If you were to open any newspaper on almost any day of the week, you may come across stories like: “Doctors Without Borders Evolves as It Forms the Vanguard in Ebola Fight” (New York Times, Oct 10, 2014); “Myanmar military burned Rohingya villages, Human Rights Watch says” (CNN, Dec 13, 2016); “Canada should do more to help women refugees worldwide: Oxfam Canada” (CTV, Oct 16, 2018).

Figure 7-4a: Sources: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Msf_logo.svg#/media/File:Msf_logo.svg Permission: Fair Use. b: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Hrw_logo.svg#/media/File:Hrw_logo.svg Permission: Public Domain. Courtesy of Mononomic. c: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Oxfam_logo_vertical.svg#/media/File:Oxfam_logo_vertical.svg Permission: Fair Use.

These are International Non-Governmental Organizations (INGOs) advocating for solutions to international health crises, human rights abuses, and the rights of at-risk groups. While Doctors Without Borders, Human Rights Watch, and Oxfam Canada are all well known global INGOs, there are thousands of smaller organizations fighting for fair trade, combatting AIDS and the stigmatization that comes with it, promoting democracy and human rights, fighting poverty, disease, and inequality to name just a few issues. More publicly, we can see the face of global civil society in the streets protesting high-level international gatherings like the G7 summits, WTO negotiations, climate change conferences, or the general debate held at the beginning of each UN General Assembly session.

Both these street protests and the more formal INGOs seek similar goals: to influence, resist, protest, and monitor the implementation of international law and policy. These are the voices of the people seeking to achieve their respective interests in shaping the form and function of our globalized world. This is global civil society, and it is not new. People have organized in reaction to perceived injustice since time immemorial. Early examples of more formalized action can be found in INGOs, like the Anti-Slavery Society, formed in 1839. Or even older, the Sovereign Military Order of Malta which was founded in 1048 and still exists today, carrying out social care and humanitarian aid in 120 states. More well known is the Red Cross, which Henri Dunant founded in the 1860s after witnessing the atrocities of the Battle of Solferino. He saw the way soldiers were treated as cannon fodder and sought to create rules and laws around warfare and, most specifically, the treatment of the wounded.

What is different today compared to the late 19^th and early 20^th centuries are the number of INGOs and the range of issues they are addressing. There are currently over 20,000 INGOs ranging from smaller niche organizations advocating for narrowly defined issues like net neutrality to large, well-funded organizations like the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, which had an endowment of 43.5 billion US dollars in 2015 and seeks to address issues as broad as global poverty. However, it is important to note that global civil society is by far the least developed of the three sectors of international society, even with exceptions like the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. Unlike its domestic counterpart, global civil society must contend with states and MNCs in an anarchical environment. There is no overarching authority to ensure everyone is following the rules or even respecting basic rights. INGOs have no authoritative body to seek protection or compensation from when states or corporations act unethically, coercively, or even illegally. Those individuals protesting international summitry are subject to the laws of the state they are in. In politically corrupt or less developed states, such individuals face violent retribution or a lack of protection from official sources. Yet, there is a need for the people’s voices to be heard in our increasingly globalized world. And importantly for our course, global civil society possibly represents a nascent form of global citizenship. This module will first look at the relationship between civil society, the state, and governance. Next, we will turn to an explicit examination of the concept of global civil society. Finally, we will close with an examination of global civil society and global citizenship.

In our quest to understand or at least meaningfully conceptualize global citizenship, it is useful to consider its domestic counterpart and its relation to the state. As discussed in module one, citizenship both defines formal membership in a political community and the reciprocal rights and obligations that exist within that community. At the core of this relationship between the state and citizens are the concepts of power and authority. Is citizenship defined and implemented in a top-down fashion? Or is citizenship achieved from the bottom-up agitation by civil society against the state? Or is it something between? The result of a mutually constitutive relationship between the state and civil society? The first model that maps the relationship between the state, civil society, and governance suggests that the key variable in understating the form and function of citizenship is state power. A powerful state that is despotic or authoritarian often seeks to limit the emergence of civil society and undermine the rights of citizens. The emergence of the fascist regime in Italy under Mussolini is a good example of this. The goal was to establish a strong state where the individual is subsumed by the state, where human existence only has meaning through the state, and where an individual’s fulfillment is only possible by service to the state.

Alternatively, a strong state can also facilitate the conditions under which civil society may flourish. It does so by establishing a social, economic, and legal system that empowers civil society. This is a state that can withstand criticism and may actually even encourage it. This is a state built upon the concept of the rule of law whereby citizens trust the state to fulfill its obligations. At the very least, they believe there is something like an independent judiciary to enforce compliance. Canada is an example of this. Upon achieving independence, the Canadian state has slowly facilitated the emergence of civil society. While the state has certainly not been altruistic, and there are many examples of coercive force being exercised against civil society organizations, Canada, on the whole, has fostered a diverse and, at times, robust civil society. The government provides funding for civil society groups to represent various voices, some of them exercising strong dissent to government policy. For example, the Liberal Government funded the Voluntary Sector Initiative between 2000 and 2005 to build capacity within the voluntary sector and encourage citizens to engage in societal issues. The Conservative government of Stephen Harper, on the other hand, sought to partner with specific civil society groups to pursue government objectives like maternal health or First Nations education, for example.

There are pros and cons to each policy direction, but both recognize the importance of civil society in achieving national goals. Ultimately, whether the state actively impedes the formation of civil society or fosters it, both argue the state is the defining variable in understanding the rights and obligations of citizenship. Alternatively, a second model that maps the relationship between the state, civil society, and governance suggests that civil society defines the form and function of citizenship. From this perspective, it is not the permissiveness of the state that is determinative but rather the social and cultural histories of the people. There are two implications of this. First, as Robert Putnam notes in his exhaustive study of good governance in Italy, if there is a strong cultural predilection towards being civically engaged, there is a strong correlation with governmental success. But perhaps more importantly for our topic of global citizenship, this also raises the question of whether a strong civil society can take root in a state or at the global level if there isn’t a strong cultural/historical tradition of being civically engaged. This has two important implications. First, it suggests that many of the world’s emerging powers may not easily internalize a strong civil society tradition. If we look at the 2016 Gallup poll on Global Civic Engagement, we can see the BRICS, an important emerging bloc of regional powers, have relatively low global civic engagement scores: Brazil (34), Russia (22), India (29), China (11), and South Africa (37). Compare this to the US (61), Australia (60), and Canada (56). That is not to say that western developed states only pursue global civic engagement. For example, developing states with very high scores, such as Myanmar (70) and Sri Lanka (57). But China and India represent roughly 2.7 billion of the 7.7 billion people on the planet. The BRICS taken together represent states that will have a strong formative influence on the character of the international system.

This leads to the second important implication: it is one thing to have a system of global governance that reflects the values of the dominant liberal democracies in 1945 that do have cultural traditions of civic engagement. It is quite another to have a globalized world where many of the most important states do not have such traditions. Therefore, this second model suggests that achieving a meaningful global civil society and global citizenship may be quite difficult. However, a third model maps the relationship between the state, civil society, and governance that suggests the form and function of citizenship can be mutually emergent between the state and civil society. From this perspective, the state and civil society mutually constitute the shape that citizenship takes and the depth of attachment people have with it. This carves out greater theoretical space for understanding citizenship and effective governance. It allows us to explain the divergent outcomes of the former Soviet States in Eastern Europe in the 1980s and 1990s. Like Poland, some of these states actively facilitated a vigorous civil society, while other states did not. It also allows for Putnam’s thesis on the divergent outcomes in Italy. He noted that despite existing in the same state, a strong concept of citizenship that demanded much of government emerged in the north while it did not happen in the south. And it also allows for the ability to explain change over time as the state and civil society interact. There are important implications of the emergent approach, specifically, the ability to incubate civil society and seek to create virtuous cycles of active citizenship. This opens space for the possibility of an active global civil society where only a weak or disjointed one has existed to date. And this, in turn, allows for the possibility of establishing a meaningful form of global citizenship. We will return to this argument in section three after looking at what contemporary global civil society looks like.

To understand global civil society, it is useful first to strip the prefix ‘global.’ So what is civil society? We can trace the conceptual roots of the term civil society to the 18^th and 19^th century Scottish Enlightenment and classic liberalism. This put a strong emphasis on the role of the market in curbing authoritarian impulses and promoting civility in society. However, the contemporary usage of ‘civil society’ refers to the social space outside of the government, the market, and the family. It is in these spaces that individuals and groups recognize and begin to agitate for commonly identified interests. In the post-Cold War world of the 1990s, this literature took on a new significance when theorizing and explaining the trajectory of the democratic transitions happening in the former Soviet States. In seeking to facilitate these transitions, western states sought to enhance civil society in Eastern Europe.

In contemporary usage, civil society has become equated with any group that is neither state-supported nor profit-motivated. These are groups that operate in the public sphere and putatively in the name of the public good. They seek to raise awareness of issues, advocate for particular solutions, influence decision makers’ choices, monitor policy implementation and represent those adversely affected. They work on global trade issues, international development, extreme poverty, global inequality, democratic governance, human rights, global health, and international peace.

Civil society organizations are largely autonomous actors, constituted by volunteers willing to commit themselves to advance those interests, values, and identities that they believe to be important. As mentioned in the introduction, many argue these groups constitute a necessary third sector of international society that mirrors trends in liberal democratic states. That the interests of states and corporations need to be balanced by advocates acting on the people’s interests. However, there is less agreement on how and why global civil society acts. From the literature, it is possible to identify three broad narratives of global civil society. The first is the liberal democratic narrative of global civil society.  Global civil society actors that conform to this narrative seek to defend western liberal democratic norms at home and foster them abroad. These norms include responsible government, the importance of an independent judiciary, institutionalizing human rights, and the advantages of a free and unbiased media. They seek to give meaning to the idea of accountability to both domestic and global citizens. They facilitate those actors seeking to establish good governance to support that accountability. They seek to empower a judiciary that can defend that accountability through the rule of law. From this tradition of liberal democratic theory, global civil society is a potentially powerful means to keep international institutions, coercive states, and covetous corporations in check. It should also be noted that global civil society actors in this tradition are most commonly found in the Global North. A good example of a global civil society actor in this tradition is Transparency International (TI). Transparency International’s core mission is to combat corruption. It was established in 1993 and is headquartered in Berlin. The majority of the work is done through the national chapters located in over 100 countries. TI chapters provide access to information and educational programming to combat corruption and work with organizations and institutions to investigate and expose specific corruption cases. They put a specific emphasis on promoting transparency in elections, government administrations, and government procurement. The national office publishes reports on corruption, with the most well-known being the Corruption Perceptions Index (CPI). The CPI ranks countries on their perceived levels of corruption and aggregates perception of corruption in international trade. The Canadian Chapter of TI, for example, has recently produced a report on ‘snow washing,’ which demonstrates the ease by which corrupt officials and organized crime can launder dirty international money through Canadian shell companies. TI is an example of a global civil society actor seeking to support liberal democratic norms at home and abroad.

The second approach is the sociological narrative of global civil society. In this tradition, global civil society is posited to be a source of popular resistance to authoritarian states, political/economic elites, and MNCs that they both work with or sometimes work for. There are some similarities between this sociological narrative and the liberal narrative of global civil society. They both perceive global civil society as providing a bulwark against the power of states and companies. For example, the mission of TI would seem to support both the liberal and sociological narratives of global civil society – checking corruption. But there are also significant differences. The liberal narrative acts in support of the status quo in terms of the global international order. The global international order was constructed by the victors of World War Two, primarily the US and UK. In its most benign form, this order seeks to balance the sovereign prerogatives of states and the protection of fundamental individual rights. At its best, this order seeks to use the market economy to increase prosperity and reduce poverty. But the system is also prone to abuse by states and companies who seek to maximize their interests, often at the cost of the most vulnerable communities in the world. For example, the impact of resource exploration on Indigenous communities or the impact of opening economies in the global south to some of the largest MNCs in the world, both leaving local communities insecure and impoverished. On the other hand, the sociological perspective challenges the economic and political structures that reinforce the contemporary international order. These global civil society actors provide a locus of resistance to the status quo, openly challenging institutions and mechanisms that perpetuate poverty and inequality both domestically and internationally. These actors often build on the prescriptions offered by important theoretical schools in the sociological narrative, including Marxist critiques, dependency theorists, and post-colonial analysis. There have been damning critiques of important international institutions like the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund, which privilege the actors, norms, and structures of the Global North. The differences between the World Economic Forum (WEF) and the World Social Forum (WSF) provide a good contrast between global civil society’s liberal and sociological narratives. The WEF, established in 1971, is an annual meeting of about 3,000 of the world’s economic, political, and cultural elite. Think of PM Justin Trudeau hobnobbing with Bono, the Secretary-General of the UN António Guterres, and Joe Kaeser, the German MNC Siemens CEO. They meet to discuss the economic and political threats and opportunities faced by the contemporary institutions of our globalized world. Perhaps more importantly, they meet to try and set the agenda for globalization, especially economic globalization, going forward. But they do not fundamentally nor critically address the norms and key institutional arrangements of the global economic and political order.

Compare the WEF to the WSF. The WSF was established in 2001 with the tagline ‘another world is possible.’ The WSF seeks to provide a space for a wide variety of actors that want to challenge the contemporary form of political and economic globalization. In 2018, over 20,000 delegates from over 700 organizations with several times that number of people in attendance. Many see the WSF as the preeminent manifestation of global civil society. It seeks to foster counter-hegemonic networks and facilitate resistance to structures that reinforce global poverty and inequality. It is by definition a locus of popular resistance. In this comparison, we can see the difference between global civil society’s liberal and sociological narratives.

The third approach is the neoliberal narrative of global civil society. Rather than seeing global civil society as representing a third sector standing in opposition to the interests of states and MNCs, this narrative argues global civil society acts in support of the contemporary neoliberal global order in two important ways. First, it is argued that global civil society actors have filled a void in developing states created by the retreat of social welfare provisions. In the 1970s, many developing economies became highly indebted, leading to the Third World Debt Crisis. Many developing states had few options to overcome these difficulties and had to take loans from the IMF and the World Bank. These loans included Structural Adjustment Policies (SAPs), which required borrowers to drastically cut back on expenditures and open their economies to global competition. When the government was subsequently unable to fund healthcare or education, global civil society moved in to be the providers of last resort. This alleviated societal pressure and undermined both revolutionary and reform movements while also legitimating the liberal economic norms of the global north. Second, it is argued that global civil society actors can reinforce the dominant norms of the global north.

It is argued that many of these actors have a ‘white saviour’ complex, sending secular missionaries to countries in the global south to show the less developed people how to organize their politics, their economies, and even their culture. However, these actors are often funded by the states and MNCs of the global north. While they may provide essential services in developing states or represent marginalized groups, they are often inextricably linked to the interests of the very actors creating the problems they are addressing.

For example, Canadian mining companies have a strong economic interest in Latin America, especially in Mexico, Chile, Peru, Argentina, Brazil, Colombia, Guatemala, and Nicaragua. Both the Canadian government and large mining companies, sometimes acting in concert, have used NGOs in the region to mitigate economic dislocation, build local capacity, and undermine resistance to MNCs. Yet, there is demonstrable evidence of corruption, coercion, and even violence against groups, often indigenous, that oppose these operations. Whether the NGOs’ intentions are honourable or not, they have played a role in maintaining the status quo and legitimating the global economic order. In the next section, we will connect global civil society in its different forms to the idea of global citizenship.

 

 

 

The last question we need to address in this module is whether global civil society is facilitating, or has the potential to facilitate, the emergence of a more meaningful global citizenship. The first point to consider is the system itself. We have noted in past modules that the world is becoming quantitatively more globalized economically, politically, and culturally. These structures and processes of globalization have quantifiable benefits: access to more goods at a lower price than ever before, reducing global extreme poverty, and rising indicators measuring the quality of life. However, we have also identified some of the quantifiable costs of globalization: environmental degradation, colonial/imperial relationships, sharply increased inequality. In this milieu, it is important to note who is advocating for what and why. The interests of states and the institutions they have created are well represented. The interests of MNCs are also well represented. But what about the people? What about the interests of the individuals and sub-national groups that may or may not favour how our globalized world is unfolding? Global civil society has to a degree, defended these interests but less effectively than states and MNCs have defended theirs. Yes, INGOs have created transnational networks that have sought to address both regional and global problems like corruption, human rights abuses, environmental degradation, nuclear proliferation, global poverty and inequality… the list goes on.

However, as discussed in the previous section, some of these INGOs advocate for the systemic norms of liberal western democracies in addressing problems. Others are more subversive, questioning the nature of the system itself and in whose interests it operates. Still, others are either knowingly or unwittingly being used by states and MNCs to maintain their privileged position in the system. This highlights an important limitation of global civil society in representing a global polity: its lack of robust legitimacy. INGOs have some democratic legitimacy in that they operate on the capital, both human and financial, of individuals who support their cause – membership and funding represent their public support. But some question this legitimacy in an age where institutions, states, and MNCs provide significant funding to support INGO programming. For global civil society to more fully represent the ‘third sector,’ to be the people’s voice in international society, there is a need to move closer to the concept of global citizenship. But is this possible?

If we think back to the first section of this module, we examined three models that map the relationship between the state, civil society, and governance. The third model of mutual emergence may provide a way forward. If citizenship and effective governance are a function of the interplay between the state and civil society, it is possible to see a path towards global citizenship. It would require both states and global civil society, although not all of them, to seek means to reform and strengthen the institutions of global governance. Much as we saw in the regional experiments of governance in the EU and the AU, more powerful and democratically accountable institutions would be able to constrain rogue interests. This would facilitate increased buy-in from the citizens who had or would have suffered without such institutional constraints. This, in turn, would further increase civil society mobilization. And through both increased mobilization and interaction between global civil society actors, it is possible to imagine a nascent identification with global citizenship. While this may seem a difficult and perhaps even doomed enterprise, two arguments are supporting it. First, it is arguably not so different from other forms of group identification. Yes, it may be difficult to imagine that we here in Saskatchewan would feel a kinship with someone living halfway around the world. Yet, someone in Tofino, on the west coast of British Columbia, can feel a national kinship with someone six time zones away in Cape Spear on the east coast of Newfoundland. Moreover, given the multicultural density in Canada, there is no guarantee that these two individuals on the opposite side of the county share any other cultural, political, ethnic, or religious markers. Yet, they both identify as Canadian. And this means they have, to some degree, mutual rights and responsibilities to each other as citizens. Even if they have never met, they are both part of what Benedict Anderson calls an imagined community. Is it so different to imagine we are part of a global community with some degree of reciprocal rights and obligations to one another? Perhaps a better question is: what will our globalized world look like in the future without some form of global citizenship? This brings us to the second argument supporting the conscious facilitation of global citizenship – it is arguably necessary. As the world becomes more globalized, it is becoming increasingly important for the third sector to represent the voices of the people. Without such representation, the system will continue to reflect the interests of states and MNCs. This may lead to a perception that the international system lacks legitimacy, which may increase discontent, calls for reform, and ultimately lead to systemic protest and violence both within and between states. However, if history is any judge, it may just take such a tragic event to push humanity towards a more democratic and representative form of global governance that consciously seeks to foster meaningful global governance.

This module has sought to critically analyze the concept of global civil society and its relationship to the concept of global citizenship.  Global civil society is hardly new, with some current INGOs, like the order of Malta, stretching back to the year 1048. However, in the last 30 to 40 years, there has been exponential growth in the number of INGOs and in the issues they engage in. Many are small organizations dealing with narrowly defined issues. Others are very well-funded philanthropic organizations with global concerns and global reach. Along with this growth in INGOs, we have witnessed a less formal global civil society presence repeatedly confront the G7 summits, World Bank meetings, international environmental gatherings, et cetera. The more formal INGOs and the less formal street protests are evidence of a growing global civil society presence. However, while this presence is increasingly being felt around the world, there is neither agreement on what exactly global civil society wants nor what it has the ability to achieve. To understand global civil society, we first looked to the domestic relationship between the state, civil society, and citizenship. We posited that effective governance and citizenship is a function of the relationship between the state and civil society. Some argue that the role of the state is determinative. Others argue it is the civic tradition of a particular group of people that is determinative. Finally, the mutually emergent approach argues that the reciprocal relationship between the state and civil society is determinative. In the next section, we tried to understand the form and function of global civil society itself, and we identified three different narratives. The first narrative argues that global civil society is rooted in liberal democratic theory. From this perspective, global civil society seeks to defend and export norms of responsible government, the rule of law, and citizens’ rights. The second sociological narrative of global civil society is argued to be a repository of resistance. From this perspective, global civil society seeks to challenge the dominant actors, processes, and structures of globalization that create poverty and inequality. The third narrative of global civil society argues that it is not, in fact, act as a voice of the people but rather acts in the interests of the dominant neoliberal order. From this perspective, global civil society reduces systemic pressure by alleviating a degree of the suffering the system creates. Further, by doing ‘good’, global civil society also demonstrates the system’s benevolence and legitimates it. The module concluded by assessing whether global civil society can lead to a more meaningful global citizenship – and this is certainly not a foregone conclusion. In fact, the odds are likely against it. However, it is possible to see a path from global civil society to global citizenship. It starts with global civil society INGOs working together and in conjunction with like-minded states to build capacity in the institutions of global governance. As these institutions can make meaningful gains for people, there would be a commensurate increase in global civil society mobilization and interaction. As patterns of involvement coalesce into familiarity, nascent forms of identification with global citizenship are possible. However, even if we begin moving down this path, the question remains whether history will repeat itself – whereby some form of global calamity is necessary to reach a tipping point before meaningful action is taken to internalize these new norms of global governance.

The first model that maps the relationship between the state, civil society, and governance suggests that the key variable in understating the form and function of citizenship is state power. A powerful state that is despotic or authoritarian often seeks to limit the emergence of civil society and undermine the rights of citizens. The emergence of the fascist regime in Italy under Mussolini is a good example of this. Alternatively, a strong state can also facilitate the conditions under which civil society may flourish. It does so by putting a social, economic, and legal system in place that empowers civil society. This is a state that can withstand criticism and may actually even encourage it. This is a state built upon the concept of the rule of law whereby citizens trust the state to fulfill its obligations. At the very least, they believe there is something like an independent judiciary to enforce compliance. Canada is arguably an example of this. The second model that maps the relationship between the state, civil society, and governance suggests that civil society defines the form and function of citizenship. From this perspective, it is not the permissiveness of the state that is determinative but rather the social and cultural histories of the people. There are two implications of this. First, as Robert Putnam notes in his exhaustive study of good governance in Italy, if there is a strong cultural predilection towards being civically engaged, there is a strong correlation with governmental success. But perhaps more importantly for our topic of global citizenship, this also raises the question of whether a strong civil society can take root in a state, or at the global level, if there isn’t a strong cultural/historical tradition of being civically engaged. The third model that maps the relationship between the state, civil society, and governance suggests that the form and function of citizenship can be mutually emergent between the state and civil society. From this perspective, the state and civil society mutually constitute the shape that citizenship takes and the depth of attachment people have with it. This carves out greater theoretical space for understanding citizenship and effective governance.

The first category of INGO identified in this module is the liberal democratic narrative of global civil society. Global civil society actors that conform to this narrative seek to defend western liberal democratic norms at home and foster them abroad. These norms include responsible government, the importance of an independent judiciary, institutionalizing human rights, and the advantages of a free and unbiased media. They seek to give meaning to the idea of accountability to both domestic and global citizens. They facilitate those actors seeking to establish good governance to support that accountability. They seek to empower a judiciary that can defend that accountability through the rule of law. From this tradition of liberal democratic theory, global civil society is a potentially powerful means to keep international institutions, coercive states, and covetous corporations in check.

The sociological narrative of global civil society sees it as a source of popular resistance to authoritarian states, political/economic elites, and to the MNCs that they both work with or sometimes work for. This narrative sees the purpose of global civil society as explicitly challenging the economic and political structures that reinforce the contemporary international order. These global civil society actors provide a locus of resistance to the status quo, openly challenging institutions and mechanisms that perpetuate poverty and inequality domestically and internationally. These actors often build on the prescriptions offered by important theoretical schools, including Marxist critiques, dependency theorists, and post-colonial analysis. They have offered damning critiques of important international institutions like the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund, which privilege the actors, norms, and structures of the Global North.

The neoliberal narrative of global civil society argues it is complicit in supporting the coercive status quo of contemporary globalization. Rather than seeing global civil society as representing a third sector standing in opposition to the interests of states and MNCs, this narrative argues global civil society acts in support of the contemporary neoliberal global order in two important ways. First, it is argued that global civil society actors have filled a void in developing states created by the retreat of social welfare provisions. In the 1970s, many developing economies became highly indebted, leading to the Third World Debt Crisis. Many developing states had few options to overcome these difficulties and had to take loans from the IMF and the World Bank. These loans included Structural Adjustment Policies (SAPs), which required borrowers to drastically cut back on expenditures and open their economies to global competition. When the government was subsequently unable to fund healthcare or education, global civil society moved in to be the providers of last resort. This alleviated societal pressure and undermined both revolutionary and reform movements while also legitimating the liberal economic norms of the global north. Second, it is argued that global civil society actors reinforce the dominant norms of the global north. Many of these actors have a ‘white saviour’ complex, sending secular missionaries to countries in the global south to show the less developed people how to organize their politics, economies, and culture. However, these actors are often funded by the states and MNCs of the global north. While they may provide essential services in developing states or represent marginalized groups, they are often inextricably linked to the interests of the very actors creating the problems they are addressing.

While only representing a potential path to global citizenship, it is argued that global civil society working with like-minded actors, including states, seek means to reform and strengthen the institutions of global governance. Much as we saw in the regional experiments of governance in the EU and the AU, more powerful and democratically accountable institutions would be able to constrain rogue interests. This would facilitate increased buy-in by the citizens who had or would have suffered without such institutional constraints. This, in turn, would further increase civil society mobilization. And through both increased mobilization and interaction between global civil society actors, it is possible to imagine a nascent identification with global citizenship. Two arguments suggest this path has potential. First, it is arguably not so different from other forms of group identification. What is a state, especially one as large as Canada, but an imagined community? If it is possible to bring an imagined community like Canada into existence, why not a global community? Such a question might have remained purely theoretical except for the second argument, which suggests global citizenship or something like it may be necessary. As the world becomes more globalized, it is becoming increasingly important for the third sector to represent the voices of the people. Without such representation, the system will continue to reflect the interests of states and MNCs. This may lead to a perception that the international system lacks legitimacy, which may increase discontent, calls for reform, and ultimately lead to systemic protest and violence both within and between states.