DEV 9050

Civil society is seen to add significant value to other sectors, whether as an official partner, through informal collaborations or through “spillover” effects. This piece of writing seeks to outline the main factors that have contributed to the resilience of civil society through to the modern time and recognize some of the main underlying thoughts and ideals that have influenced the role and operations of civil society in development. The piece of writing will start by defining the key terminologies. Then, it will go further to outline the main factors that have contributed to the resilience of civil society through to the modern time and recognize some of the main underlying thoughts and ideals that have influenced the role and operation of civil society in development. Finally a conclusion shall be given.

Civil society is about associational life. It is generally taken to refer to those groups (organizations) that exist between the state and the individual (or family) that both enjoy autonomy from the state and seek to have a significant influence on public policy, at any level (national, local or in-between. When defining civil society, emphasis should be put on four aspects as follows: Civil society has a clear objective and intention to contribute to improve the way society functions; they have an organizational structure where people join together and work together systematically to fulfill their objectives; the work civil society organizations do is voluntary, people choose freely to support the organizations; the aim is not for private individual gains but for the benefit of the public (Mumba, 2004).
Civil society can be perceived as that part of society distinct from the state and private sectors, formed for the purpose of advancing common interests and facilitating collective action (Ibid). Sometimes it is referred to as the third sector; the state and the private being the first and second sectors respectively. There are generally two types of civil