civil society and political parties. From historical

context it is often difficult to evaluate the role of the civil society totally separating it

from political parties. However, it has to be admitted that during British Colonial period

and Pakistani period the relationship between these two sectors was of alliance but not co-

optation29. On the contrary, contemporary situation is of penetration by the politically

powerful parties upon the weak and divided civil society.

                                                            29 During the British colonial period the relation between the state and the emerging civil groups rising against the colonial power was naturally confrontational. Western educated local elite in Bengal both Hindu and Muslims started the education and social reform movements which subsequently became associated with anti-colonial resistance. Ultimately, these movements led to the formation of Indian National Congress-an official platform for expressing growing national consciousness in 1885 and Muslim League in 1906 in Dhaka to lobby for Muslim political rights. It is these two organizations sometimes in parallel ways, some time through alliance and some times competitively lead the anti-British movement for independent India and Pakistan (Baxter, 1984: 17-28; Robinson, 1989:116-146).

In course of Pakistani rule (1947-1971), the secondary political actors (civil society leaders) of East Pakistan launched numerous protests and movements against what they termed as attempts by the ruling circle of Pakistan, consisting mainly of Punjabs, to impose cultural-economic-political domination upon Bengalis (Mamoon and Ray, 1998: 16). There was always a coalition between the civil society and politicians, for instance, the language movement of 1952, 6-point movement for autonomy in 1966, Mass movement against the General Ayub’s autocratic rule in 1969 and finally the War of Independence 1971. The language movement was first initiated by the student groups and intellectuals backed by the political leaders and afterwards gained support from all sections of the Bengali society in East Pakistan (Jahan, 1972:44). On the other hand, the 6-point movement was initiated by the political party Awami Leageue with necessary theoretical and technical assistance provided by economists and support from different sections of the civil society like businessmen, labor, bureaucrats, even the rural poor (Jahan, 1972: 87-89).

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In contemporary Bangladesh that is after the 1990s very few civil society

organizations in Bangladesh may be termed neutral. Political party loyalty, communalism

and class distinction tend to split most of the civil society organizations. A vast majority

of social organizations operating within the private space are simply front organizations

of various political parties. Instead of representing the collective interest of the people,

these civil society organizations are mainly engaged in the practice and promotion of the

ideas and interests of a given brand of politics (Quadir 2003, 432). No institution in the

country seems to be able to stay above the partisan conflict and confrontational politics

(Jahan, 2005:262).

In the present research survey, CSOs were asked to rate the influence of 15 types

of actors in politics on a scale from 1 to 7. Among the 15 types of actors, political parties

were rated the highest with a mean of 6.48 (Standard Deviation=1.189). But when they

were asked to rate the cooperation that existed between them and political parties on the

same scale from 1 to 7, they rated very low with a mean of 2.61, but a standard deviation

of 1.74. Moreover, the survey data reveals that the percentage of civil society

organizations contacting the ruling party and opposition party is 64% and 51%

respectively. So there is relatively high percentage of contact with powerful parties

though low rate of formal cooperation. This implies a lack of formal or horizontal

relationship between civil society and political parties which may lead us to infer a

vertical (powerful and weak) relationship existing between them. This has become

evident through the information’s gathered from interviews with resource individuals and

from personal observation of Bangladesh society and politics.

                                                                                                                                                                                  The war of Independence was a full-fledged movement that gained support from the whole nation and affected almost all citizen of Independent Bangladesh in 1971.

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Figure 3.5 Vertical Links between civil society and Political Parties in Bangladesh (elaborated model)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Source: Drawn by the author based on information gathered through personal observation and interviews

Opposition 

Government & Parliament 

Political Party  Bureaucracy 

Cabinet 

Court

Different types of civil society groups 

and other types of organizations 

NGOs  Interest Groups 

Local voluntary groups and cooperatives 

Labor Union and Trade Organizations 

Providing different types of support during election 

 

Providing Financial suppose to the parties 

Ensuring voter’s bank for the political party 

Ensuring party loyalty at the grass‐roots level strata 

Protecting party interest executing party policy at different institutes like education, industry, business, welfare, govt. institutes and even the media 

Ensure necessary personal patronage like job, promotion, winning tender, contracts, license, more govt. advertisements in  the media, govt. loans 

Providing shelter to outlaws, criminals, rent seekers, corrupt officials etc. as they have shown political support 

Distributing political patronage like recruiting the civil society leaders to high govt.  or constitutional  posts 

Protect Supporters from unwanted political and police harassment, rent seeking, and miscreants 

Providing necessary organizational base for street politics like staging mass meeting, demonstration, violent protest, strike etc. 

Affiliation to govt. party, ensures easy access to administration and better dealing with less bribery  

Ruling party control 

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The vertical give and take relationship existing between the political parties and

different civil society organizations understood from such interviews has been expressed

through a simple diagram (Figure 3.5). At the top of the figure are the major Bangladeshi

political parties. They have the same possibility to win a general election and form

coalition cabinet as well as enjoy full control over the state, administration, and judiciary

or become the opposition in parliament and engage in violent street politics. In the lower

portion of the figure are the civil society organizations of different categories. At the mid-

section of the diagram, two contrasting paradigms may be observed. The arrows going up

and down show vertical give and take process constantly taking place among the civil

society organizations and political parties. The political parties from above, with their

available state resources, distribute legal and in most cases illegal favors to CSOs or their

leaders. The political parties and in most cases the ruling party with its access to all state

facilities and resources, try to buy the civil society leaders and a section of their followers

by providing easy access to the administration, offering high government and

constitutional posts, special official favors, personal patronage like job, promotion,

winning tender, license and to the extent of giving shelter to the criminals and corrupt

officials. The civil society leaders and members who provide support to the political party

are often protected from police harassment, rent seeking or miscreants. With receiving

such favors and patronage, civil society organizations and leaders from their lower

position are sending all the necessary rational and irrational as well as monetary support

up toward political parties. With such support the political parties ensure their control

upon different institutions and economic sectors, loyalty at the grass-root level, ensure

vote banks, and also gain the necessary organizational base for staging protests, strikes

etc when they are in opposition. In the process, the CSOs lose their independent status

and become divided, determined by their members' party affiliation. The background

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texture for the civil society organizations in the diagram symbolizes the divided or

polarized situation of civil society. It is to be mentioned that all these vertical dealing

among the civil society and political parties take place in an informal manner and behind

the formal structure as there is no rule or provision by which neither CSOs can receive

money or any favor from a political party though it can from the state or foreign donors

and from rich persons or enterprise as donations, nor can CSOs contribute to political

parties. We may simplify the complex picture by drawing another figure that may give a

quick idea of the present civil society and political party relations (figure 3.6).

Figure 3.6 Simplified model of the civil society and political party relation in Bangladesh

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Naturally, the cooptation and division of the civil society that had been developed

through history and controversy over national identity before, turns out to be intensified

by patronage, clientelism, corruption etc30.

This vertical link based on patron-client relation, patronage etc., existing in the

political system of Bangladesh reaches up to highest post of the government machine –

the Prime Minister – and may go down to a poor farmer or a laborer. The local leaders

and civil society organizations, NGOs are clients to the state and patrons to the citizens

and villagers (Islam 2001, 213). It has been revealed through discussion with the resource

individuals that, interests of the clients cover group favors such as project sanctions,

financial grants, and creating job options as well as personal favors including government

loans, employment, promotion, business grants and licenses, government contracts, legal

matters, and simple favors such as medical help. In return, the government and political

parties receive loyalty and support from different sections of the social strata, financial

and logistic support during elections, gain party control over different institutions and

                                                            30  Vertical norms like patron-client relation, patronage, nepotism, corruption are powerful indigenous factors deep rooted in Bangladesh society (Tasnim, 2006). Factionalism and patron-client network have formed the base of social organization (Jahan, 2005, 1999). These cultures have developed through centuries in the rural society and afterwards generated into the urban area with migration of the rural elites and their entrance into politics (Broomfield, 1976). While the present ruling elites of Bangladesh have a moral commitment to Western political philosophies such as democracy or socialism, in practice they rely on the patron-client relationship to run the state and political parties (Islam 2001, 429). As kinship linkages are influential in Bangladeshi social culture, nepotism is extended not only to direct family members but to lineage, relatives (including those linked through marriage ties), and neighbors and friends. In connection to corruption, Nobel Laureate Professor Yunus comments, “[N]othing gets done unless you bribe, it's part of life. It's not the law or rule any more, its how you are paying” (The Daily Star, 18 January 2007). In the report on Bangladesh in 2004 by Transparency International, the sectors of political parties and NGOs were identified as moderately corrupt; that is, considered as corrupt actors in 1.1 to 3 percent of the total media reports on corruption. Among the individuals involved in corruption, 2.6 percent were from NGOs and 2.6 percent were political leaders and workers. The most corrupt individuals were officers/employers of the government sector (71.9%). In such informal system civil society organizations entangles in a vertical relation with political parties, local governments and bureaucracy undermining their autonomy and ability to articulate their independent interests and demands. Violence and violent expression of demands are another weak point for Bangladeshi civil society. As the government and political leaders hardly pay attention to peaceful protests of the opposition or petitions and advice from CSOs, often demands are expressed through violent strikes and demonstrations. Such violent civil society mobilizations are then utilized by the opposition to their political ends. (Scott: 1976, Alagappa 2004, Zafarullah 2003, Tasnim 2006, Davis and Mcgreor 2002)

 

129  

even the media and ensure necessary organizational base for staging mass protests. Such

politicization rather political penetration is observed among all types of civil society

organizations, both urban and rural base, traditional and modern.

Traditional organizations like, labor unions, professional associations, university

groupings, chambers of commerce and even, news papers are identified primarily for their

political affiliations. Ruling parties whether Awami league or BNP, have directly shown

through their decisions and actions that they give special support and rewards to those

CSOs that positively helped them in winning elections and act directly against those

selected CSOs that have collaborated with their opposition party. Labor union leaders,

rather than promoting workers’ interest, are motivated to take undue advantage from their

position or links with political parties or higher government functionaries (Zafarullah,

2003:295).

Not only in traditional or urban based organizations, political penetration is also

observed in the rural society. In the last 10 years, there has been change in the rural social

structure, power relation as well as social interaction which have been very much

influenced by the changes and policies of political actors at the capital. In their study on

the change in the contemporary rural power structure in Bangladesh, Faruque et.al. (2007)

have revealed interesting changes where links with the political parties have turned out to

be the most important factor in rural power sources while before it was the possession of

landed property, family heritage, wealth etc. Another significant change in the rural

society is the new type of grouping and rivalry within the rural society reflecting the

polarization and confrontation found in national politics.

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Modern development NGOs and their apex organization named Association for

Development Agencies for Bangladesh (ADAB) were considered neutral or apolitical so

far. However, since 1990, ADAB entered into political conflict which became severe in

2000. This has ultimately led to the division among the NGO community31. While the

NGOs at the national level are politically divided, at the local level they have been

identified as the new patrons to the poor, both in relation to providing them with micro-

credit and mediating with other power structures on their behalf.

These matters however fact they are yet to be well investigated with more

concrete data and real evidences than just observation and realization. To understand why

the civil society in Bangladesh is unable to contribute in democratic consolidation despite

its recognized success in social development, it has become necessary to understand what

are the actions civil society organizations are involved in, whether they are concerned

with participatory functions like policy making, lobby, advocacy. Moreover, in the

process of such participatory actions, what is the nature of their relation with the political

authorities, that is the political parties.

3.4 Conclusion

Civil society and its potential to contribute to democracy is determined not by any

single factor. However, in combination of different factors like history, culture, external

influence, regulatory framework, it is the Political structures that influence the civil

society most and simultaneously the nature of democracy. This fact is evident not only in

Bangladesh but other developing democracies in Asia. Stable democracy may not

necessarily facilitate strong civil society (as it may have been observed in the case of

                                                            31 The conflict has been discussed in details based on news paper reports in chapter five.

131  

India), so as strong civil society may not always lead to consolidated democracy (evident

from the Philippine case). Rather, it is the political structures and actors, whether they are

political parties, or the elites or even the military dictator, who determine the strength of

civil society to act in relation to society, politics, and democracy. So the ultimate power to

change the society, bring democracy and strengthen civil society is in the hands of the

political decision makers from above not in the people from below. This has become

clear in the comparative discussion on the civil society in India, Philippines and Pakistan.

With such understanding the present chapter has further investigated the civil

society in Bangladesh, from both aspects of vibrancy and vigilancy to point out the prime

factor that determines the nature and strength of civil society in relation to democracy. It

have been found that philanthropy culture, donor policy and web of laws for registration

have furthered the development of civil society organizations in Bangladesh and led

towards service and welfare functions rather than advocacy. The civil society, vibrant

from such consideration, have brought a silent revolution at the rural level of Bangladesh

and brought better economic life, empowerment and social awareness among the poor

and uneducated citizens.

However, besides such vibrancy, a civil society has to be involved in participatory

activities, form networks, gain strength to contribute to its ultimate aim democracy as

decided by the Neo-Tocquevillean school of arguments and the international donors.

This means it also needs to become vigilant. Review of previous researches,

observation of present political and democratic situation of Bangladesh shows that civil

society is yet to reach such vigilant nature. The present chapter has pointed out the most

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important factor that has led to such weak position of the civil society in contemporary

Bangladesh. It is the political parties and their all powerful penetrative control. This has

receded the participatory strength and strong voice of the vibrant civil society to

contribute to democracy. Historical developments have helped the political parties to

emerge as such powerful and penetrative position as well answers the reason why they

have been able to succeed in their endeavor to divide and control the social groups.

Cultural traditions of vertical social relationship, explain the nature of political

cooptation that has taken place. Foreign donation has been accused of providing the

necessary resources for corruption and patronage. Political parties have control over

different traditional, professional groups, labor unions, chambers of commence and so

on at the central and meso level. Parties have also divided and politicized the rural

society according to partisan line. Link with the political parties has become the main

source of power for the rural elites. Local civil society organization groups both

indigenous ones and small NGOs had to develop good relation with such political local

elites. The NGOs have also turned into the new patrons to the poor. Moreover, such

NGOs with development projects nationwide have lost their unity influenced by

partisan politics.

The present chapter based on comparative discussions, general observation and

previous literature reviews on Bangladesh society and politics have developed the main

three propositions on Bangladesh civil society, that is, a. it is vibrant from the

consideration of number, activeness and success so far in social development; b. the

civil society is mostly concerned with social welfare and service functions than

participatory functions that are more related to vigilant character and may give it the

better strength to contribute to democracy; c. instead of influencing government and

133  

political actors, the civil society itself has been co-opted by the powerful political

parties that has weakened its potential to contribute to democracy. In its next two steps

of investigation the present thesis shall first empirically focus on the basic nature and

functions of civil society concerning both grass-roots development and participation

and then delve more inside the relation between the civil society and politics in

Bangladesh, with the objective to establish the newly formed inferences from chapter

three.

134

Chapter 4

Rich Grass-roots Actions but Poor Participation

4.1 Introduction

Chapter Three, focused on the main factors that have contributed to the development

of civil society in Bangladesh which is mostly service and welfare based and weak from

political context. The chapter also pointed out the strong influence of political parties that

have emerged as powerful institutions through historical and political development and have

penetrated and politicized the civil society through vertical relations based on traditional

norms of clientelism, nepotism etc. The present chapter based on empirical survey data,

investigates, the nature and trends of civil society focusing on their resources, behaviors,

relations, nature of activities etc. The survey data reveals rich involvement of civil society in

grass-roots actions while indicating their low participation in politics and state related affairs.

The data also points out to a partisan and vertical trend in CSOs’ interaction with the political

actors. Chapter five concentrates more on civil society and political party relations.

The present study have tried to understand the civil society functions through a large-

N scale survey as it provides empirical data directly gathered from the CSOs and the sample

data randomly selected that includes all types of CSOs-rural, urban, modern traditional, elite

as well as infamous organizations. For understanding the actual situation at the periphery and

meso level, this method of gathering data directly from the field is considered better than

only focusing on leading national coalitions of CSOs or elite organizations working near the

state authority (Tsujinaka, 2002: 34). The broad range of CSOs involved in various types of

functions and issues, helps to make a better prediction about the tendency observed in the

civil society organization and their inclination in interacting with other political actors.

135

Moreover, the survey is based on a model that provides the opportunity to enter into further

comparative study on civil society with other countries (Tsujinaka 2006: 4) to understand

uniqueness of civil society in Bangladesh and the common structures or tendency among

CSOs in developing countries. Details about the sampling methodology and survey process

have been described in the methodology section of chapter two and appendix C and D.

Present chapter is broadly divided into three sections; the first section is concerned

with the basic characteristics of the CSOs surveyed, second sections is concerned with the

involvement of civil society in grass-roots action, while the last section gives a more detailed

emphasis on the participatory role of the civil society. First section focuses on the basic

attributes like classifications, objectives, policy interest, geographic level of activity,

membership, resource sources, budget, volunteers, employees etc. of the CSOs. Moreover,

structural strength of the civil society has been compared between CSOs working at national

and local level and CSOs receiving and not receiving foreign funds. Their cooperation with

other social, political and economic actors have also been inquired. This section provides an

over all idea of civil society originations which are found to be mostly welfare and service

oriented working at the local and meso level. Besides, membership fee and nominal

government grants they receive funds from various non-government organizations and

donors and they may have direct or indirect foreign connections. CSOs receiving foreign

assistance are better equipped with handsome budget and skilled manpower but with few

volunteers. About cooperation among civil society organization and other social political and

market actors, it is revealed that the cooperation is mostly common with local government

and other civil society actors than the market and political & bureaucratic actors.

136

Bangladeshi civil society is service and welfare oriented. Most researches on civil

society and NGOs focus mainly on this section of civil society. The present survey also

reveals the high involvement of CSOs in grass-roots actions. Civil society organizations have

mentioned their activity mainly in the field of economic empowerment, women

empowerment, education, health, joint projects with government; network building, legal and

political training, social awareness, local representation etc. It has been found that, CSOs

participation is high in service providing functions and relatively low in the functions that

relate to advocacy training.

Participatory actions-to which so far little concentration has been paid by the

researchers, occupies most attention of the present research aiming to understand civil

society’s inability to contribute to democratic consolidation. This is understood in mainly

four ways-formal relations with governments, policy making, advocacy and lobby. On

focusing on the formal relation between CSOs and government (both national and local) it

has been found that though the rate of government guidance and exchanging opinion with the

government is high participatory functions like cooperating in policy and budget or sending

representative to council or advisory bodies is relatively low. In case of advocacy, the

involvement of CSOs on democracy related issues has been found to be extremely low than

other welfare or social issues. In case of policy making it has been found that only 13% have

been successful in pursuing the government to pass a budget or policy in favor of the interest

of the CSO. In case of lobby, the data reveals that it is common among the CSOs to contact

directly the authority or powerful political actors in a vertical way rather than organizing

horizontally. The method of gaining strength through forming coalition and create pressure

on the government in a better organized way or following formal non-political methods of

137

lobby have been found to be not popular among the CSOs at the local and periphery level.

The tendency to rely more on vertical or inside lobby by the CSOs also indicate to the

partisan relation that may be existing between them and the political parties.

4.2 Nature of Civil Society in Bangladesh as Revealed through the Survey Data

Through the survey on civil society organizations, 504 CSOs of different categories

were interviewed with the aim to understand the structure, value of the CSOs and their

relation with state, politics and other actors of the political system. They were also asked

about and to evaluate the role of civil society as a whole in Bangladesh1. This section

provides a few facts from the survey that reveals civil society’s basic characteristics and

tendencies of CSOs.

4.2.1 Self Categorization by the Civil Society Organizations

The present survey was based on eight types of organizations— cooperative,

voluntary social organizations, NGOs, youth groups, labor unions, trade organizations,

professional associations and university-centric organizations. After indicating their status on

the meta level, the 504 responding CSOs were again asked to categorize themselves in terms

of 13 subcategories that best illustrates the nature of their organizations. 43% had identified

themselves as social welfare organizations. Besides NGOs, different professional groups,

university based clubs, local clubs, cooperatives also consider them as social welfare

organizations. Only 2 (0.4%) CSOs identified them as citizen groups. Figure 4.1 shows the

nature of self-classification by the civil society organizations. Another noticing feature is that

though Bangladesh is a Muslim majority country where religion plays an important role in

the social life of the citizens, only 3(0.6%) organizations have identified themselves as

1 For details see the questionnaire in Appendix C.

138

religious group2. CSOs prefer to be identified as social welfare organizations than their other

identity3.

Figure 4.1 The nature of self-classification by the civil society organizations

0%

5%

10%

15%

20%

25%

30%

35%

40%

45%

Agricultutre

Economic

Labor

Education

Culture

Administration

Social Welfare

Professional

Citizen

NGO

s

Religious

Sports

Other

CSOs

Category of CSOs

Answer Rate= 100%, N=504

2 Madrasas which are popularly known as the religious institutions in South Asia by the Western media, are actually, religious educational institutions and are registered under the ministry of Education in Bangladesh. These, Maradasa’s have not been targeted in the survey. Only those religious institutions that are registered with the social welfare ministry and are in most cases orphanage cum madarasa (for primary education) have been included in the target population. 3 In further analysis of the activities and nature of participation of civil society, these 13 categories shall be compressed into four broad categories-Economic, Education and Culture, Pressure Group and Welfare & development. Under Economic heading, all CSOs that have identified themselves as economic organization, agriculture organization and labor unions and also CSOs in the other categories. This is because economic and labor groups are related to industry and business and micro-credit, the farmers organization are also cooperatives concerned with loan and micro-credit, again the 5 CSOs that have selected the other options mentioned them selves as either micro-credit groups or business and income related groups. Under the heading of Education and Culture all the CSOs that have identified them as education and research groups, cultural organizations, religious organization and recreational and sports organizations shall be brought together. All CSOs that think they are government or administration related organization, professional groups and citizen’s group have been combinedly named Pressure group. Lastly, all the social welfare groups and NGOs have been brought under the heading Welfare and Development group.

139

4.2.2 Policy Interest

The CSOs were asked to select the government policies that relates to their objective

and functions from a long list of 25 policies. Figure 4.2 shows the list of top 14 policies

selected by CSOs. CSOs concentrate their policy interest mainly on a set of overlapping

policies like poverty alleviation (72%), social welfare (59%), rural development (59%),

health care (25%), and education (47%) that is mostly related to their service providing

projects. But other important policies that also relates to development but require advocacies

and more negotiation with the authorities, attract the CSOs relatively in a low scale like,

environment (8%), Human rights (19%), Law and order (6%), Labor policy (6% ), consumer

protection (5%) etc.

Figure 4.2 Policy interests of civil society organizations (CSO)

0%

10%

20%

30%

40%

50%

60%

70%

80%

Financial Policy

Agriculture Policy

Labor Policy

Consumer Protection

Justice and Human Rights

Law and Order

Environment Policy

Local Governement and Administration

Culture and Religion

Rural Development

Social Welfare

Healthcare

Education and Sports

Poverty Alleviation

CSOs

Policy Interest

Answer Rate 100%, N= 504

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Unless, CSOs in a large scale do not come forward on matters like human rights, law and

order, labor policy etc. they hardly can contribute to equal society, demand for justice and

security.

4.2.3 Objectives

If we see the table 4.1.where CSOs have mentioned about the objectives of their

organization4, it becomes, clear that, purpose of most of the CSOs is to provide service and

Table 4.1 Objective of the civil society organizations

Objectives of CSOs Number of CSOs in

Percentage (%)

Providing information to members 251 (50%)

Pursuing economic profit for members 303 (60%)

Protecting the standard of living and rights of the members/clients 355 (70%)

Providing education and training opportunities for members/clients 259 (51%)

Advocating on behalf of the members in order to gain subsidies

from government 119 (24%)

Assisting members in licensing and registration procedures 28 (6%)

Providing policy recommendations based on technical knowledge

for public policy making 33 (7%)

Providing education and information for the good of the general

public 182 (36%)

Providing service to the general public 376 (75%)

Providing funds to other organization 34 (7%)

N= 504, Answer rate 100%

information to their members, beneficiaries and also the public in general than advocating

and interacting with the government for the interest of the members like making policy

recommendation (7%), or assisting in licensing & registration (6%) or even advocating for

4 The CSOs were free to choose as many answers that comply with their organization’s objective.

141

gaining government subsidy (24%). The civil society organizations have the tendency to

work for the society beyond their members or beneficiaries, 75% have mentioned about their

purpose to provide service to the general public, moreover, 36% are also interested in

educating and informing people for the good of general public. So the data so far, reveals a

civil society overwhelmingly social welfare based and eager to serve the society. This

implies that the CSOs are mostly involved at local levels of the society which is in need of

welfare assistance due to the socio-economic situation.

4.2.4 Geographic Level

Geographic level within which the civil society organization limits its activities also

reflects to some extent the nature of its participatory role. Naturally CSOs working in larger

geographic area has better network and deal with the administration and politics more

frequently and have broader social goals than those working at the local level. They are also

assumed to have larger budget and better organizing skill. On the other hand, locally based

CSOs are mostly concerned with the well-being of the inhabitants of the limited area and

lack network and other logistic facilities. Figure 4.3 shows that, majority (82%) of the CSOs

surveyed are concentrated at the periphery (union and sub-district) level5. Only 10% function

at district level, 6% through out the nation and 2% globally. The local based CSOs are

considered to be highly localized, non-political and primarily concerned with poverty

alleviation (Kochanek, 1996: 704).

5 For further analysis on the structural strength, grass-roots action and participatory functions of the CSOs, CSOs working at 5 geographic level shall be brought under two headings-local and national. Those CSOs working at union/ward section and sub-district level shall be termed as Local CSOs while those working at district, national and global level shall be termed as National CSOs.

142

Figure 4.3 CSOs active at different geographic level

0%

10%

20%

30%

40%

50%

60%

70%

Union/W

ard

Sub-Disrtict /M

unicipality

District

National

Global

CSO

s

Geographic Levels

Answer Rate= 100%, N= 504

4.2.5 Member

The most important characteristics and strength of civil society from the view point of

Neo-Tocquevillean School is its membership. Figure 4.5 shows the pattern of individual

members of the CSOs surveyed. It may be observed that most common among the CSOs is to

have members within 1 to 1000, where, 26% have members within 20 to 40 persons and 21%

have members within 100 to 1000. This reveals that, in most cases the CSOs of Bangladesh

are small in respect of numbers. This is natural, for CSOs who’s more than 80% are local

based. Only few district or nation wide professional groups have been found to have

members more than 1000 persons. Again, few well established NGOs that are working

143

through out Rajshahi district as well as the whole nation, have included their beneficiary

group members as their organization member. With such large membership these NGOs have

entered the last two bars of the figure representing CSOs with members from 1000 to more

than 5000 persons. However, in case of large NGOs, observation and previous literatures do

not confirm that these large number of NGO beneficiaries are considered or treated as equal

members of the NGOs. Rather the relation between NGO officials and beneficiaries may be

termed as a relation of powerful, resourceful toward dependents, obliged (Tasnim 2005b, 92,

175, 177; Quadir 1999, 213).

Figure 4.5 The pattern of individual members of the CSOs surveyed

0

5

10

15

20

25

30

Perc

e nta

ge o

f CSO

s

0.00 1-19 20-39 40-59 60-99 100-999 1000-4999 5000-~

Number of Members

N=504, Answer rate=100%

However, in case of Bangladesh as well as other developing countries, membership

alone can neither provide any real picture of the civil society, nor the strength of the civil

society organizations. For this we also need to know about their source of income well as

their budget, number of volunteers, employees etc.

144

4.2.6 Resources

Bangladesh is a developing country, naturally membership fee, in most cases do not

provide the necessary financial need for the CSOs. They have to look for other resources. As

mentioned in Chapter three, donor policy and funds have direct influence on the vibrant

nature of the civil society. The world reputed large development-NGOs are very much

dependent on foreign funds. Besides, all registered social welfare organizations, youth groups

and women’s groups are supposed to receive a certain amount of yearly government funds.

Though nominal that is about US $30 to US$1506, the government grant inspires the local

people to form organizations. Moreover, different government ministries and related semi-

government and autonomous institutions provide loan to Cooperatives and small NGOs.

Loan and relief providing organizations like Local Government, PKSF (Palli Karma

Shohayak Funds meaning funds to help rural works), BRDB (Bangladesh Rural

Development Board) mainly distribute parts from government’s development budgets.

However, big projects of these institutions often receive foreign funds too. For example,

BRDB loan project for the Women Destitute Cooperatives is financed by Asian Development

Bank7. PKSF that provides loan to small micro-credit NGOs, also receives funds from

different international development agencies like World Bank, USAID, IFAD etc8. Besides

direct financing from international donor and agencies and foreign NGOs, domestic NGOs

provides fund to small NGOs. These funds are basically foreign funds received by large

NGO distributing to the small NGOs against the sub-contracted projects.

Among the CSOs surveyed, 310 (61%) [Question 1.7] CSOs receives funds from

government or non-government sources and 96 (19%) [Question 4.4.b] CSOs admitted of 6 Booklets published from respective ministries on the rules for providing financial grant and loan to the social welfare organizations and cooperatives. 7 Annual Report of BRDB, 2005. 8 PKSF Website http://www.pksf-bd.org/about_pksf.html access date 21 August, 2007.

145

receiving foreign assistance through money or service, directly or indirectly. However, a

large portion 194, (39%) have mentioned that they do not receive any types of funds. These,

are small local groups and cooperatives at the local level and pressure groups at the national

level9. Table 4.2 summarizes the sources that the CSOs have mentioned as their resources

and the percentage of CSOs benefiting from those sources. Same CSOs may be receiving

funds from multiple sources.

Table 4.2 Funds providing sources for CSOs other than membership fees

Funds Providing Sources *Number of receiving

CSOs (%)

1 Government Ministries 256(50.8%)

2 Local Government 7(1.4%)

3 PKSF 14(2.8%)

4 BRDB 15(3%)

5 International Agencies and Donor

Countries

36(7%)

6 International NGOs 23(4.6%)

7 Domestic NGOs 13(2.6%)

8 Domestic Foundations 1(0.2%)

9 Personal Benevolence 6(1.2%)

10 No funds receiving CSOs 194(38.5%)

N=504, No Answer= 3 (0.6%) * Same CSOs may be receiving funds from multiple sources. More than 50% CSOs do receive government funds though it may be nominal. From

the table it is also revealed that, personal benevolence and philanthropy of domestic

9 However, there is a possibility that few CSOs simply did not want to mention their sources of income and avoided the question by saying they do not receive any funds outside membership fees. Again, few cooperatives, who may receive loans from BRDB or cooperatives office, do not consider those loans as financial assistance, as they are loans not donations. Moreover, few CSOs had said that, though before they did receive government funds, they no more apply for such funds because of the bureaucratic complicacy and bribing that is involved for the process which makes the nominal amount of money non-worthy to them. [All these information has been gathered from the observation note books written by the surveyors and from the conversations with them during the survey period].

146

foundations are not directed to CSOs that are registered or enlisted. In another survey on

personal giving by Ahmed and Jahan (2002) it has been found that, more than 80% of

philanthropists belonging to the middle class, give away their alms to religious charities

orphanages or individual needy persons than to any civil society organization. Moreover,

corporate giving is not yet a common practice in Bangladesh, though they may consider it as

an implicit responsibility. In another study it has been claimed that big business houses gives

more to political organizations than to social organizations and small houses give more to

community organizations as ‘protection’ money10.

Objectives and policy interest of the CSOs show a strong tendency toward social

welfare and service providing than advocacy or policy recommendation and majority of

CSOs rely on outside financial sources-mainly government and foreign funds besides their

membership fees. The data also indicates that whether the organization acts at local or

national level and whether it receives foreign assistance or not, are the most important factors

that determine its nature and membership, besides its category. To get a better view about the

structural strength and nature of civil society organizations (CSO), the following three

important characteristics of CSOs-volunteer, employee and budget are analyzed by

considering the differences found among CSOs on point of acting at local or national level

and receiving or not receiving foreign assistance.

4.2.7 Volunteer

If we consider volunteer as manpower strength and employee as skill strength, then,

we may find the civil society organizations working at the local level (figure 4.6a) and with

no-foreign assistance (figure 4.7b) are rich in manpower. In case of CSOs acting at local and

10 Website for Philanthropy and the Third Sector in the Asia and the Pacific on Bangladesh section, http://www.asianphilanthropy.org/countries/bangladesh/index.html access date 14 January, 2007.

147

national level, 37% national CSOs don’t have any volunteers while only 16% local CSOs

work without volunteers. Relatively, trend is high among national CSOs to have volunteers

more than 100 persons. Nevertheless, stable volunteer force is possessed by local CSOs.

77% of latter type of CSOs has volunteers ranging from 1 to 50 but only 42% of national

CSOs have such pattern of volunteers.

Figure 4.6a Pattern of Volunteer among local and national CSOs

N=504, Answer rate= 100% Figure 4.6b Pattern of Volunteer among foreign assistance receiving and non-receiving CSOs

N=504, No answer=1 (0.2%)

0 %

1 0 %

2 0 %

3 0 %

4 0 %

5 0 %

6 0 %

7 0 %

N um be r o f V lunte e rs

Perc

enta

ge o

f CSO

L o c a l 1 5 .9 % 6 3 .0 % 1 3 .5 % 4 .8 % 2 .6 % 0 .2 %

N a tio na l 3 8 .6 % 3 0 .7 % 1 1 .4 % 3 .4 % 8 .0 % 8 .0 %

0 .0 0 1 - 1 9 2 0 - 4 9 5 0 - 9 9 1 0 0 - 4 9 9 5 0 0 - ~

0%

10%

20%

30%

40%

50%

60%

70%

Number of Volunteers

Perc

enta

ge o

f CSO

s

No Foreign Assistance 12.3% 64.6% 14.5% 4.7% 2.7% 1.2%

Receives Foreign Assistance 52.1% 26.0% 7.3% 4.2% 7.3% 3.1%

0.00 1-19 20-49 50-99 100-499 500-~

148

Figure 4.6b. shows the richness of volunteers among the small CSOs that do not receive any type

of foreign assistance. In most cases their number of volunteers ranges from 1 to 50 persons, and

the most common among such CSOs (65%) is to have 1 to 19 volunteers. Only 12% of such

CSOs have mentioned that they do not have any volunteers, while such absence of volunteers is

very common among CSOs receiving foreign assistance (52%). As the number of volunteer rises

higher than 100, we may observe rather steady presence of CSOs receiving foreign assistance.

This is because large NGOs belong to this group and some of them have identified their large

number of beneficiaries as their volunteers too.

4.2.8 Employee

Employees are mostly found among CSOs that are well organized and affluent with

financial resources. Reasonably, CSOs working at the national level are well organized and

run with more professionals. Figure 4.7a shows that 63%, national CSOs have employees

while only 25% of local CSOs have employees. Among the national as well as local CSOs, it

is most common to have employees within 30 persons. However, large NGOs working nation

wide may have several hundred employees working in a district.

Figure 4.7b shows that 78% of CSOs not receiving foreign assistance have mentioned

that they do not have any employees, while 77% of the foreign-assistance-receiving CSOs

have mentioned specifically the number of their employee. Among these types of

organizations 68%, have full-time employees ranging from 1 to 30 persons. Remaining 9%

have much larger employee force.

149

Figure 4.7a Pattern of employee among local and national CSOs

N=504, Answer rate = 100% Figure 4.7b Pattern of employee among foreign assistance receiving and non-receiving CS0s

N=504, No answer=1 (0.2%)

0%

10%

20%

30%

40%

50%

60%

70%

80%

N umbe r o f Emplo y e e s

Perc

enta

ge o

f CS

Lo c a l 74.5% 19.7% 5.0% 0.7%

N a t io n a l 36.4% 36.4% 20.5% 6.8%

0.00 1-9 10-29 30-~

0 %

1 0 %

2 0 %

3 0 %

4 0 %

5 0 %

6 0 %

7 0 %

8 0 %

9 0 %

N um be r o f E m plo y e e s

Perc

enta

ge o

f CS

N o F o re ig n A s s is t a n c e 78 .4% 18 .4% 3 .2 % 0 .0%

R e c e iv e s F o re ig n A s s is t a n c e 22 .9% 40 .6% 2 7 .1% 9 .4%

0 .0 0 1 -9 1 0 -2 9 30 -~

150

4.2.9 Budget

Figure 4.9a and 4.9b comparatively show the budget in 2005 of the CSOs both from

their geographical level and on the point of receiving foreign assistance. A significant portion

of the sample CSOs refrained from providing their budget. However, with the available data, it is

clear that, CSOs with various ranges of budgets are working at the local level (Figure 4.8a). The

most common among the local level NGOs to have budget within 100 thousand to 1 million BDT

(35%). However, 34% of national NGOs also have budget within the same amount while another

34% have budget exceeding 1 million BDT and in case of large NGOs it may even exceed 100

millions.

Figure 4.8a Amount of budget among local and national CSOs

Figure 4. 8b shows the annual budget of CSOs not receiving foreign assistance (56%) ranges

between BDT 1000 to only BDT 100 thousand. On the other hand, 33% of the

0%

10%

20%

30%

40%

Amount of Budget in BDT

%of

CSO

s

Local 18.0% 18.9% 20.1% 34.8% 8.2%

National 11.4% 11.4% 8.6% 34.3% 34.3%

1000-24999 BDT

25000-49999 BDT

50000-99999 BDT

100000-999999 BDT

1000000-~ BDT

* 106 (21%) of CSOs did not provide their budget statistics. ** The budget is provided in Bangladeshi currency BD Taka. 1 US $= 69 BD Taka and 1 Taka = 1.7 JP Yen (According to Yahoo currency converter http://finance.yahoo.com/currency? On 15 May 2007

151

Figure 4.8b Amount of budget among foreign funds receiving and non-receiving CSOs

* 17% of CSOs receiving foreign assistance and 22% of those not receiving foreign assistance did not provide their budget statistics. CSOs in total 106 (21%) have not been considered in this graph. So the valid N here is 398 n1=80 and n2 =317. ** The budget is provided in Bangladeshi currency BD Taka. 1 US $= 69 BD Taka and 1 Taka = 1.7 JP Yen (According to Yahoo currency converter http://finance.yahoo.com/currency? On 15 May 2007.

foreign-assistance-receiving CSOs budgets’ range from BDT 100,000 to BDT 1 million, 41%

of such CSOs have budgets exceeds BDT 1 Million. Highest budget among these 41% is 120

million BDT.

With the six comparative figures on volunteers, employee and budget, distinct gaps

between the financial and human resources of the local and national as well as, foreign-

assistance-receiving-CSOs and the non-receiving-CSOs has been revealed. CSOs working at

the national level and NGOs receiving foreign-assistance may be well equipped with

handsome budgets and skilled employees; but it is the small local groups, not receiving

foreign assistance that are rich in spirited volunteers.

0%5%

10%15%20%25%30%35%40%45%

Amount of Budget in BDT

% o

f CSO

No Foreign Assistance 19.2% 18.6% 21.1% 35.3% 5.7%

Receives Foreign Assistance 7.5% 12.5% 6.3% 32.5% 41.3%

1000-24999 BDT

25000-49999 BDT

50000-99999 BDT

100000-999999 BDT

1000000 BDT-~

152

4.2.10 Cooperation with Other Actors

As discussed in the introduction and in chapter three, civil society cannot be analyzed

in isolation as it is located within the political system and engaged in reciprocal interaction

with other political, economic and social sectors of the system. Through the survey, CSOs

were asked about the cooperation they have with different types of actors in the political

system. Based on their response, a cooperation index has been formed and the 15 actors have

been ranked based on level of cooperation with civil society organizations surveyed.

Cooperation Index

CSOs were requested to rate the level of their cooperation with 15 types of social,

political and market actors on a scale from 1 to 7 where, 1 means no cooperation, 4 means

medium cooperation and 7 means highest Cooperation. Likert scale was used to rank the 15

actors based on the level of cooperation existing between them and CSOs based on the data.

Score for each actor could range from 0 to 1600. The score for seven kinds of cooperation

namely; 1. no cooperation, 2. lowest cooperation, 3. some cooperation, 4. medium

cooperation, 5. good cooperation, 6. better cooperation, 7. highest cooperation were assigned

with weights 0, 1, 2 3, 4, 5, and 6 respectively. The cooperation index (C.I) was measured by

using the equation (1).

6543210. ×+×+×+×+×+×+×= hcbcgcmcsclcnc PPPPPPPIC (1)

Where Pnc = number of respondents who rate no cooperation

Plc = number of respondents who rate lowest level of cooperation

Psc= number of respondents who rate some type of cooperation

Pmc= number of respondents who rate medium level of cooperation

Pgc = number of respondents who rate good level of cooperation

Pbc= number of respondents who rate better level of cooperation

153

Phc=number of respondents who rate highest level of cooperation

Cooperation Index (C.I) for any selected statement could range from 0 to 1600; where 0

indicating no cooperation and 1600 highest cooperation of the unit by the CSOs. Accordingly,

Table 4.3. was formed.

Table 4.3 Cooperation ranking with other social, political and market actors Rank

How to Cooperate with Organizations Type of actor CI

Mean*

1 Local governments Political actor 1509 3.99

2 Welfare Organizations, NGO Social actor 1142 3.27

3 Agricultural Organization Social actor 1100 3.18

4 Consumer Organization Social actor 879 2.74

5 Political Parties Political sector 811 2.61

6 Scholars and academicians Social actor 710 2.41

7 Religious organizations Social actor 705 2.40

8 The mass media Social actor 703 2.39

9 Women movement organizations Social actor 528 2.05

10 Professional organizations Social actor 490 1.97

11 Government bureaucrats Political actor 471 1.93

12 Foreign government and International donor

agencies

Political actor 410 1.81

13 Trade (labor) unions and federations Market actor 325 1.64

14 Economic, business, and employers

organization

Market actor 228 1.45

15 Large business /corporations Market actor 211 1.42

N=504, Answer rate=100% * mean based on the rating of the CSOs where 1=no cooperation, 4= medium cooperation and 7= highest cooperation.

The Table 4.3. illustrates that highest cooperation between civil society organizations

is with the local government, as most of the CSOs surveyed are active at the local level, they

have high interaction with local governments which is in charge of the administrative affairs

154

of these small groups and cooperatives. However, 2nd (Welfare Organizations, NGO) 3rd

(Agricultural Organization), 4th (Consumer Organization ) are all social actors. The most

influential political actor—political party, has been ranked at the 5th place in relation to

formal cooperation, based on the rating of CSOs. Another noteworthy feature is that the

market actors have hardly any cooperation with the CSOs which goes with the low

contribution from private enterprises to civil society groups. Consequently, most of the social

actors have ranked in the first half of the list except the local government and political parties.

Again, if we observe the mean of the level of cooperation, then we may find it not so

optimistic. In a range from 1 to 7, the highest cooperation average/mean (with local

government) is less than 4, which indicate that the cooperation is hardly medium type. From

the ranking and means column it may be said that the over-all level of cooperation with 15

actors of civil society is less than medium. Particularly, with market actors the cooperation is

lowest and most cooperation exists with the social actors, among political actors the

cooperation is significant with local government and political parties however, not awe-

inspiring.

After revealing the basic characteristics and tendencies of CSOs, it is now important

to investigate what type of activities these organizations are involved in. Are they only

welfare based as the policy interest and objectives indicates? do they engage in other

activities that are more related to politics, state action and democratic consolidation? And we

also need to understand which sections of the CSOs are involved in participatory activities.

The next section explores the welfare based grass-roots actions of the civil society

organizations followed by the third section that broadly focus on the participatory nature of

the CSOs.

155

4.3 Civil Society Involvement in Grass-roots Action

Grass-roots actions, refers to CSO programs such as micro-credit, literacy, skill

training, relief, health, women empowerment, group network building, as well as social

mass-awareness, humanitarian and legal aid carried out at the rural level and within poor

communities. In most cases these programs are service based targeting the poor villagers.

76% of the organizations indicated that they were somehow involved in grass-roots development.

Table 4.4 shows the involvement of CSOs in different categories of grass-roots activities.

Respondents were free to choose multiple answers if they were involved in more than one ways

in grass-roots development. Among them, the most popular activities were found to be health

(46%), education (44%) and economic empowerment (44%), or micro-credit. Progress took place

mainly through development NGOs. Table 4.4 also shows the high involvement of social welfare

groups and NGOs in those service based programs, besides these three functions of welfare and

NGO groups have been found to be highly involved in social and political awareness (43%).

In different studies also, it has been evident that villagers who receive micro-credits for

income-generating activities from the NGOs or who participate in NGO programs are more likely

to undertake new income-generating activities, raise their income and productivity, empower

themselves, adopt family planning, reduce infant and child mortality, prevent childhood diseases,

and attain self-reliance in meeting their socio-economic and other welfare needs than those of

their comparable non-beneficiaries (Amin 1997, 116). Besides material development, the poor

have heightened their self-confidence over time (IOB 1998, 3 and Scheyvens 2002). NGOs have

also been successful in inspiring these poor, uneducated people to learn, become socially and

politically aware, and even to participate and win in local council elections. In the 1996 general

parliamentary election, the turnout of women voters was 77%11. Civil society efforts for

11 USAID Fact sheet, http://usinfo.state.gov/usa/womrts/intwmday.htm, [ Access date, 21st August, 2006]

156

Table 4.4 Nature of involvement in grass-roots actions12

12 Though 76% that is 384 CSOs said they are involved in grass-roots action, 79% that is 397 CSOs have mentioned about their involvement in particular grass-roots programs. This means 13 CSOs though do not think they are involved in over-all grass-roots action, have mentioned their involvement in particular programs. This difference may be because of their way of thinking about grass-roots action or their misunderstanding of the question 4.3. ‘ Are you involved in any grass-roots actions?’. However, when they found the name of particular actions they are involved in they have mentioned about their participation, in the questionnaire. As involvement of these 13 CSOs in different grass-roots action is fact, they have been included in the counting of the particular actions and counted in the tables.

Number of involved CSOs

Self-Classification of CSOs

Frequency

Active in GO-NGO cooperation for rural development ***

Active in developing group network***

Active in women Empowerment***

Active in local representation and ventilation of grievances to the authorities***

Active in education and literacy***

Active in health education and health service ***

Active in legal, political and human rights***

Active in economic Empowerment***

Active in social and political awareness and participation**

Economic 116 24 35 29 24 38 54 14 76 31 20.7% 30.2% 25.0% 20.7% 32.8% 46.6% 12.1% 65.5% 26.7% Education and Culture

49 3 5 6 3 40 28 10 14 18

6.1% 10.2% 12.2% 6.1% 81.6% 57.1% 20.4% 28.6% 36.7% Pressure Group

8 0 1 1 2 4 4 2 3 4

0.0% 12.5% 12.5% 25.0% 50.0% 50.0% 25.0% 37.5% 50.0% Welfare and Development

224 54 81 122 61 140 149 64 129 96

24.1% 36.2% 54.5% 27.2% 62.5% 66.5% 28.6% 57.6% 42.9% Total 397 81 122 158 90 222 235 90 222 149 16% 24% 31% 18% 44% 46% 17% 44% 30%

*** Sig. P<0.01, **Sig P<0.05 N=504 No Answer =1 (0.2%), Not Applicable =106 (21%)

157

education have ensured 82% primary school enrolment in Bangladesh 13. No doubt these are

important achievement in strengthening civil society in rural Bangladesh. Thus, it may be stated

that where there was nothing, now there is at least something.

However, if we again go back to the table 4.4 it may be observed that the involvement of

CSOs in building group networks (24%), local representation and ventilation of grievances (18%),

and educating and helping in social and political rights (17%) is relatively less than in other areas

of involvement, though we may consider these programs to be more important in citizen building

and advocacy training. Previous studies have also revealed that often rural micro-credit debtors do

not have full control over their money. NGO workers place priority on the commercial value of

micro-credits vis-à-vis its welfare potential. In most cases, the education level as well as the

management and leadership qualities of NGO beneficiaries is below the standard to gain

independence (Ullah and Routary 2003, 118). Village organizations or groups formed by the

beneficiaries of NGOs seem to act like sub-branches of the particular NGO instead of articulating

members’ needs and preferences (Hulme and Edwards 1997, 276 and IOB 1998, 251). Now we

can infer that while they have achieved something, it may not be enough for the overall

development of the grass-roots sector.

So it becomes evident that except political social awareness (30%) CSOs involvement,

(that includes both the NGOs, welfare groups, traditional pressure groups and economic

groups) at the grass roots level are mostly concerned with service providing development and

welfare activities than politics and democracy related actions.

To have a closer look on the tendency of the CSOs on grass-roots action, two service

related and two advocacy training related actions have been selected and civil society

involvement has been analyzed considering both the geographic level of activity of CSOs and

13 UNICEF Website http://www.unicef.org/bangladesh/child_development_education_389.htm [Access date, 8th November, 2006]

158

their condition of receiving and not-receiving foreign assistance. Table 4.5 is a three

dimensional cross table showing the involvement of foreign assistance receiving and non-

receiving CSOs working at the local and national level in four types of grass-roots actions.

The first two are service providing while the last two are advocacy training. In all 4 cases we

may observe overwhelming participation rate of CSOs that receive foreign funds, specially

working at national base. Because these CSOs or NGOs are large, well skilled and financed

and have multi-dimensional grass-roots programs than the small foreign assistance receiving

CSOs who may have limited projects in a certain locality. However, participation rate of latter

CSOs on health, economic empowerment and network building is also very high.

Table 4.5 Selected grass-roots action among foreign funds receiving and non-receiving CSOs engaged at the local and national level

Number of involved CSOs Active at Local Level Active National Level Selected Grass-Roots Activities Do not

Receives Foreign funds

Receives Foreign Funds

Do not Receives Foreign funds

Receives Foreign Funds

Total N=504)

Active in health education and health service**

145 36 17 37 235

52% 78% 59% 88% 46%Active in economic Empowerment 150 29 15 27 221

54% 63% 52% 64% 44%Active in developing group network *** 76 23 3 20 122

27% 50% 10% 48% 24% Active in legal, political and human rights **

42 17 9 22 90

15% 37% 31% 52% 17%Total* 279 46 29 42 396

***P<0.01, P<0.05, N=504, No Answer= 2 (0.4%), Not Applicable= 106 (21%).

* The total includes only those CSOs that have mentioned their involvement in particular grass-roots programs. The participation rate for CSOs that do not receive any foreign assistance is high too.

In case of the first two service providing activities more than 50% of these CSOs are active

159

both at the local and national level. For network building, it is the CSOs working at the local

level (both foreign assistance receiving and not receiving CSOs) that are comparatively active

than the national level CSOs. While in the case of legal aid, and political human rights

education, it is the national CSOs that are more involved as they are equipped with specialized

manpower.

As the foreign assistance receiving CSOs are mostly NGOs and they receive foreign

funds mainly for grass-roots projects-development and poverty alleviation, their high rate of

involvement in these activities is obvious. But what is more striking is the high rate of

involvement of local CSOs that do not receive any foreign assistance for social welfare. From

the consideration of grass-roots actions, the data shows that all most all types of CSOs active

at both local and national level, with varying amount of resources are engaged and active. This

indicates to a vibrant nature of civil society in terms of Neo-Tocquevillean model.

4.3.2 Evaluation of CSOs and NGO performance

Concerning performance and effectiveness of the grass-roots action, the CSOs were

asked to evaluate (1) their own performance, (2) over all NGO performance nation wide and

(3) the success of international NGOs, development agencies and donor separately on a scale

from 1 to 7, where 1 is very little success, 4 is medium success and 7 is highest success. The

three type of rating results is illustrated in table 4.6.

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Table 4.6 Grass-roots performance evaluation

Types of Evaluation Mean Standard Deviation

Percentage of CSOs (rated within 4 to 7)

Self Performance 4.3 1.278 68%

Performance of all NGOs 4.1 1.159 61%

Performance of International

NGOs and Agencies 4.1. 1.59 74%

N= 504, Not applicable =99 (20%) and Invalid Answer =7 (1%) *The evaluation was made on a scale from 1 to 7, where 1 is very little success, 4 is medium success and 7 is highest success.

CSOs engaged in grass-roots activities evaluated their performance as 4.3 (Standard

Deviation=1.28), while the average of overall national performance of NGOs was just 4.1

(Standard Deviation=1.16). Average rating 4 refers that evaluation positive but they are not

claiming high performance. Similarly to the NGO efficiency evaluation, incase of international

NGOs, agencies and donors, the evaluation mean is only 4.1 (Standard Deviation 1.599),

indicating that CSOs accept the reality of constructive contributions by foreign actors but they do

not highly appreciate their role. However, if we calculate the number of CSOs that have rated

performance from scale 4 to 7 which means, they think such CSOs are encouragingly successful,

we find, in all three cases, strong majority of CSOs have rated positively (column 3 of table 4.6).

From our analysis and discussion so far on civil society actions at the grass-roots level, we

find that, high percentage of CSOs are involved in grass-roots level, though their involvement in

service providing than advocacy training (accept social and political awareness) is higher. Again,

it has been found that, involvement of local based, domestically financed CSOs is also significant

and the performance of CSOs—traditional, modern and international, are also positive. This

confirms again, well accepted supposition that, civil society in Bangladesh has contributed

significantly in social development, poverty alleviation. Moreover, through the survey, it is

revealed that not only well recognized NGOs, but local CSOs are also active in such endeavor.

161

Civil society is involved in solving the local problems of poverty, literacy, sanitation, also to some

extent for good citizenry. This picture rather provides a healthy, vibrant picture of civil society that

may form the basis for further involvement and success in political and democracy related matters

according to the Diamond model. However, the fact is not so simple and straight. Next section, in

details analyzes the participatory nature of civil society based on the survey data.

4.4 Civil Society Involvement in Participatory Functions

Service providing is only one section of civil society function. For civil society to

contribute to politics and democracy, it has to engage more in civic education, interest

articulation, monitor the state apparatus, ensure better participation and representation of all

segments of the society in political decision making. This requires civil society to be more

involved in advocacy, policy participation, lobby etc. and come into more interaction with the

government balancing its own autonomy and independence. For this the civil society has to be

participatory. The present section shall investigate the participatory nature of the CSOs

surveyed under four broad headings-formal relations with the government, advocacy, policy

making and lobby.

4.4.1 Relation with Government

To understand the participatory nature, first I concentrate on the formal relations

(besides registration, licensing) CSOs have with the government and local government. These

relations require civil society to have interaction with governments. Table 4.7 shows rate of

government relations with four types of civil society originations. If we focus on the relation

that comes down from the government towards the civil society like guidance from the

government (57%) then it is clear that majority or a good proportion of

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Table 4.7 Nature of formal relation with government

Number of Involved CSOs Self Classification of CSOs

Frequency Administrative guidance provided by the government ***

Cooperating with and

Supporting policies and

budget activities of the government***

Exchanging opinions with the

government* **

Sending Representative to council and /or advisory bodies of the

government***

Positions Offering to government

officials after

retirement**

Economic 169 108 7 66 28 3 63.9% 4.1% 39.1% 16.6% 1.8% Education and Culture

68 19 2 19 5 2

27.9% 2.9% 27.9% 7.4% 2.9% Pressure Group

11 6 4 9 6 1

54.5% 36.4% 81.8% 54.5% 9.1% Welfare and Development

256 153 29 92 61 18

59.8% 11.3% 35.9% 23.8% 7.0% Total 504 286 42 186 100 24 56.7% 8.3% 36.9% 19.8% 4.8% ***Sig, P<0.01 **Sig. P<0.05 N=504 Answer rate= 100% CSOs of all categories, receives such guidance. In case of exchanging opinion with the

government, CSOs are considered as important stakeholder, to government policies and

decisions, the rate of involvement is 38% which is a bit less than government guidance. But

when the relationship direction, turns opposite, that is, it draws from the civil society opinion

towards government policy and action, in other words, when such relation leads to Civil

society participation, the rate of involvement is rather low. The tendency of supporting

government policy and budget (8%) and sending representative to government advisory bodies

and councils (20%) is rather low in all categories (except the pressure groups which only

counts 2% of the total CSOs surveyed).

Three formal relations belonging to each direction in civil society and

government interaction have been further analyzed to understand the tendency of participation

163

Table 4.8 Selected government relationship among foreign funds receiving and non-receiving CSOs engaged at the local and national level

Number of involved CSOs

Active in Local Level Active in National Level

Selected formal Relation with Government

Do not Receives Foreign funds

Receives Foreign Funds

Do not Receives Foreign funds

Receives

Foreign Funds

Total

Relation with government/ Administrative guidance provided by the government

208 35 21 21 285

57% 67% 48% 48% 57% Relation with government/ Exchanging opinions with the government

116 22 22 26 186

32% 42% 50% 59% 37% Relation with government/ Sending representative to council and /or advisory bodies of the national government **

52 15 14 19 100

14% 29% 32% 43% 20% Total 363 52 44 44 503 ** sig P<0.05 No Answer=1 (0.2%) N=504

of civil society. They have been placed in a three-dimension table, showing the involvement of

the CSOs receiving and not-receiving foreign funds at both local and national level, in

connection to those government relations. In case of receiving government directions it seems

that all types of CSOs receive government direction at a high rate. However, more local CSOs

(both foreign assistance receiving and not-receiving) get directions than the national CSOs

(Table 4.8, 2nd row).

Again, in case of exchanging opinions and sending representatives to the government

councils where the total involvement rate is rather low (37% and 20% respectively),

participation rate of national level CSOs (both foreign funds receiving and non-receiving) are

significantly high than local level CSOs. On the other, hand, while governance guidance is

164

highest for (57%) local CSOs that do not receive foreign funds their participating rate is

lowest in supporting policy or budget (32%) and sending representatives (14%).

From the analysis of the data on formal relation between government and CSOs it

becomes clear that more the interaction with government becomes participation related the

lower is the involvement rate. Moreover, it also indicates the tendency that, indigenous (non-

foreign funds receiving) and local CSOs are less participatory than other categories of CSOs

that may be in better position in relation to finances, skill, organizational base and education.

4.4.2 Advocacy Present research by advocacy refers to negotiating and pressurizing the government in

different ways on different political and social issues and problems as well as for particular

interest of the CSO itself. Moreover, it also considers public education on political and human

rights and mass awareness as advocacy action from consideration of socio-political condition

of Bangladesh. Such advocacy functions lead to interest articulations and bring the civil

society nearer to the authorities. Some times they may find themselves in a position of

cooperation with the authorities, other time in an opposite situation. It may be considered as

the most important barometer to understand the participatory nature of the civil society

organizations. Table 4.9 shows the rate of advocacy participation of CSOs belonging to four

broad categories on various issues. First five issues here are directly related to the social

welfare and their service programs while last five are more related to democracy and political

stability. All are burning issues from consideration of contemporary Bangladesh (in 2006).

Overall rate of advocacy participation is low; none of the issues attract 50% of the CSOs

unlike the high rate of involvement in grass-roots action. Among CSOs’ categories, pressure

165

groups have been found to be highly involved in the advocacy functions but they represent

only 2% of the CSOs. Highest rate of interest for advocacy has been found for education (39%)

and health (38%). Naturally, welfare & NGOs and also pressure groups are mostly involved

on those issues. However, the rate of involvement of economic groups and educational groups

are also not too low.

166

Table 4.9 Nature of advocacy among different types of CSOs

**Sig. P<0.05, ***Sig. P<0.01

Number of involved CSOs in Advocacy

Self-classification of CSOs

Involvement in

Involvement in

Involvement in

Involvement in

Involvement in

Involvement in

Campaign for

Involvement against

Campaign against

Campaign for

Total Frequency

Women's right

issue*** Education Public

health** Environment

issue***

Labor right and Unemployment

issue***

Political and human

rights***

better Law and order***

Corruption issue***

Street Politics

and Hartal (strike)

Culture***

Separation of the Judiciary

from the executive

branch of the Government***

Economic 167 42 57 55 34 28 21 23 14 1 4 25.1% 34.1% 32.9% 20.4% 16.8% 12.6% 13.8% 8.4% 0.6% 2.4% Education and Culture 68 13 27 20 18 12 12 10 10 1 2

19.1% 39.7% 29.4% 26.5% 17.6% 17.6% 14.7% 14.7% 1.5% 2.9% Pressure Group 11 6 7 6 6 7 5 6 5 4 4 54.5% 63.6% 54.5% 54.5% 63.6% 45.5% 54.5% 45.5% 36.4% 36.4% Welfare and Development 255 99 109 112 91 51 64 46 29 8 11

38.8% 42.7% 43.9% 35.7% 20.0% 25.1% 18.0% 11.4% 3.1% 4.3% Total 501 160 200 193 149 98 102 85 58 14 21 31.9% 39.9% 38.5% 29.7% 19.6% 20.4% 17.0% 11.6% 2.8% 4.2%

167

But when we come to the democracy and politics related issues, like political human rights

(20%), law and order (17%), corruption (12%), street politics14 (3%), independent judiciary

(4%)15, except the small number of pressure groups, the participation rate on these issues are

low for all categories of civil society organizations. When CSOs are not concerned and active

about the most crucial political and social problems of a country, then their potential to

contribute to democracy can hardly be estimated. Such non-involvement of civil society let us

to infer that either the civil society organizations are indifferent to political problems of the

country or they are avoiding any confrontation with powerful political actors. Moreover, it

may also be assumed that for some reason, the vibrant civil society organizations are barred

from meddling into such sensitive issues. We shall discuss more on this problem in chapter

five.

Table 4.10 tries to perceive the nature of CSOs participation by dividing them on the

basis their local, national character and on condition of receiving and not-receiving foreign

assistance. Total rate of participation in the five politics related issues are very low. Among

20% CSOs advocating for political and human rights, and 17% CSOs for law and order, 12%

for corruption, national level CSOs are more active than local level and a significant section is

occupied by the foreign- assistance- receiving CSOs ( row 3, 4, 5 of Table 4.10). However, in

case of campaign against street politics and for separation of the judiciary, contribution of

these types of CSOs is negligent. In the latter two issues mostly national and a very few

14 As discussed in chapter three, the political parties in Bangladesh are engaged in confrontational politics and prefer to come to streets instead of ventilating their grievances at the parliament. Often the street politics, mass protests etc. are accompanied by day long nation wide strikes which are instigated by the means of violence. 15 In Bangladesh, though the Supreme Court is independent from the government, lower divisions of the court are still controlled by government recruited magistrates. The matter is an old issue and citizens are always promised by the political parties to separate the judiciary from the government before election. However, in either regime such separation has actually taken place though at different stages initiatives have been taken for such separation and Supreme Court has given ruling on such issue. In 2007, under the emergency rule the process for separation has begun.

168

Table 4.10 Democracy related advocacy among foreign funds receiving and non-receiving CSOs engaged at the local and national level

Democracy Related Advocacy Participation

Number of Involved CSOs

Active at Local Level Active National Level

Do not Receives Foreign funds

Receives Foreign Funds

Do not Receive

s Foreign funds

Receives Foreign Funds

Total

Involvement in Political and human rights by advocacy *** 57 14 10 21 102

16% 27% 24% 48% 20% Campaign for better Law and order by advocacy 53 9 12 11 85

15% 17% 29% 25% 17% Involvement against Corruption issue by advocacy 32 9 9 8 58

9% 17% 21% 18% 16% Campaign against Street Politics and Hartal (strike) Culture by advocacy 5 1 6 2 14

1% 2% 14% 2% 3% Campaign for Separation of the Judiciary from the executive branch of the Government by advocacy

8 2 9 2 21

2% 4% 21% 5% 4% Total 362 52 42 44 500

***Sig. P<0.01 No Answer =4 (1%) N=504

local based traditional CSOs (not receiving foreign assistance) have mentioned about their

involvement.

Human rights, law and order and corruption affects the whole society-urban & rural

and the activities of both local and national life. Moreover, donors policy on good governance

has also begun to put emphasis on those issues. This is why advocacy for these issues attracted

more CSOs of different sections than have street politics or independent judiciary. Donor

instructions do not emphasize that NGOs should advocate for independent judiciary or against

street politics. Again, poor CSOs at the local level may not be well aware of the judicial

system of Bangladesh and street politics (Hartal)- may not directly affect a farmer in the

169

village as it does to an urban dweller. However, considering the social consciousness and

political awareness that has been generated through out Bangladesh with the help of NGO

projects and penetration of political parties in the rural societies, and the high turn outs at the

polls since 1990s, the over all advocacy interest of the civil society as revealed through the

data is not satisfactory.

4.4.3 Policy Making

Another more direct involvement of civil society in influencing the governance is

participation in policy making. The survey data on policy making reveals a more frustrating

picture about the participatory nature of CSOs in Bangladesh active at the periphery and meso

level. The respondents were asked whether they have ever been successful in influencing the

government/ local government in any decision, policy or budget to their favor (policy making)

and prevent such decision, policy or budget that go against their interest (policy breaking).

Table 4.11a shows the rate of success among the surveyed CSOs (of different catagories) in

policy making and breaking. Only 13% CSOs has admitted about their success in influencing

government decisions, policy or budget and only 6% in blocking such decisions or policies

that went against their interests. From the table it also becomes clear that in case of policy

making, the success rate is almost same for all categories CSOs.

170

Table 4.11a Success in policy making and policy breaking among different CSOs Number of Involved CSOs

Self-classification by CSOs Total Frequency Success in policy making

Success in policy breaking***

Economic 169 25 12

14.8% 7.1% Education and Culture 68 9 3 13.2% 4.4% Pressure Group 11 2 3 18.2% 27.3%

Welfare and Development 256

31

12

12.1% 4.7% Total 504 67 30 13.3% 6.0% ***Sig. P<0.01 Answer rate =100%

Table 4.11b Participation in PRSP policy process by different CSOs

Self-classification by CSOs

Number of Involved CSOs

Total Frequency Participation in Poverty

Reduction or Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper (PRSP)***

Economic 8

169 4.7% Eduaction and Culture 7 60 11.7% Pressure Group 3 11 27.3%

Welfare and Development 37

246 15.0% Total 55 486 11.3% ***Sig. P<0.05 No answer =18 (4%)

Table 4.11b shows the percentage of CSOs that participated in a nationally and

internationally16 well-publicized government policy on poverty reduction, the Poverty Reduction

16 By the websites of international development agencies like, World Bank, Asian Development Bank etc.

171

Strategy Paper (PRSP). The PRSP was formed in phases between 2000 and 2005 and it is claimed

that all types of stakeholders at all levels had been consulted in its formation17. However, the

survey results show that only 11% of CSOs took part in PRSP opinion exchange meetings. Level

is also low for welfare and development CSOs (15%) too.

Though the rate of policy success of the CSOs organizations is very poor, it is important to

see which section of the civil society enjoys better success record. Here again it becomes clear

that though more than 80 % CSOs are local based and majority of them do not receive any foreign

funds, it is the national based and in most cases foreign assistance receiving CSOs, that are most

active among the very small community of CSOs influencing national and local politics. This

indicates that large NGOs mostly enjoy the limited scope of policy making (table 4.12a, 4.12b).

Table 4.12a Policy making and breaking among foreign funds receiving and non-receiving CSOs engaged at the local and national level

Number of Involved CSOs

Active at Local Level

Active at National Level

Policy participation Do not Receives Foreign funds

Receives Foreign Funds

Do not Receives Foreign funds

Receives Foreign Funds

Total

Success in policy making 38 8 6 15 67 10% 15% 14% 34% 13% Success in policy breaking 10 2 9 9 30 3% 4% 20% 20% 6% Total 363 52 44 44 503 No Answer rate=1 (0.2%) N=504

17 Unlocking the Potential: National Strategy for Accelerated Poverty Reduction. 2005. Planning Commission, People’s Republic of Bangladesh. Available at IMF website https://www.imf.org/external/pubs/ft/scr/2005/cr05410.pdf (Access date: 15 May, 2007).

172

4.12b Participation in PRSP policy process among foreign funds receiving and non-receiving CSOs engaged at the local and national level

Number of Involved CSOs

Active at Local Level

Active at National Level

Do not Receives Foreign funds

Receives Foreign Funds

Do not Receive Foreign funds

Receives Foreign Funds

Total

Participation in Poverty Reduction or Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper (PRSP)**

22 10 8 15 55

6% 20% 18% 38% 11% Total 351 50 44 40 485

**Sig P<0.05 No Answer= 19 (4%)

In case of in the PRSP process, again it is the foreign assistance receiving CSOs that claims

more participation than other non-receiving CSOs both at the national (38%) and local level

(20%).

From the survey data on formal relations with government, advocacy and policy

making, it becomes, clear that participation level of the civil society is rather low and though

there are lots of small and big civil society organizations active at the local level that gives a

vibrant look to the landscape of the civil society, they are hardly participatory, even if they

may contribute to social service. It is the foreign-assistance-receiving CSOs that are highly

active at the grass-roots level and also are involved though in low rate in other participatory

activities. But all types CSOs are very careful not to intervene in issues that are politically

sensitive but crucial for the democratic health of the country. It is now important to know in

which way the CSOs approach the government for realizing their interests and ends. Next

section, analyzes the methods used by the CSOs to lobby the authorities. This also provides an

interesting pattern of civil society and politics relations.

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4.4.4 Lobby

Civil society organizations were asked to rate the frequency of different activities that

they do when they try to draw the attention of the government on certain issue or appeal the

authorities for their interest or demands. In other words, through this question [question no.

2.5] the nature of lobby of the organizations had been inquired. Through the structured

questionnaire CSOs were asked about both vertical18 and horizontal19 ways of lobbying as

well as some very formal methods. Table 4.13 shows the percentage of CSOs of four broad

categories engaged in such acts. The over all frequency of lobby is rather low. Among the low

rates, most common is to contact with the parties both in power (54%) and opposition (29%)

as well as the government administration (77%) directly, rather than sending a petition or

letter (6.3%), arrange press conference (14%) or form a coalition of CSOs to press their

demands. Only 12% involvement in forming coalition also indicates the weak network among

civil society organizations in Bangladesh. If we further analyze the data category wise, then

we may observe that almost same proportion of CSOs in each category contact the ruling party,

opposition party and administration.

The vertical lobby is very popular among all types of CSOs in almost same rate, so as

holding round table meetings and conferences (58%) with the pressure groups and welfare

groups involved in a higher rate then the other two catagories. Among the formal and

horizontal lobby this is the only popular means.

18 By vertical lobby I mean mainly the inside lobby (Tsujinaka, 2002:167), where the CSOs directly contact the powerful or authorities individually for their interest or demand. In this case the interaction may take place in formal or informal way but the relationship is structured in a more powerful and less powerful position. Negotiation may end up in a give and take understanding. Here, vertical lobby takes place through interaction with the ruling and opposition party and the administration directly. 19 By horizontal lobby, I mean the methods to attract government attention or make demand in a combined way like forming coalitions, or arranging meetings, press conference. In this way the CSO articulates its interest to the public and gain social and moral support from other like minded stakeholders. After building strength horizontally, together they push forward their demand towards the higher authorities.

174

Table 4.13 Nature of lobby by different CSOs.

**Sig. P<0.05, *** Sig. P<0.01

Number of Involved CSOs Self-

classification of CSOs

Total

Frequency

Lobby / Contacting the parties

in the cabinet

Contacting the

opposition parties

Contacting governmental

department and agencies

Helping to draft

legislative bills for political parties or

governmental organization

***

Presenting research results or technical

information to political

parties and/or

government ministries***

Asking members of

the organization

to write letters or make

phone calls to political parties or

government administration

Engaging in mass protests or

demonstrations***

Organizing seminars,

round table

meeting, rally etc

Holding press

conferences in order to publicize

ideas and let know

organizations position on

different issues and

incidents***

Forming coalition

with other organizations

or NGOs

Economic 169 91 47 132 0 2 10 32 88 15 16 53.8% 27.8% 78.1% 0.0% 1.2% 5..9% 18.9% 52.1% 8.9% 9.5% Education and Culture

68 40 23 45 1 0 5 13 40 5 5

58.8% 33.8% 66.2% 1.5% 0.0% 7.4% 19.1% 58.8% 7.4% 7.4% Pressure Group

11 6 5 8 3 2 2 8 8 7 0

54.5% 45.5% 72.7% 27.3% 18.2% 18.2% 72.7% 72.7% 63.6% 0.0% Welfare and Development

256 134 72 202 4 10 15 39 158 44 39

52.3% 28.1% 78.9% 1.6% 3.9% 5..9% 15.2% 61.7% 17.2% 15.2% Total 504 271 147 387 8 14 32 92 294 71 60 53.8% 29.2% 76.8% 1.6% 2.8% 6.3% 18.3% 58.3% 14.1% 11.9%

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The most recognized formal means to seek government attraction is petition (writing

letter), here the rate of using such method is very low (6%) among all types of CSOs. The

most vital horizontal mean for lobby in a democratic setting is forming coalition with like

minded CSOs for a certain cause or issue. Tendency to form such coalitions is strikingly low

among all the categories including the welfare CSOs (15%) that homes the large NGOs too.

More interesting is that, though the pressure groups have a better profile for participation in

advocacy, and interacting with the government and their rate of vertical lobby is very high

(55%, 46% and 73%), non of the 11 pressure groups surveyed admitted of forming coalitions.

Such tendency is found in only 15% of the most prominent section of the civil society—the

welfare and development CSOs.

Table 4.14 further analyzes the lobby tendency among the surveyed CSOs by dividing

them according to their activities at different geographic level and their characteristics of

receiving civil society foreign assistance or not. Here again, the high tendency of vertical

lobby is present in all sections of the CSOs. However, in the case of foreign assistance

receiving CSOs acting at the national level, the tendency to contact opposition party is half to

other CSOs (16%). This is because these CSOs are organizationally already strong and backed

by the donors. Good relation with ruling party is more important for them to proceed with

their functions. But for small NGOs at the local level, they seem to have contact with both the

opposition and position to maintain their programs. The practice of giving petitions (writing

letters) is low in almost same rate among the CSOs active at all sections.

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Table 4.14 Selected lobby performed by foreign funds receiving and non-receiving CSOs engaged at the local and national level

Number of involved CSOs

Active at

Local Level Active at

National Level

Different types of Vertical and Horizontal Lobby

Do not Receives Foreign funds

Receives Foreign Funds

Do not Receives Foreign funds

Receives Foreign Funds Total

Contacting the parties in the cabinet 212 24 19 16 271 58% 46% 43% 36% 54% Contacting the opposition parties 111 16 13 7 147 31% 31% 30% 16% 29%Contacting governmental department and agencies 277 45 34 30 386 76% 87% 77% 68% 77% Asking members of the organization to write letters or make phone calls to political parties or government administration

19 4 5 4

32 5% 8% 11% 9% 6% Organizing seminars, round table meeting, rally etc 206 35 32 21 294 57% 67% 73% 48% 58%Holding press conferences in order to publicize ideas and let know organizations position on different issues and incidents**

23 15 18 1571

6% 29% 41% 34% 14% Forming coalition with other organizations or NGOs** 24 11 7 18 60 7% 21% 16% 41% 12%Total 363 52 44 44 503** Sig P<0.05 No Answer= 1(0.2%) for foreign assistance N=504 Though, arranging meeting is very popular among all sections of the CSOs, it is national level

CSOs having no foreign assistance that has the highest rate (73%) to get involved in those

actions. Holding press conference is common among national CSOs than local CSOs. This is

because local CSOs’ officials may have to come to town, to contact journalist and hold such

conferences. Among the few CSOs that do form coalitions (60 that is 12%), tendency is high

among CSOs acting nation wide and receiving foreign assistance (41%).

177

From the data on lobby it becomes clear that there is an over all tendency to lobby the

government vertically rather than horizontally or formally among all types and sections of the

civil society organization. Among the horizontal lobby, holding public meeting and rally are

most popular among CSOs. This may have been a positive fact for a healthy civil society if

simultaneously they formed coalition and showed unity among themselves. Rather in case of

forming coalition that ultimately leads to strong network among the civil society organizations

and provide the necessary strength to push for demands and tackle the pressure from the state,

CSOs’ involvement is very low. Again in case of vertical lobby, highest is having direct

contact with the government. It is an obvious fact as for registration, permission, license and

other official matters all CSOs have to contact the local or national government. But the

tendency of having direct contact with the political parties to pursue the government for civil

society interest is pretty high in Bangladesh. This indicates a partisan tendency among the

civil society organizations. CSOs that have a low profile in getting involved in participatory

matters have high rate of contacting the political parties directly for their interests and

demands.

Our inference about the partisan or politicized nature of civil society and low rate of

network becomes stronger if we compare the situation in Bangladesh with other Asian

countries both developing and developed, enjoying multi party democracy. Figure 4.9

comparatively shows the nature of lobby through ruling party, opposition party and through

forming coalition of Japan, Korea, Philippines, Turkey and that of Bangladesh. The same

question about lobby was asked to the civil society organizations of those countries20.

20 Figure 4.9 has been constructed based on the data borrowed from the Special Project on Civil Society, State and Culture in Comparative Perspective, University of Tsukuba

178

Figure 4.9 Lobby through political parties and coalition formation–five country comparison

Figure 4.9 clearly distinguishes the high tendency of CSOs of Bangladesh that prefer to

partisan method of lobby than other countries and also the low rate on forming coalition

among themselves to make demands. In case of elite democracy- Philippines that we have

focused on in chapter three, we see that CSOs have double or more the tendency to form

coalition than contacting the political parties, just opposite to the situation in Bangladesh.

Civil society organizations can hardly contribute to democracy and better governance when it

prefer to contact parties individually than forming network and strong platform among

themselves. Such tendency leads them to division and a weak position in relation to the state.

4.5 Summary and Conclusion

4.5.1 Summary

Chapter four, using the survey data collected directly from the civil society

organizations at the periphery and meso level investigates the participatory nature of civil

society. In the first section, basic characteristics of the civil society have been revealed

0%

10%

20%

30%

40%

50%

60%

Lobbythrough

Ruling Party

Lobbythrough

Opposition

FormingCoalition for

Lobby

Japan (Ibaraki) N=197

Korea (Kyengi) N=110

Philippines (Cebu)N=159

Turkey (Istanbul)N=507

Bangladesh (Rajshahi)N=504

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focusing on the attributes like, classifications, objectives, policy interest, geographic level of

activity, membership, resource sources, budget, volunteers, employees etc. of the CSOs.

Objectives and policy interest of the CSOs show a strong tendency toward social welfare and

service than advocacy or policy recommendation and majority of CSOs rely on outer financial

sources-mainly government and foreign funds besides their membership fees. The data also

indicates that, whether the organization acts at local or national level and whether it receives

foreign assistance or not, are the most important factors that determine its nature. It has been

found that, CSOs working at the national level and NGOs receiving foreign-assistance may be

well equipped with handsome budgets and skilled employees; but it is the small local groups

(that do not receive foreign assistance) that are rich in spirited volunteers. In case of

cooperation existing between the CSOs and other political, social and market actors, the data

indicate that most cooperation exists between local government and social actors, then with

political parties. Lowest cooperation and relation exists with the market actors. In Bangladesh,

the civil society and market are yet to emerge as cooperating or rather interacting actors at the

periphery and meso level.

Second section of the chapter reveals the high tendency of involvement in grass-roots

actions. The data show the high involvement of foreign funded CSOs with national base

programs, but more interesting finding is that, all most all types of CSOs active at local and

national level, with contrasting financial and organizational base are engaged overwhelmingly

in grass-roots development. This rather, confirms the existence of a vibrant civil society

organization from Diamond model. The endeavor of the CSOs, NGOs and international

development agencies has also been evaluated positively though not profoundly. However, it

has also been found that, CSOs participation is high in service providing functions and

relatively low in the functions that relate to advocacy training and building good citizenry. But

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for civil society to contribute to democracy, such conscious citizenry and advocacy functions

are essential. However, the rate of involvement in advocacy training is not too low. It may be

hoped that, a steady growth in such activities in the future may lead to positive development.

Participatory nature of civil society has been understood in mainly four ways-formal

relations with governments, policy making, advocacy and lobby.

First attention has been given on formal relation between CSOs and government (both

national and local). It has been found that more the relation requires association of the civil

society into government decisions and actions like giving advices, supporting policies and

budget, the rate of involved CSOs comes down. Again, the percentage rate of involvement by

local CSOs not- receiving-foreign assistance on those participatory issues, have been found to

be lowest than other CSOs receiving foreign assistances or acting nation wide with better

budget and organizational resources.

In case of advocacy, it has been revealed that civil society is mostly involved in issues

that are related to development and social welfare than, issues that are related to accountability

and governance. However, these issues are more important in consolidating democracy and

receive less attention by the CSOs of all types. Only a slim section of large NGOs concentrate

on issues like human rights or corruption as they have been directed so by the donors, but

issues like, street politics or independent judiciary are hardly attended by any type or section

of civil society. The advocacy performance as revealed in the data is very low and

insignificant in contrast to the political consciousness of Bangladeshi citizens and as expected

in a parliamentary democracy.

More direct involvement of civil society is determined in its capacity and success in

influencing government decisions, budget and policies. But the data reveals same frustrating

picture where only 13% have been successful in pursuing the government to pass a budget or

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policy supporting the interest of the CSO. It may be observed that, the minor portion of the

CSOs who are involved in participatory actions, are mostly organized, skilled, and well

financed enjoying national base support, from the remaining majority. Local small CSOs are

hardly involved in such actions.

The data on lobby, reveals interesting participatory nature and pattern of interaction of

the civil society with the authorities and political actors. It is common among the CSOs to

contact directly the authority or powerful political actors in a vertical way rather than

organizing horizontally. The method of gaining strength through forming coalition and or

contacting the press and create pressure on the government have been found to be not yet

popular among the CSOs, specially at the local and periphery level. The tendency to rely more

on vertical or inside lobby by the CSOs indicate to the partisan relation that may be existing

between them and the political parties. A comparative table on Japan, Korea, Turkey and

Philippine display that such tendency is very high in Bangladesh in comparison to other

countries.

4.5.2 Concluding Remarks

Logically, when civil society has a low profile in participating in advocacy, policy

making and forming coalitions, it can hardly bring pluralism or aggregate interests of the

communities and represent all sections of society. It may also fail to gain the strength to

monitor the state functions. Voice of the civil society in national policies shall hardly be

counted.

Bangladesh do have local groups and associations engaged in social development, that

may comply with Diamond model or be considered as the basic structure for the generating

Putnam’s social capital. But survey data also shows that most of these local groups are not

engaged in networks and in functions that generate civic engagements leading towards

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stronger civil society and working democracy. Moreover, these organizations are run by

mainly members and volunteers and most of them do not receive foreign assistance. This also

means that they have been left out from the international initiative for development and

governance. Only selected NGOs have been blessed with foreign assistance to be engaged in

social development as well as good governance and they enjoy the skilled manpower,

resources and organizational strength to engage in different social and to some extent political

endeavors. Such sprinkled initiative of the donors to strengthen civil society can hardly bring

good governance neither at the local level, nor at the national level.

More interesting is that, through the survey it has also been exposed that though the

rate of participation of such donor assisted CSOs and also CSOs with national or district wide

organizational base, is higher than the small indigenous CSOs at the local level, overall

participatory rate is much low in contrast to their activities on grass-roots actions. We have to

admit that participatory nature of the civil society (including all types and sections) at the

periphery and meso levels are low. Naturally their prospect for contributing to democracy or

emerging as a strong vigilant force is not so encouraging.

Through the survey questionnaire, the civil society organizations were asked if they

thought the civil society in Bangladesh was successful in influencing the government on

national policies. Only 32% responded positively and the majority 68% answered negatively.

So about 70% CSOs themselves think that they have no influence on the government. What

causes such poor participation? It is not political apathy, which may serve as an explanation in

the case of developed democracies (Putnam 2000, 35, 46-47). While investigating the reason

for such failure, 52% of the CSOs mentioned the problem of lack of unity among the CSOs

themselves and 43% pointed out to the problem of politicization of the civil society

organizations. The primary data on the opinion of individual CSOs lead us to dig more to

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understand the reason for a less participatory civil society and its inability to contribute to

democracy in spite of its vibrancy. And we may assume it is not political disinterest but over

politicization. In chapter three, I have discussed about the powerful role of the political parties

in democratic age in Bangladesh and based on previous literatures, observations and

interviews have mentioned how the civil society is also penetrated by the political parties.

Such politicization polarizes the civil society, seizes its autonomy, and refrain it from its

participatory role in national policies and decisions. When the civil society is controlled by

government and political forces, it can hardly act as a vigilant force. Next chapter shall focus

on reasons behind the non-participatory attitude of the civil society with special focus on civil

society and political party relations.

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Chapter 5

Civil Society and Political Relation in Bangladesh

5.1 Introduction Chapter four based on survey data revealed the basic trends of the civil society in

Bangladesh, particularly at the periphery and meso level. It have been understood that,

majority of civil society are service and welfare oriented and there are differences between

civil society organizations working only at local level and those through out the country and

also among those who receives foreign assistance and those who do not from the point of

view of financial and human recourses and organizational strength. Through the data analysis

it has also been clearly comprehended that over-all rate of participatory activities, that is,

those actions of civil society that are more related to democracy and politics is low.

Moreover, a partisan tendency has been found among all types and sections of civil society

that seem to have a logical connection to the low rate of civil society participation. The

present chapter shall investigate dipper into the political relation of civil society using both

quantitative and qualitative analysis. The focus shall be mainly on civil society interaction

with state and society. Present chapter looks into both national and local civil society in

Bangladesh. Before entering to the main part of the analysis, I shall discuss the necessity for

such further analysis from theoretical point of view.

According to Diamond (1996: 209), the basic two functions of the civil society are to

monitor and retain the exercise of power by democratic state and to democratize authoritarian

state. The present study is concerned with civil society actions under a democratic (at least

formally) state, particularly a new democracy. For a new democracy, Diamond gives

emphasis on the necessity of vibrant civil society to bring institutional reform and fight

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against corruption. In case of Bangladesh, among large number of CSOs, we have seen that

very thin section of civil society organizations (12%) are engaged in such campaign against

corruption, rather CSOs are often accused of corruption1. Another important role of civil

society is to supplement political parties by stimulating political participation, building better

citizenry, providing leadership training. Moreover, experience with associational life may

enrich other democratic values like tolerance, moderation, compromise and respect opposite

views. These ideal theories give the impression that such democratic norms and practice are

driven from civil society and directed towards society and political parties and their leaders.

However, practically, directions of such flow of political norms and practice are present in

two ways traffic. In Bangladesh, it is found that conflict and intolerance within and among

the political parties are often generated to civil society that often may become polarized,

corrupt and ineffective in democratic terms. Civil society have also been stated to be a

necessary condition for transition from clientelism (Diamond, 1996:210), but practically,

civil society organizations including the development NGOs in Bangladesh have been found

to have entered the long patron-client chains running from top government leader down to

the periphery level of Bangladesh and often NGOs have been accused of becoming new

patrons to poor (Tasnim 2007, Lewis 2004 and White 1999). Moreover, issue oriented

pluralistic civil society is considered to cut-cross social cleavages and divisions and bring

unity among the nation. Berman (1997) have already shown how rich civic engagement in

pre-world war Germany led to rather dictatorship than democracy. In case of the ethnically

homogenous and mostly casteless society in Bangladesh, the society still have been found to

1 According to Corruption Data Base Report 2004 of Transparency International- individuals from NGO personnel occupied 2.6% of the corruption reports in the media. In a recently published report by transparency international on NGOs, presence of nepotism, weak governance and lack of internal democracy and accountability have been revealed within the NGO administrations (Problems of Governance in NGO Sector: 2007).

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be vertically constructed and politically polarized. Civil society here instead of forming

bonding and bridging social capital among different groups are rather helping in sharpening

political division, which had originated in historical circumstances and strategically used and

generated by political parties2. In all four crucial points, the civil society in Bangladesh has

been found to be behaving in the opposite dimension to democracy than what is ideally

expected from it. Moreover, in each point, Bangladeshi civil society shows the links or the

presence of strong influence of political forces and deterring it from playing its democratic

role. Bangladeshi political situation as discussed in chapter three, resembles much of the

patriarchy as depicted by Coppedge (1994) based on the experience of Venezuela.

Partiarchy as termed by Coppedge (1994:18) is a democracy in which political parties

monopolize the formal political process and politicize the society along party line. It is the

degree to which political parties interfere with the fulfillment of the requirements of Robert

Dhal’s polyarchy (the synonym of democracy for present study). In an extreme ideal type of

Partyarchy, the political parties control the government recruitments, elections, parliaments,

social organizations, and media. In Coppedge’s words,

Citizens are free to form and join organizations but most existing organizations are deeply

penetrated by political parties. Politically relevant organizations besides parties are either

affiliated with a single party or are split into party factions that compete for control. New

organizations that seek to be independent become targets for party takeover, by co-optation or

infiltration, or by the creation of competing party-affiliated organizations. One way or

another political parties dominate organizational life (Coppedge, 1994:19).

Though the statement is for an extreme type and used to describe the politics of Venezuela in

the beginning of 1990s, it resembles with the situation of Bangladesh in the 1990s up to 2006.

The two powerful political parties and their allies have controlled the Bangladesh politics.

2 Discussed in chapter three.

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Who ever came to power winning elections have monopolized the state apparatus and using

the government power have tried to control all sections of the society, market and political

life. And they have used vertical means like corruption, patronage, nepotism, violence to

strengthen their support and control upon all the institutions than their political ideologies3.

In the process, civil society have been violated, penetrated, polarized, controlled and

weakened by political parties.

However, for developing such comments on civil society, political party and

democracy into concrete argument or inference; we require hard and strong evidences or

proof. The survey data alone do not provide the necessary proof that explain low rate of the

civil society participation and indicate their vertical link with the political parties. With the

aim to bring to light the reasons behind the low participation of the civil society and its

inability to contribute positively to democratic consolidation, the present chapter

systematically uses, survey data, news paper reports and analysis, information revealed

through interviews and discussion with resource persons, observation notes of the surveyors

during the main Survey on CSOs and personally collected information on selected CSOs.

First section of the chapter uses direct survey data to understand the perception of the civil

society organizations about the influential actors of the political system, nature of their

relation with important actors in society and tendency to have contact with political parties.

Second section of the chapter, using sample newspaper reports and editorials on civil society

tries to understand the nature of political links, vertical links, bureaucratic links, violent

connections to civil society as well as the rate of interest articulations by civil society on

those issues. Third section focuses on some selected but important sections and actions of

3 Though historical developments centering these political parties also have played a significant role in the political polarization of the society and civil society.

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civil society. Using both newspaper reports and interviews, observations and personally

gathered information this section tries to reveal the actual picture of the civil society and

political relation to identify the reasons behind the weak contribution of civil society to

democracy.

5.2 Civil Society and Political Relation as Revealed in the Survey Data This section tries to understand most influential actors in Bangladesh from the

perception of CSOs. Moreover the civil society relation with political actors and political

parties are also analyzed in this section based on the data gathered through a questionnaire

survey upon 504 CSOs of Rajshahi District.

5.2.1 Most Influential Actors CSOs were requested to rate the influence of 15 types of social, political and market

actors in the political system of Bangladesh from a scale from 1 to 7 where, 1 means least

influence, 4 means medium influence and 7 means highest influence. Likert scale was used to

rank the 15 actors based on the level of influence as rated by the CSOs. Score for each actor

could range from 1015 to 3261. The score for seven kinds of influences namely; 1. least

influence, 2. low influence, 3. some influence, 4. medium influence, 5. more influence, 6.

higher influence, 7. highest influence were assigned with weights 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 and 7

respectively. The Influential Index (II) was measured by using the equation (2).

(2) Influential Index (II)= P1*1+P2*2+ P3*3+P4*4+ P5*5+P6*6+P7*7

Where P1 = number of respondents who rate least influence

P2 = number of respondents who rate low influence

P3= number of respondents who rate some influence

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P4= number of respondents who rate medium influence

P5 = number of respondents who rate more influence

P6= number of respondents who rate higher influence

P7=number of respondents who rate highest influence

Influential Index (II) for any selected statement could range from 1015 to 3261; where 1015

indicating least influence and 3261 highest influence of the actor by CSOs. Accordingly,

Table 5.1 was formed.

Table 5.1 Influence ranking of different actors upon the political system

Rank Actors Type of Actor Influential Index Mean* 1 Political Parties Political Actor 3261 6.48 2 The mass media Social Actor 2455 4.88

3 Government Bureaucrats Political Actor 2342 4.66

4 Foreign government and International donor agencies

Political Actor 2239 4.45

5 Local governments Political Actor 2154 4.28

6 Large business /corporations Market Actor 2112 4.20

7 Trade (labor) unions and federations Market Actor 2006 3.99

8 Economic, business, and employers organization

Market Actor 1737 3.45

9 Scholars and academicians Social Actor 1539 3.06

10 Welfare Organizations, NGO Social Actor 1531 3.04

11 Women movement organizations Social Actor 1440 2.86

12 Professional Organizations Social Actor 1431 2.84

13 Religious organizations Social Actor 1361 2.71

14 Agricultural Organization Social Actor 1135 2.26

15 Consumer Organization Social Actor 1015 2.02

N=504, No Answer= 1 (0.2%) * mean based on the rating of the CSOs where 1=least influence, 4= medium influence and 7= highest influence.

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From the ranking table (table 5.1), political parties emerge as significantly influential

actors with distinctly high points than other actors. It scores higher than government

bureaucrats and also foreign donors with more than 1000 point distance. Mass media has

been ranked 2nd in relation to influence. Since 1990s, the press, though not the electric media

has become relatively free, but not 100% independent from political influence. Though the

civil society had highest cooperation with local government (chapter 4) they ranked its

influence as 5th. Again though they had very little cooperation with market actors, large

business organizations, labor unions and employers organizations, these actors have been

ranked as 6th, 7th 8th in order of influence. On the other hand the social and civil society

actors like scholars and intellectuals, welfare NGOs, women’s movement, professional

organizations those who are considered the most important section of the civil society in

relation to development and democracy have been rated 9th, 10th, 11th, 12th respectively.

Though the table raking is based on the perception of only 504 CSOs, it do reflect the

influence pattern of different social, political and market actors and indicates the low position

of the civil society actors and high influential position of the political parties. Next we shall

try to understand which type of actors (political or social), CSOs prefer to keep personal

relation with.

5.2.2 Personal Relation with Actors Civil Society organizations surveyed have already mentioned the political parties as

the most influential actors in the political system. However, for a civil society organization to

function and interact with the state, it also needs to come in contact with other political and

social actors. Table 5.2a shows the nature of CSOs or their leaders/members having personal

relation with the different important actors [Question 2.6]. It is note worthy that 78 CSOs that

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is, 15.5% of the total sample refrained from answering such question. This means that these

CSOs were nervous in revealing such information of personal relation. This attitude in

refraining from answering such questions reflects rather lack of freedom and presence of

some type fear among CSOs and citizens. This is rather inconsistent to liberty and democracy

that the constitution of Bangladesh provides to its citizens. As the society is politically

polarized and the political parties are always fighting against each other, the CSOs did not

want to expose their personal relation with important persons and political leaders in fear of

persecution by the followers and members of the opposite party. However, with the data

available, it becomes clear that CSOs keep personal relation more with political actors like,

leaders of political parties (ruling party 54%, Opposition party 36%), elected Mayor or

chairman (44%) etc. than a journalist (32%), or magistrate (4%).

As the CSOs are mostly working at local level, they hardly have chance to meet the

parliament members (33%) who prefer to be in the capital than spending more time in their

constituency. If we analyze the data, category wise then we may observe that, the tendency

is high in all categories to have personal relation with the local political leaders and elected

persons among the respondents, especially the leaders of the ruling party.

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Table 5.2a Personal Relation between different CSOs and Important Actors

***Sig . P<0.01, ** Sig. P<0.05, N= 504, No Answer=78 (15.5%), Not Applicable =3

If we use the same data, to analyze the responding style of CSOs working at the local

and national level and those receiving and not receiving foreign funds, then again same type of

political tendency is revealed (5.2b).

Number of Involved CSOs Self-classification by CSOs

Total Frequency

An elected parliament member***

A leader of the ruling party

A leader of the opposition parties

A mayor / Union Chairman ***

A journalist ***

A chief or a section chief from a department of government/local administration **

A chief or a staff of an international organization international NGO ***

A judge or a magistrate of the national or local court ***

Economic 141 46 81 52 63 28 50 18 5 32.6% 57.4% 36.9% 44.7% 19.9% 35.5% 12.8% 3.5% Education and Culture

56 27 30 22 36 21 14 4 0

48.2% 53.6% 39.3% 64.3% 37.5% 25.0% 7.1% 0.0% Pressure Group

9 6 8 5 9 6 7 5 4

66.7% 88.9% 55.6% 100.0% 66.7% 77.8% 55.6% 44.4% Welfare and Development

217 61 110 73 79 81 77 51 8

28.1% 50.7% 33.6% 36.4% 37.3% 35.5% 23.5% 3.7% Total 423 140 229 152 187 136 148 78 17 84% 33.1% 54.1% 35.9% 44.2% 32.2% 35.0% 18.4% 4.0%

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Table 5. 2b Personal relation existing between important actors and CSOs of different sections

Number of Involved CSOs CSOs or its members having personal relation with important actors

Local National No Foreign Assistance

Receives Foreign

Assistance

No Foreign

Assistance

Receives Foreign

Assistance

Total

An elected parliament member 98 11 17 14 140 32.3% 25.6% 45.9% 35.0% 33% A leader of the ruling party 180 23 14 12 229 59.4% 53.5% 37.8% 30.0% 54% A leader of the opposition parties 113 19 11 9 152 37.3% 44.2% 29.7% 22.5% 36% mayor / Union Chairman 118 15 30 24 187 38.9% 34.9% 81.1% 60.0% 44% A journalist** 71 16 17 32 136 23.4% 37.2% 45.9% 80.0% 32% A chief or a section chief from a department of government/local administration

92 17 21 18 148

30.4% 39.5% 56.8% 45.0% 35%

A chief or a staff of an international organization, international NGO***

29 17 8 24 78

9.6% 39.5% 21.6% 60.0% 18% A judge or a magistrate of the national or local court

2 2 6 7 17

0.7% 4.7% 16.2% 17.5% 4% Total 303 43 37 40 423

***Sig . P<0.01, ** Sig. P<0.05, N= 504, No Answer=78 (15.5%), Not Applicable =3 However, it is clear that, the rate of having relation with party leaders is high among

local CSOs than national CSOs, while the rate of having personal relation with Mayor or

local council chairman is higher among national CSOs. Relatively, CSOs receiving no

foreign assistance has a higher tendency to have political connection than those CSOs

receiving foreign funds with the exception of having relation with opposition party at the

local level (44%). This means that small NGO receiving foreign resources try to keep good

relation with all types of political forces to continue their projects in the local area. Next we

shall try to reveal the relationship that CSOs have directly with political parties.

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5.2.3 CSOs relation with Political Parties CSOs were directly asked about what type of relations they had with specific political

parties and how often they contacted them. CSOs were very careful to answer such direct

political answer that exposes their relation to political parties. A good number of CSOs

responded that they had no relation with political parties. But those who genuinely did have

relation have mentioned their relation. Table 5.3a shows the rate of CSOs of different

categories that have contact with five type of political parties-Bangladesh Nationalist Party

(BNP)4, Bangladesh Awami League (AL)5, Jamate Islami Party (Jamat)6, Jatiya Party (JP),

Communist Party (any faction). Each CSOs have the possibility to contact more than one

Table 5.3a CSOs having contact with political parties

Number of CSOs having contact with Political Parties Self-Classification

Total frequency

BNP Awami League New

Jamate Islami New

Jatiya Party*

Communist Party**

Economic 169 115 86 53 34 11 68.0% 50.9% 31.4% 20.1% 6.5% Education and Culture

67 43 35 20 13 5

64.2% 52.2% 29.9% 19.4% 7.5% Pressure Group 11 8 7 6 4 3 72.7% 63.6% 54.5% 36.4% 27.3% Welfare and Development

254 160 128 89 78 30

63.0% 50.4% 35.0% 30.7% 11.8% Total 501 326 256 168 129 49

65.1% 51.1% 33.5% 25.7% 9.8%

N= 504, No Answer =3 ** Sig P<0.05

4 Ruling party in 2006 5 Opposition party in 2006 6 Part of the ruling coalition government with two Ministers in the cabinet in 2006

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Party7. Naturally, the highest rate of contact is with the ruling party BNP (65%) and such

high rate is constant among all types of CSOs. So is the case of contact with the powerful

opposition AL (51%) which is also contacted by different categories of CSOs with almost

same average. The rate of contact with other coalition partner— Jamat though less but

significant (36%). Such high contact with political parties is rather abnormal for CSOs who’s

76% are mostly engaged in grass-roots action, only 15% of the them have admitted that, they

are some how related to politics [question 2.9]. To have a more precise look, we have divided

the data section wise, just like the case of personal relations.

Table 5.3b Political party relations with CSOs belonging to different sections

Number of CSOs having contact with Political Parties

Local National

CSOs Relation with Political Parties

No foreign assistance

Receives Foreign

Assistance

No foreign

assistance

Receives Foreign

Assistance Total

BNP 245 32 25 24 326 68.1% 61.5% 56.8% 54.5% 65% Awami League 186 28 23 19 256 51.7% 53.8% 52.3% 43.2% 51% Jamate Islami 113 20 18 17 168 31.4% 38.5% 40.9% 38.6% 34% Jatiya Party 89 13 13 14 129 24.7% 25.0% 29.5% 31.8% 26% Communist Party 22 5 10 12 49 6.1% 9.6% 22.7% 27.3% 10% Total 360 52 44 44 500 N=504, No Answer=4

7 CSOs were actually asked [question 2.3] to rate their nature of contact with political parties on scale from 1 to 5 where 1 is no contact at all, 2 is medium contact and 5 is highest contact. For simplification, in the table 5.2.3a CSOs that rated their contact with political parties from 2 to 5 have summed up and has been regarded at the numbers that have contact with a particular party.

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Table 5.3b shows tendency8 of high rate of political party contact (ruling and opposition

party) among all of the civil society organizations working at local and national level and

receiving or not receiving foreign assistance. However, it may be argued that, CSOs

organizations for many possible reasons and genuine causes may contact the political parties.

So these numbers are not enough to prove partisan tendency among civil society organization.

However, if we try to understand the data from a comparative perspective, using survey

results of other Asian countries, then the following figure (figure 5.1) can be formed.

Figure 5.1 Relationship with ruling party and opposition

Data Source: Special Project on Civil Society, State and Culture in Comparative Perspective, University of Tsukuba9.

8 Table 5.2.3a and 5.2.3b are actually combination of a number of cross tables formed through SPSS program. However, in most cases the cross tables have been found to be statistically insignificant with chi-square scores having significance more than 0.05. Nonetheless, from a qualitative mindset, these numbers and tables do show a political tendency among the CSOs that has relevance to the practical situation in Bangladesh and that can be easily supported or complimented through other direct and indirect data like news paper cutting, interview, observation notes etc. 9 CSOs of Japan, Korea, Turkey and Philippines were separately asked about their relation and contact with certain political parties and were given the 1 to 5 scale to rank such relation and contact. This figure sums up percentage of CSOs that have ranked from 2 to 5 on both questions and show the average percentage as the political link for those countries. In case of Bangladesh the relation and contact, that is link with political parties, was inquired through one question.

0%

10%

20%

30%

40%

50%

60%

70%

Link withRuling Party

Link withOpposition

Party

Japan (Ibraraki)N=197

Korea (Kyengi)N=110

Phillippine (Cebu)N=159

Turkey (Istanbul)N=507

Bangladesh(Rajshahi) N=504

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Japan and Korea also show a higher tendency of CSOs and political party relationship than

other two developing countries-Philippine and Turkey, however, it is less by at least 10%

than that of the case of Bangladesh. CSOs of Philippine that maintain strong network among

themselves (49%) have low rate of relationship with political parties. The comparative figure

let us at least infer that political party relations of civil society in Bangladesh are unusually

high than other developed and developing countries in Asia. Comparative data on high

tendency of CSOs in Bangladesh to contact the ruling party and oppositions lead us to

engage in further investigation on the political relation of the civil society to reveal the actual

partisan situation in Bangladesh and identify the most important factor that impedes civil

society from contributing to democracy. Next section tries to understand civil society and

political relation through other data besides survey results.

5.3 Civil Society and Politics: Qualitative Analysis From the survey data it has been evident that political parties are important influential

actors in the society and civil society has the tendency to keep personal relation with political

leaders than government officials or NGOs staff etc. It has further been found that, CSOs

have a very high tendency to contact both the ruling and opposition party while they try to

term themselves at apolitical. Such data, facilitates the inference on partisan tendency among

civil society organizations and vertical political relation. But we need more hard evidences to

verify the inference. During the survey, CSOs were very careful to answer or avoid politics

and policy related questions that may reveal their political identity. Besides, politics related

information is often pretty hard to divulge directly through survey questionnaire. Thus,

further analysis on civil society and political relation in this chapter shall be done

qualitatively with the help of some other source of information and materials.

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The first section shall focus on news paper reports on civil society of specific three

years and specific months to reveal the relation of civil society and state and politics as well

as their nature of interaction with political institutions. However, though sample news paper

reports may give hints to the actual situation that had been going in the recent years of

Bangladesh but may not provide a full picture of civil society participation, political relation

and democracy. With the aim to reach a better comprehensive picture, last section of the

chapter focuses separately on prominent sectors of civil society like development NGOs,

cooperatives, labor union, citizen groups and intellectuals, professional groups. Discussions

are based on information gathered directly through interviews, observation, conversations,

and surveyor’s field notes and as well as from news paper reports and investigations.

5.3.1 Civil Society and Politics from News Paper Analysis Among the large number of dailies in Bangladesh, three dailies (one English and two

Bangla10 news paper) have been selected for analysis in the present study. As Bangladeshi

media and press are also politicized, special care has been given to select comparatively

neutral newspapers. Among the very few so far neutral dailies, The Daily Star have been

selected as it is nationally and internationally well recognized English Daily in Bangladesh.

Daily Ittefaque has been selected as it is the oldest news paper in Bangladesh since 1953 and

considered as neutral bangla daily. Daily Jugantor has been selected as it is said to be the

mostly circulated paper in 2006 and 2007. Newspaper issues from January to June of 2001,

2006 and 2007 have been targeted for searching reports on civil society. The year 2001 has

been selected as it was the last year of rule of Awami Leauge Regime, and 2006 (same year

for conducting the survey on CSOs) was the last year of the rule of the BNP Regime. The last

10 Bangla is the national language spoken and written in Bangladesh.

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years of the two regimes have been selected as at the last stage, the political corruption,

nepotism etc. reaches to the highest and different stake holders begin to press the government

for fulfilling the unrealized promises that the party made in their election menifestos. Again,

at the same time, with the election ahead, new interests are generated and articulated towards

the political parties to include those in party manifesto. The year 2007 have been selected,

because since January, an army backed interim government is ruling Bangladesh under the

state of emergency. This interim government though non-elected have been trying to be a

responsive government and providing media freedom. During this regime, political

corruption occurred during previous regimes have began to be investigated and related

reports came out in the dailies. During this period CSOs working at the national level, mainly

economic groups and thinks tanks have also become active in articulating different national

interests.

Table 5.4 Sampled news papers Year of reporting Name of the Newspapers 200111 2006 2007 Total The daily Ittefaque 15 17 14 46 100.0% 35.4% 23.7% 37.7% The Daily Star - 12 24 36 - 25.0% 40.7% 29.5% The Daily Jugantor - 19 21 40 - 39.6% 35.6% 32.8% Total 15 48 59 122

The targeted issues were searched for reports on news on NGOs, trade unions, cooperatives,

professional associations, social and citizen groups, seminars held by civil society groups and

international organizations, government moves on CSOs, corruption related to CSOs. With

11 For the year 2001, only newspaper for Ittefaque was available for analysis. Issues of Daily Jugantor and Daily Star of 2001 were not available for photocopy at the libraries of Bangladesh.

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manual search12 in total 122 new reports have been selected for analysis. When all three news

paper reported the same news, only one newspaper story that reports in details have been

considered for analysis. Table 5.4 shows the number of reports found in each year and from

each daily. These reports based on their texts mentioning13 the types of CSOs and links to

administration, party, corruption, violence14 etc. have been coded with SPSS with the aim to

get a simplified picture of the reports and verify whether they do support our inference about

politicization of the civil society, their vertical relation with powerful actors.

Before entering into analysis of the news reports, it must be mentioned that

politicization is a phenomenon that is present in all sections of the society and market. This is

something taken to be granted by the media and citizens in Bangladesh. Only such facts

become media news when they are really serious and affect the social and political life or the

issues are brought to attention to the government by elite civil society groups and large

NGOs. News about CSOs that we have surveyed may not become media report just through

their actions and projects. However, the news reports do provide evidences of politicization,

division among CSOs along party line, dominance of ruling party supporters among all

institutions, offices and associations. Table 5.5 shows the presence of different attributes

found with varying rates among six types of civil society organizations. The term economic

group refers to all types of business organizations, trade organization corporation and their

apex organizations, education and cultural groups also include think tanks, intellectuals and

12 Manual search refers to searching the reports one by one from the hard copy of the news paper issues and not through any search machine going through websites on newspaper data base. 13 By mentioning these links and CSOs I do not mean the use of these specific words but mention of these attributes through the reports—latent content analysis. 14 By violence I mean unruly function of the public, pressure or force created by CSOs and parties through hooligan-extortion, shrikes that are also accompanied by violence. However, armed violence or bombing carried out by criminals as well as by the islamist or fundamentalist groups in the recent years in Bangladesh have not been brought under consideration as they do not confirm the civil society definition used for the research and also the Neo-Tocquevillean model.

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citizens groups arranging meetings and articulating interest in a formal way, pressure group

refers to professional groups and also anomic groups formed instantly for support of a

particular demand. NGOs include all types of small, large and apex NGO organizations, in

the same way cooperative and labor unions also include all sorts of such organizations.

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Table 5.5 CSOs types and mention of different attributes in the news reports

Number of News Paper Reports

CSOs types Total Frequencies

Vertical link Links through corruption, nepotism, patronage ***

Party Link**

Bureaucratic link

Violence, strike, extortion***

CSOs or leader identified as corrupt ***

Donor backing, report, seminar, instructions***

News on interest articulation for particular and public interest***

Economic 18 7 11 11 7 6 0 10 38.9% 61.0% 61.1% 39.0% 33.3% 0.0% 55.6%Education and Culture groups

21 15 13 8 1 1 2 20

71% 76% 43% 5.0% 5.3% 10.5% 95%Pressure Group 34 11 24 18 20 8 1 28 32% 71% 53% 59% 24% 3% 82%NGOs 20 10 9 11 5 10 7 7 50.0% 45.0% 55.0% 25.0% 50.0% 35.0% 35.0%Cooperatives 6 6 2 5 3 3 0 1 100.0% 33.0% 83.3% 50.0% 50.0% 0.0% 16.7%Labor Union 23 20 17 15 21 19 0 4 87.0% 74.0% 65.2% 91.0% 82.6% 0.0% 17.4%Total 122 69 72 69 57 47 10 70

57% 59% 57% 47% 39% 8 % 57%Sig. **P<0.05, ***P<0.01 N=122

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From table 5.5 it becomes evident that in majority of cases or reports there are

mention about vertical links (57%), party links (59%), bureaucratic links (57%), violence

(47%). The newspaper reports have either mentioned about such attributes found in certain

events or as such matters have been protested by different social organizations. Along with

these links there are 39% news where CSOs or their leaders have been accused of being

corrupt, violent and working for self or party than the interest of the organization and the

citizens. Mention of donors is found mostly in the case of NGOs. However, the percentage of

interest articulation by the civil society organizations (57%) is also not less.

The high rate of interest articulation may be explained through two different

dimensions where both are verity. High rate of interest articulation is a positive sign for a

nation and its health of democracy. However, such tendency looses its attraction when it

lacks pluralism. Among the 70 reports on interest articulation, 20 that is 33% are on

roundtable meeting where two particular civil society group Centre for Policy Dialogue, the

think tank chaired by Professor Rehman Sobhan and Shujon the citizen group lead by

Professor Muzzaffar Ahmed have articulated their interest. Moreover these two organizations

are like minded CSOs and working for same type of policy matters and political issues. They

are considered as the elite section of civil society and often termed by the media and press as

‘the civil society’. Other formal articulations have been made by few NGOs and business

groups. This may be considered rather monopolization of the civil society advocacy space by

a few CSOs. In spite of their honest objectives and strong articulations, pluralism may not be

observed unless the ideas of other Citizens groups, intellectuals also get proper attention of

the media.

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Again, in Bangladesh another way of articulation is through violence, strike that

naturally attract the media and press. Among the 70 cases of mentioning articulation 20% are

done through violence, 19% are done through strikes. In most cases, trade unions and

desperate anomic groups and professional groups take resort to such techniques to express

their demands and force the government to listen to their problems. State’s weakness and

incapacity to meet all the needs and party government’s negligence to rightful demands often

lead to such violent expression of the civil society. Violent street politics among the political

parties also have influenced such agitating attitude. During the first half of 2006 there was

big movement of all primary school teachers associations for their salary and other rights that

continued for few months. 10 of the reports concern this school teachers’ movement where

they had taken the means of strike, agitation, procession and even hunger strike to get

government’s attention. This movement shall be discussed in details in the next section.

Another noticing feature is that 39% of the news reports have mentioned allegation

against CSOs or their leaders. Corrupt CSOs have been found in all types of civil society

groups with labor union being the highest. Some NGOs have been reported to be fake and

cooperatives or related officers as corrupt. In case of labor unions, the reports were published

in 2007, when the corrupt leaders had been arrested for their rampant corruption, extortion

and illegal properties which they have made with the power they received from the political

parties, mainly the ruling party. If we try to have a closer look then we see that among those

39% report against CSOs, 55% also mention about bureaucratic link, 64% mention about link

with political parties and 56% about vertical link that is corruption, nepotism, patronage etc

and 66% also about violence.

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The simplified presentation of the 122 news report of civil society shows clear

relations with corruption, patronage, party link, bureaucratic contact in a rather high scale as

the percentage of such issues are all over 50%. It has also been revealed that through political

co-optation process civil society organization themselves have also become corrupt. The

news reports have revealed how civil society leader with the backing and blessing of the

political power have become corrupt and violent working against the interest of their member

and also the nation15 . Moreover, it has been found that there is a high tendency among the

pressure groups and other CSOs to articulate through strike and violence. Civil society

actions during normal time and under the democratic age in Bangladesh shows link to

Gramscian civil society than the liberal model opposite to the expectation of the Neo-

Toquevillean school. Among the formal healthy way of interest articulation as prescribed by

the Tocquevillean school and expected by the donors for consolidating democracy is

practiced by only a section of CSOs and few elite CSOs enjoy the facility to publicize their

idea through the press. The news paper report analysis provides an over all idea about the

civil society and political relation that have been observed at the beginning of 21st century in

Bangladesh. In the next section I shall focus specifically on the important sections of the civil

society to understand their inability to play a positive role in democratic consolidation as

ideally expected from them.

5.3.2 Sector Wise analysis of Civil Society and Political Relation in Bangladesh 5.3.2.1 NGO Sector

Organization formation through the NGO approach began in Bangladesh mainly after

its independence in 1971 and proliferated during the 1990s. The NGO community of 15 Corruption, extortion, violence at the different industries, government financial institutions like Banks and sea port area by union leaders are also acts against the national interest.

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Bangladesh has been classified into three sections (Stiles, 2002:50)-Major NGOs,

Intermediary NGOs and mid size and small NGOs. The Major NGOs are big well organized

NGOs having nationwide network. They receive the lion share of the foreign funds granted

for NGOs in Bangladesh every year. The world class NGOs like BRAC, Grameen Bank,

Proshika, TMSS 16belong to this group. Mid sized and small NGOs provide either a wide

range of services in one region or a narrow range of services nationwide. Intermediary NGOs

are like umbrella agencies to direct and coordinate NGOs, such as Association of

Development Agencies of Bangladesh (ADAB), Federation of NGOs in Bangladesh (FNB),

NGO Forum, and Campaign for Popular Education. Though before NGOs were regarded as

comparatively neutral, after 1990s such NGOs have become politically colored and lost their

non-political character which is fact for all types of NGOs. The survey data have shown

NGOs active at the local level have high rate of keeping personal relation with political

actors and contacting political parties. This subsection shall focus on the polarization and

political affinity that have divided the NGO community in Bangladesh. Besides development,

economically NGOs have brought foreign resources to the country and politically through

their social awareness program and micro-credit gained the ability to control the decision of

large section of voters at the grass-roots level. These two economic and political facts are

important cause for political parties and ruling regimes to become interested in co-opting this

sector.

ADAB from 1974 to 2003 was the only apex organization of development NGOs in

Bangladesh with a membership reaching 1388 NGO17 members through out Bangladesh. Up

to late 1980s it functioned neutrally with few contradictions among the leaders at the

16 TMSS-tengamara mohila shobuj shongho (a Bengali name meaning green women’s group). 17 Directory of NGOs 2003-2004, Association of Development Agencies in Bangladesh.

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executive committee. In late 1980s the incumbent chairperson of ADAB, Zafarullah

Chowdhury of the NGO Gono Shashto Kendro, was accused of cooperating with the Military

dictator as an informal policy advisor. As soon as the regime changed after a mass movement

and new elected government came to power, the ADAB chairman was forced to step down

by a small faction of the ADAB leadership lead by Kazi Faruque Ahmed, Chairman of

Proshika (Hossain, 2006:242) but not with any informal instruction from the government or

ruling party at that time.

However, it is in 2001, when the clear political division and conflict emerged in

ADAB leadership with one group led by Kazi Faruque Ahmed alleged to be an ally of the

Bangladesh Awami League and other group led by Kushi Kabir, chairperson of a leading

Human Rights NGO named Nijera Kori ( we do by ourselves) thought to have a special link

with the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP). Though none of the NGO leaders are formally

members of any political party, the NGO community since 2001 has become divided into

these two groups maintaining political link with BNP or AL. The polarization became

distinct when a large section of ADAB members with the leadership of Kushi Kabir18 and

Fazle Hasan Abed of BRAC came out of the apex organization and formed a new umbrella

organization named Federation of NGOs in Bangladesh (FNB) which claims to represent

about a 1000 NGOs (944 members). The website of FNB (http://www.ngofederation.net/)

clearly mentions that they have broke away from ADAB accusing the Kazi Faruque leader of

broken ADAB and his followers to be political. However, news paper reports on the events

of internal clash among ADAB during 2001, 2002 and 2003, clearly show the political link

or affiliation of both the sections.

18 Personally, Kushi Kabir is sister-in-law of ex- parliament member and ex-minister of BNP— Nazmul Huda who was a powerful and influential leader of the political party ( The Daily Star, 5th August 2007)

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Kazi Faruque and his NGO Proshika have been alleged to have good connection with

the Awami League both when the party was in power and also when sat in the opposition

bench. It is also blamed that the Proshika have provided the AL party (while it was out of

power) the necessary grass-roots support for lunching movements -street agitation, blockades,

against the BNP government in 1996 and in 2004. Besides, in the name of election awareness

campaign, the NGO Proshika and also ADAB under the leadership of Kazi Faruque have

influenced the voters to vote for AL and reject the Islami forces or fundamentalists forces as

they are anti-progressive and acted against the independence war in 1971. It is often said that

this block of NGO have helped AL both in 1996 and 2001 general elections. Naturally,

NGOs with such political allegation was not acceptable to the BNP government that came to

power in October 2001 with the help of another right wing party Jamate Islami (Jugantor

June 6 2002, Hossian 2006:242, Stiles, 2002:120). Proshika and its leader charged with

political activities, fund embezzlement and conspiracy against the state faced severe

government repression, arrests and blockade of foreign funds in 2004 (Daily Star , 3 May 23

May, July 27, 2004) However, latter happened after the break of ADAB.

The other powerful section of ADAB leadership was the Kushi Kabir and Fazle

Hasan Abed Group. This section of the leadership particularly Kushi Kabir (while she was

the chairperson of ADAB) had been in contact by the other party-BNP in 2001, just before

election and two months after ADAB had began its voter’s education campaign that goes

against the interest of the BNP and its allies. In July 2001 controversy and conflict among the

ADAB executive committee on the issue of Kushi Kabir meeting BNP leader Kahilda Zia led

to events like filing case with the police and calling a mid-term election for ADAB executive,

where the Kazi Faruque group won the election (11, 12, 13, 16 July 2001 Daily Star,

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Jugantor, Prothom Alo, Bhorer Kagoz). However, in two months time through the October

2001 national election, BNP and its allies came to government power.

After coming to power BNP government refused to accept or negotiate with ADAB

due to its politicized leadership that has always acted against its regime. Using such stagnant

relation between the new BNP-Jamat government and elected leadership of ADAB, the

Kushi Kabir and Abed block began initiatives to form a new coalition of NGOs that would

act as the voice of the entire development NGOs nation wide. With the unspoken sponsorship

of the government and support from small non-ADAB local NGOs through out the country in

two years initiative FNB was formed on the based on national NGO conventions called twice.

National local NGOs that have benefited from ADAB and Kazi Faruqe block have also

joined such convention realizing the benefit of joining forums that are blessed by the regime

(Bhorer Kagoz July11, 2001, Jugantor August 6, 2006 and Daily Star February 18, 2003,

Hossain, 2006:245).

It becomes clear that it is the political links of the NGO leaders and exploiting

attitude of the political parties and regimes that had actually brought final division or

polarization among the national NGO leaders19. Since then, NGOs have become careful not

to act against the interest of the ruling regime and be tactful in dealing with political matters.

In 2006, during the survey (September and October), which was the last month of the BNP-

Jamat regime; the NGOs have tried to avoid responding to survey questions that may reveal

their political link or identity. In an unrecorded interview a high official of micro-credit NGO

(TMSS)20 admitted that things have become critical day by day. Even if an NGO try to

remain neutral but engages in projects with the government or attract government’s attention

19 It needs to be mentioned that though Grameen Bank is considered as an NGO in research papers and new reports, it is by law a private bank. So it remains outside the events and conflicts of ADAB and FNB. 20 Interview with Officer in charge of TMSS NGO-Rajshahi Zonal Office 12th October, 2006.

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through its work or in some other way, then opposition becomes suspicious about the NGO.

This creates great trouble for the NGO when the regime changes and the opposition come to

power. The official feared that in the coming days, it might be impossible for NGOs to run

without the shelter of a big party if the situation continues. So after 2001, donor backing was

not enough for NGOs to perform their projects uninterruptedly. Moreover, at the local level,

political divisions have created a panic among the small NGOs at the local level. Under such

situation the NGOs have to please their patron-donors, as well as the ruling and opposition

parties and avoid all actions that may go against the interest of either of the parties. Naturally

this limits the freedom of the NGOs and their actions-specially that are related to

participation and democracy. Next I shall focus on professional pressure group.

5.3.2.2 Primary School Teacher’s Movement 2006 Bangladesh history is the history of movements. Movements, where people and

groups come down on streets agitating for their demands in an antagonistic mood, have

always been considered as a democratic and an important way to establish right and bring

change. Such Gramscian tradition has often been observed during the democratic age when

civil society and politics was expected to move in a liberal democratic model. The

government and administration in Bangladesh have failed to develop into responsive

institutions. This is partly because they never came out of the influence of the colonial and

Pakistani bureaucratic system and partly for the corrupt political leaders who were always

concerned about their party and supporter’s interest than the interest of the nation. Among

political and social movements that have taken place from 1990 to 2006, this section shall

focus on a civil society movement of a particular sector of professional organization fighting

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for their specific interests or demands –The primary school teachers movement of 200621.

School teachers group as a CSO satisfy all types of definition of civil society. Interest

articulation and pressing home demands by such groups is an acceptable, rather expected

function from the consideration of both liberal democratic model and also New Gramscian

model of civil society formations. However, the uniqueness of such movement lies in its

nature, polarized character and the way government has handled such movement.

The primary school teachers’ association is considered as a highly organized and well

networked group in Bangladesh. Such primary school teachers associations are found in

every sub-district, district and division level that hierarchically reaches to the national level.

They also have rank of leadership based on geographic level. However, there are categories -

teachers of government school, non-government school, community school, madrasa etc.

Elections are held regularly among these organizations and each group consists of factions

along party line. Since independence, the school teachers community have engaged in

movements with varying scale on different issues, mostly for their salary rise and other

facilities to be granted by the government. It is to be mentioned that in Bangladesh generally,

the school teachers of both government and non-government primary school are poorly paid

with very little or no allowances for house, medical treatment etc. However, as such school

teachers’ groups are vibrant and have network through out the country down to the periphery

level and school teachers are considered as the traditional opinion leaders at the rural areas,

they have attracted the attention of local elites and also national political parties. Now we

shall directly focus on the matters of the 2006 which was mainly for realizing the long

21 By searching the news paper of Ittefaque, Daily Star and Jugantor from May to August of 2006, 69 reports and editorials have been found on the Primary School teachers’ movement. Among them 41 reports have been sorted deducting 28 reports that provide the same information. So the present discussion is mainly based on the information gathered through these 41 news reports.

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demands for better salary, other facilities and nationalization of the non-government primary

schools.

After the reintroduction of democracy in 1990s, the school teachers first went to the

then BNP government with their demands in 1994. During that time leader of the opposition-

chairperson of Awami League, promised association leaders to fulfill their demands if her

party is elected to power. The when AL came to power in 1996, no initiatives were taken to

solve their problem, and then teachers began agitation in 2000 at the end of the government

tenure. That time the regime entered into negotiation which ultimately went in favor of the

authorities not the teachers. So the teachers again they went to a movement aiming to carry

out their demands through big gatherings, hunger strikes etc. (Ittefaque 6 June, 2001). At that

time the then opposition leader-Chairperson of BNP promised to fulfill all the demands of the

school teachers if they were elected to form the government in the next coming election22 and

in September 2001 BNP came to power. In 2006, the last year of the BNP-Jamat government,

the teachers groups were still going through discussions with government for providing

higher salary and other facilities for them, but found that the draft national budget (which the

last budget for that government), had not allocated the necessary funds for meeting their

demands. It seems that these poor teachers have become instruments for the parties to win the

election else nothing (Jugantor 18, 2006). This time the teachers were prepared for an all out

movement. About eight hundred thousands (800,000) teachers directly or indirectly became

involved in the movement organized by 41 apex association of school teachers. They

arranged big gatherings at the capital, went on sitting in front of the secretariat, hunger-strike

at important squares of the city and lastly, went on full-fledged strike, keeping 25 thousand

22 Again in 2006, at the critical stage of the Primary teachers’ movement the opposition-AL and its left allies in the same way, showed support to the leaders and promised to realize all their demand if they are elected to power.

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schools closed through out the country for 30 days and depriving 15 million children from

education during this time. Moreover, they have tried to block roadways and water ways of

every district, a natural practice by violent labor groups, university students groups and

anomic groups. The main demands from the primary teachers who were joined by high

school teachers and also madarasa teachers were, 1. Nationalize non-government primary

teacher’s jobs, 2. 100 percent government salary for teachers of non-government high

schools and colleges, 3. elimination of wage discrimination of the government primary

school teachers, 4. nationalize the community primary school, 4. incorporate the ebtedayee (a

kind of small private madarasa) teachers into national pay scale (Daily State 5 July, 2006).

However, different groups had their specific demands too.

This combined movement of school teacher’s included both BNP aligned groups a

well as AL linked groups. From the news briefings of every day event during the movement

from May to September, it becomes evident that every category and section of the teachers’

associations that participated had factions and these factions had tilt towards either the ruling

party or the opposition. These factions though fighting for the same cause, had announced

programs separately and carried out the events in different public squares in the capital. For

example, when the community school teachers declared program for till death hunger strike,

pro-BNP faction among these teachers observed it in Muktangon (free square) while the pro-

Awami League faction started their strike in central Shaheed Minar (Monument square)

(Daily Star 20 June, 2007).

Such all out protest and movements of the teachers took place due to the long neglect

of the party governments both BNP and AL. Always the teachers’ demands gained strength

with the support of the opposition who gave them electoral promises which they never kept.

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During this particular movement in 2006, the opposition AL and its aligned left block backed

the teachers that gave more force to the movement. The BNP-Jamat government did let such

violent movement go on for months hampering the national education through out the

country. It did not take strong suppressive actions like arrests of activists; banning

processions etc. with only some incidents of clashes with police during the blockades and sit

in. This is because 2006 was the last year of government for its five years term. Nonetheless,

government could not meet all the demands of the teachers that would cost it 1 billion 500

million BDT which the state exchequer was not ready to provide. The government took the

policy of delaying in dialogues with the agitating groups. Moreover the Education Minister

took a political strategy to not to talk with all groups together, rather discussing with different

factions separately. The minister agreed to a number of demands but on conditions.

Naturally, BNP linked factions accepted government’s half hearted response to negotiations

while others did not. Some sections of the teacher’s group went back to school empty handed

after long strike and agitation; others lost the strength to remain in the streets. The unity of

the movement was broken. Still a few AL linked factions of the non-government primary

school teachers remained in the street up to September but the movement lost its force. The

media attention went towards more violent protests by other anomic groups on different

issues and the street politic that the opposition had just began when the 8th Parliament had

only a few remaining days. Next I shall focus on the politicization, corruption and violence

observed among labor unions.

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5.3.2.3 Labor Unions and Trade Organizations 5.3.2.3.1 Labor Union If we go back to table 5.1 then we may observe that labor unions have been rated 7 in

order of influence upon the political system, though it has very little cooperation with other

CSOs (ranked 13 in order of cooperation-chapter 4). The influence of such union is healthy

and positive to democracy or not is the aim of discussion for this sub-section. Among the 122

news reports analyzed in section 5.3, 23 are on labor unions. 15 of the news reports have

been published in 2007, that is, reporting the corruption and arrest of big union and CBA

(Collective Bargaining Association) leader and stories of how such leaders have controlled

and manipulated the industrial or economic sectors with the blessings of political leaders

using extortion, violence, corruption and other illegal means.

Table 5.6 Politicization, corruption and violence among labor unions as revealed in news paper reports Politicization, corruption and violence among labor unions Frequency Percentage

Administrative link 15 65%

Political Party link 17 73%

Vertical links-corruption, patronage, 20 87%

Violence, strike, extortion 21 91%

Labor union leader considered as corrupt 19 83%

Table 5.6 provides a precise idea about what is in those reports on labor unions, actually the

leaders. CBA leaders who have been reported here in most cases have been found to be

guilty of corruption (87%), violence and extortions (91%) powered by the political parties

(73%) and administration (65%). They with their links with successive ruling parties have

had created reign of terror in the working zones where they controlled all financial decisions.

They even decided about personnel and day to day management of the public enterprises.

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Not only union leaders have misappropriated government funds, manipulated tenders and

forced to take decisions that went against the interest of the industry or market but also have

extorted money from the poor worker’s wage pay slips. They often forced the workers to pay

certain percent of their wages to the CBA leader as Tips (The daily star, 16 February and 6

May, 2007). Power and corruption of the trade union leaders have been found most and in

worst form in the important areas that are directly related to national economy such as the

Chittagong Sea Port and Dock area, public enterprises including the corporate banks, the

transport section and even the tea fields (Bangladesh until recently used to export tea)

(Ittefaque 3 March, 2007, Jugantor 4 April 2006, 28 February, 2007). However the most

important export sector in Bangladesh is ready made garments that contribute to the countries

GDP. This sector is also not free from internal politics factions and violence which are some

times politically colored. In May and June of 2006 there had been labor unrest in this sector

of industries that led to violence where the workers acted like mobs. This unwanted and

unexpected incident had caused immense loss to the national economy. Ruling party blamed

the opposition as the collaborator to the destructive acts while opposition pointed out to the

ruling party to be responsible for the event. In three months time, negotiations had been

reached among the garment owners and labor union leaders on matters of least amount of

wages and other facilities through the mediation of the government (Ittefaque23, 24May, 3, 6

June 2007).

Besides, these important sectors of the economy, labor unions and CBA leaders are

found in all nationalized industries per rules of the labor law. Politicization, factionalism,

extortion, corruption and powerful influence of the CBA leaders are present in almost all

cases.

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5.3.2.3.1.1 Rajshahi Sugar Mill Labor Union

During the survey, the labor union of Rajshahi Sugar Mill was selected for field study

and its labor leaders and mill workers and officers were interviewed and observed. The trade

union represents 1234 members who are all labor and office workers of the mill. Its main

objective is to protect interest of workers and bargain with the authorities. Major financial

source is the membership fee23. They have liaison with other labor unions of sugar mill under

a federation and labor unions of other sectors. It has been found that this particular union is

not totally controlled by the political parties but also not independent of the political power.

Union members also engaged in internal politics. The executive committee is elected by the

members in every two years. During elections, the panels of candidates are formed according

to party line that reflects the national politics. However, though a panel is marked as BNP

panel and another as AL panel, candidates supporting other political parties (like some

communist factions) may also be found inside these panels. In most cases, influence of ruling

party panel is huge among, the members and the administration. Even if ruling party

supporters do not hold any elected post in the union, their influence and power are observed

every where. However, there is no permanent voters’ bank for each panel. The voters’

decision changes with the change in national politics and performance of the union

president24. After going through the list of elected members and their political affiliation, for

2001, 2003, 200525, we see that election results reflected national politics, in 2001 when AL

was in power 10 of the elected members were from AL while 6 from BNP. On the other hand

when BNP was on power in 2003 and 2005 the distribution was just opposite with 9 BNP

and 7 AL candidates elected in 2003 and 13 BNP and 4 AL candidates elected in 2005.

23 More introductory information about the labor union is provided in the case study section in Appendix F 24 Group discussion with the Mill workers and Mill Engineer during field visit on 26th September, 2006. 25 As provided by the office of the labor union.

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Within the sugar mill area influence of the labor union is immense. The management recruits

mill labors and workers with consultation of the union. Each department of the mill

administration has to move according to the wish of the labor union. Central political leaders

of Rajshahi district like parliament members, Mayor have direct influence on the recruitment

process and sugar selling decisions26.

While surveying other labor unions related to transport in Rajshahi city, it had been

revealed that when the normal labors enter into movements for their rights and facilities, the

government try to buy the labor leaders with money and suppress such movements27. So

politicization of and extortion by labor union leaders is a fact in all sections of the industry

and market. However, the level of politics and corruption is high at the centre and most

important sector than in the periphery.

5.3.2.3.2 Trade Organizations

Besides the labor unions, there are the trade organizations of businessmen, chambers

of commerce formed by industrialists, business magnets, garments mill owners etc. These

organizations that represent the market are also not free from politics, division and

competition. Just like other organizations, there are particular laws for registration and

regulations of trade organizations (trade organizations ordinance of 1961). The two largest

chambers are the Dhaka and Chittagong Chambers of Commerce and Industry both of which

are highly politicized, poorly organized and dominated by petty traders (Kochanek, 1996:

715). Representing the Graments owners, the BGMEA (Bangladesh Garments Manufactures

and Exporters Association) have emerged as an important interest group in Bangladesh.

26 The case study description is based on interview with President of the Labor Union of Rajshahi Sugar Mill also information gathered through conversation with normal workers, labor officers, and engineer and lastly on the documents provided by the sugar mill office on 26th September , 2006. 27 Observation note by surveyor A. S. M. Sarwar, submitted on 25th September, 2006.

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However, the officially recognized apex organization of Bangladeshi business is the FBCCI

(Federation of Bangladesh Chambers of Commerce and Industry). It is to be mentioned that

FBCCI is the only section of the civil society that out of their interest to protect their market,

have always protested again the street politics, particularly the all out general strikes named

hartal often called by political parties. However, because of its capital and financial

resources, there also exists a special, informal and often corrupted relation between the

private sector and political parties. In most cases, following the tradition of other

conventional CSOs, the election results within each chamber and trade organization reflect

the composition found in central and local governments. Among the sample news paper

reports and editorials, 18 news were on economic organizations. Among these reports 56%

expressed news on interest articulation by the trade organizations, again 39% about the

vertical links like corruption, nepotism, patronage and 39% on violence, strikes and

extortions. Again these same sample of news reports mentioned about political parties, 39%

about the ruling party and 22% about both the ruling and opposition parties. Particularly,

these reports covered news on internal corruption of the chambers of Commences and also

personal corruption and political links of the elected Chamber Presidents of two districts,

internal conflict among the trade organizations backed by political leaders and also genuine

interest articulation by the business groups. Among these reports, one report was on

Rajshahi Chambers of Commerce and it was on the arrest of the President for corruption and

extortion case. News paper reports also pointed out the strong political and business link the

arrested president had with the ruling party and its leaders.

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5.3.2.3.2.1 Rajshahi Chambers of Commerce

The incident of arrest took place in 2007. The particular Chamber of Commerce

office in Rajshahi District had been visited during the survey in 2006 and besides the

questionnaire; some more detailed information about the organization had been collected.

The Chamber have been found to be an old one established in 1951 and active and well

organized with defined rules and a constitution. It had been regularly holding elections and

publishing annual reports. The chamber is also a member of FBCCI, representing all trade

organizations active in Rajshahi district. Though the election of the board of directors takes

place for every two years with the participation of all member trade organizations in town

and periphery, in most cases it is the wealthy and powerful businessmen at central Rajshahi,

enjoying strong links with the ruling party, who ultimately become elected28. The elected

president and the working committee members in most cases are found to be directly or

indirectly linked to the party in power. The report books for 2000 and 2002, that is during AL

regime and BNP regime show the clear differences. However, there are a few members who

are locally popular and are elected to the committees during both the regimes. In most cases,

it have been accused that the leaders and elected persons are wealthy and powerful and often

used their position in the Chamber to gain benefit and enjoy undue favors for their personal

business and benefit. The Chamber members have admitted that, as business interest group,

they have not been much successful in contributing to the development of economy and

industry in the Rajshahi region29 . On political matters, they have shown reservation in

revealing information to the interviewers. So it has not been possible to investigate more on

28 As found in the designation and profile of the elected members in the Annual reports. 29 Field visit to the Rajshahi Chambers of Commerce Office 24th September, 2006.

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the relation between the business leaders and their political links. However the arrest of the

Chamber President in 2001 reveals it corrupt and vertical links with political power.

5.3.2.4 Cooperatives and Small Welfare Groups30 5.3.2.4.1 Cooperatives Besides the NGOs, most of the CSOs that are found at the local level of Bangladesh

are cooperatives and small welfare groups and clubs. They may be registered or

unregistered. However, CSOs that are receiving funds and loans from the government has to

be registered as cooperatives or as voluntary welfare organizations with the respective

ministry and their local offices.

Cooperatives have a long tradition in Bangladesh since 1804 when the British Rulers

first introduced it in Bengal. The present cooperative system finds its roots in the Comilla

Cooperative Model introduced in the Pakistani Period during 1960s. There are varieties of

cooperative with different status and monetary power at different levels of the rural and as

well as the urban society, mainly for providing loans. At present the cooperative system in

Bangladesh is under the control of the Ministry of Local Government, Rural Development

and Cooperative. Bangladesh Rural Development Board (BRDB) is in charge of the

management of most of the cooperatives in Bangladesh. At the rural level it is organized

mainly in two steps-Village Cooperatives at the periphery and Central Cooperative located

at each Sub-District. The central cooperatives committee is elected by the periphery

cooperatives. Again 4 BRDB officers become member of the central committee as per rules.

Such cooperatives are mostly formed by farmers but also by poor laborers, workers, fishers,

30 This section has been written based on information gathered through recorded and unrecorded interviews and conversation with Local government executives, BRDB official and Joint Registrar of the cooperative directorate of Rajshahi Division, survey reports and observation notes of the surveyors.

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small business man and people belonging to different livelihood in the villages. There are

separate cooperatives for men and women. Periphery or primary unit of cooperatives are

formed of 20 to 40 members at the villages, these groups again elect one member to the

college of electorate who ultimately elect the members to the central committee at the union

level amongst themselves31.

At the rural area prime objective of cooperatives is providing small-loans (5 to 20

thousand BDT)32 to farmers and fishers and small businessmen. The loan is also distributed

for various purposes, like agriculture, live stock, beginning small business, group irrigation,

supply of drinking water and so on. Some of the cooperatives are termed as multipurpose

cooperatives concerned with more than one type of development activity. There are also

special cooperative projects for landless destitute men and women funded by Asian

Development Bank. Another project named participatory link model for rural development

is financed by Japan while the project for Advocacy on Reproductive Health and Gender

issues through rural cooperatives is helped by UNFPA. All these projects work through

particular cooperatives. Besides loans, capitalization and mobilization, cooperative

members under the management of BRDB, are also given training for self employment,

environmental education, sanitation, gardening, tree plantation, family planning etc 33 .

However, during the survey, the cooperatives have been found to be mostly concerned with

loan and financial matter than other development activities.

The foreign development partners provide financial assistance for particular projects,

however, normally the cooperatives are run by the capital, collection of loan and service

charges by the members. The government provides money occasionally as it did for five

31 Interview with the BRDB Officer, Poba Sub-district, 9th October, 2006. 32 Which means about US $ 70 to US $ 300. 33 BRDB Annual Report 2004-2005.

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consecutive years after 1971 just after independence and again distributed two billion

Bangladeshi Taka in 200334. Other small projects are also financed from the government’s

development budget35. This means a fresh and big amount of government capital have

begun to cycle among the cooperatives as loans in the last three years.

However, in comparison to the development NGOs the success of such cooperatives

in economic empowerment and social development may not be considered as remarkable36.

Such cooperatives have hardly been targeted in social science; especially political

science research and the press are also not interested in publishing news on them. The only

six news reports on cooperatives that have been found in the sample news paper reports

(section 5.3.1) are related to corruption. 5 cases are reports not on the cooperatives but the

corruption of government cooperative officers and how they manipulated the cooperatives.

The other remaining news describes the suffering of the cooperative members due to

encroachment of its designated land by local political leaders. During field survey, all types

of the cooperatives have been addressed with same questionnaire, how ever difference had

been observed in their way of replying, in their social status and political relations. It has

been found that, primary cooperative formed by poor farmers or destitute women are hardly

aware of their rights and are apolitical and consider themselves as powerless. They were

rather afraid of answering politics and political party related questions in fear of repression

from the political elites and hooligans. According to a recent statistics of the wage rate in

Bangladesh 37 such cooperative members who are engaged in agriculture labor earns

34 Interview with the BRDB Officer, Poba Sub-district, 9th October, 2006. 35 BRDB Annual Report, 2004-2005. 36 Interview with the BRDB Officer, Poba Sub-district, 9th October, 2006. And also Joint Registrar of the cooperative directorate of Rajshahi Division, 19th April, 2006. 37 Survey on Wage rate in Bangladesh 2006-07, Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics, http:www.bbs.gov.bd/dataindex access date 27th November, 2007.

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annually 22,680 BDT which means only US$ 330. Education level of the rural people in

Bangladesh is 41.7% while the national rate is 60.5%38. Members of such cooperatives

more concerned with the materialistic matter for their existence than their concern for the

society and politics. Moreover, their complaints are often not heard by the local council

members at the union level and officials at the sub-district level39.

But the members and chairman of the central cooperative committee have been found

to be well aware of politics and often involved in party politics directly or indirectly. In

most cases they have been found to be related to BNP-ruling party40. Central cooperatives

deal with large amount of money, so there is some power and as well as status. Naturally

they have been influenced by the political parties. During the survey, some of the

respondents were brave enough to directly admit that political and wealthy elites intervene

in the loan distribution process and often the real poor become deprived of their right to due

loan. During interview, the divisional head of the Rajshahi Directorate for Registrations of

Cooperatives have also admitted that in good number of cases it has been found that

cooperative leaders are actually local touts41 who miss use the loans through conspiring

with the government officials42. Few respondents during the survey have also admitted that

cooperative officials were corrupt who demanded bribes to register their cooperatives.

Misappropriation of funds, internal conflict of the members as well as lack of proper

guidance and inspection from the cooperative officers and BRDB offices have often led

38 Bangladesh Population Census 2001(2003). 39 Observation note of Jannatul Ferdous, submitted 25th September, 2006, page 20. 40 Observation notes of Jahangir Alam submitted 27th September, 2006 page 5, 18; Ahmed Murad Chowdhury, submitted 27th September, 2006, page 10-11. 41 The English word is used here in negative meaning often used in Bangla conversation to mean cheat and dishonest persons who earns leaving through improper monetary dealings and with the blessing of the local political leaders or local elites. 42 Joint Registrar of Cooperatives, Rajshahi Division, 6th May, 2006.

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cooperatives become inactive or dissolved though their names still hang on lists at the

cooperative office43.

Farmers who contribute most to the agrarian economy of Bangladesh have been

observed to be silent in the democratic age and also before. There have been only a few

scattered farmer protest and clashes with security forces on the crisis of fertilizers during the

season. Such non-participation of the cooperatives is partly due to the cooperative law that

does not allow cooperatives to make any demand to the government in the initial two years

from its registration44 and partly for the ignorance of members at periphery units and for

political influence upon central cooperatives. Through conversation with BRDB officials it

became evident that on official matters, though the central cooperative members are the

formal decision makers and loans to periphery groups are sanctioned through their

signatures, practically the power is in the hand of these government officers45. This is true

especially for destitute women. So the participation and power formally given to the elected

members of the central cooperative committees, it is rather a farce and there is no initiative

to empower these women to the level to be able to understand their responsibility and power

to decide on their own.

Cooperatives that constitute 38% of the total CSOs surveyed in the present research

have hardly been found articulating their demands or participating in rallies or policy

making etc. though the vertical influence of politics are profound among them, specially

among the central cooperatives at the sub-district level. This tendency have lead the level of

43 Observation report of Mahmud Hasan, submitted on 25th September, 2006 Page 1; Ahmed Murad Chowdhury, submitted 27th September, 2006, page 3. Md Jannatul Ferdous submitted 25th September 2006, page 16,17, 33. 44 Cooperative rule 2004. 45 Interview with the BRDB officer, Poba Sub-district, 9th October, 2006.

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CSOs involvement in participatory activities at the local level very low, however, the rate of

contacting political parties and leaders have remained high.

5.3.2.4.2 Local Social Welfare Groups and Cultural Sports Club

Another neglected section in the civil society studies and donor policies, is the local

social welfare groups and cultural sports clubs. These CSOs are mostly engaged albeit in a

small scale in campaign against dowry46, child marriage, and family planning; providing

community library; raising social and political awareness through entertainment like drama

and songs or just playing football. These are all registered under the Voluntary Social

Welfare Act 196147. The rural society have been mostly studied from the context of NGO

projects and their beneficiaries but from the associational culture that have emerged among

the local residence on their own or through the influences of the activities of the large NGOs.

Often researchers have termed such local small welfare groups and clubs as inactive

(Siddique 2002:412). Observation from survey reveals that such inactiveness may be true to

some extent but cannot be accepted as a generalized trend. Surveyors did found some CSOs

to be inactive or dissolved like the cooperatives but they have also found good number of

dynamic CSOs belonging to this category also 48 . Such community organizations have

relevance for research from different point of views-welfare and relief, political awareness,

opinion formation and citizen mobilization. Naturally for the same reasons they may be

target of the political parties too. The number of such CSOs at local level has increased

rapidly since 1990 but most of them may not receive foreign assistance though a nominal

46 Money and/or property that a wife of her family must pay to her husband when they get married in South Asia. 47 Development NGOs as well as medium and small NGOs also have to primarily register themselves under the same act, or the Societies Registration Act 1860, then again register with the NGO Affairs Bureau if they want to receive foreign funds. 48 Observation note of Jahurul Islam submitted 21st September, 2006, page 5, 31.

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government fund. While a few of such CSOs have been found to be registered only for

enjoying the government grant, another group of social welfare organizations have been

found working for the people for the last 50 or more years in the area. These groups have

been noted to be the first relief provider and worker during natural disasters.

The welfare groups and clubs have been found to be politically conscious, though not

participatory or enjoying a cooperative relationship with local council and TNO offices. It

had been observed that in spite the clubs and local welfare groups termed their organizations

as non-political the active members and chairman personally did have political affiliation

with either the ruling party or the opposition. Reflection of such party politics becomes

evident when other members supporting the same party get the most benefits and facilities

from the club49. When a club becomes tilt to a certain faction then its normal activities

become affected due to favoritism and politicization. Before, such CSOs have played

significant role in education, entertainment. CSOs leaders were also acceptable enterprises

for local arbitration known as Shalish. Now they have lost such acceptance because of their

political links and internal conflicts. Sometimes, local elites who have political identity, are

often related to such clubs and welfare groups and try to carry out their political objectives

through CSOs activities50. If the group members belong to the opposition party then they are

deprived from government grants and their registration is often threatened to be withheld.

These groups are also victim of government corruption. Often the officials ask for 30%

commission for processing the government grants they receive. Local council members

affiliated with ruling party also claim percentage to such grant otherwise threaten to blockade

49 Observation note, Momen Khan submitted 27th September, page 11; Ahmed Murad Chowdhury, submitted 27th September, 2006, page 15, 20; Md Selimuzzaman submitted 21st September, 2006 page 9. 50 Observation report of Mahmud Hasan, submitted on 25th September, 2006 Page 5, 7.

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funds51. Naturally CSOs have no other way but to keep good relation with political parties,

particularly the ruling party for their existence.

Moreover, internal conflict and corruption52 are also found among such small groups

which may be considered as another impediment against emergence of local CSOs as a

strong social force to participate at policy level. Though in average the CSOs have termed

local government to be the most cooperative actor (chapter 4) particularly the women groups

have complained about the non-cooperation of the local government53.

Such cooperatives and social welfare clubs have hardly been considered as civil

society force by researcher or donors but have been successfully targeted by the political

party for penetrating the rural society. These local CSOs have the potential to develop

collective unity, social and political consciousness among citizens but they lack necessary

resources and guidance. Hardly any initiative has been taken to include these CSOs in the

mainstream development projects of the donors. Among the respondent only one club

admitted that BRAC have provided them 150 books to enlarge their library. BRAC’s such

initiative after breaking away from ADAB may be considered as its policy of alluring local

groups to strengthen its newly formed federation FNB. Whatever, may be the objective, this

is a good but small initiative of BRAC to strengthen the local community. However, political

extortion and penetrations remains a big setback to vigilant civil society at the periphery level.

51 Observation note of Md Jannatul Ferdous submitted 25th September 2006, page 16; Mahmud Hasan, submitted on 25th September, 2006 Page 1. 52 Observation note of Jahurul Islam submitted 21st September, 2006, page 5. 53 Observation note of Md Jannatul Ferdous submitted 25th September 2006, page 20.

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5.3.2.5 Intellectuals, Think Tanks and Citizens’ Group Generally intellectuals are considered as the driving force for a civil society in

bringing democratic change and consolidation. In Bangladesh, university teachers, students,

lawyers have played glorious role in movements for autonomy, independence and democracy

during British, Pakistani and Bangladesh period as mentioned in chapter three. During the

democratic period intellectuals, thinks tanks and citizens groups have been found to be vocal

but already marked by their political color. This section of the civil society as mentioned

before is considered as the elites of civil society attracting media attention in the recent years.

Often only this section is identified as ‘the civil society’ in its traditional meaning in

Bangladesh. However, such core of the civil society though respected and noted by the

nation is very much politicized. Probably it is the university teachers associations and student

organizations of the national universities in Bangladesh that has the longest history of

political division. Such ideological and political division originated long before the

independence in 1971 as this section had important contribution to the independence

movement. However, since 1990s their political practice has deteriorated to its worst and

often is considered unacceptable. They have used party slogans and have engaged in party

sponsored activities. Students associations have turned into direct student wing of the

political parties, have never acted independently from the party directions and became

involved in arms politics. Their present performance has blurred their glorious role during

movements. Their present activities are hardly possible to explain or discuss in the Neo-

Tocquevillean model. Often such student and teacher politics is found to be the biggest

obstacle to higher educational environment in Bangladesh. This sub-section, shall focus

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mainly on the university teachers groups and their political divide and then thinks tanks and

citizens groups.

5.3.2.5.1 Intellectuals

It is said that now-a-days professors are becoming familiar for political identity than

research work or academic excellence54 . At all national universities in Bangladesh, the

teachers are found to be broadly divided into two factions. On section are identified with the

AL and left political block and another to the BNP and Jamat political block. There may be

further factions among these two sections and the professors may not be directly member of

each party. During the election of the university teachers’ association, panels for candidates

are formed along these two political lines. Which government is in power determine which

panel wins most of the posts in the association. All other elected posts like faculty dean and

syndicate members as well as administrative posts like vice-chancellor, treasurer in most

cases are filled in by professors who support the ruling party or its coalition. The university

teachers’ associations and other associations representing each block of the teachers like Zia

Association (BNP), Bangbondhu Parishod (AL), Progressive Teacher’s Block (AL & Left)

articulate their views and opinions on most political events that are of national interest

through sending statements to the press, arranging processions or even going into strike.

However, during articulating such views, they don’t represent the entire teachers’ community

but their affiliated political block. Their statements always go in favor of the political party

that they support. Political appointments in national universities have become a regular

practice for several years with the growing involvement of teachers with political parties. The

university authorities give appointment to like minded candidates to increase their vote bank

54 Professor and elected member of the syndicate, Rajshahi University, 8th October, 2006.

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to win in the teachers association’s elections and please the higher-ups in the government55.

The party government also pushes for such political appointments to ensure their strong hold

and control upon the universities-intellectuals and students during their period of rule and

also when they are out of power. Though they are professors, it is not only ideology but other

personal interests like appointment, promotion, administrative posts and other facilities that

indulge them to join a political block. The university professors interviewed (who themselves

are also involved in such university politics) have admitted such trend to be negative. In this

way teachers serving the highest educational institutions are bought by political actors. They

loose the strength to criticize university administration or the government actions even if it is

wrong and unjust. They have lost the ability for free thinking. Alarming is that the

polarization and division has become more distinct after 200156. Interviewed professors

admitted the necessity of conscience and consciousness among the professors to accept the

right and wrong than blindly follow the parties. They also acknowledged that educational

atmosphere of the universities would have been much better and productive had such type of

teachers politics did not exist57.

Another powerful intellectual cum pressure groups in Bangladesh are the lawyers and

courts. The bar associations and the Supreme Court Lawyers Association have high influence

upon the state and government. It is said that in election years the election result of the

Supreme Court Lawyers Association forecast the outcome of the national election. This

55 The Daily Star 13th August, 2006, Daily Star 9th April 2005, The Daily Star 18th September, 2005. 56 Professor, ex-vice Chancellor, Dhaka University interviewed on 21st October, 2006. Professor ex-vice Chancellor, Rajshahi University interviewed on 8th October 2006. 57 The discussion on university teacher’s politics have been based on personal observation, interviews with two ex-vice chancellors of Rajshahi University and Dhaka University, a syndicate member and ex-secretary of Rajshahi University Teachers’ Association and a Dean of University of Rajshahi. Information has also been gathered through news papers reports particularly those published in The Daily Star on April 4, July 27, 2007; February 13, August 13, 27, December 27 2006; April 09, May 17 September 18 2005; August 25, December 26 2004.

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means the lawyers are also divided along party line just as the university teachers or other

trade union or professional group in Bangladesh. Moreover, the lawyers have also been

found in acts like agitation, processions, and even unruly activities to articulate their interests

and press home their demands (Ittefaque 12 January 2001, 29 March 2006, Jugantor 1 April

2006, The daily Star 16, 25 June, 2005). Bar association at every 64 districts are divided in

the same party line.

5.3.2.5.2 Think Tanks and Citizen Groups

A new trend since 1990s is the emergence and the voices of think tanks and citizens

groups in Bangladesh. Professor Rehman Sobhan and his Centre for Policy Dialogue (CPD)

have already been high lighted in chapter two at the literature review section. The centre has

alliance with BRAC, Grameen Bank, Shujon (another like minded citizen group) in

Bangladesh and also with other Bangladeshi intellectual groups in USA. It may be

considered as another supporter of the new liberal model. The organization is well reputed

among the educated society and has a monopoly upon media coverage as it also have alliance

with the two dailies Prothom Alo and The Daily Star and a private TV channel –Channel-i.

Though the think tank has acceptability among educated citizens and have wide media

coverage it may not represent the opinion of the all the researchers, policy specialists and

intellectuals. The CPD along with Professor Yunus of Grameen Bank and 11 leading

economist and business personalities had lunched a movement for fair candidates that have

attracted a lots of criticism and controversy among different sections of the intellectuals

(mainly among fully left minded and centric-Islami tilt minded) in the early 2006. A series of

criticism and counter writing were published in news papers other than Daily Star and

Prothom Alo (Ittefaque 27 March , 10, 29 April 2006, 20 Jugantor April 2006). During

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interview with the University Professors on the civil society in Bangladesh, it had been found

that CPD actions had full support of the intellectuals belonging to the AL block while half

hearted support from those belonging to the BNP block. Though CPD tries to arrange round

table meetings that include different sections of professionals and often leaders of both BNP

and AL, it actually represents the idea of a section of intellectuals. Unless new think tanks

emerge with the same strength, influence and financial ability and network, pluralism may

not be achieved among the elite civil society. A loose alliance may be observed among

eminent citizens with liberalist, secular mentality and those who are donor supported. But

they cannot be considered as the conscience of the entire civil society rather a slice of the

citizenry. Shujon- a new citizens’ group lead by another eminent economist and former

executive director of Transparency of Bangladesh (TIB) belong to the same intellectual circle.

5.3.2.5.2.1 Rajshahi Rakkha Shangram Parishod-RRSP (Movement to Protect Rajshahi)

During the field survey, a citizen group of Rajshahi city that had attracted media

attraction both among the local and national press –Rajshahi Rakkha Shangram Parishod-

RRSP (Movement to Protect Rajshahi) had been observed and its leader had been

interviewed58. The citizen group voice for the basic needs- like medical treatment, drinking

water supply, power supply, and gas supply for the people of the area, environmental

degradation in the area and against government decisions to move important offices and

building from Rajshahi and point out irregularities, corruption, and administrative failures

found in Rajshahi. They articulate their interest through petition, press conferences, round

tables, seminar and also public meetings arranged at open grounds, rallies and processions

protesting certain events, sit in, hunger strike, giving ultimatums and up to calling all out 58 A more detailed case study of the CSOs have been included in Appendix F

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strike (Hartal)59. Though the citizen group is working for the interest of the Rajshahi, it had

been found to be placed in an antagonistic position in relation to the Rajshahi city

corporation. It has good relation with press and media and cooperation with other non-

political groups like professional groups, economic groups etc. Originally RRSP was formed

by a few merchants in the town, but later have attracted membership from all types of

professions-teachers, intellectuals, journalists, lawyers and other educated citizens. The

executive committee is elected in every two years. Besides membership fee, other sources of

finance are the local eminent businessmen and other sponsor organizations like banks,

enterprises, and national dailies. The organization claims that they have neither any relation

with the political parties nor with any political blocks. Rather they have come forward for the

interest of the citizens of Rajshahi as the political parties have failed to do so. The

organization have gained reputation and media attraction for its movement for natural gas

supply in the city and it came in direct conflict with the administration protesting

maltreatment of the patients in private clinics. The secretary had even been arrested and

tortured by law enforcement forces60.

However, if we go through the lists of advisory committee membership lists of the

RRSP, we may see presence of well reputed citizens of Rajshahi city that represents both the

BNP (but not Jamat) block and the AL and left block. However, the majority of members

belong to the left and AL block61. The convener of RRSP though claim to be non-political,

have been found to be a former elected member of the Board of Directorate of Rajshahi

59 Interview with the Convener, Rajshahi Shohor Rokkah Shongram Porishad, Rajshahi, 28th September, 2006. 60 As admitted by the convener of Rajshahi Rakkha Shongram Parishod, Interviewed on 28th September. 61 Proceeding of a Round Table Meeting on Development of Rajshahi, Published by Rajshahi Rokkah Shongram Parishad. Rajshahi: May, 2006.

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Chambers of Commerce during the AL regime62 and had links with the left groups in his

young age and found presently in a confronting position with the present administration.

During conversation with other citizens about RRSP, it had been found that, the organization

and its moves have been praised by all but the over presence of members of the latter block

have discouraged the BNP and right minded citizens to engage in the movement directly.

Besides, the elites and civil society leaders that support the ruling coalition are already

favored by the government and administration. Naturally, for the loyalty they have sold for

personal and group benefits prevent them from joining any movements that protests the

government policy. The polarization that have divided the whole society and civil society

have refrained the citizens from organizing in systematic movements in a united manner for a

common local cause.

So it may be observed that among think tanks and citizen’s groups both at the centre

and local areas in Bangladesh, it is the left and AL tilted groups than the BNP aligned groups

that are more active. Unless there is a balance among both the blocks and truly non-political

citizens groups are established, there might be big difference in the manner of articulation by

the CSOs and nature of government responses with the change of regimes.

5.4 Summary and Conclusion The present chapter is a complementary chapter to the data analysis done in chapter

four with the aim to dig out the reasons for low participatory civil society in Bangladesh and

its insufficient contribution in consolidating democracy. The researcher assumed that

powerful influence of political structures particularly political party upon the civil society

impedes its democratic performance. Historical and political development and vertical 62 Annual Report Book 2002, Rajshahi Chambers of Commerce.

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cultural background have led the political parties to the position to co-opt and polarize the

civil society since 1990s. In chapter four, from survey data analysis it has become clear that

rate of participatory activities like policy making, advocacy, lobby is low and there is a

tendency among the CSOs to adopt vertical means to lobby the authorities than horizontal

ones and they often contact political parties for perusing their problems or demands.

The present chapter with same set of survey data has shown that CSOs perceive the

political parties to be the most influential actor in the political system. CSOs themselves have

rated market actors as medium powerful. Except the press and media, all other social actors

had been ranked at the lower positions. The survey data also showed their high tendency of

keeping personal relation with political leaders and contacting both the ruling and opposition

parties. Such tendencies have been found high in case of all categories and sections of CSOs.

However, CSOs working at the local level with out foreign assistance have found to be more

inclined to political contacts. Such high rate of political contact in Bangladesh is

comparatively distinct in contrast to other developed and developing countries in Asia (figure

5.1). Nevertheless, such high rate of contacting political parties is not enough to establish

our inference on the politicization and co-optation of the CSOs by political parties. There are

limitations in gathering information on political relation through direct questions and formal

surveys on CSOs. For overcoming such limitation other sources of data had been used and

qualitative analyses have been applied.

The second section of this chapter using different data—newspaper reports,

interviews, informal discussion, survey observation notes etc. have qualitatively analyzed the

tendencies of civil society having political links, vertical links, bureaucratic links and the

nature of using violent means by CSOs and style of their interest articulation. Moreover,

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some selected but important sections and actions of civil society in relation to politics have

been given special focus and been discussed on the basis of information gathered from

different direct and indirect sources. Through such discussions, politicization of the CSOs,

ruling party influence, faction or division within the civil society as well as the society along

party line have been pointed out as to be real fact.

First, a sample of news paper reports on civil society published from January to June

in 2001, 2006 and 2007 in three dailies selected on the basis of their neutrality, acceptability

and circulation had been coded and simplified using SPSS program. The simplified analysis

revealed high rate of political links, corruption, and violence in CSO related reports. In 39%

of the reports, CSOs or their leaders had been termed corrupt having links with the

bureaucracy, party, violence, extortion and patronage, nepotism. Though 29% of the reports

were on interest articulation of CSOs, among those reports 20% also mentioned about

violence and 19% about strike and 33% articulation was by the same group of think tanks

and citizen groups. Such numbers imply the strong influence of Gramcian model for pressing

demands in antagonistic way rather than through negotiation and bargain and lack of

pluralism among the advocacy groups. The harmony expected from a vibrant civil society

group in Neo-Toquevillean model is absent here. This is due to the influence of movement

based historical development of Bangladesh and violent street politics practiced by the

political parties as well as the irresponsive governments during the democratic age. These

facts support the hypothesis of the political influence upon the civil society and presence of

corruption, patronage and other illegal means in civil society and state interaction.

It has also been found that means for articulating demands are more violent and acute

than expected in a democratic setting. Gramcian elements or outlook are still present in

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liberal democratic framework in Bangladesh. Interest articulations through violence and

strikes do not imply to high civil society participation or a vigilant civil society, but lack of

proper harmony among the state and civil society relation and presence of deprivation,

extremism and emergency in the political system. Normal or formal means of pressing

demands or interest articulations can hardly make head-a-way in Bangladesh. Survey data

also shows that such formal means have been found to be unpopular among the civil society

organizations. Not all organizations have the ability to protest violently, it takes place mostly

at the meso and central level. Besides, such violent protest does not always bring satisfactory

results. Again the number of CSOs with the capacity of arranging round table meetings or

forming policy papers and attract attention of the media and government is also very few.

Lastly, important five sections of the civil society and their political relation have

been focused on using information gathered from newspaper reports, interviews, field visits

and observation notes. Through such discussions, our augments on strong political influence,

patronage, corruption, political polarization existing in different sections of the civil society

and at both local and national level have become more evident. The development NGO

community has been found divided and polarized among party line. They may not be directly

involved with a party but need to maintain indirect link with them to carry on their projects.

Due to polarization, NGOs now seek the shelter or patron of one party when it fears

persecution from the other.

In case of professional groups like the school teachers association, it has been

exposed that political parties have exploited the nation based network of such CSOs as an

instrument for winning elections. As these professional groups are already penetrated and

polarized, their united movements often fail to reach their goal as the government uses such

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division to weaken their strength and arrive at negotiations in favor of the state not the civil

society groups. Political link and violence have given rise to corrupt and criminal labor union

leaders. The collective bargaining associations instead of articulating the financial, social

demands and rights of the poor workers and labors, have turned out to the be the magic lamp

for labor leaders for accumulating wealth, seizing not only the basic wages of the labors but

sacrificing interest of the public industries and enterprises. Trade organizations also have

strong link with the political actors.

At the rural periphery level, large numbers of cooperatives and small welfare

associations and clubs have been found to be the source of opinion formation, collective

unity, with the potential to generate social and political consciousness among the citizens.

Though such local indigenous civil society organizations resembles with Putnum’s soccer

clubs, bird watching groups, they have been neglected by the development practitioners.

However, organizational strength and ability to form collective and individual opinions have

attracted local elites and political parties towards CSOs. They have used the patron-client

social structure to penetrate the local clubs and welfare organizations. Political affiliation and

politically motivated function of the members and internal conflict have eroded the quality,

image of such CSOs and their strength. The central cooperative leaders have been targeted by

local elites and political parties because of the large amount of loan they control and

distribute to other primary unit cooperatives.

At the meso and national level there are the intellectuals, think tanks and citizen

groups which are considered the conscience of civil society as well as its driving force.

Discussions have revealed the university professors to be politically colored and their

political affiliation is connected to not only ideology but personal interests like appointments,

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administrative posts, promotion etc. Student association reached to such political and violent

level that it may be no more be considered as civil society organization. In case of think tanks

and citizens groups, lack of pluralism and unity have been revealed. Pattern of membership

and participation in such non-political citizens groups also reflects the political divide in the

society.

From our discussion it becomes clear that civil society both at the local and national

level are under political pressure or politically linked by vertical forces. The political

penetration is evident both at the periphery and at the core of the civil society. Where ever

financial resources and votes (opinion formation) are in some way in control of civil society

organizations, they have become target for political penetration. This may explain the

division among NGO community as well the teachers associations and also labor unions and

cooperatives. When the civil society is co-opted controlled, the leaders and members are

working not for the interest of the groups they represent but for personal gain, status-quo and

the political parties, they can hardly perform their vigilant role. Instead of monitoring the

state apparatus, they are contributing to the misdeeds of the government and political parties.

If they continue to be under political pressure and remain divided among themselves along

party line, civil society organizations can hardly gain the necessary independence and strong

character to emerge as vigilant forces. Lacking such vigilant power, a civil society, no mater

how it is vibrant, may not contribute to democratic consolidation.

In case of Bangladesh, democratic consolidation by civil society is to take place

mainly in four ways. CSOs, particularly the NGOs are in headway for civic education but

that have led them to become target of political parties. In case of interest aggregation, it has

been seen that the civil society at the local level are hardly engaged in such acts. Those at the

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centre and meso level engage in such activities through formal and horizontal means are very

few and follow same type of liberal secular ideology. The other way of interest articulation is

rather violent and very much entangled to politics and political parties. When the core of the

civil society and as well as the periphery are co-opted by the political party, they cannot play

in any significant role to monitor the state and market. As often the civil society leaders are

corrupt and political and vertically linked to the government, they hardly can ensure any

honest participation and representation of different segments of society in political decision

making.

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Chapter 6

Conclusion

6.1 Introduction Political actors do play a powerful role in shaping civil societies’ vigilant nature. The

previous chapters show how civil society in Bangladesh has been less involved in actions that

are related to politics and democracy. These chapters also identified the powerful influence

of the political actors in deterring the ability of civil society in contributing democratic

consolidation. This chapter first answers the research question, 'why the civil society in

Bangladesh can hardly contribute in democratic consolidation' based on the findings in each

chapter, then moves on to the discussion on implication of the study on Bangladesh

democracy, liberal democratic theory and donor policies. The present chapter argues that,

civil society in Bangladesh may be termed vibrant from its activities and success in social

development, but it can hardly be termed vigilant because of its low participatory nature and

politicized and divided attributes. This also qualifies the prevalent assumption of the liberal

democratic model often incorporated in donor policies, which emphasizes the positive and

direct relation between civil society and democracy.

The study points out the impracticality in the donors’ policy and expectation from the

civil society organizations in Bangladesh. The present study concludes that donors should not

take ambitious policies to strengthen civil society with high expectations like democratic

consolidation in developing countries like Bangladesh. Unless political consensus grows

among the political actors to accept the political game democratic consolidation is hardly

possible with the efforts made by a few selected civil society organizations. This also

requires concomitant institutionalization of political structures and economic development.

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6.2 Answer to the Research Question In this study, civil society in Bangladesh, its nature, action and political relation has

been investigated through three different attempts that ultimately support the inferences on its

vibrant nature considering social development; its high rate of involvement in social welfare

and low performance in participatory activities; and its weak, divided and politicized nature

in respect to democracy.

The third chapter, at first, based on comparative discussion argues that it is the

political actors who determine the nature of democracy and level of civil society strength in

developing countries. In case of Bangladesh, political parties and leaders have been pointed

out to be the prime reason for a weak civil society. However, donor policy, social

circumstances, historical development, culture and law also have combined effect in the

development and nature of civil society here.

Donor policy, natural disaster, poor economy and culture of philanthropy and charity,

web of registration laws have led to vibrant civil society consisting of both world class

development NGOs working with nationwide organizational base as well as small welfare

groups and cooperatives, active at the local level. Such vibrant civil society does show

evidences of civic engagement and collective activity and a high orientation towards service

provision and social welfare rather than participating in local governance or exerting people’s

right. Moreover, though the culture of group formations and collective activities is very

common in Bangladesh society, the internal nature of the CSOs have been found to be

reflecting the vertical social relations like kinship, clientelism etc. Democratic and horizontal

relationship between civil society leaders and members are hardly found in those

organizations, whether it is a cooperative, NGO, labor union or a professional group, while

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most of the CSOs may possess very much democratically organized written constitutions and

rules.

Vigilant nature of the civil society, that is more related to politics and democracy has

been inferred to be highly influenced by political history, by political structures and

particularly by political parties in the 1990s. If we recall the figure 3.5 in chapter three, it

becomes clear how political parties and their governments have maintained their control over

the civil society organizations vertically through corruption, patronage, nepotism, special

legal and illegal favors, extortion etc., for attaining control on different institutional domains,

ensuring organizational base at the rural level and confirm their vote banks at all levels of

society. Moreover, the historical legacy of civil society and political party coalition on

different movements, and the ideological divide among the citizens due to historical roles of

different sections of the society have provided the necessary background and logic to divide

the society and civil society along partly line. Previous literatures and interviews have

identified such penetration of political parties at all stages of civil society both at the core

level and the periphery level. This has receded the participatory nature and strong voice of

the vibrant civil society.

Based on such inferences on civil society in Bangladesh, in chapter four and five, its

participatory activities and political relations have been investigated empirically using hard

evidences and direct information that supports our inferences on a less participatory civil

society and its politicization. Literatures on Bangladesh civil society is rich in analyzing and

evaluating the social welfare functions, however, the present research for the first time has

investigated its participatory functions and political relations based on wide range of primary

and secondary data.

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Chapter four partially answers the question regarding inability of civil society in

consolidating democracy by distinctly showing the low rate of involvement in participatory

actions by civil society organizations. Besides the low rate of participatory activities, the

primary data also reveal a tendency among the CSOs to avoid issues that are more related to

politics and democracy that may lead them to a confrontational situation with the government

and political parties. If we recall tables 4.9 and 4.10 on the participation rate of civil societies

on democratic issues, it becomes evident that on sensitive issues like campaign against

corruption (12%), against street politics (3%), for independent judiciary (4%), etc., the

involvement rate was very low in contrast to the advocacy rates on education (40%), public

health (39%) or environment (30%). The data have also shown partisan tendency among the

CSOs, as they have a high rate in contacting directly the political parties to lobby the

government and on other matters too. The high contact with the political parties by CSOs in

Bangladesh, have been verified comparatively with other Asian countries, the Bangladeshi

case shows abnormally high rate (recall figure 4.9 and 5.1). The data have also shown the

low rate in coalition formation among civil society organizations.

Logically, when civil society has a low profile in participating in democracy related

advocacy, policy-making and forming coalition, but has high vertical contact with political

parties, it can hardly bring pluralism or aggregate interests of the communities and represent

all sections of the society.

Among the 504 CSOs surveyed, 80% are active at the local level. Among them most

organizations are cooperatives, local social welfare groups and small NGOs working in a

limited area. These organizations are formed mainly for welfare and economic purpose and

most of the members are poor farmers and destitute women. Average annual income of these

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poor members is only around US$ 330. Their level of education is also very low. Naturally

they are interested in the materialistic gain from such collective actions like agriculture loan,

micro-credit, employment training etc, rather than showing interest in the policy matters of

the local government or the change in national politics. Local NGOs are also concerned with

these types of persons as their beneficiaries. Some of the welfare groups are formed by local

elites or the educated persons of the area. However, they lack the necessary resources and

donor attention. Moreover, lack of internal democracy makes these CSOs often prone to

political co-optation.

In chapter five, findings based on qualitative analysis of news paper reports have

supported the inferences made in chapter three on politicization of civil society organizations,

penetration of civil society by political parties using vertical means like corruption, patronage,

special favor, nepotism etc., and also that the political divide existing at all levels of the civil

society—periphery, meso and central levels.

Moreover, from the data and information, high rate of using violent means and

extortion, strikes by both political parties and civil society organizations have been revealed.

This implies strong presence of Gramscian model of civil society and it does not refer to a

vigilant civil society but indicate the presence of deprivation, extremism and emergency in

the political system. In case of advocacy, besides, less participation, lack of pluralism have

been noticed, rather it may be termed a monopoly of a few liberal and secular minded think

tanks and citizens groups attracting the media and government and channeling their ideas and

advices claiming to represent the whole civil society in Bangladesh.

Sector wise discussion on civil society and political relations have exposed such

political links, co-optation and polarization of the civil society at the top elite level like the

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apex organizations of the development NGOs, division among intellectuals, as well as the

local level like small welfare groups. The same tendency has been found in CSOs with

nation-wide network like primary school teachers, labor unions, as well as those enjoying

local network like cooperatives. It has been found that, where there is control of vote and

resources in the hands of civil society organizations, they have become the target of political

parties. CSOs, instead of mobilizing such power towards bargaining with the political forces

and controlling state actions have been found to be penetrated by the political parties for their

valuable resources.

In a nutshell, service and welfare related activities have been found to be popular

among CSOs than actions that are more related to policy making, governance and democracy.

Moreover, these civil society organizations have been hinted to be neither horizontal nor

democratic internally. In consequence they have been found to be prone to politicization,

polarization and cooptation. These are the weakest points for the civil society to gain a

vigilant character. On the other side, the political environment in which the civil society

functions has also been found to be uncongenial to democratic consolidation and a strong

civil society. Though Bangladesh is formally a democracy, the political atmosphere is always

confrontational played by the two major political coalitions engaged in a zero sum game.

Politics is played by the rules of clientelism, corruption, patronage and extortion. The social

political interaction is also based on a vertical give and take relation. In the process the civil

society is co-opted and divided by the political parties. Naturally the civil society looses its

independent strength to emerge as a strong third force to contribute to democracy.

However, it is to be admitted that supporting data used to point out the relationship

between civil society and politics are just based on information gathered from news papers,

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resource persons, observations during field trips and the observation notes made by the

surveyors. These data helped to build strong inferences conforming to critical assumptions

made on civil society and political relations in the first and third chapter. Nevertheless, more

concrete data, gathered through in-depth case studies, participatory observations etc. to

completely prove the inferences on politicization, penetration and use of vertical means –

corruption, patronage, nepotism etc. have not been possible to assemble at this stage of the

research. Despite such weakness, the combined data used for identifying the vibrant and

participatory nature of civil society and its political relations should be considered sufficient

to identify the reasons behind the weak civil society and its poor performance in relation to

politics and democracy. Based on the findings through the present study, next we shall

examine the ability of the present civil society in Bangladesh in consolidating democracy.

6.3. Ability of Civil Society in Consolidating Democracy As discussed in chapter one, for Bangladesh to achieve democratic consolidation, it is

necessary to ensure the combined effect of four major interacting factors, e.g., political

institutionalization, stable economic growth, formation of a democratic culture and a

participatory civil society. It has also been identified that a participatory civil society has four

main tasks to realize democratic consolidation. These are, civic education on political and

human rights, interest aggregation, monitoring of state apparatus and economic society and

ensuring better participation and representation of all segments of society in political decision

making. With the data and analysis revealed through the present study, it is now possible to

point out to a considerable extent the ability and potentials of civil society in consolidating

democracy in Bangladesh.

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On civic education, the performance of the civil society is satisfactory so far. At the

grass-roots level, it has been found that CSOs are involved in some types of civic education

and advocacy trainings like developing group network (24%), local representation and

ventilation of grievances (18%), providing education and service in exercising legal and

political rights (17%), and raising social and political awareness (30%). However, such

activities have been found to be performed at a far low rate than the CSOs’ involvement in

service providing functions like education (44%), economic empowerment (44%) etc.

Though low in rate in comparison to other service providing functions, raising political

awareness has become a part of the grass-roots projects of civil society organizations,

particularly among NGOs as the donors have put emphasis on such activities. The high rate

of voters’ turn out (over 70%) during the 1996, and 2001 elections is said to be partly due to

such awareness programs. Naturally, this must be evaluated positively for the citizens of

Bangladesh and its democracy. However, as discussed in chapter five, awareness programs

give the NGOs the opportunity to influence a large section of the voters’ decision regarding

to whom to vote. Naturally the contesting political parties have considered this as a means to

ensure a large vote bank. This led to political deals among the political parties and NGO

leaders, which ultimately brought partisan allegations against some NGOs and their coalition.

This divided the largest umbrella organization of development NGOs—ADAB.

In case of interest aggregation, civil society has been found to be inefficient due to its

low level of network and lower rate of participatory actions. Though the civil society in

Bangladesh has strong link with the political parties, it is not for channeling grievances and

pursuing for collective interest of the civil society through the parties. Rather political link

has been found to bring about division among the civil society organizations and their

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coalitions. In case of civic engagement at the local level, the Bangladesh case supports the

observation made in the CIVICUS project (2007) where it has been found that often in the

South, the local initiatives for social welfare and collective actions, voluntarism, charity etc.

are not coupled with a strong organized civil society in terms of levels of organizations,

networks, infrastructure, and resources. Excluding the foreign funded NGOs, most of the

CSOs particularly at the local level lack the necessary resources, organizational skills and

technical assistance that may help them form network, write petitions, or engage in other

forms of lobbying or advocacy. Moreover, Bangladeshi citizens do not enjoy social liberty as

much as developed countries or even neighboring India. Small local NGOs also try to avoid

playing political roles in public though they have to maintain political links informally for

their existence and execution of their programs.

At the capital level, only a minority of like-minded think-tanks, citizens' groups and

NGOs have emerged as the voice of the civil society attracting the media and debating with

the state. These few CSOs belong to a certain block and ideology (liberal and market

economy) group; they cannot represent the whole civil society that consists of different views

and ways of thinking. However, it is only these organizations that possess the necessary

technical, intellectual and financial support to attract the media, press and the government. So

the interest aggregations are not taking place in a bottom up manner but by a few elite

organizations at the centre.

Evaluating on the basis of participation and representation all segments of the society,

the low participatory Bangladeshi civil society can hardly make any success. Among the

CSOs surveyed, 68% thought that the civil society in Bangladesh could not influence

government and national policies. The survey also found that only 13% of the CSOs had

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succeeded in influencing the government or local government for a certain decision, budget

or policy that they supported. Besides, participation rate through lobby, advocacy and other

means like sending representative to local council and advisory bodies, have also been found

to be low1. Such findings rather refer to a low potential for the civil society to ensure

participation and representation of all segments of the society.

Lastly the most important activity of the civil society is to monitor state actions. Low

rate of participatory activities by the civil society at the periphery and meso levels has

already been mentioned. Moreover, analysis has shown that there are rather vertical links

between the political actors and the civil society and political parties have penetrated the civil

society. When the civil society organizations are already co-opted and controlled by the

political actors they can hardly act independently and stand against the excesses of the state.

Nevertheless, the potential or ability of civil society in Bangladesh in consolidating

democracy cannot make us very optimistic.

Not only the data that have been used for the present research, but observation of the

contemporary political situation of confrontation, corrupt and non-transparent government

and weak state do not depict a scenario that would provide any better environment for the

civil society to act strongly for democracy. Instead of protesting against the government or

corrupt politics, CSOs themselves have been found to become corrupt, unaccountable and

controlled by the political forces. Only in extreme deprivation CSOs or citizens' anomic

1 However, in different literatures, NGO reports and analysis of the international development agencies, the civil society particularly the NGOs have been praised for inspiring the poor villagers not only to vote, but to participate and win in local council elections. According to BRAC Annual Report for 2003, that year among 4484 Unions of Bangladesh, 3945 women candidates for union council election were among BRAC beneficiaries and among them 2388 succeeded. This is the effort of only one NGO— the largest NGO in the country. However, very few CSOs in Bangladesh are as large, well organized and networked and resourceful as BRAC. Majority of the CSOs don’t have the necessary resources to support their members for such activities. This has become evident through the main survey of the research that has interviewed large NGOs as well as small local NGOs and small welfare groups and cooperatives both at the local and urban levels.

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groups have been found protesting against the government in the streets, which often turn

into violent clashes between the public and security forces. However, this does not represent

any strong or active civil society but a weak state and irresponsive government.

6.4 Neo-Tocquevillean Assumption and Donor Policies: Implication of the Bangladesh Case

The present study not only pointed out the reasons behind the inability of civil society

in Bangladesh to contribute to democratic consolidation but also made attempts to qualify the

assumption on civil society and democracy by the main stream Neo-Tocquevillean school.

The school presumes that the more associations there are in a country the greater the

possibility that democratic institutions will improve. It is believed that efforts to produce

democracy through civil society and civic engagement may bring about macro social outputs

from micro social efforts, the democratic practices shaped in associational activities will have

spillover effects in other context and the same associational structures will operate in similar

ways in different socio-historical back ground. Such supposition has profoundly influenced

the donor policies on developing countries.

The Bangladesh case has shown that despite the existence of a good number of civic

groups and local associations and clubs at the community levels, civil society hardly

influenced or contributed in local government decision making, national policies, and

democracy. A good number of CSOs are working not only at the local level but also at the

meso and central levels; but these organizations can hardly be considered as autonomous or

well networked. Rather, most though not all CSOs, have been found to be politicized and

controlled by political actors and local elites, acting in favor of the status-quo rather than the

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people they represent. Moreover, a very few of them have been found to be active in actions

that are related to politics and democracy.

That civil society is an essential but not enough condition for democratic

consolidation- is a fact broadly accepted by the contemporary researchers on civil society.

Alagappa (2004) in his project on Asian civil society has pointed out to the same fact. In the

CIVICUS CSI project, positive relations have been identified between a strong civil society

and a strong state. Diamond (1996, 1999) has also mentioned the necessity of internal

democracy within the CSOs, and some ideal characteristics for a civil society to be able to

contribute to democracy. At the same time he emphasized the necessity of political

institutionalization and liberal economic growth. Such ideal condition and characteristics of

civil society may provide strong theoretical base for the study of civil society, but in reality

turns out to be impractical. Empirical investigation in developing countries like Bangladesh

reveals its inapplicability. For civil society to work well and emerge as a powerful sector to

bring and maintain democracy, it requires proper democratic environment that most of the

developing countries fail to provide.

But Diamond (1992, 1996) is optimistic that civil society movement and actions may

make through the undemocratic environment and contribute to better democratic atmosphere

in multiple ways like fighting against corruption, nurturing democratic values, bringing an

end to clientelism, bringing unity among social cleavages and so on. The Bangladesh case

has proved such expectations from a civil society to be unrealistic and normative. CSOs have

been found to be in no position to generate democratic values, reduce corruption or

clientelism. Rather the civil society leaders have been found to become corrupt, NGOs have

been found to be incorporated in the patron-client network and most of the CSOs to be under

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the control of the political parties. Under a situation of low level of economic development,

vertical social relations, instable political system and weak state, civil society alone cannot

struggle through. Rather on its way it becomes influenced by the negative forces existing in

the environment.

The present study is concerned about such theory, because international development

agencies and bilateral donors have used such Neo-Tocquevillean assumption to support their

policies on good governance and strengthening civil society. The Bangladesh case reveals

that such theory has been adopted half heartedly and not from a well empirical understanding

by the donors. First, local, indigenous CSOs that have the higher potential to generate social

capital, civic engagement and participation have been totally neglected from the development

projects, emphasizing only on a few selected NGOs formed and functioning according to the

Western notion of civil society. Second, the traditional trade unions, professional groups,

trade organizations, student groups etc. have also been overlooked in the civil society

strengthening program mentioning them as politicized (Hansen 1996). So the close

connection between the political parties and such CSOs and the lack of institutionalization

within the political parties themselves are in the knowledge of the donors to some extent. In

spite of such information, the donors are still targeting the symptom of the problem by

forming and supporting new CSOs but neglecting the real causes that may ultimately

inactivate the fresh few organizations too. Sprinkles of assistance and support for social

capital and civic engagement can hardly reach the goal of democratic consolidation.

Third, donors have placed high targets for civil society organizations overestimating

their ability and underestimating the powerful influence of the indigenous environments like

history, culture, politics etc. It must be realized by the donors that, developing countries are

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not plain lands where proper weeding, seeding and watering of new CSOs may bring new

democratic culture, good governance and corrupt free country that is, an all prepared ground

for market economy and liberalization. These are old societies possessing their own

indigenous social and political culture, tradition, political and economic trends. History,

culture and politics must be considered more carefully and sensitively before taking any

policy that targets not only social development but also democracy.

High expectation from a few civil society organizations may hardly bring in any

projected outcome in relation to democracy. Before undertaking civil society related policies,

donors must consider to (a) set achievable targets for the civil society organizations, (b) take

into account the potentials of local civil society organizations and (c) make continued efforts

simultaneously for concomitant economic development and political institutionalization.

Unless initiatives are taken to bring about a consensus among the social, political and

economic actors on democracy, democratic culture consolidation can ever be achieved. This

may be accomplished mainly through indigenous process and through realization of

democratic practice among all the stakeholders. Responsibility lies more with the powerful

actors that is, the political parties and their leaders.

6.5. Matters Remain Uninvestigated Civil society though considered a separate entity from the state and market; is

simultaneously engaged in constant interaction with the state, society, market, family life,

culture and almost all segments that may be found in a political system. So researches on

civil society are always wide and multi-dimensional and it is difficult to identify the limit to

the study area for a particular research. However, it is not possible to include and analyze all

matters related to civil society in a single study. The present study has particularly

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concentrated on the civil society in Bangladesh and its relation to democracy. In the process,

though a good number of factors and issues have come out in discussion and data analysis,

there are still some of areas that have remained uninvestigated.

First, economic influence and relation to civil society, though mentioned in different

sections of the thesis, economic actors like corporate groups, business magnets and trade

organizations have not been deeply investigated in relation to civil society and politics in the

present study. Second, through the study, CSOs themselves have been identified as corrupt

and there have been accusation against their internal democracy and accountability. Further

investigation into such allegations has not been covered in the present study. Third, previous

literatures as well as the survey data on civil society in Bangladesh have identified weak

network among the civil society organizations. However, present research structure and data

collection format did not provide enough space for network analysis.

Though these issues are still pending for further investigation, from the aspects that

have been well focused and analyzed, it is definitely possible to understand the main reasons

behind the inability of the civil society in contributing significantly to democratic

consolidation. The civil society though vibrant and active at local level for social

development, has been identified as less participatory. Political parties and their vertical

penetrative policy to control, co-opt and divide the civil society have been identified as the

prime causes behind such low participatory civil society. Further, analysis on the market

relation and influences, internal corruption and network among the civil society organizations

would have led us to the same conclusion with stronger supportive evidences.

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6.6 Conclusion: ‘Vibrant but not Vigilant’

Bangladesh does have a civil society embedded in the country's culture, history and

political developments and it conforms to the idea of civil society both from the Neo-

Tocquevillean model as well as the Neo-Gramscian Model. The integrated model as

developed in chapter one (figure 1.1) has provided the flexibility to study civil society both

from its actions as well as interaction with other actors in the society. Dividing the

characteristics of civil society in two broad aspects—vibrant and vigilant, helps to understand

and analyze civil society from both its social (service providing) and political (participatory

actions) aspects. Such study on influential factors of civil society and then upon civil society

organizations themselves as units of civil society followed by their nature of political

interaction has led to come closer to the critical arguments made in the beginning of the

thesis.

The nature and dimension of Bangladesh civil society have been found to be

determined by a number of factors. Donor policy, economic situation and culture of

voluntarism and charity and easy process for registration, have led to a rather large number of

formal and informal civil society organizations. They have been found to be active at local

level and mostly concerned with social welfare and services. Indigenous initiative and donor

support have even led to establishment of world class NGOs on social development and

micro-credits. Survey data also supported such fact by showing the high rate of civil society

involvement in the grass-roots development. From such consideration, the civil society of

Bangladesh may be termed vibrant. Nevertheless, majority of the CSOs are concerned with

immediate needs and material aspects like poverty, disaster relief, health etc. rather than the

related policies and decisions of local or national government.

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However, historical development and political institutions have also profound

influences in the nature and function of the civil society, particularly for its weak

performance in relation to politics and democracy. This is what the present study was

concerned largely about. Political parties have been identified as the most influential factor in

the politics related activities of the CSOs. Empirical investigation has revealed a low profile

in the participatory nature of the CSOs. Further analysis on their political relation in the

contemporary Bangladesh, have indicated that instead of influencing the government and

political actors, the civil society itself has been penetrated, co-opted, politicized and divided

by the political parties and party governments. This has reduced their ability to generate

democratic norms, articulate interest or monitor the government. So the civil society has

failed to emerge as a vigilant force to uphold good governance and democracy. The present

study in different ways has pointed out to political actors, that is, the political parties and

political leaders as the prime reason for low participatory and weak civil society, hardly

contributing in democratic consolidation.

In recent analysis on civil society in other developing countries in Asia, like India or

the Philippines (Behar and Prakash, 2004; Quimpo, 2004; Franco, 2004; Rocamora, 2004), it

is the political actors that have been identified as the prime factor in determining civil society

influence and democracy.

In case of India, which is considered the most successful and stable democracy in

South Asia, civil society has its legacy in the historical movements for independence.

However, from a liberal democratic model overview of contemporary Indian civil society has

been considered as a weak one. Just like the case of Bangladesh, as Chibber (1999) pointed

out that, the traditional civil society like labor unions, professional groups, students groups

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are linked to political parties in India, the business organizations never acted like interest

groups and the large rural community groups have no influence on the government's

agricultural policies. Moreover, civil society has been found to have accommodated space for

uncivil and communal forces like RSS. There are only a few instances of non-partisan,

autonomous local based indigenous movements for causes like environment and culture

(Behar and Prakash, 2004). So, Indian civil society is the ground for different elements—

politicized, non-partisan and even uncivil. In all cases, it is the political forces that have

controlled or made space for the civil society to act in a democratic or undemocratic way or

remain silent or inactive. From such consideration, civil society in India can hardly be

evaluated as contributing profoundly to its democratic stability. The fact is that India

successfully developed the political consensus among the prime political and social actors

and also the culture to accept peaceful transfer of power. Moreover, accommodative and

compromising mentalities of the political actors and political parties for democracy have

been able to overcome the influences of dark side of civil society and continue the journey

towards democratic consolidation.

On the other side of the coin, though Philippine is noted for its high density of NGO

networks—not only in number but in vigor and scale—it is dominated by an elitist

democracy. Literatures and analysis on the Philippines’ civil society depicts an idea of a

vigorous civil society consisting of CSOs of different types and sections contributing in a

wide area of the state, society and politics. Strong CSOs’ network, government policies and

legislations have lead to CSOs in the Philippines to the extent of entering electoral politics.

However, such vigorous, participatory civil society has also been found to be ineffective in

influencing day to day politics. Practically, the civil society has been found to be controlled,

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bought and divided by the political elites who control the landed properties, national finance

and political power. So again, though not the political parties but the prime political actors

have been identified as the decisive factor in determining the political influence of the civil

society and nature of democracy.

This implies that, democracy, particularly democratic consolidation, relies on a

combination of conditions, where a participatory civil society is only one factor. However,

more important is the consensus that grows among the political, social and economic actors

and particularly the competing forces on democracy and political practices. Under such

consensus and compromise civil society may emerge as an effective force. So the

performance and influence of civil society in consolidating democracy depends on the culture

and consensus of other actors. Never the less, this must also be accompanied with a strong

state, economic growth, equal social distribution, administrative reforms and so on in case of

a developing country.

For Bangladesh it would require a drastic change in its social, political and economic

system. It is hardly possible in years or decades, to satisfy all these conditions for democratic

consolidation. Even if the civil society had all its ideal characteristics as expected by the

Tocquevillean school, it can hardly contribute positively for a consolidated democracy under

the contemporary situation. The present research has shown that the civil society is rather

weak from the view point of politics and often prone to be influenced by negative elements in

politics and society. Any revolutionary change in government policy to bring democratic

reform in the administration, political institutions and judiciary accompanied by desperate

drives against political corruption, as well as other forms of illegal dealings may ensure a

better order in the political system. However, the culture to rule or decide from above,

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vertical social relations, method of building social support in give and take manner and

political culture of opportunism or taking advantage of religious belief, ideology, and

historical legacies shall continue to exist. This implies that the possibility for a strong,

autonomous, horizontally networked, policy oriented civil society that is a civil society both

vibrant and vigilant is far from reality in the near future.

This does not mean that civil society has no chance to contribute to society and

politics. Policies should be undertaken to strengthen civil society accepting the social and

political facts and it should not be accompanied with high expectations like democratic

consolidation. Civil Society in Bangladesh has already shown its success to a recognizable

extent in social development, economic empowerment. However, for further development, it

requires more formal interaction with the government, better network and stronger voice that

is more participatory activities than it has been found in the present research. Though civil

society may not be able to overcome totally the influence of politicizations, lure of patronage,

vertical social relations, it has the possibility of improving and gaining a stronger position.

International and national policies should aim to get better output from such civil society

organizations accepting the influence of the negative social and political forces. In this way,

whatever positive outcomes are produced may be considered as achievements.

For democracy and democratic consolidation in developing countries—if this is the

actual target—donor agencies must focus on the civil society, political institutions and

related organizations simultaneously. Moreover, such policy must be based on in-depth

understanding of the history, traditions, social structure, indigenous culture and political

development of each region and country.

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Potential for further research in the field of civil society and democracy in

Bangladesh may be considered in two dimensions. Both are important to reach a more

comprehensive and concrete understanding of civil society and its political relations. One is

investigating deeply inside the relationship between civil society organizations and local

governments coupled with network analysis among civil society organizations. Other

dimension is comparative—comparing the civil society of Bangladesh with that of other

democratic developing countries like India or The Philippines to concretely determine the

reasonable extent or end for a civil society to contribute in democratic consolidation and

point out the prime political, social or economic institutions or combination of institutions

where actual key to democratic consolidation may be hidden in developing countries.

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Appendix A

Map of Bangladesh

(Source: Banglapedia at http://www.banglapedia.org/Atlas/bangladesh.htm

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Appendix B Map of Rajshahi District

(Survey Area)

(Source : Banglapedia at http://www.banglapedia.org/HT/R_0079.HTM)

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Appendix C

Survey Questionnaire (Bangla version of the following questionnaires were used for the survey)

Survey on Civil Society Organizations in Bangladesh, Rajshahi District1

Name of the Organization: Address: Sub-district Rajshahi. Address of the central office if your organization is a local chapter: Respondent’s official designation in the organization: [Section I: Basic information about the civil society organization] Q1.1. Which of the 13 classification listed below best describes your organization? (Please circle only one)

1. Agriculture and farmer related organization 2. Economic or business organization

1 The questionnaire was structured considering the objectives of both the Project on Civil Society, State and Culture in Comparative Perspective and the objectives and hypothesis for the present study.

• This is strictly a research survey having no relation with government, private organizations or any International door agencies.

• Organization’s director or whoever is responsible for the daily operations of your organization

will answer and help the surveyor to fill in the questionnaire.

• Please select the answers that best represent your organization. • The answers given in this survey can be individual respondent’s point of view and do not

necessarily have to represent the point of view of the organization.

• Some questions in this survey may not apply to your organization. Feel free to skip these questions.

• If your organization is a local chapter then please try to answer your questions from the point of

view of the organization as a whole. If you are not able to do so, please answer from the point of view of your local chapter.

• The identity of respondent to this survey will be kept confidential. • Thank you very much for your kind cooperation.

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[Section I: Basic information about the civil society organization] Q1.1. Which of the 13 classification listed below best describes your organization? (Please circle only one)

3. Agriculture and farmer related organization 4. Economic or business organization 5. Labor union or federation 6. Education and research related organization 7. Cultural organization 8. Government or administration-related organization 9. Social Welfare organization 10. Professional organization (medical, legal, education, engineers etc.) 11. Citizen’s group 12. NGO (including foreign or international organization) 13. Religious organization 14. Recreational or sports related social organization 15. Other, ……………………Please specify.

Q 1.2. Indicate below which national and local policies are of interest or relevant to your organization’s activities? Choose all that apply.

1. Financial policies (Management of govt. money) 2. Fiscal policies (Government tax, debt…) 3. Trade and international commerce policies 4. Industrial promotional policies 5. Civic engineering, construction and public works policies 6. Transportation and traffic policies 7. Communication and information policies 8. Scientific technology and research policies 9. Local development policies/Rural Development 10. Diplomatic policies 11. International exchange, cooperation and aid policies including foreign debt problem 12. National defense and security policies 13. Law and order 14. Justice and human rights 15. Local government and administrative policies 16. Labor polices 17. Social welfare 18. Agriculture 19. Consumer protection policies 20. Environment, energy and natural resources policies 21. Healthcare policies 22. Education, academic, sports and recreational policies 23. Poverty alleviation 24. Culture and religion 25. Others,……………

Q1.3. What is the main purpose of your organization and the primary goal of your organization’s activities? Choose all that apply

1. Providing information to members 2. Pursuing economic profit for members 3. Protecting the standard of living and rights of the members/clients

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4. Providing education and training opportunities for members/clients 5. Advocating on behalf of the members in order to gain subsidies from government 6. Assisting members in licensing and registration procedures 7. Providing policy recommendations based on technical knowledge for public policy making 8. Providing education and information for the good of the general public 9. Providing service to the general public. 10. Providing funds to other organizations 11. Others___________

Q1.4. Is your organization registered with any ministry or institution?

Yes___ No________ Q1.4A.If yes, name the ministry or institution_________________________

Q1.5. When was your organization founded?

Q1.6. How many members does your organization have? (Round off the exact number)

Individual Members Member organization (If it has*)

*If your organization is an umbrella organization/ federation compiling other member organizations, like ADAB, NGO Federation, Federation of Labor Union, Came etc. Q1.7. Does your organization receive funds or some other type of financial assistance from outside sources besides membership fee? If yes, in the space below, please write the names of the organizations or government agencies that have provided financial assistance to your organization. Yes_______ No____________ If yes, Name of the organization or agency ______________________________

Q1.7A: Are the financial assistances accompanied by condition? Yes .. NO….

Q1.8. How many employees does your organization have?

(1) Full time employees ________(2) Part time employees _______(3) Volunteers ____ Q1.9. What was your organization’s budget in Taka in the year 2004 or 2005 In 2004 ____________ or In 2005_____________ (a round figure is Ok) Q1.10. What geographic area does your organization mainly encompass in conducting its activities? 1. Union/Ward-- 2.Subdistrict / Municipality--, 3. District--, 4. National --5. Global--.

Question 1.10A: When a policy related problem or incident occurs in the geographical area indicated in Q1.10, how much influence does your organization have on these problems? Please Identify. 1. Strong influence 2. Some influence 3. Little influence 4. Hardly any influence 5. No influence.

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[Section II Nature of Interaction with the State and Political Parties] Q2.1. Circle the statement that describes the relationship your organization has with the government or local government. Choose all that apply.

1. Accredited or approved by the government 2. Licensed by the government 3. Administrative guidance provided by the government 4. Cooperating with and supporting policies and budget activities of the government 5. Exchanging opinions with the government 6. Sending representative to council and /or advisory bodies of the national government 7. Offering positions to government officials after retirement 8. Receiving government funds or grants. 9. Receiving foreign fund through the government 10. Having joint projects or program with the government.

Q2.2. What are the obstacles or problems that you face in your interaction with the government (like getting registration, approval of projects, grants etc. or negotiating your demands, pursuing for certain policy or budget grant). Select all that apply.

1. Corruption in the Administration 2. No cooperation from the office staff 3. Over inspection by the government 4. Bureaucratic complicacies and red tapism 5. Unwanted political interference and pressure 6. Conditions entangled with foreign and government funds 7. Division and irregularities within your own organizations 8. Other______________________________________

Q 2.2A. How does your organization solve those obstacles or problems? Choose all that apply?

1. Bribe the officers 2. Use personal, friendship network to pursue or pressurize the administrative officials by

political leaders or high ranking officers. 3. Show political support to the party in power and use the political influence to get your case

done by the administration. 4. Other___________________________________________

Q 2.3. What type of relationship and communication do you have with political parties? Choose the statement which best corresponds to your organization’s action today and ten years before. 1=Never communicate, 2=Rarely communicate, 3= Communicate about half the time, 4= Usually communicate, 5= Always communicate Political Parties Now Ten years before Bangladesh Nationalist Party

1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 1. 2. 3. 4. 5.

Bangladesh Awami League

1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 1. 2. 3. 4. 5.

Jamat-e-Islami Bangladesh

1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 1. 2. 3. 4. 5.

Jatiyo Party (including factions)

1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 1. 2. 3. 4. 5.

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Bangladesh Communist Party (any faction)

1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 1. 2. 3. 4. 5.

Others

1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 1. 2. 3. 4. 5.

Q2.4. During national elections, has your organization taken any of the following actions, and if so how frequently? Choose the statement which best corresponds to your organization’s actions today and ten years ago. 1= Never, 2= Some of the time, 3= About half the time, 4= Most of the time 5= Always Today Ten years ago

1. Played a role for nomination and election for a particular candidate

1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 1. 2. 3. 4. 5.

2. Recommended a member/client of your organization as a party/election candidate.

1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 1. 2. 3. 4. 5.

3. Launched campaign for free and fair election

1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 1. 2. 3. 4. 5.

4. Participated as independent observers at different polling stations during the election day.

1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 1. 2. 3. 4. 5.

5. Other………………………… 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. Q. 2.5. When your organization appeals to government/ administrations/ political parties, how often do you take any of the measures listed below?

1=Never, 2=some of the time, 3=about half the time, 4=Most of the time, 5=Always (1) Contacting the parties in the cabinet (by personal interviews, phone calls, with the help of a broker etc.)

1. 2. 3. 4. 5.

(2) Contacting the opposition parties (by personal interviews, phone calls, with the help of a broker etc.)

1. 2. 3. 4. 5.

(3) Contacting governmental department and agencies (by personal interviews, phone call, with the help of a broker etc.)

1. 2. 3. 4. 5.

(4) Helping to draft legislative bills for political parties or governmental organization.

1. 2. 3. 4. 5.

(5) Presenting research results or technical information to political parties and/or government ministries.

1. 2. 3. 4. 5.

(6) Sending representatives to local or national councils and /or advisory bodies to the government

1. 2. 3. 4. 5.

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(7) Asking general organizational members to write letters or make phone calls to political parties or government administration

1. 2. 3. 4. 5.

(8) Engaging in mass protests or demonstrations

1. 2. 3. 4. 5.

(9) Organizing seminars, round table meeting, rally etc.

1. 2. 3. 4. 5.

(10.) Holding press conferences in order to publicize ideas and let know organizations position on different issues and incidents.

1. 2. 3. 4. 5.

(11) Forming coalition with other organizations or NGOs

1. 2. 3. 4. 5.

Q.2.6.Does your organization or any member have personal relationship with any of the following persons? (Choose all that apply)

1. An elected parliament member, 2. A leader of the ruling party, 3. A leader of the opposition parties, 4. A mayor / Union Chairman 5. A journalist 6. A chief or a section chief from a department of a government/local administration (Secretary, D.C.

S.P. UNO), 7. A chief or a staff of an international organization, international NGO, 8. A judge or a magistrate of the national or local court.

Q2.7A. Has your organization ever succeeded in having a budget, policy, action or decision it favored being implemented by a national or local government? Yes_ No _ Q 2.7.B. Has your organization ever succeeded altering a budget, policy, action, decision, or blocking the implementation of a policy, decision, it did not favor? Yes_ No _ Q2.8. Do you think that your organization is an autonomous one and can function independently from the government and political parties? Yes_________ No___________

Q2.8A. If your answer is yes in which way do you think your organization is autonomous and independent? (Choose all that apply) 1. Your organization is well reputed and is backed by the foreign donor groups. So you can easily adopt your new policies and implement your projects. 2. As your organization has good relation and informal link with the government and political party you don’t have to face any unwanted political pressure or control. 3. The policies of the present government and your organization are very much interrelated so you don’t face any political interference.

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4. Local elites and Mastans (hooligan) now benefit from your activities and you no more go against the interest of the status-quo. So you can do your work normally. 5. As you have been able to develop better network or coalition with other like minded organizations, you have a strong platform to speak out and it protects your autonomy too. 6. We are able to provide by ourselves the major portion of our financial need 7. Other______ ________________________________ Q2.8B If your answer is no then why do you think that your organization doesn’t enjoy autonomy? (Choose all that apply)

1. You are always under government scrutiny and unwanted direction 2. You often have to bribe the government through cash or kind. 3. You have to form your policy and project as directed by the donors with very little space for autonomy. 4. Financially you are very much depended on government and donor agencies 5. The local elite and hooligans are often creating obstacles in your everyday activities, demanding political rent and turning the government and the public opinion against you. 6. There is often pressure from the opposition or party in power to abide by their ideology and decisions. So you cannot act independently. 7. Executives and members of the organization give more preference to their political identity than the interest of the organization. 8. Others______ _____________Please specify. Q2.9. Do you think that your organization is somehow involved in national or local politics? Choose the statement that best reflects your organization’s overall activities. Yes_______ No__________ Q2.9A. If yes, does your organization involve in politics on its own or is your organization approached by outside sources to become involved in politics? (Choose only one)

1. Most of the time we are approached by outside sources. 2. There is a balance between internal and external drives 3. Most of the time, we get involved on our own. 4. For our existence there is no other way but to meddle in politics.

[Section III Relationship among the civil society organizations] Q 3.1 What sources does your organization uses to get information for its activities? Rank, in order of importance, three from the list below. 1__________________, 2. _____________________, 3. ______________________

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1. Government 2. Local government 3. Political parties 4. Parliament members 5. Elected representative of the local government 6. Scholars or professionals, think tank 7. The mass media (Radio, TV, Newspaper) 8. Technical or trade papers 9. Foreign government 10. Foreign NGOs, international organizations etc. 11. Other domestic organization with similar interests 12. Members of your organization 13. Business companies 14. Others _______________

Q 3.2. How many times has mass media mentioned your organization during past 3 years? Write the approximate number of times your organization has appeared on national or private television and/or in any national or local newspaper or magazine. __________________ times Q 3.3. To what extent do you think the following groups influence politics in Bangladesh? Rate each of the following groups on a scale from 1 to 7 in terms of political influence. ( 1 stands for very little influence, 7 stands for a lot of influence, and 4 is the neutral point.

1. Trade (labor) unions and federations 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 2. Agricultural Organization 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 3. Economic, business, and employers organization 1 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 4. Government Bureaucrats 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 5. Political Parties 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 6. The Mass Media 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 7. Large business /corporations 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. Scholars and academicians 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 9. Consumer Organization 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 10. Welfare Organizations, NGO 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 11. Professional Groups 12. Women movement organizations 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 13. Local governments 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 14. Foreign government and International donor agencies 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 15. Religious Organizations 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7.

Q3.4. What type of relation and cooperation does you organization has with the following groups? Rate the following groups on a scale from 1 to 7 in terms of cooperation with your organization. 1 stands for uncooperative, 7 stand for cooperative and 4 is the neutral point.

1. Trade (labor) unions and federations 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 2. Agricultural Organization 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 3. Economic, business, and employers organization 1 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 4. Government Bureaucrats 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 5. Political Parties 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 6. The Mass Media 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 7. Large Business /Corporations 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. Scholars and Academicians 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 9. Consumer Organization 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 10. Welfare Organizations, NGO 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7.

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11. Professional Groups 12. Women movement organizations 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 13. Local governments 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 14. Foreign government and International donor agencies 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 15. Religious Organizations 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7.

[Section IV Problems and Prospect in the context of Civil Society in Bangladesh] Q4.1. Below are listed important political decisions and events that have taken place in the last 15 years. Please scale your organizations Participation, Position and Satisfaction to each of these decisions and events. (if the event took place before the establishment of your organization then you are free to skip those events).

1. 12th Amendment of the Constitution for the reintroduction of parliamentary system of government in Bangladesh. Participation:1. No participation___ 2.Participation_________ 3.Strong participation ____ Position: 1.Against_____ 2 Neutral._________ 3.Favor _________ Satisfaction: 1.Dissatisfied_____ 2.Satisfied_________ 3.Very Satisfied _________ 2. Movement for a caretaker government in 1996 and the 13th Amendment introducing caretaker government system. Participation:1. No participation___ 2.Participation_________ 3.Strong participation ____ Position: 1.Against_____ 2 Neutral._________ 3.Favor _________ Satisfaction: 1.Dissatisfied_____ 2.Satisfied_________ 3.Very Satisfied _________ 3. The water treaty with India for fair distribution of Ganges water in 1996. Participation:1. No participation___ 2.Participation_________ 3.Strong participation ____ Position: 1.Against_____ 2 Neutral._________ 3.Favor _________ Satisfaction: 1.Dissatisfied_____ 2.Satisfied_________ 3.Very Satisfied _________ 4. Trial of Bangabondhu Shiek Mujibor Rahman Murder case Participation:1. No participation___ 2.Participation_________ 3.Strong participation ____ Position: 1.Against_____ 2 Neutral._________ 3.Favor _________ Satisfaction: 1.Dissatisfied_____ 2.Satisfied_________ 3.Very Satisfied _________ 5. 14th Amendment of the Constitution for Women’s representation in the parliament Participation: 1._______ 2._________ 3. _________ Position: 1._______ 2._________ 3. _________ Satisfaction: 1._______ 2._________ 3. _________ 6. National Strategy for Economic Growth, Poverty Reduction or Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper (PRSP) Participation:1. No participation___ 2.Participation_________ 3.Strong participation ____ Position: 1.Against_____ 2 Neutral._________ 3.Favor _________ Satisfaction: 1.Dissatisfied_____ 2.Satisfied_________ 3.Very Satisfied _________ 7. The government decision to deploy Rapid Action Battalion (RAB) to control the deteriorating law and order situation. Participation:1. No participation___ 2.Participation_________ 3.Strong participation ____

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Position: 1.Against_____ 2 Neutral._________ 3.Favor _________ Satisfaction: 1.Dissatisfied_____ 2.Satisfied_________ 3.Very Satisfied _________ Q. 4.2. Is your organization involved in any of the following issues? Choose as many issues that correspond to your organization’s actions. In which way you are involved in those issues- advocacy (Negotiating and pressurizing the government in different ways and providing public education) or service providing (materially helping citizens on those matters such as health clinic, financial aid, legal aid, school, skill training etc.) ? You can circle both if it applies to your organization.

1. Political and human rights a. by advocacy …………… b. by service providing………. 2. Rural development a. by advocacy……………. b. by service providing ………. 3. Law and order a. by advocacy……………. b. by service providing ………. 4. Women’s right a. by advocacy……………. b. by service providing ………. 5. Education a. by advocacy……………. b. by service providing ………. 6. Public health a. by advocacy……………. b. by service providing ………. 7. Environment a. by advocacy……………. b. by service providing ………. 8. Labor right and Unemployment a. by advocacy……………. b. by service providing ………. 9. Corruption a. by advocacy……………. b. by service providing ………. 10. Street Politics and Hartal (strike) Culture a. by advocacy……………. b. by service providing ………. 11. Separation of the Judiciary from the executive branch of the Government a. by advocacy……………. b. by service providing ………. Q.4.2A. Do you think that there are some positive effects through activities of your organization and other civil society groups on those issues you have pointed out? Yes…………… No………………. Partially…………………… Q4.3. Is your organization involved in grass-roots level activities (for example micro-credit, education, skill training, health and nutrition, relief and rehabilitation and so on)? Yes…………. No………… Q.4.3A. If Yes, Please specify your area of activity, you may select all that apply. 1. GO-NGO cooperation for rural development 2. Developing group network 3. Women empowerment 4. Local representation and ventilation of grievances to the authorities 5. Education and literacy 6. Health education and health service 7. Legal and human rights 8. Economic empowerment 9. Social and political awareness and participation

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Q. 4.3B. How would you evaluate performance of your organization and the over all performance of NGOs in those sectors that you have selected in question 4.3A. ? (1 stands for very little progress, 7 stand for a lot of progress, and 4 is medium progress). Performance of your organization: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. Over all performance of the NGO sector: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. Q. 4.4. How would you evaluate the role of international NGOs/ organizations and donor agencies in strengthening civil societies in Bangladesh? (1= negligent, 7= highest and 4= medium). 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. Q. 4.4A. Have your organization been benefited in any way by an international NGO or organization? Yes ________No___________ If yes, then in which way (Choose all that apply) 1. Financial assistance/donation a. directly b. through a national big NGO 2. Technical assistance 3. Your organization was formally a branch of a foreign NGO Q 4.5. Do you think that civil society organizations can successfully create strong pressure or influence upon government in policy formation, in Bangladesh? Yes………… No………………. Q 4.5A If the answer is Yes, can you give some recent examples? _____________________________________________________ Q4.5B . If the answer is No, why do you think that civil society organizations hardly can create a strong pressure or influence upon government in policy formation, in Bangladesh? Choose all that apply.

1. Because they lack unity and strong network 2. Because most civil society organizations are partisan. They are influenced and controlled either

by the government or the opposition. 3. Most groups are not well organized 4. Advocacy groups are very few in comparison to service providing NGOs in Bangladesh. 5. The government and the politicians have no formal/informal obligation to pay attention to the

demands of civil society groups. 6. Patron–client relationship is still very strong in Bangladesh. 7. Others..(Please point out the reason)……………………..

Q4.6. What are the actions that civil society organizations could do in order to have a more effective participation in forming government policies? Choose all that apply.

1. Create a stronger network with similar organizations 2. Ensure better accountability and democratic norm within the organizations themselves. 3. Demand responsible action from elected representative 4. Increase awareness among public on major social and political issues and policies 5. Come out of the formal/informal influence by political parties upon civil society organizations. 6. Others…(Please point out )……………………………….

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Thank you for your patience and kind cooperation. Signature of the interviewer…………………date………. . Signature of the interviewee………..

A Survey on Civil Society Organizations in Bangladesh, 2006 Open-ended Questions2

(a) For politicians and government administrators

Interviewee___________________ Designation and Address_________ _____________________________ Date_________________________ 1. Could you please explain what is the relationship between your organization or administrative unit and civil society organizations (like NGO, cooperatives, professional group, labor union, chambers of commerce etc.). What type of cooperation and interaction is taking place? 2. In which way do you think these civil society organizations help the government? 3. What type of cooperation do you extend to these organizations both officially and personally? 4. How would you evaluate the role of civil society organizations in formulation of government policies as well as in their implementations? 5. How would you evaluate the role of civil society organizations in different development projects? 6. What type of people do you give importance to, when they come to you for solving a problem and for settling a dispute? A single citizen with the reference of an influential person, or A group or representative of an organization, NGO, cooperative or a professional group, union or A group having affiliation with a political party? 7. How do you regard members of different civil society organizations? As a citizen or normal voter of the area or a supporter of the government or the opposition? 9. According to your own judgment or way of thinking, what type of role should such civil society organizations play in the society and state?

2 Often the interviewees have been asked questions out side the format as supplementary questions. Besides, some of the government officials and NGO officers have been inquired into particular matters that are related to their function and jurisdiction of control like, officials rules on cooperatives, NGO activities. Again professors and citizen groups and labor union leaders were also particularly asked about their related professional groups

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(b) For scholars and civil society leaders Interviewee___________________ Designation and Address_________ _____________________________ Date_________________________ 1. Which portion of the society and what type of organizations do you regard as civil society? Please answer from theoretical point of view as well as in the context of Bangladesh. 2. Where would you place civil society that you observe in Bangladesh? And Why? (a) Against the government, (b) In cooperation with the government or (c) somewhere in the middle? 3. Is it possible to separate civil society or civil society organizations from the political sphere of the country? Whom do you think is more influential in this case? (a) The government is more successful and has penetrated the civil society organizations through patronage, clientelism, nepotism, corruption and bureaucratic chain and using it according to its wish? (b) The civil society has gained enough strength to keep the government’s actions within its limits and ensure democracy? Or, (c) The situation is something in between, with the government in an advantageous position? 4. How would you evaluate the role of civil society in development and democratization of Bangladesh? 5. Do you think that, performance of civil society at the grass root level is remarkable while at the national level is rather frustrating or the opposite or something in the middle? Could you please explain the reasons behind your position? 6. Whatever is the success or failure of civil society organizations in Bangladesh, we may observe that the number of civil society organizations here is pretty large. What may the reason for such proliferation of organizations? What type of organizations do you think are common here- service providing or advocacy groups? 7. How would you evaluate the role and influence of donor countries, International development organizations and International NGOs in the development and performance of civil society in present Bangladesh? (If the interviewee is affiliated with an international development organization) 8. Could you please explain your organization’s objectives in relation to the development of civil society in the developing countries and specially Bangladesh? a. What type of projects have you taken in the past and at present for strengthening the civil society? b. What are the outcomes that you are getting through these strategy and projects? Are they encouraging? or frustrating? c. If the outcome is not encouraging, what may be the problem? In your way of setting the strategy and estimating the outcome? or in the indigenous setting of these countries? Could you please explain?

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CSO Case Study Data Collection Format

1. Type of Organization 2. Name of the organization 3. Self Introductory brochure or booklet (if available)

4. Organization’s historical development

5. Organization’s constitution, objectives and membership pattern

6. Nature of Activities

7. Financial sources and relationship with the financing actors

8. Relationship with the media

9. Relationship with other organizations

10. Relationship with the authority/government administration

11. Style and nature of negotiating with/ pressurizing the authority/government

12. Style and nature of inspection, pressure or interference the organization experiences from the authority, government and political parties

13. List of successes of the organization in realizing its objectives and in its dealing with the

government 14. List of failure of the organization in realizing its objectives and in its dealing with the

government 15. Reasons for the success and failures

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Appendix D

Survey Report Survey on Civil Society Organizations in Bangladesh, Rajshahi District

Purpose: The objective of the survey is to understand the basic trend and characteristics of the civil society organizations (CSO) in Bangladesh and their relationship to society, state and politics. Survey Area: Rajshahi District consisting of 9 Sub-district and Rajshahi Metropolitan city. It is the capital of North Zone of Bangladesh. Name of each sub-districts are-Poba, Durgapur, Puthia, Godagari, Bagmara, Mohonpur, Tanore, Charghat, Bagha. Survey Method: The survey was conducted with the help of surveyors who directly interviewed the president or representative of the sampled organizations and filled in structured questionnaires accordingly. Survey Population: In Bangladesh there is no yellow book or any directory providing information of non-government organizations. For the survey, non-profit and non-government organizations registered or enlisted by any ministry or institution has been regarded as the target population. However, full statistics of all these organizations are not available at one office or directory. Accordingly, following types of organizations were targeted with their list being collected from the affiliated government offices or institutions. In total the target population is 37683. By category they are:

1. 2540 Cooperatives registered under the ministry of Local Government, Rural Development and Cooperatives, provided by the Cooperative Directorate, Rajshahi.

2. 793 Organization registered as Voluntary Social Organizations under the Ministry of Social Welfare, collected from the Social Welfare Directorate, Rajshahi.

3. 129 NGOs according to the ADAB Directory of NGOs-2003 (updated and adjusted). 4. 108 Youth Groups registered under the Ministry of Youth and Sports, collected from the

Youth Directorate at Rajshahi. 4 5. 99 Labor Unions registered under the Ministry to Labor and Employment collected from

Labor Directorate Rajshahi.5 6. 45 University of Rajshahi based registered cultural, academic, professional organizations

were collected from the Rajshahi University Office. 7. 21 prominent trade organizations in Rajshahi District as provided by the Chambers of

Commerce Rajshahi. 8. 33 registered Professional Groups. List formulated by consulting administrative officers of

Rajshahi District, University Professors and other local senior residents. 6

Sampling method: The total population of Civil Society Organizations is 3768. Target population initially was 400. So with an expectation of 30% answer rate, the sample 3 This is a rough estimate of the total population of civil society organizations in Rajshahi city as the list of trade groups and professional groups are not complete and even the list provided by the government offices were found to be not updated with full addresses. 4 As the same organization can be registered with more than one ministry, there is a few possibility of overlapping, especially in the case of social welfare organizations, NGOs and youth groups. 5 These lists of cooperative, social welfare groups, NGOs, labor union and youth groups were organized and divided according to 9 sub-districts and Rajshahi city area. 6 Formal official list of trade groups and professional groups were not available.

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population was made 1227 through random sampling with 3 as the random number. Every 3rd organization from the population lists was included in the sample list. This is about 33% of the total population. To avoid bias, sample list of 1227 organizations were again divided into 400 groups with 3 organizations coming serially in each group. The surveyor had to try his/her best to interview only one organization from each group with the first organization in each group getting first priority and the 3rd organization getting the 3rd priority. If any organization is not available from one group, then more than one organization can be interviewed from the next group. As the time and budget was fixed and there was no chance of extension, the latter provision had to be included.

Sampling Population: Below are the numbers of sampled civil society organizations belonging to different categories. Table A-1 sampled civil society organizations belonging to different categories

Categories Sample Size 1 Different Types of Cooperatives 838 2 Registered Voluntary Social Welfare Organizations 260 3 NGOs based on ADAB Directory 2003 35 4 Organizations listed under Youth Department 33 5 Labor organizations listed under Labor Directorate 32 6 Chambers of Commerce and trade organizations 6 7 Professional Groups 11 8 Rajshahi University based cultural, educational and professional

groups 12

Total 1227

Data Collection: The survey for Rajshahi District took place in September and October 2006. (Particularly, From 9 September to 2 October, 2006) Surveyors, that is 19 graduate students of Rajshahi University and one undergraduate student of Bangla College as research assistant were contacted before hand. The first formal briefing session with the surveyors was held at Rajshahi University on 7th September. Second, briefing session was held in 9 September 2006 in the morning. In the briefing sessions the objective and the process of the survey was explained thoroughly. The questionnaire was discussed in detail. Every surveyor was given a note book to use it as a diary for the survey period and write down every point that they felt to be noted. They were also instructed about what type of things they were allowed to note down. The survey began on 9th September. The surveyors at first went to the Sub-district office, collected the local map of the each area and met the government officials in charge of the social welfare and cooperatives and updated the sample list they were provided and gathered more information about the location of the organizations. Then they began their survey. In total 504 Questionnaires were filled in from 9 sub-district and Rajshahi city. The surveyors were to go to the field every day unless they had class/exam or urgent engagements. In every two days, they in person came to meet the researcher and submitted the filled in questionnaires and she checked those in front of them, so that they don’t do the same mistakes again. Then they were given enough fresh questionnaires for the next two days. The number of filled in questionnaire submitted and the number of fresh questionnaire distributed for each day and the number of working days for each surveyor

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were, recorded down. Everyday, from time to time, the researcher kept contact with them over phone. Whenever necessary they also rang me. Table A-1 shows how many questionnaires were filled in each days. Table A-2 Questionnaires filled in each day

Date

Number of Questionnaire filled in Percent (%)

20060909 9 1.8

20060910 4 .8

20060911 61 12.1

20060912 50 9.9

20060913 60 11.9

20060914 65 12.9

20060915 37 7.3

20060916 39 7.7

20060917 51 10.1

20060918 42 8.3

20060919 44 8.7

20060920 18 3.6

20060921 2 .4

20060922 9 1.8

20060923 7 1.4

20060924 3 .6

20060925 1 .2

20060928 1 .2

20061002 1 .2

Total 504 100.0

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Problems faced initially: Just after beginning the survey, different types of practical problem began to show up. The addresses provided in the list were not complete. There was no phone directory to find out the contact number of the organizations or make appointment before hand. The biggest problem was locating the cooperatives and finding the responsible person to answer the questions as they did not have any permanent office. There was also problem with the long list of cooperatives provided by the cooperative office. A good number of cooperatives in sample list have been found to be non-existent or have been extinct. The same problem occurred in all Sub-districts. Surveyors had to rely on the information provided by the Sub-district office and then by the local people and walk for hours to find the addresses. There was lots of wastage of time and money. Moreover, in the case of Social Welfare groups there had been also difficulties in locating the organizations as they have changed their addresses or the organization is not active any more. New Decisions taken during the Survey: So considering the time and budget of the survey, after an acceptable number of cooperatives were interviewed, further interview with cooperatives were stopped on the 14th, September, 2006. The surveyors were ordered to give more emphasis on social welfare groups, clubs and NGOs. Moreover, from 15th September the besides sample list, they were also given the total population list of social welfare organizations and NGOs. These two new decisions were inevitable for finishing the survey in time and reaching the target with the limited budget. To avoid biasness, the surveyors each day were to go to a certain zone (Union- A sub-district is divided into unions) of a sub-district and interview available and active civil society organizations of that union found in the list provided. Next day they went to survey in another union. Survey output: Out of 3768 total organizations, 1227 were sampled for the survey. Out them 504 organizations of different category responded, so the answer rate is 41 Percent. The survey represents 13.5 % of the total population with an answer rate of 41%. The Table A-2 shows the statistics of the all three steps-Population, sampling and interviewed CSOs. In bracket is percentage of the respondent to the total population of each group.

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Table A-3 The statistics of the all three steps-population, sampling and interviewed CSOs

Categories Total

Population

Sample

Size

Interviewed CSOs (% to

the total population)

1 Different Types of Cooperatives 2540 838 193 (7.6%)

2 Registered Voluntary Social Welfare

Organizations

793 260 243 (31%)

3 NGOs based on ADAB Directory 2003 129 35 22 (17%)

4 Organizations listed under Youth Department 108 33 13 (12%)

5 Labor organizations listed under Labor

Directorate

99 32 9 (9%)

6 Chambers of Commerce and trade organizations 45 6 6(28%)

7 Professional Groups 21 11 6 (18%)

8 Rajshahi University based cultural, educational

and professional groups

33 12 9 (20%)

Total (Answer rate 41% ) 3768 1227 504 (13.5%)

However, according to output of the data, the interviewed organizations again may be classified according to the ministry or institution they have identified their affiliation with as shown in Table A-3. Table A-4 The CSO under affiliated ministry of institutions Affiliated Ministry of Institutions

CSOs

1. Cooperatives-Ministry of Local government Rural Development and Co-operatives 186 (7.3%)

2. Social Welfare organizations-Ministry of Social Welfare and Ministry of health 237 (30%)

3. NGOs-Registered with Ministry of Social Welfare and NGO Affairs Bureau 22 (20.9%)

4. Youth Groups Registered with Ministry of Youth and Sports 10 (9%)

5. Labor Union (Registered with Ministry of Labor and Employment) 9 (9%)

6 Rajshahi University Group 17 (31%) 7 Registered with other ministries and institutions (Professional and Trade

Organizations) 9 (20%)

8 Women Groups (Registered with Ministry of Women and Child Affairs)* 14

Total 504 (13.5%) *Note: The women organizations are mixed in the cooperative groups, youth groups and few are in the list of social welfare organizations.

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Again, the following Table A-4 shows how the CSOs have classified themselves as civil society organizations and their percentage among the 504 respondent organizations. Table A-5 CSO’s classification Classification CSOs

Agriculture and farmer related organization 92 (18.3%)

Economic or business organization 56 (11.1%)

Labor union or federation 16 (3.2%)

Education and research related organization 17 (3.4%)

Cultural organization 16 (3.2%)

Government or administration-related organization 1 (.2%)

Social Welfare organization 223 (44.2%)

Professional organization 8 (1.6%)

Citizen's group 2 (.4%)

NGO (including foreign or international organization) 33 (6.5%)

Religious organization 3 (.6%)

Recreational or sports related social organization 32 (6.3%)

Other type of organization 5 (1.0%)

Total 504

This shows that 44.2% organizations have identified themselves as welfare organizations while 18.3% as agriculture based. This is very obvious for an agrarian and developing country like Bangladesh having a culture of voluntarism and accepting a large amount of foreign donation and loan each year for human resource development and relief.

Field Visits: The researcher herself also visited the different areas where the survey was conducted by private transport (Rent-A-Car). It was field trips to different areas sometimes with the surveyor in charge of the area, often alone or with the survey assistant to me. The survey assistant was also sent to different places alone. Here the researcher revisited the civil society organizations or the government officers in charge of cooperative, others in charge of NGOs or Social Welfare organizations also met the Sub-District Executive officers (UNO)— in charge of sub-districts. Some were kind enough to answer inquiries and even give me interview about their relation to the civil society organizations in their area. List of date and place for the filed visits are given below. Field Visits in September, 2006 1. 10th Poba Sub-district, 2. 12th Mohonpur Sub-district, 3. 13th Godagari Sub-district 4. 14th Tanore Sub-district 5. 15th Durgapur Sub-district, 6. 17th Bagmara Sub-district, 7. 19th Charghat and Bagha Sub-district, 8. 21th Rajshahi city, 9. 27th Puthia Sub-district and Rajshahi city.

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Interviews and Case Studies: Besides the interview with structured questionnaires, the researcher also interviewed some resource persons, for example, the Mayor and Parliament member of Rajshahi, High Government Officials in charge of Cooperatives, Professors, NGO Executives, Sub-district head and so on. Some interview was recorded with the permission of the respondent. Where they declined, their answers were just noted down. Detailed information with the objective of doing case studies on a labor union, three different types of NGOs, an advocacy organization, Chambers of Commerce and a Professional Group have also been collected. In this connection, some surveyors also helped in gathering information. This process continued even after the survey was formally over. Questionnaire Cross-checking: When good number of filled in questionnaires began to pour in every day, the researcher personally began to cross check each questionnaire and see for mistakes and ambiguity and misses. Besides the name, address and string answers written in Bengali had to be translated into English. As the surveyors were still going to the field the misses could be rechecked. Besides, in most cases interviewers gave their contact numbers like (personal mobile number). So they could be contacted if necessary. Afterwards, 5 more surveyors helped in this regard and cross checking the 504 cases was finished by 27 September. These 5 surveyors were paid separately for such assistance. Data input, data cleaning and data analysis: The data input process began 28th September. And it took about two weeks to complete with the help of professionals. After coming back to Japan in November 2006, inputted data have been rigorously cleaned and transformed from Excel to SPSS format. After wards the actual data analysis process began.

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Appendix E

I. List of Designation of Resource Persons Interviewed 1. Professor, Department of Anthropology, Rajshahi University also the Chairman of the Rajshahi Chapter of Shujon-a national based citizen group. Recorded interview on 23 April, 2006. 2. Professor, Department of Political Science, also Dean, Faculty of Social Sciences, and ex-secretary of Rajshahi University Teachers Association, Rajshahi University. Recorded interview on 23 April, 2006. 3. Professor, Department of Applied Physics, Ex-vice Chancellor of Rajshahi University. Recorded interview taken on 8th October, 2006. 4. Professor, Department of Applied Physics, Elected Member of the Syndicate and ex-secretary of Teachers Association, Rajshahi University.- recorded interview taken on 8th October, 2006 5. Professor, Department of Anthropology, and ex-vice Chancellor, Dhaka University. Documented interview (due to technical problem with the recorder) taken on 21st October, 2006. 6. Mayor, Rajshahi City Corporation, Elected Parliament Member. Documented interview (due to technical problem with the recorder) taken on 30th September, 2006. 7. TNO-Chief Executive Officer, Poba Sub-district, Rajshahi. Recorded interview, 10th October, 2006. 8. Ex-TNO, Shathia – Subdistirct , Bangladesh. Recorded interview, 9th October, 2006. 9. Senior Assistant Secretary (Government Officer), at present on deputation for PhD research at the Institute of Bangladesh Studies, Rajshahi University. Recorded interview taken on 6th May, 2006. 10. Rural development officer, BRDB, Poba Sub-district, Rajshahi. Recorded interview taken on 9th October, 2006 ( Introduced cooperative system and nature of BRDB management system). 11. Joint Registrar, Directorate of Cooperatives, Rajshahi Division, Rajshahi. Documented interview taken on 19 April, 2006. (Introduced cooperative system in Bangladesh). 12. Officer in charge of Rajshahi Zonal Office, Tengamara Shobuj Shongho (TMSS). Documented interview, 12th October, 2006. 13. President, Labor Union, Rajshahi Sugar Mill, Rajshahi. Recorded interview taken on 26 September, 2006. 14. Convener, Rajshahi Shohor Rakkah Shangram Parishad,(citizen group). Recorded interview taken on 28th September, 2006.

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II. List of Observation Notes used for the Describing and Analysis the Cooperatives and Small Welfare Groups in Chapter Five

Each of the 20 surveyors who were assigned to interview the sample organizations with the structured questionnaires, were given A5 size notebook to note down what they observe. They were particularly asked to note down information and observation about the characteristics of the organizations and the interviewee that may not be revealed through the structured questionnaire, additional information that may come out through interviewing the organizations, the matters that the interviewee seem to be avoiding, like political affiliation etc. and also their personal impression about the organization, the study area and the survey itself. They were given the flexibility to write such notes in daily basis or as a report and submit after the whole survey was over. As a result, some of the surveyors wrote the notes, just like daily diary writings, other as a full fledged report. Though these observatory notes are not well structured, they have provided genuine information about the grass-roots organizations from their personal observation and conversation with the organization leaders. Such observations that have been verified through my personal field visits at the rural areas and local administrative offices, have been considered as primary data for writing the section on the political relations of the cooperatives and small welfare groups in chapter five. Following is the list of the observatory notes used for present thesis. It must be mentioned that, these note are hand written and are in Bangla language.

1. Jahangir Alam, Surveyor for Bagmara sub-district. Observation note submitted on 27th September, 2006. 23 pages note.

2. Momen Khan, Surveyor for Bagmara sub-district. Observation note submitted on 27th September, 2006. 30 pages note.

3. Selimuzzaman, Surveyor for Bagha Sub-district, Observation note submitted on 21st Septemebr, 2006. 27 pages note.

4. A.S.M. Sarwar, Survyor for Rajshahi town and sub-urban areas, Observation note submitted, on 25th, September, 2006. 20 pages note.

5. Md. Jannatul Ferdous, Surveyor for Tanore Sub-district, Observation note submitted on 25th, September, 2006. 37 pages note.

6. Mahmud Hasan, Surveyor for Tanore Sub-district, Observation report submitted on 25th, September, 2006. 27 pages report.

7. Ahmed Murad Cowdhury, Surveyor for Durgapur Sub-district, Observation note, submitted on 27th, September, 2006. 22 pages note.

8. Md. Johurul Islam, Surveyor for Poba Sub-district, Observation note, submitted on 21st September, 2006. 33 pages note.

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III List of Libraries from where the Newspaper Reports have been Searched and Collected News paper reports on civil society and civil society related events and movements have been used in the present research in order to understand the civil society and political relations in Bangladesh. The news paper reports have been sorted out with the help of 4 research assistance from the following libraries in Dhaka, Bangladesh.

1. Library for Transparency International Bangladesh, Gulshan, Progress Tower, Dhaka. 2. Public Library, Shahbag, Dhaka. 3. National Library and Archives, Agargoan, Sher-e-Bangla Nagar, Dhaka. 4. Library for Bangladesh Institute of Development Studies, Agargoan, Dhaka. 5. Community Development Library, 9/A Dhanmondi, Dhaka. 6. Library for National Institute of Local Government, Agargoan, Sherebangla Nagar,

Dhaka. 7. National Press Institute, Circuit house, Bailey Road, Dhaka.

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Appendix F

Selected Case Studies of Civil Society Organizations

This section provides brief case studies of four types of CSOs— Trade union,

Cooperative, Development NGO and Citizens Group. Each case study will focus on mainly

four points—basic information of the CSO, pattern of membership and election, relationship

among the leaders and members or beneficiaries and nature of interaction with the politics or

government.

I. Rajshahi Sugar Mill Labor Union7

a. Basic Information

Rajshahi Sugar Mill Labor and Workers Union (from now on shall be termed just as

union) is registered under the Ministry of Labor and Employment since 1967. The union is

run on the basis of a detailed constitution. It represents 1234 members who are all labor and

office workers of the mill. The union posses two storied building located within the mill area,

where the office of the union is situated. Its main objective is protecting interest of the

workers and bargain with the authorities for wages, pension, and financial security for the ill

and injured workers. There are different ways through which the union may bargain and

negotiate with the authorities. Union is also given the democratic right to call on strikes.

Major financial sources of the union are membership fee, entrance free, monthly fee, special

fee, subsidy from the authorities and income from the property of the union. The union have

liaison with the other sugar mill labor unions joined under a federation and labor unions of

other industrial sectors.

b. Pattern of Membership and Election System

All labors and workers of Rajshahi Sugar Mill except security guards, office assistant

at the confidential section, are eligible to become members of the union and become a voter

and gain the right to contest in the union elections. They shall be always responsible for

paying the due fees in time, accept the decisions taken in the general council meetings and

7 The present case study is based on field visit, interview with the Labor Union leader, group discussion with other workers and officers and the necessary paper materials-like constitution of the union, election results etc. provided by the Rajshahi Sugar Mill, Labor Union Office.

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always work for the betterment of the union and interest of the workers. The union is run

through a 23 members’ executive committee with 17 members elected directly by the general

members in every two years. The committee, following constitutional rules shall work for the

implementing objectives of the union. In need they have the power to recruit necessary staffs

for running the union office and have the responsibility of financial affairs of the union. Such

decision shall be decided by the consent of the majority members of the committee. They can

take decisions for certain problem and issues, where the constitution remains silent. However,

most important responsibility of the committee is of bargaining with the mill authorities.

c. Relationship between leader and other members

The elected president of the executive committee is termed the collective bargaining

(CBA) leader. He is very powerful, has immense influence on the workers, and as well as on

other officers. He doesn’t work as a labor or worker after being elected and maintains a well

furnished office better than the office of the general manager of the mill. Status of the

elected leader and members are very different from a normal worker. Members of the

committee bargain on behalf of the rest of the workers for wage raise and other facilities.

However, voting system bring some democratic atmosphere in the union. Specially during

the election season, these leaders and other candidates has to pursue the workers who elect

them through a secret ballot. Practically, it has been observed that, the labor leader who

support the ruling party or those who are blessed by the ruling political leaders take over

actual power of the union and sometimes control of the mill itself. Even if these leaders do

not hold any elected post in the union, their influence and power are found every where.

c. Internal Politics and Reflection of National Politics

It has been found that this particular union is not totally controlled by the political

parties but also not independent of the political power. During elections of the executive

committee, the panels of candidates are formed according to party line that reflects the

national politics. However, though a panel is marked as BNP panel and another as AL panel,

candidates supporting other political parties (like some communist factions) may also be

found inside these panels. In most cases, influence of ruling party panel is huge among, the

members and the administration. However, there is no permanent voters’ bank for each panel.

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The voters’ decision changes with the change in national politics and performance of the

union president 8 . After going through the list of elected members and their political

affiliation, for 2001, 2003, 20059, it had been found that election results reflected national

politics, in 2001 when AL was in power 10 of the elected members were from AL while 6

from BNP. On the other hand when BNP was on power in 2003 and 2005 the distribution

was just opposite with 9 BNP and 7 AL candidates elected in 2003 and 13 BNP and 4 AL

candidates elected in 2005. Within the sugar mill area influence of the labor union is

immense. The management recruits mill labors and workers with consultation of the union.

Each department of the mill administration has to move according to the wish of the labor

leaders. Central political leaders of Rajshahi district like parliament members, Mayor have

direct influence on the recruitment process and in determining sugar price and calling tender

for selling sugar10.

Rajshahi Sugar Mill Labor and Workers Union represent unions that are active in

medium sized, hardly profitable government industries, situated in a region far from the

central economic and production zone of the nation.

II. Pahar Pur Adarsho Shomobai Krishok Samity (Pahar Pur Ideal Farmers’

Cooperative)11

a. Basic Information

In Bangladesh, there are varieties of cooperative with different status and monetary

power at different levels of the rural and as well as the urban society, mainly for providing

loans. At present the cooperative system in Bangladesh is under the control of the Ministry

of Local Government, Rural Development and Cooperative and Bangladesh Rural

Development Board (BRDB) is in charge of the management of most of the cooperatives in

rural areas of Bangladesh. These cooperatives are organized mainly in two steps—Village

Cooperatives at the periphery and Central Cooperative located at each Sub-District. The

8 Group discussion with the Mill workers and Mill Engineer during field visit on 26th September, 2006. 9 As provided by the office of the labor union. 10 The case study description is based on interview with President of the Labor Union of Rajshahi Sugar Mill also information gathered through conversation with normal workers, labor officers, and engineer and lastly on the documents provided by the sugar mill office on 26th September , 2006. 11 The case study have been developed based on the field visit to Bagmara on 19th September, 2006, information the chairperson provided in the survey questionnaire and through personal interview as well as the observation note provided by the surveyor Jahangir Alam, submitted 27th September.

292

central cooperatives committee is elected by the periphery cooperatives. Such cooperatives

are mostly formed by farmers but also by poor laborers, workers, fishers, small businessmen

and even destitutes. There are separate cooperatives for men and women. Periphery or

primary cooperatives are formed of 20 to 40 members at the villages; these groups again

elect one member to the college of electorate who ultimately elect the members to the

central committee at the union level amongst themselves12. At the rural area prime objective

of cooperatives is providing small-loans (5 to 20 thousand BDT)13 to farmers and fishers

and small businessmen.

The cooperative under study is a normal periphery cooperative of 35 members who

are all male farmers. The cooperative is active in Bhobanaigonj union, under Bagmara sub-

district, Rajshahi. It was established in 1984 and registered under the Ministry of Local

Government, Rural Development and Cooperatives. Paharpur Cooperative is supervised by

the local officers of BRDB. It is a stable and old cooperative with a yearly budget of 150000

TK which means US$ 20205. This is rather a large budget in comparison to other

cooperatives in the area. The cooperative members have informed that besides loan it is also

engaged in other social welfare functions for its members and other villagers.

b. Pattern of Membership and election

The 35 members are all farmers living in the same area and they came together and

formed the group. Afterwards by contacting the BRDB office they became formally

organized, developed particular rules for the cooperative and with the help of the BRDB

office, registered themselves at the local cooperative office. First they had to form a common

capital with their personal saving and then began to receive loans from the BRDB office with

the supervision of the BRDB officers. They invest loan mainly for agriculture purpose and

irrigation. According to rule, the 6 members committee for the cooperative shall be elected

every year. However, for a long time there has not been any election and the chairman is

leading the cooperative for a long time. But, the chairperson is a popular person and has been

elected by fellow members to the electoral collage and ultimately elected as the chairman to

12 Interview with the BRDB Officer, Poba Sub-district, 9th October, 2006. 13 Which means about US $ 70 to US $ 300.

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the central cooperative active at the Bagmara Sub-district. This central election was

conducted by the BRDB office.

c. Relation between the Leader and members

The cooperative has been identified to be involved in other social activities like

planting samplings, sending members for different employment trainings etc. So it is not

working just for the economic benefit of its members but also for their social wellbeing too.

In comparison to other members in the cooperative, the leader or the chairperson has been

found to be economically and socially in a better position. He is actively a supporter of the

ruling political party. With the help of BRDB officials and using his personal link with the

political leaders the chairman has brought better funds or programs for the cooperative.

However, this has been possible because of his position in the central cooperative and

relation with the higher ups which is hardly found in the case of other cooperatives.

d. Nature of Interaction with the government and politics

As the chairperson of Paharpur Cooperative is directly involved in politics, he have

led the cooperative into political actions. The cooperative chairman and members have been

found to be involved in different election related functions like, supporting and campaigning

for a particular candidate and again participating in programs for political awareness. The

cooperative besides, registration, receiving loans and guidance from the government are not

involved in other functions that may lead them to participate in policy making. For their

problem, they prefer to go directly to the leaders of the ruling party or the BRDB office or

Sub-District Administrative office rather than forming coalition with other cooperatives or

send petition etc. They hardly have any type of cooperation with social, economic or political

actors in the society, not even with NGOs. However, the chairperson admitted that before

having political connections they have faced problems like corruption, no cooperation and

bureaucratic complicacies in their dealing with the government offices for their loans and

registration. These problems were solved when they showed their political support to the

ruling party. He admitted frankly that political identity of the cooperative or its leader does

matter in decisions to sanction loans and government other facilities. The cooperative is

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hardly involved in any advocacy activities as the main objective of the members are not

networking or civic engagement but for some mutual economic benefit.

Despite of the fact, the cooperative thinks that it has some influence in their area it

works and it is autonomous. However, the reason for such autonomy is that first they have

now good relation with the ruling party, second, the welfare and economic objectives of the

organization resembles with the government policy and finally, the cooperative has been able

to build a stable common capital by itself since 1984 through lots of ups and downs. So now

it is not too much financially dependent on the government.

III. Thengamara Mahila Shobuj Shongho (TMSS) [Thengamara Women’s Green

Group]14

a. Basic Information

Thengamara Mahila Shobuj Shongho (TMSS) is a well established development

NGO. It was first formed with the initiative of local organizers and after words received

foreign support and funds. TMSS is not as large or famous as BRAC or Grameen Bank,

however, it may be considered as a large NGO. Though it originated in northern region of the

country in 1980, it is now working nation wide and involved in the traditional micro-credit

and other social welfare activities like other development NGOs. TMSS covers 1614 unions,

247 sub-districts of 62 districts. It became involved with micro-credit in 1991 with the

financial loan provided by PKSF. It is involved in different sectors of activities like social

development, health, micro-finance, business promotion, education, human rights and gender,

fisheries & live stock, environment and forestry, agriculture and disaster management,

training etc. Interest rate for TMSS loan is 12.5% and for ultra poor 10%. TMSS have

received different national and international awards since 1986 till date for their performance

in social development, micro-credit and women empowerment. Among its 47 development

partners 16 are international development agencies or foreign embassies.

14 The case study has been written based on visit to TMSS Rajshahi Zonal office, Interview with the office in charge 12th October 2006, Annual Report of TMSS 2005 and TMSS website http://www.tmss-bd.org/index.html last intern access 5th December, 2007.

295

b. Nature of membership and election

TMSS is centrally governed by an executive committee consisting of 15 members and

they are elected by the general members of TMSS in every three years. The committee is

responsible for appointing the Executive director, selecting chartered accounting farm for

auditing, formulating TMSS policies and provide consultancies to run the organization. The

rule is that, in each zone or area where TMSS is active in the country, chairpersons of every

basic group that is sustainable for at least 3 years and also 1 or 2 local elites of the area

together join the general committee. Members of the general committee representing all

zones, vote for the members of the executive committee. The executive director is the

honorary secretary and she also has the power to appoint three more members from outside.

The process seems to be well thought and democratic for an organization. But if we observe

the member list in the Annual Report Book of 2005, then we may find that in this way only

two genuine beneficiary working at the periphery have been able to enter the executive

committee. Other is well established and famous social workers. This still may be considered

democratic in comparison to other development NGOs. The committee appoints the

executive director. However, since its initial age to date the executive director is the same

person and her picture hangs in the offices of the TMSS just the way the Prime Ministers

Picture hang in every government offices in Bangladesh. From the consideration of internal

democracy this may not be termed healthy. Actually Professor Hosne Ara Begum is the

legendary figure in TMSS. Without her leadership TMSS may not have developed into a

large NGO and her presence is necessary for the further enhancement of the NGO. The same

explanation goes for long leadership of the Professor Yunus of Grameen Bank and Fazle

Hasan Abed of BRAC. Charisma plays an important role in the development and strength of

large organizations in Bangladesh, just in the way it is important to party politics in

Bangladesh.

At the local level, just like other development NGOs, the micro-credit and other social

service are provided collectively to small group of beneficiaries. Each basic group is formed

of 10-30 women. First three days they discuss with the TMSS workers about their aim and

objectives. On the 4th day training for micro-credit begins. Weekly meetings are held where

micro-credit as well as other types of social issues like sanitation, environment, women rights

etc. are discussed. Among them elections are held for the post of chairperson. Only in

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Rajshahi zone (that includes other neighboring districts of Rajshahi) number of such groups

under TMSS is 3543.

c. Relation among the NGOs and beneficiaries

As understood from the conversation and field visits, TMSS is working in the same way

as other development NGOs. It is a hierarchical managerial system, where the field workers

are trained in the central or zonal offices and they provide service to the beneficiary groups

accordingly. At group meetings of basic groups, the TMSS field worker coordinates the

meeting agenda and decides how the meeting will proceed and as well as collect the weekly

contribution of the members and their loan installments. Function of the NGO staff do not

provide any scope for considering the beneficiaries as equal member of the NGO staff, nor

can he/she consider herself equal to them. It is more like service provider and service

receiver relationship. Theoretically, it is expected that in time through the efforts of the NGO

staff the economic empowerment and development awareness of the beneficiaries these

groups will become autonomous. Practically there are very few instances of such

independency. The same comment may be made in the case of basic unit groups of other

development NGOs.

d. Nature of interaction with the government and politics

TMSS belong to the NGO group that was considered neutral CSOs during the 1990s.

TMSS still remains as a member of ADAB after its split and formation of a new coalition

named FNB. It maintains all the formal relationship with the government. TMSS participate

in every monthly coordination meeting with the District Commissioner and also at the sub-

district level with the TNO. At the meeting they exchange their opinion, share problems with

the administration and also submit reports. The TMSS official in his interview admitted that,

his NGO do convey their opinion and advices to the government for rural development

policies. However, this is done in a hierarchical way. From the field the branch managers

convey their opinion to their higher bosses then it is conveyed to the zonal office. From zonal

office it goes to the central office. Then the central office consults the matter with the

government, PKSF and the donors.

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In the initial days, while working at the field, TMSS had problems with the local elites

due to clashes of interests. However, they have over come it in the last decade through

different initiatives like exchange of opinions between the prayer leaders and mosque

committees and different NGO officials. At present that is in 2006, local governments and

administrative units as well as local elites provide all the necessary cooperation to TMSS.

From the point of view of national politics and politicization of NGOs, according to the

NGO official TMSS tries to be in a neutral position. It did not break away from ADAB to

join FNB, again it is also not very active in ADAB functions. However, it has become tough

to work in a politicized and polarized environment. Naturally large NGOs enter into big

contract with the government on different social welfare projects. Often such joint venture of

NGO is considered as a political action by the opposition. When the opposition come to

power, that particular NGO is black listed by the government. Not only the parties to be

blamed. The NGO leaders have also made politicized decisions; there exists intra-NGO

tensions also. Moreover the NGOs are not totally transparent and not free from internal

problems. Taking all these together, in the coming days, it might be impossible to run a NGO

with out the shelter of a major political party.

IV. Rajshahi Rakkah Shangram Parishod-RRSP (Movement to Protect Rajshahi City)

a. Basic Information

Rajshahi Rakkah Shangram Parishod-RRSP (Movement to Protect Rajshahi City) is a

local citizen’s group organized by the middle class and elite persons of Rajshahi city with the

aim to protect the interest of the area, particularly Rajshahi city. The process for establishing

such organization began in 1997. The citizen group voice for the basic needs- like medical

treatment, drinking water supply, power supply, and gas supply of the people of Rajshahi,

environmental degradation in the area and against the government decisions to move

important offices and building from Rajshahi and point out irregularities, corruption, and

administrative failures found in Rajshahi. They articulate their interest through petition, press

conferences, round tables, seminar, public meetings arranged at open squares, rallies,

processions protesting certain events, sit in, hunger strike, giving ultimatums and calling all

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out strike (Hartal)15. Besides membership fee, other sources of finance are the local eminent

businessmen and sponsor organizations like banks, enterprises, and national dailies.

b. Nature of Membership and Election

Originally RRSP was formed by a few merchants in the town, but later have attracted

membership from all types of professions-teachers, intellectuals, journalists, lawyers and

other educated citizens. The membership pattern, executive committee, advisory committee

are based on written constitution. The executive committee is elected in every two years by

the members. Any citizen of Rajshahi may become a member of RRSP. However, only 140

citizens have been found formally member of the organization. It also has a 20 member

advisory committee consisting of local elite citizens of Rajshahi town. However, besides the

formal members the organization has the ability to ensure participation of a considerable

number of members and prominent citizens in the different events and activities organized by

RRSP.

c. Nature of relation between the leader and members

The RRSP is actually a group of like minded citizens belonging to the same social

class. Naturally the relationship between the leaders and members are so far congenial. It

have been observed that there are good number of members who are officially members but

not active at all. It is more common among the female members to become official members

due to their husbands’ involvement in the group. It is the executive committee that takes

decisions to organize the seminars, rallies and stage protests. Naturally all the petitions

placed to the authorities are decided by this committee. When the RRSP faces any problem

they try to solve the problems with help of their personal network and their relationship with

other professional organizations like the Bar Associations, Teachers’ Associations etc and

consultation with the advisory committee. In 2006, it is the convener not the Chair person

who has been found to be more active with his like minded fellow members in the name of

RRSP and received media attraction. This implies that, though RRSP is active and well

known CSOs, it is actually run by a few like minded leaders and concerned citizens.

15 Interview with the Convener, Rajshahi Shohor Rokkah Shongram Porishad, Rajshahi, 28th September, 2006.

299

d. Nature of interaction with the society and politics

Though the citizen group is working for the interest of the Rajshahi, it had been found

to be placed in an antagonistic position in relation to the Rajshahi city corporation governed

by the elected mayor of BNP— the party in power. In 2005 and 2006, RRSP had become

active in pointing out the irregularities found in the administration and protested against

government policies concerning Rajshahi. It came in direct conflict with the administration

protesting maltreatment of the patients in private clinics. The convener had even been

arrested and tortured by law enforcement forces16 , this attracted the national media. The

organization claims that they have neither any relation with the political parties nor with any

political blocks. Rather they have come forward for the interest of the citizens of Rajshahi as

the political parties have failed to do so. The political parties (BNP, Jamat) to resist the

popularity of RRSP have supported the formation of new citizens groups, however, those

groups lack proper organizational strength and necessary citizen’s support. RRSP has very

good relation with press and media and cooperation with other non-political groups like

professional groups, economic groups etc. The organization has gained reputation and media

attraction for its movement of natural gas supply in the city.

However, if we go through the lists of advisory committee membership lists of the

RRSP, we may see presence of well reputed citizens of Rajshahi city that represents both the

BNP (but not Jamat) block and the AL and left block. However, the majority of members

belong to the left and AL block17. The secretary of RRSP though claim to be non-political,

have been found to be a former elected member of the Board of Directorates of Rajshahi

Chamber of Commerce during the AL regime18 and in his young age had relation with left

organizations. Presently he is in a confronting position with the BNP and Jamat led

administration. During conversation with other citizens about RRSP, it had been found that,

the organization and its moves have been praised by the citizens but the over presence of

members of the latter block have discouraged the BNP and right minded citizens to engage in

the movement directly. For example, in the seminars organized by RRSP, good number of

university professors has participated. After going through their name list, it had been

16 As admitted by the Secretary of Rajshahi Rakkha Shongram Parishod, Interviewed on 28th September. 17 Proceeding of a Round Table Meeting on Development of Rajshahi, Published by Rajshahi Rokkah Shongram Parishad. Rajshahi: May, 2006. 18 Annual Report Book 2002, Rajshahi Chambers of Commerce.

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observed that all the teachers who presented there belong to the AL and left block. Besides,

the elites and civil society leaders that support the ruling coalition are already favored by the

government and administration. Because of the loyalty that they sold for their personal and

group benefits prevent them from joining any movements that protests government policy.

The polarization that have divided the whole society and civil society have refrained the

citizens from organizing in systematic movements in a united manner. Unless there is a

balance among both the blocks and truly non-political citizens groups are established, there

might be big difference in the manner of articulation by the CSOs and nature of government

responses with the change of regimes.

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Appendix G Profile of Two Major Political Parties in Bangladesh

I. Bangladesh Awami League Year of Establishment: 1949 Leaders: Founder leaders— Abdul Hamid Khan Bhasani, Shamsul Huq and Sheik Mujibur Rahman; Leader that led the Independence Movement—Sheikh Mujibur Rahman; Present leader—Sheikh Hasina Wazed (daughter of Sheikh Mujibur Rahman). Ideology: Socialism and secularism (during Pakistani period and also at the initial years of independent Bangladesh). At present the party moves on with idea of liberal democracy supporting market economy. With a foreign policy to develop better friendship with neighboring India, AL terms the nation of Bangladesh as Bengali—deriving such identity from its history, culture, attained sovereign and independent Bangladesh through a united and determined struggle in the war of independence. Naturally, the party has strong bond with the secular and left section of the society. Party Type: Initially a revolutionary vanguard party, at present a catch-all party. Voter’s Support: 40% of the total vote in 2001 general election (lost the election). 37% of the total vote in 1996 general election (won the election). 30% of the total vote in 1991 general election (lost the election). Website: http://www.albd.org/autoalbd/index.php19 Discussion: Bangladesh Awami League (AL) is the vanguard party that led the independence

movement against Pakistani rulers. It was established in 1949 to represent the left leaning

faction of Muslim league of the then East Pakistan (present Bangladesh). In the course of the

Autonomy Movement of 1960s, AL became a popular regional party and came into

prominence under the charismatic leadership of Sheikh Mujibor Rahman (Hossain,

2000:510). During the Pakistani period AL ruled the province with very little success in

democracy and ending up in corruption for a brief time (1956-1958) (Kochanek, 2000:532).

Its movement for loose autonomy from West Pakistan ultimately turned into an

overwhelming freedom movement. After a brief but bloody battle politically lead by Awami

19 In Bangladesh e-politics is not popular as the internet communication system is yet to develop to reach all voters belonging to middle class. So the websites of the political parties may not be well developed, informative and updated as it may be in other developed countries and even in neighboring India.

302

League, Bangladesh became Independent in 197120. Having Sheikh Mujibor Rahman as its

president, Awami League formed the first government and ruled until 1975.

Awami League in 1972 was composed of middle class, rural-based elite that was

steeped in the culture of patron-client politics. They were largely district and local town

lawyers and assistant lawyers and teachers who engaged in petty trade business. The party

was highly factionalized and was held together by patronage and charisma of Mujib. Mujib

ruled Bangladesh like a private fiefdom (Kochanek, 2000: 532). The behavior of AL during

this period reaffirms Lapalombara’s (1966:32) explanation for non-competitive one-party

rule in new developing countries. In the initial years of nation-building and state-building in

developing countries, the political leaders often try to avoid the luxury of pluralistic

democracy and become sensitive to political opposition. This is what happened in the case of

newly independent Bangladesh. Moreover, internal corruption, pressure for modernization,

constant demand from the newly active social groups and left revolutionaries impelled AL to

take an one party solution that led military coup de-tate and end of the regime with the killing

of President Sheikh Mujibur Rahman. Since, then, up to 1996 Awami league remained in

opposition party.

Just after the assignation of the leader, in 1975, Awami Leauge became disorganized

and fragmented, and could not emerge as any powerful opposition against the popular rule of

General Zia in the early 1980s. During the Ershad regime (another Militray general), at first

Awami League (under the leadership of Sheik Hasina daughter of the slain leader Mujibor

Rahman) showed some support and also participated in the controversial 1986 election under

the military government. However, later, it formed a strong platform to oppose the autocratic

government and played an important leading role in the combined movement against the

Military rule in 1990. In the first election after reintroduction of democracy in 1991 AL was

defeated despite of winning 30% votes, and was placed in opposition bench in the parliament.

During this time, the party emerged as a non-compromising opposition who preferred to go

to streets and engage in agitation than expressing grievances at parliament. The party also

showed success in gaining and taking advantage of support from some portion of the civil

society that included a few well known NGOs and bureaucrats. This section of the civil

20 The AL leadership with the support of all the citizens of Bangladesh, was accompanied by the military leadership of the Bengali officers who defected from Pakistani army and the international support from India and USSR.

303

society actively participated in AL’s non-cooperation program, demanding resignation of the

BNP government and for free fair elections under a neutral care-taker-government. This

helped AL to come to power and it formed the government with the support from Jatiya Party

(former military dictator lead party) after 18 years in 1996. Since then the already politicized

civil society, entered a new faze of politicization and polarization. After, five years of its

rule, in 2001 election, ruling AL again lost to the coalition of Bangladesh Nationalist Party

and Jamat Islami Party.

II. Bangladesh Nationalist Party Year of Establishment: 1978 Leader: Founding leader—Ziaur Rahman; Present leader—Begum Khalida Zia (wife of Ziaur Rahman) Ideology: Since its establishment BNP believes in liberal democracy with market economy. BNP composed the idea of Bangladeshi nationalism—that draws a line of distinction between the people of Bangladesh and the ethnic Bengalis of West Bengal and project the image of Bangladesh as a distinctive Muslim Nation. Naturally the party attracts support from the centrist and right section of the society using its anti-Indian sentiment and religious sympathy. Party Type: Initially Personalistic Party, at present Catch-all Party. Voter’s Support: 41% of the total vote in 2001 general election (won the election). 34% of the total vote in 1996 general election (lost the election). 31% of the total vote in 1991 general election (won the election). Website: http://www.bnpbd.com/21 Discussion: Considering its origin, BNP may be termed as Personalistic party (Gunther and

Diamond, 2003:187) .22 The assassination of AL leader Shiekh Mujibor Rahman, was

21 In Bangladesh e-politics is not popular as the internet communication system is yet to reach all voters belonging to middle class. So the websites of the political parties may not be well developed, informative and updated as it may be in other developed countries and even in neighboring India. 22 Personalistic party is considered as a vehicle for a leader or ruler to win election and exercise power. Such parties are constructed or converted by an incumbent or a national leader exclusively to advance his or her national political ambition rather than any ideology or program. Clientelistic network and distribution of particularistic benefit are the strategies of such party that are often found to have weak, shallow and opportunistic organizational base.

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followed by a series of coups and counter coups. In the consequence, General Ziaur Rahman,

a hero of the Independence war, established bureaucratic-military rule. Bangladesh

Nationalist Party had been constructed by the incumbent army ruler (General Ziaur Rahman)

exclusively to advance his national political ambition and civilize his military regime. BNP

then was a broad-based coalition of political forces opposed to Awami League drawn from

the military, the business community, pro-Chinese communist radicals, pro-Islamic elements,

and former members of the AL who opposed Mujib’s one party rule. Many of these

organizations were banned or ostracized as collaborators because of their pro-Pakistani

records during the AL regime. In contrast to AL counterparts, BNP members were drawn

from the upper strata of Bangladeshi middle class and rich farmers in the rural areas.

Naturally, all these diverse interest were held together with charisma of General Zia and

patronage built on government jobs, bank loans, license and permits (Kochanek, 2000:533).

BNP then emerged as the only powerful civilian political force in Bangladesh until the next

series of coup de tat in 1981 and 1982. Ziaur Rahman was assassinated in May 1981 during

a failed coup and in another bloodless coup General Ershad captured the state power of

Bangladesh in 1982. Since then to 1991, BNP under the dynastic leadership of Begum

Khalida Zia-widow of the slain leader Ziaur Rahman, survived with the image of a non-

compromising opposition party.

BNP won the parliamentary election held in 1991, just after the successful mass

upsurge to topple General Ershad’s eight year’s autocratic rule. Since 1990s, BNP has served

two terms in office (1991-1996, 2001-2006) and one term sat at the opposition bench. Both

the BNP regimes were accused of corruption, nepotism, vote mugging and election

engineering by the press and opposition and ended amid severe political crises, violence.

305

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Quadir, Fahimul. (1999). Democracy, Development and Civil Society in Bangladesh: The Quest for a New Praxis for Sustainability. (Unpublished PhD Thesis) Dalhousie University. UMI Dissertation Service.

Tasnim, Farhat. (2005b). The Role of Japanese NGOs in Strengthening Civil Society of

Bangladesh: A Case Study of Shapla Neer. (Unpublished Maters Thesis) University of Tsukuba.

News Papers

1. The Daily Star http://www.thedailystar.net/ last internet communication on 30th September 2007.

2. Dainik Ittefaque, http://ittefaq.com/get.php?d=07/11/13/w/d_vyxm last internet connection on 30 June 2007.

3. Dainik Jugantor http://jugantor.com/online/day.php?id=792&sys=3 last internet connection on 30 June 2007.

4. Dainik Prothom Alo http://www.prothom-alo.com/ last internet communication on 30 th September 2007.

5. Bhorer Kagoz, 11, 12,13, 16 July 2001.

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6. Time, http://www.time.com/time/ 3rd April, 2006, 25th January, 2007

7. The New York Times, June 13, August 9, October 26, 2004, 12 January, 2007 http://topics.nytimes.com. Last access, 20th November, 2007.

8. The Economist 10 February, 2007

Websites

1. Asian Development Bank http://www.adb.org/ last internet access 15 November, 2007.

2. Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics, http://www.bbs.gov.bd/ last internet access, 1 December, 2007.

3. Bangladesh Institute of Labor Studies website http://www.bilsbd.org/labour_law.html, last internet access 23 June, 2007.

4. CIVICUS Civil Society Index http://www.civicus.org/new/CSI_background.asp, last internet access 18 July, 2007.

5. Centre for Policy Dialogue http://www.cpd-bangladesh.org/, last internet access 12 June, 2007.

6. Civil Society, the State and Culture in Comparative Perspective http://csc.social.tsukuba.ac.jp/index.html, last internet access12 December, 2007.

7. Centre for civil society studies in John Hopkins University http://www.jhu.edu/~ccss/ last internet access November 4, 2007.

8. FBCCI http://www.fbcci-bd.org/midframe.html, last internet access , 16 August, 2007.

9. Freedom house website http://www.freedomhouse.org/template.cfm?page=1 , last internet access, 25 November, 2007.

10. Government of Bangladesh http://www.bangladesh.gov.bd/, last internet access ,1 December, 2007.

11. Micro Credit Summit http://www.microcreditsummit.org/summit/previous.htm, last internet access ,14 April, 2007.

12. NGO Affairs Bureau of Bangladesh http://www.ngoab.gov.bd/, last internet access, 3 December, 2007.

13. PKSF Website http://www.pksf-bd.org/about_pksf.html, last internet access, 21 August, 2007.

14. PRSP 2005 available at IMF website https://www.imf.org./external.pubs/ft/scr/2005/cr05410.pdf. last internet access, 15 May, 2007.

15. Registrar of Joint Stock Companies & Firms, Bangladesh, internet access at http://roc.gov.bd./regi_society.html, last internet access, 12 January, 2007

16. Secretariat of the Election Commission of Bangladesh at http://www.ecs.gov.bd/, 6 August, 2007.

17. Transparency International Bangladesh http://www.ti-bangladesh.org/, last internet access , 13 November, 2007.

18. TMSS website http://www.tmss-bd.org/index.html, last internet access, 6 December, 2007.

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19. USAID Fact sheet, http://usinfo.state.gov/usa/womrts/intwmday.htm, last internet access , 21 August, 2007.

20. UNICEF Website http://www.unicef.org/bangladesh/child_development_education_389.htm, last internet access, 8 November, 2006

21. UNDP http://hdr.undp.org, last internet access 8 November, 2007. 22. Website of Professor Yunus http://muhammadyunus.org/NobelPrize/press_release.html last

internet access, 10 February, 2007. 23. Website of the Department for Business Enterprise & Regulatory Reform (UK),

http://www.dti.gov.uk/employment/employment-legistlation/emplyment-gudance/pa. access date 24 December, 2007.

24. World Bank http://web.worldbank.org/, 28 November, 2007. 25. Website for Philanthropy and the Third Sector in the Asia and the Pacific on

Bangladesh section, http://www.asianphilanthropy.org/countries/bangladesh/index.html , 28 November, 2007

26. Yahoo currency converter http://finance.yahoo.com/currency? 15 May, 2007.