This essay defines civil society and defends its importance as a distinct sphere of voluntary, autonomous organization situated between the state, the market, and the family. Drawing on scholarly definitions, the paper distinguishes civil society from political parties, business firms, and governmental bodies, and examines institutions such as trade unions, churches, and interest groups as its core components. The essay argues that civil society is essential to democratic life, serving as a bridge between individuals and the state, a check on economic inequality, and a platform for minority voices. The role of a free media in enabling open civil discourse is also explored.
What is a civil society? To answer this question — to understand the nature and composition of a civil society — one must first answer a prior question: what is a society? A society may be defined as a conglomeration or association of individuals that is greater than, and represents a wider and more diverse range of interests than, "the one." In other words, a society is more than an individual. Although a family, or at least an extended family, could be perceived as a kind of microcosm of society, technically a family is not equated with a society by sociologists because of its relative singularity of interests — emotional, social, and economic.
In contrast, the nature and components of civil societies — such as trade unions, churches, and interest groups of various political orientations — are voluntary in their associations, unlike a family, yet have plural but relatively focused interests to achieve on behalf of their membership, unlike political parties.
Unlike the society of the state or government, membership in civil society organizations is conscious, willed, and voluntary. One is not born into a trade union as one is born an American, for example. Nor is the diversity inherent in civil societies comparable to that of political parties. However, although some structures may resemble the voluntary membership found in economic societies such as business firms, civil societies usually have ideological as well as economic goals to fulfill on behalf of their membership. Payment in civil societies is usually voluntarily contributed by the membership itself, rather than given to members as in businesses or involuntarily extracted through taxation as in government.
Civil society in its ideal form is a necessary component of economic societies of all kinds. Left to itself, the market exacerbates inequalities, undermines solidarity, and generates structures of power relations that are all the less accountable for existing in the private rather than the public sphere. This is true even of socialist regimes, which exacerbated inequalities through political party favoritism and patronage. Unlike business organizations, civil societies are autonomous and independent of the immediate market's needs.
Civil society also differs from political society as well as governmental and governing societies because it does not organize on a partisan basis to aggregate interests and formally compete for state office. Politicians, as primary actors in political society, seek to mobilize public support and constitute winning coalitions in the formal competition for state power through elections and the constitution of legislatures. A civil society — such as the Federation of Korean Trade Unions — can, after an election cycle, become a political party (as it did when it formed the Democratic Labor Party), but the goals of the organization will inevitably shift from representative to partisan and electoral. It must then respond to the needs of organizations beyond its original membership, even when, as in this example, the "trade union" exists in a relatively authoritarian state that limits the full functionality of civil society.
The media may be considered one additional component of civil society, forming its own loose civil society in and of itself. The media helps give rein to the full and free discourse required to make civil societies fully possible in today's democratic environment, so that different opinions from different organizations with different goals can interact and debate in the most fertile and fruitful manner possible.
Despite the usual connotations of "civility," a civil society is not an idealistic coherence of individuals who all think and speak the same way. Quite the contrary: it is precisely because of the possibility of debate that civil societies can form. Individuals form voluntary associations — such as a union — that are not purely remunerative but are based on shared practical needs and ideological agreements. Without a free media, however, such associations are much more difficult to create. When they do form under a dictatorship, civil societies tend to resemble revolutionary or secret "cells" of individuals, much as they did in tsarist Russia, rather than open associations. Because of their illegality, such cells tend to have a more political than social agenda.
"Autonomy, pluralism, and Alagappa's three perspectives"
"Civil society's role in checking state and market power"
"Amplifying minority and disenfranchised voices"
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