The State & NGOs: Perspective from Asia 9789812307156

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The State and

NCOs

This chapter is reproduced from The State and NGOs: Perspective from Asia , edited by Shinichi Shigetomi (Singapore: Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, 2002). This version was obtained electronically direct from the publisher on condition th at copyright is not infringed. No part of this publication may be reproduced, translated, stored in a retrieval system, or transmi tted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies and Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo.

The Institute of Southeast Asian Studies (ISEAS) was estab lished as an autonomous organization in 1968. It is a r egional research centre for sc holars and other specialists concerned with modern Southeast Asia, particularly the many-faceted problems of stability and security, economic development, and political and social change. The Institute’s research programmes are the Regional Economic Studies (RES, including ASEAN and APEC), Regional Strategic and Political Studies (RSPS), and Regional Social and Cultural Studies (RSCS). The Institute is go verned by a tw enty-two-member Board of Trustees comprising nominees from the Singapore Government, the National University of Singapore, the various Chambers of Commerce, and professional and civic organizations. An Executive Committee oversees day-to-day operations; it is chaired by the Director, the Institute’s chief academic and administrative officer.

The State

andNGOs Perspective from Asia

Edited by Shinichi Shigetomi

I5ER5

Institute of Southcas.t Asian Studies Slngapor~

First published in Singapore in 2002 by Institute of Southeast Asian Studies 30 Heng Mui Keng Terrace Pasir Panjang Singapore 119614 Internet e-mail: [email protected] World Wide Web: http://www.iseas.edu.sg/pub.html All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies and Sasakawa Peace Foundation. © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo The responsibility for facts and opinions in this publication rests exclusively with the editor and contributors and their interpretations do not necessarily reflect the views or the policy of the Institute or its supporters. A Japanese edition of this book was first published as follows: Shinichi Shigetomi, ed., Ajia no kokka to NGO: J ugo kakoku no hikaku kenk yu (The State and NGOs in Asia: Comparative study on 15 countries). Tokyo: Akashi Shoten, 2001. ISEAS Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data The State and NGOs: perspective from Asia/edited by Shinichi Shigetomi. 1. Non-governmental organizations—Political aspects—Asia. 2. Democratization—Asia. 3. Asia—Politics and government. I. Shigetomi, Shinichi. II. Title: State and non-governmental organizations: perspective from Asia HC60 S79 2002 sls2001052834 ISBN 981-230-151-8 (soft cover) ISBN 981-230-152-6 (hard cover) Typeset by Stallion Press (India) Pvt Ltd. Printed in Singapore by Seng Lee Press Pte Ltd.

© 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

Contents

About the Contributors Preface 1 The State and NGOs: Issues and Analytical Framework Shinichi Shigetomi

vii ix 1

2 Bangladesh: A Large NGO Sector Supported by Foreign Donors Ken’ichi Nobusue

34

3 India – NGOs: Intermediary Agents or Institutional Reformers? Hiroshi Sato

57

4 Sri Lanka: Community Consultants in an Underdeveloped Welfare State Etsuyo Arai

72

5 Pakistan: Regulations and Potentiality in a Fragmented Society Susumu Nejima

94

6 The Philippines: From Agents to Political Actors Takeshi Kawanaka

110

7 Thailand: A Crossing of Critical Parallel Relationships Shinichi Shigetomi

125

8 Vietnam: Control of NGOs by NGOs Chizuko Suzuki

145

9 Indonesia: Flexible NGOs vs Inconsistent State Control Yumiko Sakai

161

10 Malaysia: Dual Structure in the State–NGO Relationship Yoshiki Kaneko

178

11 Singapore: Subtle NGO Control by a Developmentalist Welfare State Yayoi Tanaka

200

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CONTENTS

12 China: Social Restructuring and the Emergence of NGOs Kenji Otsuka

222

13 Hong Kong: Uneasiness among Administrative Agents Yukari Sawada

245

14 Taiwan: From Subjects of Oppression to the Instruments of “Taiwanization” Tadayoshi Terao

263

15 South Korea: Advocacy for Democratization Noriyo Isozaki

288

16 Japan: From Activist Groups to Management Organizations Katsuya Mochizuki

311

Index

331

© 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

About the Contributors

Etsuyo Arai is Research Fellow at the Institute of Developing Economies (IDE), JETRO. Her topic of research interest is in the economy and politics of Sri Lanka. Noriyo Isozaki is Professor of Political Science at the Political Science Department, Faculty of Law, Gakushuin University. Her topics of research interest are politics in South Korea, especially on democratization, politics over economic development, and social change. Yoshiki Kaneko is Professor at Dokkyo University, Japan. His research interests are in the fields of Malaysian politics, ethnicity and national integration in Malaysia, and international relations in Southeast Asia. Takeshi Kawanaka is Research Fello w at the Institute of De veloping Economies (IDE), JETRO. His research interests are in the fields of Philippine politics and comparative politics. Forthcoming book: Power in a Philippine City, to be published by IDE in 2002. Katsuya Mochizuki is Visiting Research Fellow/Overseas Research Fellow at the Nigerian Institute of International Affairs/Institute of Developing Economies (IDE), JETRO. He is implementing a research project in Nigeria called the “Emergent Actors in African Political Economy”. Susumu Nejima is Research Associate at the Graduate Sc hool of Asian and African Area Studies (ASAFAS), Kyoto University. His research interest is in NGOs with Islamic features, mainly in Pakistan. Forthcoming book: Islam and Development: Ismaili Community in Northern Pakistan (in Japanese), to be published by Nakanishiya Shuppan Co. in 2002. Ken’ichi Nobusue is a student at Kochi Medical School. He was a researcher at the Institute of Developing Economies (IDE), JETRO, from 1993 to 2000.

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ABOUT THE CONTRIBUTORS

Kenji Otsuka is Research Fellow at the Development Studies Department, Institute of Developing Economies (IDE), JETRO. His research interests are in the fields of environmental issues and social change in China. Yumiko Sakai is Associate Professor of International Politics, Faculty of Law, Chuo University. Hiroshi Sato is Professor at the Faculty of International Co-operation, Shumei University. His research interests are in the f ields of economic reform and politics in India, India–Southeast Asia relations, and democratization in Bangladesh. Yukari Sawada is Associate Professor at the Tokyo University of Foreign Studies (TUFS). Her topics of research interest are social welfare reform, industrialization, and gender inequality in southern China. Shinichi Shigetomi is Senior Research Fellow at the Institute of Developing Economies (IDE), JETRO. His research interests are in the fields of rural development, rural organizations, and agricultural economics in Thailand. He is the author of Cooperation and Community in Rural Thailand , published in 1998 by IDE. Chizuko Suzuki is a Researcher at the Afro-Asian Institute of Japan. She has been studying the social impact of foreign direct investment and social development in Vietnam. Yayoi Tanaka is Adviser, Development Assistance Department, Japan Bank for International Co-operation. Her research interests are in the fields of theory of NPO and ci vil society, evaluation of NPOs, and collaboration among NGOs, government, and the business sector. Tadayoshi Terao is Resear ch Fellow at the Institute of De veloping Economies (IDE), JETRO.

© 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

Preface

In recent years non-governmental organizations (NGOs) have projected an increasingly strong presence. They can no longer be characterized simply as “volunteer organizations supporting the efforts of developing countries to develop”; they are also emer ging as important actors in the realm of international politics, and have demonstrated the potential to shake even the foundations of the international economic order. In advanced countries, too, there is a g rowing interest in the non-pr ofit organization sector (or NPO sector), which consists of non-governmental, non-profit-oriented organizations. Thus, not only have NGOs established themselves as lasting elements of society, rather than ephemeral bodies tha t are active during certain phases of a society’s developmental process, but there are also high expectations that they will play the role of leading agents of “civil society”. However, the existing literature on NGOs is concerned almost exclusively with the questions of wha t roles NGOs should pla y, and what should be done to further boost their acti vities. Once we turn our attention to Asia, moreover, we are str uck by the v arying ways in which NGOs manifest themselves in different countries. Those in South Korea are very active in the political realm. In Bangladesh there are some that resemble large private corporations. Influential NGOs in Malaysia are heavily involved in consumer movements. Very few researchers have taken note of the varying ways in which NGOs, or what might be called “NGO phenomena”, manifest themselves in different countries, and attempted to disco ver the origin of these differences. The present volume, the f irst of its kind , attempts to understand the NGO phenomena in a total of f ifteen Asian countries by looking at them from a unified analytical perspective. The analyses presented in this volume pivot around the key concept of two “spaces” that are open for NGO activities. To begin with, there is an economic space that calls for NGO activities — this involves the need for economic resources that are not properly catered for by any of the existing sectors of society, that is, the market, the state, or the community. Second, there is a political space tha t emerges when the sta te or the community

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PREFACE

allows NGO activities. The working hypothesis of this book is that the NGO phenomenon in a specific country is determined as a function of the “extent” and “form” of these two spaces. Positing this hypothesis does not mean that the present volume regards NGOs as being reactive to given political and economic conditions. Ra ther, it aims to inter pret NGOs’ activities, including advocacy activities and those aimed at social reform, as efforts to f ill, to the grea test extent possible, the v acant space left uncovered by existing mainstream or orthodox resources allocation channels. These reform-oriented activities may naturally be directed at the state which, with its strong political ability to regulate and control, distributes resources very deliberately. This explains why this book focuses on the relationships between states and NGOs. The adoption of the above-mentioned methodology has narrowed the analytical perspective of this volume in the following two ways. First, this book discusses state–NGO relationships exclusively within the framework of the nation-state, with the result that NGOs based in foreign countries are analysed with reference not to the environments in their home countries but of those in their fields of operations. Second, since the book focuses on Asia, it naturally deals with state–NGO relationships primarily as they pertain to the social and economic development of the countries concerned. In fact, NGOs in Asia came into being with the main objective of working for “people alienated from the benefits of development”, and have been striving to w ork towards this end . This altruistic mission and lack of expectation of receiving adequate payments from service recipients is used to define NGOs vis-à-vis other private non-profit organizations. Our joint research project was launched at the Institute of Developing Economies (IDE) in 1999, and since 2000 has been financially supported by the Sasakawa Peace Foundation (SPF). The participants are all Japanese researchers specializing in the study of specific countries or regions of Asia. One distinctive feature of the book, then, is that it is a collection of analyses of NGOs in Asia undertaken by researchers each of whom, if not necessarily a specialist on NGOs, has intimate knowledge of the environments for NGO activities in the country of his/her specialty . A joint research project composed solely of Japanese researchers, while carrying the risk of presenting analyses through the prism of a Japanese perspective, does have the merit of encouraging participants to hold intensive discussions with one another and carry out international comparisons from a shared and coherent perspective. As project co-ordinator and editor of the book, I am confident that we have taken full advantage of the merits mentioned above.

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On this occasion, I would like to express on behalf of all the participants our heartfelt thanks to the two organizations that have generously sponsored our joint project. Special thanks are due to Ms Yayoi Tanaka (formerly Chief Program Officer of the SPF, currently seconded to the J apan Bank for International Co-operation) for having resolutely proposed that we publish our findings not only in Japanese but also in English, and to Mr Akira Iriyama, President of the SPF , for having brought Ms Tanaka’s suggestion into reality. Not only has Mr Iriyama taken steps to financially support the publication of this English edition, but he has also continually encouraged me to raise the academic quality of our findings sufficiently to open dialogues with both Western and non-Western audiences. In the course of carrying out the research, we have benefited from a number of v aluable suggestions and comments made by Messrs Akira Matsubara, Hisatake Togo, Yutaka Tsujinaka, and Mitsugu Endo. Each of us also received various forms of help, advice, and kindness from NGOs, researchers, and government officials in the countries of our field surveys. We would like to e xpress our gra titude to these NGOs and other organizations, and to numerous indi viduals for their generous help. Our thanks are also due to Ms Fumiko Okamoto and other staff members of the SPF who have handled the administrative affairs of the project. The findings have already been pub lished in Japanese b y the IDE and Akashi Shoten Co., Ltd., and we would like to thank them for having willingly consented to our request to compile this English version on the basis of the findings published in Japanese. Lingua Guild, Inc. is credited for having carried out the tedious Japanese–English translations for this volume accurately and promptly. Last b ut not least, I w ould like to offer my special thanks to Ms Triena Ong, Managing Editor, and her staff at the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies (ISEAS) for having undertaken copy-editing work, production, and design to make this volume all the more attractive. S. Shigetomi

© 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

This chapter is reproduced from The State and NGOs: Perspective from Asia , edited by Shinichi Shigetomi (Singapore: Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, 2002). This version was obtained electronically direct from the publisher on condition th at copyright is not infringed. No part of this publication may be reproduced, translated, stored in a retrieval system, or transmi tted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies and Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo.

THE STATE AND NGOs: ISSUES AND ANALYTICAL FRAMEWORK

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1 The State and NGOs Issues and Analytical Framework Shinichi Shigetomi INTRODUCTION

In many developing countries the presence of non-governmental organizations (NGOs) can no long er be ignored. They are engaged in an extensive array of activities, including philanthropic work to people left out of the developmental process as well as efforts at addressing problems of environmental destruction and other negative consequences of economic development, and efforts to institutionalize popular political participation. There are some countries where NGOs are involved in the formulation of, or otherwise wield considerable influence on, g overnment policies. Moreover, in several countries the incorporation of NGOs as judicial persons has given them great organizational stability, and they provide attractive career opportunities even for elite college graduates. When seen individually, the future prospects of quite a number of NGOs may be r ather shaky, but there is no denying that NGOs as a group have established themselves as a recognized sector of society. Existing discussions seem to ha ve been preoccupied with the f act that NGOs are movement-oriented entities, led by certain ideals, and have tended to focus a ttention on questions in volving their missions and the proper means to achieve these missions (Korten 1990). Given, however, that NGOs today form a social sector, it is imperative that we see them as constituting a social phenomenon and probe into the salient features and principles of the phenomenon. When considering the raison d’être of NGOs in the social conte xt of developing countries, one pr emise is the e xistence of people who ha ve been left out of the market-based developmental process, and are unable to

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SHINICHI SHIGETOMI

secure the necessary resources to lead fulfilling lives. In advanced countries the state has (or is supposed to have) institutional mechanisms to take care of these people. In de veloping countries, in contrast, these institutional mechanisms are often poorly developed, and the state often lacks the interest or the wherewithal to improve them. Thus, the existence of people w ho have been left out by both the mark et and the state seems to be the most fundamental factor behind the establishment and contin ued existence of NGOs in these countries. Despite the fact that they emerged due to the existence of similar social needs, NGO sectors in dif ferent developing countries ha ve taken on considerably different features. In some countries they have virtually become distribution agencies of state resources, while in others they compete harshly with bureaucrats and politicians, attempting to g et a lar ger say in the decision-making about resource allocation. In some countries the state has co-opted NGOs into the process of administration, while in others NGOs are outspoken critics of go vernment policies. Despite sharing the dysfunction of the state as a commonraison d’être, NGOs differ significantly from country to country in terms of the NGO–state relationship. NGOs in any single country also dif fer, depending on the f ield of activities they undertake. What is the source of these dif ferences among NGOs? They may be partly explained by differences in their ideals. However, NGOs in various parts of the world tend to display considerable similarities in defining ideals, identifying targets, and choosing approac hes to their tar gets, since the y have been promoted and supported to a certain xe tent by international NGOs and international or ganizations, especially in r ecent years through the increase in cross-border communications. One indication of the similarities is the existence of a host of keywords, such as “participation”, “community development”, “empowerment”, “sustainable development”, and “women”, which seem to be emphasized, albeit to varying extents, by NGOs around the world. The foregoing observation suggests that the differences in appearances and modes of operation of NGOs in dif ferent countries may derive from differences in the environments surrounding them. Given the assumption that the market in a specific country fails to adequately distribute resources to some segment of the population, it seems possible to pinpoint themodus operandi of the state, which is supposed to make up for market failures, as the major determinant for the NGO phenomenon, the w ay the country’s NGO sector will exist and operate. If this is the case, then by looking into differing manifestations of NGO sectors in different countries, we can also © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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elucidate the salient features of each state. This volume analyses the NGO phenomenon in fifteen Asian countries, with reference to the environmental conditions surrounding them, and in particular to the NGO–state relationship. THE MAIN FEATURES OF THE VOLUME

Several studies dealing with state–NGO relations have already been published. However, the following features of the present v olume set it apart from the existing studies. Focusing Attention on the “Third Sector” in the Developmental Process

Non-profit organizations (NPOs) or NGOs, which are constituents of what is often called the “third sector” or “non-profit sector”, are found not only in developing countries but in advanced ones as well. In fact, research in this field has been based primarily on such organizations in the developed world. Seibel and Anheier (1990, p. 8) assert, for instance, tha t the “third sector” was “discovered” and became a topic of discussion in theWest at a time when the state’s role in society was being scaled down. Consequently, discussions on the third sector in the West take for granted that both the market sector and the g overnment sector once perf ormed relatively important roles in the distrib ution of resources in society, and assess the advantages and disadvantages of the third sector relati ve to the other tw o sectors (Bauer 1990, p. 272). In developing countries, however, the resourcedistributing functions of both the market and the government have been found to have been grossly inadequate even prior to the emergence of the third sector.1 Given the situation in de veloping countries, where a lar ge number of people are unable to receive sufficient resources from either the market or the government, it is meaningless to argue over whether the third sector can potentially perform the distrib utive function mor e effectively than the market and the government. In her attempt to overcome the drawbacks of the discourse about the third sector as applied to developing countries, James (1987, p. 401) asserts that excess demand for (or insufficient supply of) public services is the crux of the problem facing developing countries. While her observation about excess demand may not in itself be mistaken, what is problematic about her argument is that she ascribes the excess demand to the absence of incentives to encourage people with taxpaying abilities to bear the costs of services for the sake of the poor. There are, however, a n umber of other f actors that seem to e xplain more

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convincingly the existence of excess demand for public services in developing countries than tax-paying behaviour, which weighs the amount of tax against the amount of public services received. These factors include: the very small sizes of the national economies (which form the bases for taxation); the taxation systems themselves that leave much to be desired; and political and administrative systems for distributing national resources to the poor that are also inadequate. In the end James, it appears, remains captive to the mind-set of discourse in theWest, with its assumptions about the behaviour of Western taxpayers. It is also important to note that any discussion about the third sector in developing countries should duly consider the existence of political features that are absent from the adv anced countries. Governments in developing countries are often authoritarian and inhospitable to political pluralism. In such a political milieu, political relations between the state and NGOs are radically different from those in advanced countries, and can be very tense.2 It should be noted, incidentally, that the primary interest of this volume is to discover what actions locally based NGOs in de veloping countries take in addressing the issues of de velopment and poverty. Thus, it leaves out from its discussion of fshore activities undertaken by for eign-based NGOs to help improve the lives of people in developing countries. Analysing Different Manifestations of NGOs

In contrast to the fact that analyses of NGOs in advanced countries have been primarily interested in addressing the question of “What are the af ctors that make NGOs viable?” and g aining a fair picture of their realities by 3 using the methodologies of economics and other social science disciplines, studies on the state–NGO relationship have tended to be undertaken from normative standpoints, with the main question being “How should the state and NGOs relate to each other in order to impr ove the environment for NGO activities?” (Trivedy and Acharya 1996; Smillie 1999; Fisher 1998). Among studies in the latter gr oup, however, some deal with the r ealities of state–NGO relationships. In particular, Riker (1995) neatly categorizes state–NGO relations into four types (neglect, support, co-operation, and co-optation) at each of three dimensions (f inancial, organizational, and policy). However, Riker’s analysis w as undertaken with the aim of answering the question of “How do, or should, NGOs and the state relate to each other in a w ay that helps the development of NGO?” As a result, it fails to consider the question of“Why does the state’s interference in NGOs in a particular country manifest itself in a particular manner?” Rather than © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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taking this type of normative standpoint, this volume attempts to objectively analyse why state–NGO relations in particular countries take on features peculiar to those countries. Focusing on Traditional Social Organizations and Systems

As can be readily inferred from the fact that NGOs are often lumped into what is known as the third sector, it has been conventional to discuss them in comparison with the tw o other sectors, namely the mar ket and state sectors. This introduction, at the outset, has also set a similar frame work for the research agenda of this v olume. In addition to these tw o sectors, however, there is a set of mec hanisms that people maintain at the g rassroots level to help each other mutually in procuring resour ces. Important among them are traditional social or ganizations and institutions, such as neighbourhood communities, kin groups, and patron–client relationships. In analysing the manifestations of NGOs inAsia, it is especially imperative to pay due attention to the functions performed by the traditional sector— functions that can work both for and against NGOs, depending on the circumstances. However, studies on NGOs, which for years have focused overwhelmingly on the adv anced countries, have seldom paid suf ficient attention to tr aditional organizations and institutions. This volume, in contrast, will elucidate the fact tha t the manifesta tions of NGO-rela ted phenomena in some developing societies are affected to a significant extent by the way the traditional sector works in each given society. A Broad Scope of Subject Matters and a Unified Analytical Framework

Several case studies of state–NGO relations in developing countries are already available. Among them, Yamamoto (1995) and GAP (1997) are noteworthy because of their extensive coverage of Asian countries (eleven and ten countries, respectively). And yet, with the exception of India, which is discussed by the f ormer, the countries of South Asia are mostly absent from these studies. Moreover, the two studies, which are mainly concerned with analysing the existing situations of NGOs in various countries, fail to make more than a passing mention of state–NGO relations. In contrast, Heyzer (1995) and Farrington et al. (1993) do focus on state–NGO relations in Asia. However, the former, with the goal of analysing these relations on an issue-by-issue basis, fails to present clear-cut pictures of the situation in each country. The latter, despite describing the situations in a total of six

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countries on a country-by-country basis, limits its focus to the narrowly defined theme of “the development of peasant-oriented technologies”. On the other hand, Silk (1999), while dealing with a total of eleven countries, does no more than describe and analyse NGO-related legal structures. Unlike these existing studies, the present volume deals with a total of fifteen countries, including four in South Asia, and offers extensive analyses of the political, administrative, and legal systems concerning state–NGO relations in each country. It is not, however, a potpourri of country reports written from varying perspectives and in varying styles; instead, all the contributors to this volume, in analysing the state–NGO relations in the countries of their concern, share the same definitions and analytical framework, which will be explained in the subsequent sections. DEFINITIONS Definitions of the Term “NGO”

To approach our major focus of inquiry , it seems necessary to say a fe w words regarding the meaning of the term “NGO” as it is used thr oughout this volume. For the analytical purpose of this v olume, we will refer to a comparative study of NGOs by Salamon and Anheier (1994) as a useful guide, and define “NGO” as an organization possessing the following six attributes: (1) non-go vernmental, (2) non-prof it-making, (3) v oluntary, (4) of a solid and continuing form, (5) altruistic, and (6) philanthropic. To begin with, the requirement of being “non-governmental” means that an NGO must carry out its decision making as an organization independently from the wishes of the government. The second requirement that an NGO must be “non-profit-making” means that its acti vities must not be dri ven by profit-making motives, and tha t whatever profits may arise from its activities must not be divided among its members for personal benefit. The third requirement, that it be “voluntary”, means that the only qualification for membership must be the desire of an indi vidual to participate. Participation must not be conditional on belong ing to some other organization. The fourth condition, a “solid and continuing f orm”, means that, unlike various forms of voluntary activities carried out on an ad hoc basis, an NGO must be an ongoing entity with a solid organizational form. The four requirements listed above are inspired by comparisons among the NPO sectors in advanced countries. For the purpose of our discussion of NGOs in developing countries, it seems necessary to introduce two further requirements. The fifth requirement, “altruistic”, means that the immediate

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purpose of an NGO is to act for the benef it of others. The addition of this requirement is necessary because the provision of relief to the socially and economically weak is an important moti vation for the estab lishment of NGOs in de veloping societies. This requirement is added in or der to differentiate the NGOs discussed in this v olume from neighbourhood organizations and NPOs set up to pur sue specific common interests of community residents. The last r equirement, “philanthropic”, means tha t an NGO has a poor prospect of recei ving adequate payments from the recipients of its services. This requirement is predicated on the fact that the recipients of services of fered by NGOs in de veloping countries are the socially and economically disadv antaged. As a consequence, NGOs must raise funds for their activities from sources other than the recipients. Given their non-governmental nature, this means that they must count on contributions from the private sector for significant portions of their funding. With the introduction of this last requir ement, hospitals, educational institutions, and other organizations which Salamon et al. include in their definition of NPOs must be excluded from our analyses.4 Admittedly, these institutions may be non-profit-making, but they are in a position to secure their continuity by collecting payments or fees from the recipients of their services. Including these or ganizations in our anal yses of NGOs in developing countries would rather blur the focus of our analyses. Needless to say, however, health-care and educational institutions that provide services to the socially and economically disadvantaged without relying on payments from the recipients do satisfy the condition of being philanthropic. The foregoing six requirements may be sa tisfied simultaneously only by archetypal NGOs. NGOs in actual e xistence may diverge from the archetypal models to some extent. We might even say that countries without any archetypal NGOs at all ar e far more common than those that ha ve them. It is reported, for instance, that NGOs in Hong Kong are dependent on government subsidies to a signif icant extent, so tha t they have been even able to pay their staf f salaries comparable to those of go vernment employees. In Bangladesh many NGOs rely on revenues from their microcredit businesses as a crucial source of funding; it is v ery questionable whether these NGOs conform with the requirement of being philanthropic if it is applied rigorously. For the purpose of the comparative studies in this volume, it would not be sensible to apply the six requirements overly rigorously at the expense of narrowing the coverage of NGOs. We have found it important to start from the fact that, should we rigorously apply the archetypal definition to various countries, we would commit the error of leaving out many of the

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important NGOs (or organizations deemed to be NGOs) from our analyses. For instance, given the probability that a rigorous application of the nongovernmental conditionality to Hong Kong would leave us with virtually no NGOs to study, we have chosen to approach the situation in Hong Kong by asking “Why is this so?”We took this approach because the gaps between the attributes of archetypal NGOs and those of actual NGOs in a certain country actually highlight the features of NGOs peculiar to that country . We have, therefore, used the def inition of NGOs gi ven above only as a guideline for narrowing our selection of NGOs in each country , and then chosen the NGOs to study by relaxing the requirements to suit the situations in each country. As a result, not all the organizations analysed in this volume may fully conform to the definitions of the archetypal NGO. Understanding the State

In order to consider the relationship of NGOs to the state, it is necessary to explain briefly what we mean by the state, and what functions of the state we consider important. When a group of individuals interact with one another socially , rules become necessary, and are formulated through such interactions. When a group of people frequently interact with one another , a set of commonly accepted rules forms. Such rules, which are upheld by an individual group, are what might be called “social” rules, and signify that the society has a system for governing and regulating its constituent members. The society is also equipped with a system for distributing (or redistributing) resources to its members on the basis of its rules. The state is an entity which establishes a set of rules that it applies uniformly to all its constituent societies across the boundaries among them, and which it enfor ces in the name of safe guarding “the public interest”. Included among these rules are, on the one hand, those (laws, police, etc.) for regulating private interactions among its members (its citizens) and, on the other, those which regulate the formation and management of goods and services w hich are not produced b y private interactions among its citizens. Hall and Ik enbery (1989, p. 13) re gard the f ormer rules as representing the “despotic dimension” of the state, and the latter rules the “infrastructural dimension”. Given this understanding, state–NGO relations should be examined in terms of these tw o dimensions. If we were to pa y attention solely to the “despotic dimension”, our analyses would be focused on the extent to which and the means by which the state regulates NGOs. Existing studies on © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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state–NGO relations seem to have been concerned primarily with this dimension of the state (Riker 1995; Fisher 1998). However, the state also has its “infrastructural dimension”. And it is the state’s performance in this dimension, on the question of to what areas it is managing to supply how many resources, that determines the areas of activities available to NGOs. In this v olume we will def ine the for mer and the latter dimensions as determining, respectively, the “political space” and “economic space” for NGOs, and will analyse the ways in which NGOs manifest themselves in these two spaces. ANALYTICAL FRAMEWORK The Space for NGOs

With the foregoing definitions of NGOs and the sta te in mind , we have postulated the hypothesis that the concrete ways in which NGOs manifest themselves in a g iven country ar e determined by three factor s: (1) the characteristics of NGOs; (2) the economic space for NGOs; and (3) the political space for NGOs. Characteristics of NGOs

The philosophical/ideological orientations and social backgrounds of the members of an NGO, as well as its financial basis, go a long way towards shaping its action programme and approach, which in turn are reflected in its attitude towards the state and the contents of its activities. In India, for instance, where the philosophical influences of Hinduism and other religions and the teachings of Mahatma Gandhi remain strong, NGO activists have been traditionally imbued with a strong sense of voluntarism, a philosophical orientation which has led to an emphasis on independence from the government among NGOs. Economic Space for NGOs

The second determinant of the way NGOs manifest themselves is the state of demand f or their acti vities, or the arena in w hich they are needed. Individual citizens (or their households as minimum economic units) require various goods and services (or what we call resources). Citizens can procure some of these resources from the market (see Figure 1.1). The market is an arena where individual citizens must purchase resources in a competitive

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FIGURE 1.1 Flow of Resources and Possible Arenas for NGOs’ Activities

Market State

Individual citizens

Resources

Community

Position occupied by NGOs Source: Drawn by the author.

way, using prices as the basis for decisions on whether or not to purchase a certain good. But not all necessary r esources are supplied by the mark et, and even when sufficient resources are available on the market, there are a large number of citiz ens, especially in de veloping countries, who do not have the wherewithal to buy them on their own. It is at this juncture that the state emerges as an alternative supplier of resources. By making use of its administrative systems and mechanisms, it can provide people with various goods and services. The resource-distributing function is usually seen as being performed by the market and the state (or the go vernment) alone. Both or thodox economics and the theory of civil society take the binary opposition between the market and the state for gr anted. In reality, however, there are other systems for the distribution of resources, which are built into societies, as pointed out in the preceding section. As noted already, a society is often equipped with some rules peculiar to itself, according to which it maintains and distributes resources that cannot be supplied by either the mark et or the state. F or example, it is a common practice for Japanese rural communities to maintain a commonly owned forest and/or irrigation system, and to distribute the benefits of these common assets to their members. In Chinese society people often form associations of people from the same province, through which they give charity to help out poor members of the

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THE STATE AND NGOs: ISSUES AND ANALYTICAL FRAMEWORK 11

associations. Islamic societies, too, ha ve the zakat (poor-relief tax) and resource-redistribution arrangements based on rela tionships of m utual assistance between individuals or on patron –client relations. All of these may be regarded as distributive mechanisms inherent in society. In addition to these traditional organizations and systems, new organizations have been established by community residents for the pursuit of common interests. We will refer to these common mechanisms for resource procurement, which are jointly owned by members of a society, as a community. In other words, what we call a community here does not simply mean a neighbourhood or kinship group, but connotes a much wider overall social system. It is nothing new to regard communities as constituting a sector or a system, ranking alongside the market and the state. In their discussion of associations, Streek and Schmitter (1985) contrasted the concept of community to the mark et and the state . Drawing upon these ar guments, Pestoff (1992) compared the welfare service supplying functions of NPOs to those of the market, the state, and community. Pestoff (1998, p. 46) sees households and families as examples of communities— a perception which seems to mirror the realities of West European societies. In our discussion of NGOs in Asia, however, communities, which constitute the third sector alongside the market and the state, must be understood more broadly as encompassing wide social organizations and systems. When the systems of market, state, and community fail to perform their resource-distributing functions properly, there is room for NGOs to emerge as a fourth category of agents to distribute resources on their own,5 or to interfere with the existing distribution systems, making up for or correcting their shortcomings (as illustrated by the circles in Figure 1.1). The allocation of resources and the agents of allocation, as seen from the standpoint of individual economies, can be schematically represented by a triangle, as sho wn in Figure 1.2. 6 Assuming that the large triangle represents the total volume of resources required by an individual economy, the figure describes the situation where the market, the state, and communities each satisfies some portions of the total demand. When there is space left uncovered by these existing sectors, an arena emerges in which NGOs can act. We can call this an economic space for NGOs. A large economic space means that the services of NGOs are in great demand. If the volume of resources supplied by the state, the market, or comm unities grows, the space shrinks. Thus, in order to identify the factors determining the size of the economic space for NGOs, it is necessary to look at the flaws in the three existing sectors.

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FIGURE 1.2 Economic Space for NGOs State Areas left uncovered by the three sectors form the economic space for NGOs.

Market

Community

Source: Drawn by the author.

Among these shortcomings, it is those in the state ’s functions that we have focused on in this v olume. We have tried to identify the economic space for NGOs by discovering whether there are any specific items of public services tha t the state is failing to suppl y properly, or mor e specifically, whether there are any shortcomings in terms of the quantities of resources being supplied and the areas of society being co vered, or where in particular the state’s distribution system is found wanting. Political Space for NGOs

The third factor determining the wa y NGOs exist and operate in a g iven country is the extent of political control exercised over them by the state and society, or what Hall and Ikenbery call the “despotic dimension” of the state. For the state, as well as for communities, controlling the distribution of resources is essential for maintaining the power to control their constituent members. As such, they may look upon the“outside elements” called NGOs as threats to their e xisting systems of contr ol when they intrude into the affairs of resource distribution with the intent of making up f or or taking over defective distributive functions. The threat becomes r eal with the emergence of NGOs which directly criticize the state’s existing system of resource distribution. Since the state b y its very nature, as pointed out in the preceding section, regards its own rules as universal and legitimate, it

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THE STATE AND NGOs: ISSUES AND ANALYTICAL FRAMEWORK 13

is likely that it will impose restraints on those NGOs which are deemed to be operating outside of these rules. We will call the arena in which NGOs can act without being subjected to suc h restraints a political space. This space shrinks as the state intensifies its “despotic dimension”. In order to get a picture of this political space, we have examined the types of le gal and administrative systems maintained in each country. The existence of an adequa te economic space for NGOs does not immediately mean that they are free to act. As well demonstrated by the cases of China andVietnam, there are places where, in spite of the existence of a large demand for NGO activities, a political environment conducive to the free activities of NGOs is absent. It is also important to note that the way and the intensity with which the state imposes political r estraints on NGOs vary significantly from one country to another. In some cases, as in pre-democratization Taiwan, the establishment of social organizations by private-sector initiative is almost totally banned by law, while in other cases, as in Indonesia, restraints on NGOs are imposed at the discretion of the government and its bureaucrats. The political space for NGOs is not determined solely by the state. Communities have a similar “despotic dimension” in the sense that, since they supply resources to their constituent members, the y can coerce their members into behaving in accordance with certain norms. Existing studies of NGOs and NPOs have tended to limit their analyses of communities to positive aspects, but such a view is one-sided. Among the f ifteen countries studied in this v olume, community constraints on NGOs are most pronounced in P akistan. Even though the country’s agrarian villages suffer heavily from poverty and the backwardness of social development, the NGO sector is smaller and weaker than that of Bangladesh. This is because w henever NGOs try to conduct acti vities in the countryside, they find themselves facing traditional social norms, which severely restrain their acti vities. If, for instance, NGOs tr y to launch educational programmes for women and girls, they end up colliding headon with existing norms that try to keep women in a traditional status. Given the difficulty of operating in agrarian communities if a group dares to openly oppose the communities’ social norms, NGOs have no choice but to limit the scope of their acti vities to the pro vision of health-care and h ygiene services. These restraints, which are imposed by both the state and communities, demarcate the boundaries of the political space for NGOs, and significantly affect the areas and methods of their activities.

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Spaces for NGOs and NGO Activities

The foregoing observations suggest that the environment for NGO activities is determined by the combination of the political and economic spaces which exist in a given country. Figure 1.3 is a three-dimensional schematic illustration of ho w the potential f or NGO acti vities is determined as a function of tw o variables, namely the political and economic spaces. The sizes of the tw o spaces are brok en down into three levels each for illustrati ve purposes, and ar e plotted along the ordinate and the abscissa, so that a combination between a certain size of one space and a certain size of the other determines the potential for NGO activities, which is plotted along the v ertical axis. In countries such as Bangladesh, the Philippines, and Thailand, where both the political and economic spaces for NGOs are wide (namely countries where there is great demand for NGOs and restraints on them are weak), there is gr eat potential for NGO acti vities, and in f act they are v ery active (A in Figure 1.3). Sri Lanka also has a lar ge number of NGOs, but given the ea gerness with which the go vernment has dealt with resource distribution compared to the go vernments of Thailand and elsewhere, the economic space for NGOs in Sri Lanka is smaller, with the result that the arena for NGO activities is limited to consultations and similar services (B). Standing on the opposite pole from A (at I) are countries such as Singa pore, where both spaces ar e very narrow (the demand for NGO services is small, and restraints on their acti vities are strong). Naturally, in these countries, in contrast to those ofA, NGOs are rather inactive. The Malay society in Malaysia, w here NGOs are scarce, seems to be in much the same situation. Compared with the countries located at I, the economic spaces in South Korea and Taiwan seem to be much wider, but during the pre-democratization period, when the political spaces were limited, NGO activities were restrained (H). It should be pointed out, ho wever, that NGOs were some what active in South Korea, because they were not restrained as severely as those in Taiwan. Furthermore, in the countries located at G, where large economic spaces for NGOs exist (and NGOs’ services are in g reat demand), but where the state and/or communities ar e restrictive (and thus political spaces ar e narrow), NGOs are r elatively inactive. This is the case , for example, in Pakistan, Vietnam, China, and the non-Malay societies in Malaysia. However, the existence of a large latent demand for NGO services in these countries means that an y easing of political r estraints, even if on a v ery

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THE STATE AND NGOs: ISSUES AND ANALYTICAL FRAMEWORK 15

FIGURE 1.3 Relationship between the Spaces for NGOs and the Potential for NGO Activities

A High B D Potential for NGOs’ Activities

E

C F

G

Low Large

H

Economic Space

I Small

Small

Large Political Space

Source: Drawn by the author.

limited scale, would instantly galvanize their activities, as has been witnessed in India and Indonesia. At C, which is directly opposite to G, we f ind countries like Japan, where political restraints on NGOs are virtually nonexistent, but where there is far less demand for NGO services than in developing countries. In these countr ies NGO activities targeted towards people within the national borders are not very brisk. In Hong Kong, where both economic and political spaces are moderate compared to those in other countries, NGOs’ activities are also moderately brisk. Analysis of NGO Advocacy Activities

The above-mentioned analytical perspective takes the existing spaces for NGOs as given, and then probes into the way NGOs manifest themselves. However, this analytical perspective enables us to see only a portion of the activities actually being under taken by NGOs. In f act, many NGOs are active in changing the very environments surrounding them (Heyzer 1995; Levitt 1973). In order to gain an objecti ve understanding of the NGO phenomenon, our analyses must also deal with these ef forts of NGOs to change their own social and political milieus.

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A Taxonomy of Advocacy Activities

As we examine the NGO phenomenon, or the way NGOs manifest themselves in the developmental process, we will also look at reformoriented actions by NGOs as part of their responses to various problems that arise in developing countries in the course of development. Figure 1.4 is identical to Figure 1.2, except that the space occupied by NGOs has been added to it. It shows that out of the total space accessible to NGOs, there is still a vast expanse of vacant space that they have not yet filled. The existence of this vacant space is a salient feature of the situation faced by NGOs in developing countries. However, as they attempt to fill in this vacant space, even by small bits, they stop passively accepting their environment as given, and start actively working on it. Their efforts to change the en vironment for their activities may be classified into four types, depending on the directions pursued. One direction is to create conditions to make it easier for NGOs to fill in the vacant space. Referring to Figure 1.4, this means that the NGOs can try to change the environment in such a way that they can expand their coverage of the economic space (as indicated by white arr ows). If they are willing and are equipped with the necessary resources and staff members to expand FIGURE 1.4 Economic Vacant Space and Political Activities by NGOs State Vacant space unfilled by the sectors

NGO

Market Source: Drawn by the author.

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Community

THE STATE AND NGOs: ISSUES AND ANALYTICAL FRAMEWORK 17

the arena of their activities, but are politically prevented from doing so by the existing sectors, they will first try to change the political environment. Given the high probability that the state will be the most repressi ve of all the existing sectors, it often becomes the main target of their reform efforts. But NGOs are not always capable of entirely filling in the vacant space. In many cases their capacity is inadequate to fill up the size of the vacant space. In this event NGOs will urge those operating the existing distributive systems to expand their activities to cover this vacant space. Explaining using Figure 1.4, the aim of such actions by NGOs is to force the state, the market, and communities into e xpanding their areas of acti vities (as indicated by black arrows). Here, too, NGOs will target their action mainly at the state, because it is often m uch more difficult to change the market artificially, and also because r esources held by communities are often far smaller than those controlled by the state. One method of carrying out a movement to this end is to call upon the state to supply greater amounts of r esources. Asking the g overnment to provide the poor with incr eased educational, health-care, and welf are services and gr eater economic oppor tunities, or asking for a “larger government”, constitutes an important part of the mo vements staged by NGOs in developing countries. This is the second dir ection pursued by NGOs in their efforts to change their environment. However, even if the government becomes larger, it is never certain that the government will make its decisions on resource distribution in the ways deemed desirable by NGOs. In order to address this question, NGOs may try to change the political and administr ative decision-making processes themselves, by staging a campaign for better politics. This is the thir d direction pursued by NGOs towards reform. Better politics here means the existence and functioning of a mechanism by whic h the political will and opinions expressed by the people are transmitted to the government. What happens when a country becomes suf ficiently economically developed so that the areas covered by the state, the market, and communities grow large, and that most of the space not covered by them is filled in by NGOs? At that point, a question emer ges regarding the compar ative advantages of the three existing systems and NGOs in executing the task of supplying resources. For example, a certain area being served by the state may actually be served more efficiently and effectively by the NGO sector. If so, NGOs may call upon the state to outsource some of its functions. In other words, they may press for a “smaller government”. Such demands can often be put into effect without much resistance from the state and the market, which will likely find them compatible with their own interests.

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When seen from this perspective, it is easy to understand why the legislation of an NPO Law in Japan was supported by the government party and the business community. This is the fourth direction pursued by adv ocacy actions of NGOs, typically those in advanced countries. The foregoing taxonomy of NGO advocacy activities makes it clear that studies of the third sector undertak en by researchers in the West concern themselves overwhelmingly with mo vements calling for smaller government. By f ocusing attention on the state of af fairs in ad vanced countries, these studies deal only with the stage of development where the vacant space has become almost non-existent, and where NGOs can compete effectively with the state and the mar ket for additional ter ritory. In developing countries, however, NGO advocacy activities tend to aim for larger government and better politics. It is precisely because of impressive accomplishments from these efforts that NGOs in developing countries are now drawing much attention as prospective vehicles for the formation of civil society. Determining Factors

Given this taxonomy of NGO ef forts towards changing the environment for their activities, one might wonder what are the factors that determine the way these efforts manifest themselves. A comparison of the situations in the fifteen countries considered in this v olume suggests that there are, roughly speaking, three determining f actors. One is the intensity of expectations placed on the state . The larger the amount of r esources supposedly available for distribution by the state, the greater the expectations which NGOs place on the state, and the more strongly they feel encouraged to press for increased supplies by the state. The second is the e xtent of political pluralism. The types of political campaigns a vailable to NGOs differ from one country to another, depending on the degree of freedom of expression of political opinions which individuals and interest groups can enjoy under each political system. And the third is the extent of fulfilment of people’s economic needs, which, in the framework of our analyses, means the extent to which people ’s demand for resources is being met b y the market, the state, communities, and NGOs. In cases where the state cannot be expected to accomplish much in terms of resource distribution (either because it does not hold many resources, or because the dominant economic philosoph y is sceptical a bout the state’s role in the distr ibution of resour ces), NGOs will ha ve little incentive to pressure the go vernment. This applies most typicall y to NGOs in © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

THE STATE AND NGOs: ISSUES AND ANALYTICAL FRAMEWORK 19

Bangladesh; but it seems rather common for NGOs anywhere to pin some hope on the state, which means that the remaining two factors (namely the extent of political pluralism and the e xtent of fulf ilment of people ’s economic needs) are crucial (see Figure 1.5). To begin with, in the lack of a consolidation of political pluralism,NGOs remain politically silent regardless of the extent to which people’s economic needs are or ar e not being fulf illed. There are countr ies where people’s economic needs are not being met satisf actorily, but NGOs are forced by the state to remain politically silent; in others, despite significant economic development, NGOs still remain under authoritarian political rule, and their political silence is sustained partly by the extravagant allocation of resources. As political plur alism makes headw ay in a gi ven country, NGOs increasingly begin to express their political will openly. If the country is at a stage where people’s economic needs are not yet fully satisfied, the NGOs will be actively involved in campaigns f or both a lar ger government and FIGURE 1.5 Reform-Oriented Actions of NGOs and Factors Affecting Their Evolution over Time

The extent of political pluralism (functioning of the system guaranteeing the expression of political will) High

Smaller government

Larger government Larger government

Medium

Better politics

Political silence

Low Low

Note:

Direction and route of historical evolution.

Source: Drawn by the author.

© 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

High

Extent of fulfilment of people’s economic needs (coverage of resource allocation)

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better politics, because at that stage of economic development, other political actors or groups have not yet grown strong enough to serve as vehicles for the expression of various opinions. Frequently, it is under a milieu of this type that NGOs play a leadership role in democratization movements. If the political environment remains unchang ed, while people’s economic needs come to be met more satisf actorily, NGOs will tone do wn their demands for a lar ger government, while pressing e ver more strenuously for better politics. In a country where political pluralism is well established, there is little need for NGOs to push f or better politics, as the y can leave this task to other actors, such as political parties. If, however, people’s economic needs are not being adequately met, NGOs will still find it necessary to work for a larger government. But as the countr y proceeds to a higher sta ge of economic development, and as the f our sectors gain the ability to meet most of the people’s demand for resources, political movements calling for a smaller government will emerge. It should be noted in passing that in each of the cases mentioned above, the NGO sector may demand an easing of re gulations which restrict its activities. Even in countries like China,where political activities are severely restrained by the go vernment, NGOs are demanding, albeit w eakly, that regulations binding their activities be cut back. On the other hand, even in democratically more mature countr ies like Japan, there are calls for a loosening of regulations on the establishment of NGOs and for improved tax incentives for them. The way that the advocacy efforts of NGOs manifest themselves seems to change o ver time, in accordance with changes in the political and economic environment. Given the gener al correlation between improvements in a countr y’s capability to satisfy its people ’s economic needs and a shift in its political climate to wards one mor e receptive to political pluralism, these reform-oriented efforts seem to develop over time along the broad arrows indicated in Figure 1.5. Manifestations of NGO Advocacy Activities in Asian Countries

Where, in this figure, can we locate the countries dealt with in this volume? In China and Vietnam, which rank low both in terms of the fulf ilment of economic needs and the receptiveness to political pluralism, the conditions are not yet ripe for NGOs to engage in political activities. It should be pointed out, nonetheless, that the Chinese Government has slackened its repressive attitude at least to the extent of allowing NGOs to voice demands © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

THE STATE AND NGOs: ISSUES AND ANALYTICAL FRAMEWORK 21

for a loosening of administrative restrictions over their activities. In countries which are intolerant of political pluralism, and where the economic needs of citizens are being well met, reform-oriented actions by NGOs are of course slow in manifesting themselves. This was especially the case with Taiwan before it be gan its process of democratiza tion. In Malaysia, Singapore, and Hong Kong, where the authoritarian regimes are beginning to relax somewhat, some NGOs seem to have started placing an emphasis on working for better politics. Thailand, which ranks low in terms of satisfying people’s economic needs, has seen a slackening of political restraints, encouraging NGOs to step up their activities in pursuit of better politics in addition to activities for a larger government. This development reflects the perception among NGOs that the existing political and administrative systems have not properly heeded people’s demands. The recent situation in Indonesia seems to be similar. On the other hand, in South Korea, where people’s economic needs are better met than in Thailand and where the amount of resources held by the state is greater, there is a widespread perception that the decision-making process on resource allocation is inadequate, and this is driving South Korea’s NGOs to work aggressively for democratization. In India NGO activities are considerably restrained, but given the fact that the country’s overall political system allows the democratic expression of opinions, NGOs are not playing a leadership role in the movement for better politics. In the Philippines and Sri Lanka, w here existing political systems are capable of channelling political opinions, NGOs are not taking the initiative in demanding reforms of the political systems. In Japan, where people’s economic needs ar e catered to f airly well, achieving a smaller government is the main focus of NGOs’ (and NPOs’) political objectives. International Advocacy Activities by NGOs

Among the various political activities undertaken by NGOs, those targeted at international conferences and international agencies are attracting by far the greatest amount of attention. These international activities are not directly dealt with in this volume, which takes nation states as the basic framework of analyses. Nonetheless, the analytical framework adopted in this volume can also prove useful in understanding these international activities. NGOs, after years of efforts to get the state and the market to fill in the economic space, have come to realize that the actions of these two sectors are being determined by factors that stand above the framework of nation states or national economies. Therefore, even when NGOs work hard to

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push these two sectors to maintain f arm prices at sufficient levels to help improve the living standards of peasants, in many cases they find that the adoption of mechanisms to stem the inflow of cheaper foreign farm products is banned by international agreements. Countries heavily indebted to foreign countries or international organizations are severely restrained by external pressures when dr awing up their o wn national economic policies. As economic globalization pr oceeds, and as political and administrati ve relations between countries gr ow closer and stronger, issues concerning development, which were once domestic problems, are being affected ever more profoundly by international agreements and international consensus. On the other hand, in some countries it is possible for NGOs to do much to fill in the economic space by dra wing upon resour ces from foreign governments and pri vate organizations (Hulme and Ed wards 1997, pp. 6–7). In these countries, where there is no need to press for a lar ger government, NGOs will rather concentrate their efforts on directly lobbying foreign governments and or ganizations to supply r esources, and will distribute the donated resources by themselves.

MANIFESTATIONS OF NGOs IN FIFTEEN ASIAN COUNTRIES: A SUMMARY

What are the salient features and main determinants of state–NGO relations in the Asian countries analysed in this volume, as seen from the analytical perspective discussed thus far? In this section we will present an overview of the way the spaces for NGOs manifest themselves in each of the countries examined, and thereby offer a glimpse into the main contents of the hcapters that follow. The countries are taken up roughly in order of the sizes of both their economic space and political space for NGOs. Bangladesh

Bangladesh, which ranks among the top Asian countries in terms of the intensity of NGO activities, has a large number of such organizations. Many have grown very large in size, and in their efforts to sustain themselves as business entities have come to rely considerably on interest earnings from their micro-credit businesses. Given the fact that the state, which chronically and severely suffers from dire shortages of the resources necessary to supply public services, routinely counts on NGOs to supply resources, it has absolutely no reason to r estrain the activities of NGOs politicall y. This © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

THE STATE AND NGOs: ISSUES AND ANALYTICAL FRAMEWORK 23

explains why they have grown so large in size and number. Conversely, the NGOs, for their part, have nothing to expect from the state, and therefore no incentive to launch political activities. The net result of these factors is the existence of vast economic and political spaces, in which NGOs, with attributes similar to those of prof it-making enterprises, are v ery active. Today, NGOs are on the one hand b ypassing the weak state, recei ving resources from international donors, and on the other are directly linking with local administrative bodies in the implementation of various projects. The Philippines

The Philippines, like Bangladesh, is poverty-stricken, and thus contains a vast economic space f or NGOs. These organizations made their appearance in the economic space earl y on, b ut for year s acted as representatives of e xisting political f orces. However, following the expansion of the political space after the installa tion of the Aquino administration, NGOs ha ve grown increasingly independent from existing political or ganizations, while becoming e ver more dee ply involved in political activities of their own. One factor explaining the NGOs’ political activism is the fact that, unlike in Bangladesh, there is a widely shared understanding that the state has an important role to play in the distribution of resources. Another factor is the fact that the bureaucracy of the Philippines is modelled after tha t of the United States, so that the he gemonic political force can appoint its o wn members to important administrative posts. Given this state of affairs, NGOs find it imperative to compete with other political forces in order to secure political influence o ver the decision-making process in the administrative branch. Thailand

NGOs in Thailand began their activities with the purpose of serving the large number of relatively impoverished people who had been left behind in the process of economic development. Since the 1980s, with the easing of governmental restrictions on NGOs, the political space for their acti vities has grown wider. As they were originally established and led by intellectuals critical of the government, until the mid-1980s they undertook development projects of their own, independently from the government. But the NGOsponsored projects, which were limited in siz e and number , proved inadequate to fill the vast economic space. Consequently, NGOs gradually

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started trying to exert influence on the government’s policies and projects. However, given the existing political system ’s failure to fully allo w the free expression of political opinions, as well as the administrative system’s exclusiveness towards individuals and g roups not af filiated with the bureaucracy, NGOs in Thailand, unlike their Philippine counterparts, have not tried to join the po wer centre of decision-making, b ut have instead chosen to work at its periphery, staging movements aimed at reforming the political and administrative systems. India

In spite of its democratic political system which allows the free expression of opinions, India treats NGOs more restrictively than the preceding three countries. Since the mid-1960s, however, and especially since the poverty of rural areas became a serious political issue, the government has come to recognize the inevitability of relying at least to some extent on NGOs in order to distribute resources more effectively. Seen from the side of NGOs, this meant that continuing inflows of subsidies from the government became indispensable for their existence. Consequently, a large number of them have become distribution agents of government resources. Ho wever, India’s NGOs, with their strong tradition of voluntarism, have the potential to try to change the government’s resource distribution system, instead of merely making up for the system’s flaws. Indonesia

Given the v ast economic space in Indonesia ’s poverty-stricken rural districts, efforts to mak e up for the shortcomings of go vernmental resource distribution activities have long been set as the top priority by the country’s NGOs. However, as they were working under a oppressive political climate, NGOs had to be careful not to invite suppression by the government. The law itself w as not so hostile to them. Instead, suppression was exercised at the go vernment’s administrative discretion — both by means of direct suppression at the hands of the state’s machinery (the police and the military), and by means of suppression meted out by local communities under the control of Golkar (the ruling party). The opposite side of the coin w as that suppression was meted out on a discretionary basis, and hence NGOs could manage to avoid suppression to some extent by using personal connections with © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

THE STATE AND NGOs: ISSUES AND ANALYTICAL FRAMEWORK 25

members of the r uling circle. This seems to e xplain why NGOs were considerably active even when the Suharto government was in power. Pakistan

As a country with serious problems involving poverty in rural districts and urban slums, and violations of women’s human rights, Pakistan has a large economic space for NGOs. Moreover, there are few state restraints on NGOs. Nonetheless, many of the country ’s NGOs ar e engaged mainly in philanthropic activities, and mor eover, these acti vities tend to be concentrated in small, selected localities. This is due to the fact that NGOs operating in Pakistan, a country that is sharply segmented into small social groups, often f ind that their pr oclaimed ideals run counter to, and are restrained by, norms upheld b y social groups or communities which are meant to be the beneficiaries of their services. Consequently, NGOs have adopted a strategy of choosing the recipients of their services from among groups of people w ho belong to the same social g roups as their o wn members, building up g ood records of perfor mance and then e xtending their activities to people belonging to other social groups. China

Compared with NGOs in the other countries mentioned thus far, those in China have been subjected to much more severe restrictions by the state. But as the country started along the road towards a market economy, the state began to feel the need to allow the establishment of NGOs to supply social services on its behalf (thus e xpanding the economic space f or NGOs). As a result of a subsequent moderate easing of the regulations on NGOs by the government, a number of groups have been established. Although many can be characterized as proxies f or state organs, some are called gr ass-roots NGOs, and w ere established as private-sector initiatives. While the government needs NGOs, it has by no means given up its intent of keeping them under its political control. It has thus le gislated a new law concerning NGOs, but at present both the government and the NGOs themselves are still experimenting with which facets of NGOs’ activities would be subject to restriction. Vietnam

As in China, it was in the course of the country ’s transition to a mark et economy that the Vietnamese state found it necessary to let NGOs supply

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public services on its behalf. At the same time , however, it w as felt imperative that their political activities be strictly controlled. The concrete measure adopted by the Vietnamese Government to attain these objectives consisted of tw o parts: agg ressively inviting foreign NGOs to set up operations in Vietnam, bringing with them the resources necessary for social development; and designating quasi-go vernmental community organizations as local NGOs, assigning them to the incoming oreign f NGOs as their local counterparts and local supervisors. Under this arrangement, foreign NGOs are allowed to work in Vietnam insofar as the resources they bring in ar e valuable in supplementing the shortages in the resources supplied by the go vernment, but are denied the freedom to criticiz e the country’s political and administrative affairs. Taiwan

The political space for NGOs in Taiwan during the pre-democr atization period was very small, because under the single-party r ule every social organization established in the private sector was regarded essentially as a political organization, and was placed under strict control. People’s energies were funnelled into business undertakings in areas dominated by small and medium-sized firms. While this helped improve the overall living standards of the people, the Taiwanese Government failed to provide any meaningful social welfare services to losers in market competition and to the socially weak. In other words, there was clearly an economic space to be filled by NGOs, but it remained unfilled because of the hostile political environment. The picture began to change drastically in the late 1980s,when the freedom of association was guaranteed, and a number of private organizations came into being to w ork on a wide range of issues, including en vironmental problems, social welfare, and the restoration of community cultures, and started voicing criticisms of the shortcomings of the government’s policies in their respective fields of interest. South Korea

In this country not only did the state restrict fr ee political activities, but it also interfered considerably with the economic life of society by giving support to and protecting the country’s major chaebol business groups, which constitute a f orm of monopoly capital. This being the case, the term “democratization” in South K orea was understood to mean not only the attainment of a higher degree of freedom in the sphere © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

THE STATE AND NGOs: ISSUES AND ANALYTICAL FRAMEWORK 27

of politics, but also to discard the arbitrary pattern of resource distribution that had been practised in the economic sphere . Thus, democratization was the ultimate objecti ve for many NGOs active in various areas. Even after the country’s political sphere was democratized and the political space f or NGOs e xpanded, these g roups, with their deep-rooted distrust of existing political parties, are finding it essential to, as a prerequisite to straightening out the inequalities in resource distribution, work hard to reform the political system. Malaysia

The political space for NGOs in Mala ysia is also small, but the country’s economic space is characteriz ed by a dual str ucture. To be more precise, the state, despite its willingness to implement generous social and welfare measures for Malays (leaving a small economic space for NGOs in Malay society), has been reluctant to provide even basic public services to nonMalays (leaving a large economic space in non-Mala y societies). For the latter, NGOs are important as alternative suppliers of r esources, and are staffed mostly by non-Malays. Groups which deal with consumers’ problems are active in Malaysia precisely because of the go vernment’s failure to adequately provide the non-Mala y population with e ven the basic administrative services indispensable f or daily lif e. Politically, the government has set up a system for suppr essing recalcitrant groups, with the result that NGOs, while perfor ming functions to mak e up f or the shortcomings in the government’s administrative activities, have criticized the political system, albeit not too openly or aggressively. We can say that a dual structure exists in the political space as well. Singapore

Following the country ’s independence, the go vernment applied a v ery restrictive policy on private organization in order to prevent hostile political forces from g aining influence. It took the initiati ve in or ganizing neighbourhood organizations of residents, and used these organizations to control people. The government retains extensive discretionary powers over the issuance of permits and approvals to NGOs, and has actually disbanded a large number. Thus, the political space available to NGOs in Singapore, like that in Malaysia, is r ather small. On the question of economic space, however, it differs significantly. The government has taken the trouble to provide substantial, high-quality public services in areas such as housing,

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education, and medical care, which are superb even by the standards of the advanced countries of the West. This has made the economic space for NGOs in Singapor e very small, and in conjunction with the small political space, has led to a very low level of NGO activity. Since the 1990s, however, when the go vernment started relaxing its political restr aints on NGOs, activities demanding political democratization have emerged on a limited scale. Japan

In Japan, a developed country, the services supplied by the state are far more complete and extensive than those in developing countries. Areas not well attended to by the state have been taken good care of by extragovernmental bodies and communities. In this countr y, therefore, the economic space for NGO activities has remained fairly small. However, with the incr easing diversification and fractionaliza tion of people ’s needs, areas have emerged that are left uncovered by the state’s services. Recently, momentum has been g aining among movements of citizens who either aspire to collecti vely address ne wly emerging niche requirements by establishing new organizations of their own, or in some cases try to pressure the state into outsourcing some of its functions to their own organizations. These developments are giving rise to NPOs. Given the likelihood that types of services meant for a large number of recipients will be tak en care of directly b y public authorities, NPOs are likely to be left with those services which are very special, or nichefocused. On the other hand, so long as there are potential recipients willing to pay for such special services, the continued existence of NPOs is secure. Consequently, NPOs are emer ging as new economic actors in a variety of markets. Sri Lanka

Sri Lanka’s government is known for having given priority, for many years, to distribution rather than to economic growth. The educational and healthcare services reach the farthest corners of the countryside, and grass-roots organizations are functioning effectively as receptacles for such services. Consequently, the economic space f or NGO activities in the country has been rather limited. The most important role of NGOs has been to counsel grass-roots organizations on ho w to use r esources effectively, and the

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government on how to improve the methods of resource distribution and what recipients should be gi ven priority. Given the fact that the political opinions of the people ha ve been transmitted to the go vernment through political parties, NGOs ha ve not been e xpected to perf orm the role of political advocacy groups. In sum, NGOs and the g overnment have been supportive, rather than anta gonistic, to each other . It should be noted, however, that, after witnessing an e xpansion of the economic space for NGOs brought about by the unfolding of economic liberalization since 1977, as well as the escalation of ethnic conflicts,the government has begun to make the legal system towards NGOs slightly more restrictive than in the past. Hong Kong

As a means to satisfy the people’s needs, the Hong Kong Government opted to rely on NGOs, distributing subsidies to them instead of establishing and administering a public service supply system of its o wn. The government had been treating NGOs as indispensable partner s for the e xecution of various policies, and had e ven guaranteed NGO staf f members w ages comparable to those paid to go vernment employees. Thanks to this arrangement, Hong Kong managed to grow into an entity which was fairly well-developed economically and w as equipped with a r elatively large economic space for NGOs. At the same time , however, being a colonial government, it had to be very sensitive to people’s political activities. This led to an imposition of se vere restraints on political acti vities by NGOs, transforming them into administrative agents. However, the state found it increasingly difficult to keep paying large subsidies to NGOs, and started to pursue a polic y which aimed to transform them into mark et actors. Furthermore, inspired by the mo vement towards the democratization of Hong Kong’s political system that g athered momentum on the e ve of Hong Kong’s return to Chinese sovereignty, political activities among NGOs began to emerge. Notes 1

It should be noted, ho wever, that some of the de veloping countries of Asia adhering to socialist principles (namely China and Vietnam) have recently undertaken drastic cut-backs on state-provided public services as part of their ongoing transition to market economies, thereby creating

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2

3 4

5

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conditions for the emergence of a third sector . The situation in these instances is basically the same as in other developing countries, in that they, too, suffer from immense shortages of public services. For example, Douglas (1987), in his treatise on the political conditions conducive to the establishment and existence of NPOs, refers to systems of restraints on free-riders and how to identify the beneficiaries of NPOs’ services. However, these factors can be meaningful onl y when NPOs are free from political restraints concerning establishment and activities. In developing countries, these f actors are of secondar y importance, because the very establishment and existence of NPOs and NGOs ar e restrained and threatened by the state. See, for example, papers compiled in Powell (1987) and Anheier (1990). Salamon et al. (1999, p. 24) report that the NPOs they studied drew 47 per cent of their incomes from membership fees and payments for their services. This is not surprising, given the fact that two-thirds of the NPOs they studied were active in educational, health-care, and social services (ibid., p. 12). Korten (1990, p. 100), with his insistence that organizations composed of ordinary people should recei ve a due share of a ttention along with the government, corporations, and voluntary organizations, proposes to call such organizations collectively the fourth sector. Similarly, Pestoff (1998), who maintains the convention of calling NPOs the third sector, refers to communities as the fourth sector. However, when seen in light of the history of emer gence and de velopment of NGOs in Asia, it is NGOs tha t should be called the fourth sector . Fowler (2000) does treat NGOs as constituting a fourth g roup, but identifies civic society as constituting the thir d existing sector, in addition to the mark et and state sectors. A similar schematic representation of resource allocation has been made by Pestoff (1992), but, as pointed out already, he identifies families or households as communities.

References

Anheier, Helmut K. “Institutional Choice and Organizational Behavior in the Third Sector”. In The Third Sector: Comparative Studies of Nonprofit Organizations, edited by Helmut K. Anheier and Wolfgang Seibel, pp. 47–52. Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 1990.

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Bauer, Rudolph. “Nonprofit Organizations in International Perspective”. In The Third Sector: Comparative Studies of Nonprofit Organizations, edited by Helmut K. Anheier and Wolfgang Seibel, pp. 272–75. Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 1990. Douglas, James. “Political Theories of Nonprofit Organization”. In The Nonprofit Sector: A Research Handbook, edited by Walter W. Powell, pp. 43–54. New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1987. Farrington, John, David J. Lewis, S. Satish, and Aurea Miclat-Teves, eds. Non-Governmental Organizations and the State inAsia: Rethinking Roles in Sustainable Agricultural Development. New York: Routledge, 1993. Fisher, Julie. Non-Governments: NGOs and the Political Development of the Third World. West Hartford: Kumarian Press, 1998. Fowler, Alan. “NGO futures: be yond aid: NGDO v alues and the fourth position”. Third World Quarterly 21, no 4 (2000): 589–603. Group Action Planning for International Cooperation (GAP). Ajia no NPO [Civil society in Asia-Pacific region]. Tokyo: Alc, 1997. Hall, John A. and G. John Ikenbery. The State. Buckingham: Open University Press, 1989. Heyzer, Noeleen. “Toward New Government–NGO Relations f or Sustainable and People-Centred De velopment”. In Government–NGO Relations in Asia: Prospects and Challenges for P eople-Centred Development, edited by Noeleen He yzer, James V. Riker, and Antonio B. Quizon, pp. 1 –13. Kuala Lumpur: Asian and Pacific Development Centre, 1995. Heyzer, Noeleen, James V. Riker, and Antonio B. Quizon, eds. Government– NGO Relations in Asia: Prospects and Challenges for People-Centred Development. Kuala Lumpur: Asian and Pacific Development Centre, 1995. Hulme, David and Michael Edwar ds. “NGOs, States and Donors: An Overview”. In NGOs, States and Donors: Too Close for Comfort?, edited by D. Hulme and M. Edwards, pp. 3–22. London: MacMillan Press, 1997. James, Estelle. “The Nonprofit Sector in Comparative Perspective”. In The Nonprofit Sector: A Research Handbook, edited by Walter W. Powell, pp. 397–415. New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1987. Korten, David C. Getting to the 21st Century: Voluntary Action and the Global Agenda. West Hartford: Kumarian Press, 1990. Levitt, Theodore. The Third Sector: New Tactics for a Responsive Society. New York: AMACOM, 1973.

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Pestoff, Victor A. “Third sector and co-operative service — An alternative to privatization”. Journal of Consumer Policy, no. 15 (1992), pp. 21–45. ——— . Beyond the Market and State: Social Enterprises and Civil Democracy in a Welfare Society. Adershot and Vermont: Ashgate Publishing, 1998. Powell, Walter W., ed. The Nonprofit Sector: A Research Handbook. New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1987. Riker, James V. “Contending Perspectives for Interpreting Government– NGO Relations in South and Southeast Asia: Constraints, Challenges and the Search for Common Ground in Rural Development ”. In Government–NGO Relations in Asia: Prospects and Challeng es for People-Centred Development, edited by Noeleen Heyzer, James V. Riker, and Antonio B. Quizon, pp. 15–55. Kuala Lumpur: Asian and Pacific Development Centre, 1995. Salamon, Lester M. and Helmut K. Anheier. Emerging Sector: The Nonprofit Sector in Comparative Perspective — An Overview. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University, Institute for Policy Studies, 1994. Salamon, Lester M. et al.Global Civil Society: Dimensions of the Nonprofit Sector. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University, Institute for Policy Studies, 1999. Seibel, Wolfgang and Helmut K. Anheier. “Sociological and Political Science Approaches to the Third Sector”. In The Third Sector: Comparative Studies of Nonprofit Organizations, edited by Helmut K. Anheier and Wolfgang Seibel, pp. 7–20. Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 1990. Silk, Thomas, ed. Philanthropy and Law in Asia: A Comparative Study of Nonprofit Legal Systems in Ten Asia Pacific Societies. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass Publishers, 1999. Smillie, Ian. “At Sea in a Sie ve?: Trends and Issues in the Relationship Between Northern NGOs and Northern Governments”. In Stakeholders: Government and NGO P artnerships for Inter national Development, edited by Ian Smillie and Henny Helmich, pp. 7–35. London: Earthscan Publications, 1999. Streek, Wolfgang and Philippe C. Schmitter . “Community, Market, State and Associations?: The Prospective Contribution of Interest Governance to Social Order”. In Private Interest Government: Beyond Market and State, edited by W. Streek and P.C. Schmitter, pp. 1–29. London, Beverly Hills, New Delhi: SAGE Publications, 1985. Trivedy, Roy and Jag abandhu Acharya. “Constructing the Case f or an Alternative Framework for Understanding Civil Society, the State and the Role of NGOs ”. In NGOs, Civil Society and the State: Building © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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Democracy in Transitional Societies, edited b y Andrew Clayton, pp. 55–64. Oxford: INTRAC, 1996. Yamamoto, Tadashi, ed. Emerging Civil Society in the Asia Pacific Community: Nongovernmental Uunderpinnings of the Emer ging Asia Pacific Regional Community. Singapore: Institute of Southeast Asian Studies and Tokyo: Japan Center for International Exchange, 1995.

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This chapter is reproduced from The State and NGOs: Perspective from Asia , edited by Shinichi Shigetomi (Singapore: Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, 2002). This version was obtained electronically direct from the publisher on condition th at copyright is not infringed. No part of this publication may be reproduced, translated, stored in a retrieval system, or transmi tted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies and Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo.

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2 Bangladesh A Large NGO Sector Supported by Foreign Donors Ken’ichi Nobusue INTRODUCTION

With 120,000 full-time staff members, 1,000 non-governmental organizations (NGOs) provide health care, education, and micro-credit in Bangladesh (NGO Bureau 1994). BRAC, the Bangladesh Rural Advancement Committee, alone has 24,000 full-time and 34,000 part-time staf f members and spends o ver US$288 million a year, an amount equal to one-thir tieth of the g overnment budget (BRAC 1999, pp. 10–12). There are many NGOs as large as BRAC in Bangladesh. Why have Bangladeshi NGOs expanded so much? In this chapter I will suggest the absence of a welfare state and an underdeveloped market economy as the basic reasons. Developed countries have contributed to Bangladeshi NGO expansion financially, and the Bangladeshi Government actually cannot control the NGO sector that is linked to the global new social movement. By referring to these factors, this chapter sketches the process of NGO sector growth and analyses its impact on the Bangladeshi state and society. Bangladeshi NGOs should be praised for creating a public resource distribution system beyond the nation state. WEAK STATE, UNDERDEVELOPED ECONOMY

The Bangladeshi Government continues to use up resources to build its support base. Having grabbed political power by a coup d’état, the military rulers have bought off the country’s power elite to overcome weak legitimacy © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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(Sato 1990, pp. 20–29). Furthermore, party politicians, even though elected in democratic elections, give their supporters government resources as the spoils of victory at the polls. Neither providing welfare services nor promoting a rational market economy, the Bangladeshi spoils system has gi ven rise to a small gr oup of political profiteers (Murayama 1998, pp. 17–23; Osada 1998, pp. 33–35). For example, the banking sector has lent Tk580.833 billion, 41 per cent of which are bad loans now (The Daily Star, 15 June 2000). The Bangladesh Krishi (Agriculture) Bank alone has incurred Tk15.625 billion in bad loans, 56.5 per cent of the total inancing f (Ministry of Finance 1994, pp. 330–36). (The Krishi Bank will be discussed later in relation to its helping Prof. Yunus open Grameen Bank.) Business cir cles get loans as rewards for supporting the go vernment, and have no intention of pa ying them back. F oreign governments have given the banking sector of ficial development assistance (ODA) funds, but the corrupted power elite has wasted them (Sobhan 1991). In rural Bangladesh local governments have employed the Comilla Model for agricultural co-operatives that g roup both wealthy and poor f armers together, giving them input goods, funds, and technical advice (Chowdhury et al. 1987, pp. 14–16). Although the Green Revolution has been realized, the gap between the rich and the poor has continued to widen (Fujita 1993, pp. 51–59). To control local rural society, the central government depends on wealthy farmers and rewards them through the local government system, a pyramidal chain of patron–client relationships. The poor and needy get little help from either the government or the market, so 44.7 per cent of the popula tion now lives under the po verty line. Do we call this government failure or market failure? Neither. Because the Bangladeshi power elite never wanted economic de velopment or a welfare state all along, they profit from an underdeveloped economy and a weak state. The weak Bangladeshi state is helpless to stop them from robbing ODA funds, or carrying out selfish redistribution measures. Since the power elite have amassed fortunes through OD A projects and e xport-oriented industries, an under developed domestic economy does not bother them, but rather g ives them an ab undant source of cheap labour . Their “weak state, underdeveloped economy” strategy has been successful (Nobusue 2000a, pp. 150–53). In contrast, the countries of Southeast Asia have built strong states that have taken the lead in economic de velopment. Threatened by the socialist camp, they have adopted this strategy as the only way to survive (Fujiwara 1996, pp. 211–16). Since Southeast Asia and Bangladesh © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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adopted different strategies, the characters of their NGOs are also different. In the Philippines and Thailand, as well as South Korea, NGOs have tended to protest against authoritarian resource distribution systems and attempted to build alternative systems (Shigetomi 2000a, pp. 8–14; 2000b, p. 6). We can understand Southeast Asian NGOs as being par t of a worldwide new social movement. Nation states, both developed and developing, democratic and authoritarian, can no longer cope with global environmental pollution or a borderless economy. In Western Europe welfare states manage people more rigidly, and big companies contr ol workers and consumers more arbitrarily, a situation that Habermas calls the “colonisation of life space”. There people organize NGOs to re volt against the existing nation states and big, multinational enterprises (Kato 1994, pp. 278–79). However, the Bangladeshi state has ne ver been strong enough to lead economic development in an authoritarian way nor to manage the people as a welfare state. Private sector companies are small. So, without enemies to revolt against, the Bangladeshi NGOs have come only to provide the poor with welfare services that the state cannot give them.

NGO POVERTY ALLEVIATION PROJECTS

BRAC was organized by just twelve youths in 1972 in a small village, with the aim of rescuing liberation war victims. Expanding quickly since then, BRAC has continued to represent the character of the whole Bangladeshi NGO sector. This section will provide a sketch of BRAC’s history to show how Bangladeshi NGOs have developed. (Chen 1986; Lovell 1992; Ohashi 1993; and Shimozawa 1998 were referred to in writing this section.) From Ad Hoc Relief to Permanent Development Projects

Since poverty has complicated causes, BRAC soon learned that ad hoc rescue could not really help the poor. In 1973 BRAC instituted an Integrated Rural Development Programme, a continuous project providing agricultural support, literacy education, and health care to entire rural communities in 200 union (villages). However, the pr ogramme failed for two reasons: technical err ors and the social power structure. The former led to boring textbooks and vocational training unsuitable to the rural economy. The latter was more troublesome, for BRAC’s services passed into the hands of wealthy farmers. BRAC made the same mistakes as the Comilla Model.

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By improving the teaching materials, BRAC tried various development methods at 180 union in Manikganj district. At the same time, its research division studied the rural power structure, and clearly found that the wealthy farmers, connected to the central government by patron–client relationships, accumulated wealth by po wer, and po wer by wealth (BRA C 1979; BRAC 1983). BRAC’s Target Approach

After research and e xperimentation, BRAC came up with its Target Approach in 1976, a method for or ganizing only the poor into samity, or small co-operatives, and provided them with welfare services (Chowdhury 1989, pp. 16–24). Paulo Freire’s philosophy clearly influenced the Target Approach in that BRAC (1) thinks from the standpoint of thepoor, (2) helps them become independent, (3) motivates them to take part insamity projects voluntarily, and (4) raises their awareness about human rights. BRAC also adopted principles f or itself. To continue projects o ver a long period in a stab le fashion, BRAC (5) ensures its or ganization’s sustainability, by (6) rational projects and (7) efficient management. Since the poor live everywhere, BRAC (8) spreads its project areas quickly, which brings about economies of scale. Next BRAC (9) produces various goods and provides many services independentl y, because po verty alleviation needs remedies in many fields and many items that neither the government nor private companies can supply. Finally, (10) the empowerment of women takes first preference. Since many Bangladeshi women suffer from pardah, traditional discrimination, their average life expectancy is 57.6 years, shorter than the male life expectancy of 58.1 years. The literacy rate shows a similar trend along gender lines: women 34.8 per cent and men 47.8 per cent (BBS 1996, pp. 4, 7). To help achieve sexual equality, BRAC serves women first (Lovell 1992, pp. 24–28). In Bangladesh most NGOs follow BRAC’s principles and have learned their project know-how and curricula from it. Grameen Bank’s Micro-credit

Micro-credit was started in 1976 outside of the BRA C-led NGO sector. Chittagong University professor Mohammad Yunus saw a handicraft worker enslaved because she did not ha ve Tk5. Only by borr owing the mone y could she be set fr ee. However, banks do not lend to the poor , because dealing in such small sums is not profitable for them. © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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TABLE 2.1 Grameen Bank’s Micro-credit Accounts

1976 1977 1978 1979 1980 1981 1982 1983 1984 1985 1986 1987 1988 1989 1990 1991 1992 1993 1994 1995 1996 1997 1998

Number of Members

Disbursed Repaid Outstanding Bad Loans (million taka) (million taka) (million taka) (million taka)

10 70 290 2,200 14,830 24,128 30,416 58,320 121,051 171,622 234,343 339,156 490,363 662,263 869,538 1,066,426 1,424,395 1,814,916 2,013,130 2,065,661 2,059,510 2,272,503 2,368,347

0.0075 0.0800 0.3400 3.05 14.05 33.33 45.15 99.35 304.36 428.45 541.73 810.03 1,280.43 1,768.28 2,262.47 2,639.54 5,203.80 10,622.00 13,912.30 13,663.60 11,877.70 16,270.70 19,119.40

0.003 0.024 0.087 1.39 5.80 25.40 31.60 58.97 199.46 379.78 465.87 653.86 1,014.24 1,495.28 1,988.53 2,325.04 3,620.20 7,623.60 12,186.10 13,317.80 11,556.50 14,380.30 17,481.50

74.27 177.48 246.06 330.97 644.07 1,094.90 1,593.23 2,117.37 2,551.17 4,423.94 8,763.57 11,052.95 11,176.19 10,953.66 12,589.09 14,202.19

0.50 0.60 0.00 0.00 0.29 11.91 15.71 25.40 60.24 98.13 279.59 588.71 853.94 1,278.42 1,643.28

Source: Grameen Bank Annual Report.

Failing to find any bank that would deal with the poor, Prof. Yunus lent Tk856 of his own money to forty-two poor workers. Later, the Krishi Bank, on Prof. Yunus’ advice, opened an experimental Grameen (rural) branch in 1977 (Yunus 1998, pp. 6–12, 123–28).Table 2.1, which shows the business performance of Grameen br anches, reveals that their bad loan rates ar e much lower than other banks.After six years of smooth growth, the Grameen Bank Ordinance of 1983 changed the Grameen branches into an independent Grameen Bank. BRAC had a lending scheme, too, but samity members had to study and save money first, then borrow the money they had accumulated. Underestimating the business aptitude of the poor , BRAC thought that without enough education, samity members would spend money only for © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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daily needs. But in light of the Grameen Bank’s success, BRAC incorporated micro-credit into its Rural De velopment Programme in 1986. The Rural Credit Programme was started in 1990 and took in “graduates” from the samity of the Rural Development Programme. BRAC’s Style and Expansion

Today BRAC’s activities may be divided into three components: 1. Organizing samity, with the Rural De velopment/Credit Programme providing training for motivation and awareness-raising, information on human rights and le gal affairs, vocational training, sa vings promotion, and micro-credit (BRAC 1998b). 2. Non-formal primary education for poor children, especially girls. To narrow the education gap between the rich and the poor and between boys and g irls, BRAC builds schools, prints te xtbooks, and trains teachers (Prather 1993). 3. The Health and Population Planning Programme provides the poor with primary health care, mother and child care, and family planning services (BRAC 1998a). Table 2.2 shows some of the changes tha t have occurred in BRAC’s activities. BRAC wants to expand its organization, and in actuality expansion is proceeding rapidly. NGOs, by nature, can survive in the niches occupied by neither the government nor the market; but in Bangladesh, such niches are so huge that the rapid growth of NGOs is both possible and necessary. Government health workers serve 40–50 per cent of the nation, and polio vaccinations are provided to almost all the c hildren. So NGOs ser ve the remaining 50–60 per cent (Grieve 1995, p. 122). Foreign donations have supported NGO expansion financially. Just after its founding in 1972, BRAC received money from Oxfam and the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF). Table 2.3, containing BRAC’s financial accounts in 1998, sho ws that many foreign governments and NGOs give BRAC a lot of money. Foreign donations for the whole Bangladeshi NGO sector increased from US$106.6 million in 1990/91 to US$231.91 million in 1996/97 (Ministry of Finance 1998, p. 223). Figure 2.1 outlines the monetary flow between governments and NGOs. In the next section let us look at how such relationships have been formed. © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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– – – – 352,300 460,800 – 649,300 825,790 1,036,254 1,510,000 1,840,000 2,230,000 2,750,000

– – – – 213 368 – 691 1,004 1,500 2,290 3,219 3,887 5,226

Micro-credit Outstanding (million taka) 22 154 419 223 1,606 2,204 2,890 11,108 20,388 28,274 35,175 34,175 34,334 34,517

Number of Schools

Note: The account calculation method was changed in 1995. Source: BRAC Annual Report.

1985 1986 1987 1988 1989 1990 1991 1992 1993 1994 1995 1996 1997 1998

Number of Samity Members 676 4,672 12,305 6,690 48,180 69,124 86,700 334,247 647,250 896,385 1,137,767 1,108,685 1,103,378 1,105,292

Number of Students – – – – – – – – – – 24,373 12,536 19,263 25,140

Number of Health Workers

TABLE 2.2 BRAC’s Activities

2,268 2,206 2,576 3,043 3,526 4,222 – 8,178 10,849 11,897 16,083 17,425 20,433 23,978

Number of Full-time Staff – 179.52 236.01 282.50 482.48 756.72 1,285.84 1,382.67 1,677.06 2,805.45 6,754.27 8,476.28 10,921.96 13,114.29

Total Income (million taka)

– 70.7% 68.7% 59.9% 67.9% 68.2% 70.8% 58.0% 53.0% 63.9% 19.6% 18.6% 15.5% 16.3%

Ratio of Foreign Donations

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TABLE 2.3 BRAC’s Accounts in 1998 (In taka) Income

Expenses

Opening balance 315,663,347 European Union 921,477,757 DFID (U.K. Government) 330,373,177 DGIS (Dutch Government)/ NOVIB (Dutch NGO) 243,563,211 KFW (German Government) 206,729,428 Bangladeshi Government 153,225,452 Aga Khan Foundation/CIDA 135,342,447 Pathfinder International (NGO) 61,405,538 DANIDA (Danish Government) 50,692,012 NORAD (Norwegian Government) 39,370,660 UNICEF 28,934,920 German Embassy 1,911,856 Aus Aid (NGO) 1,523,002 CIDA (Canadian Government) 1,505,570 OXFAM (NGO) 1,104,599 CESVI 821,270 Other domestic donations 5,022,962 Borrowing from Palli Karmo Shahayak Foundation 409,700,000 Borrowing from ArabBangladesh Bank (private) 100,000,000 Borrowing from UNI Bank (Denmark) 12,839,139 Borrowing from Bangladeshi Government 6,000,000 Project income 2,494,921,564 Loans repaid by samity members 7,114,578,284 Saving from samity members 482,124,420

Income and employment generation 2,662,336,987 Loans disbursed to samity members 8,451,423,743 Education 907,669,872 Health and nutrition 287,566,985 Repayment to Bangladesh Krishi Bank 4,537,200 Increase in working capital 415,242,992 Closing balance 390,052,836

Total

Total

13,118,830,615

Note: US$1 = Tk45.5. Source: BRAC (1999, pp. 74–75).

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FIGURE 2.1 Monetary Flow between the Bangladeshi Government and NGO Sector (1)

Foreign Governments International Agencies Foreign Donors

Bangladeshi Government

(3) Foreign NGOs

(4)

(2)

Bangladeshi NGOs

Note: At first the governments and the NGO sector had no contact, so money flowed parallel [(1) and (2)]. However, at the end of the 1980s, because of a paradigm shift and inef ficient ODA projects, foreign governments and international agencies started helping Bangladeshi NGOs [(3)] f inancially, which prompted the Bangladeshi Government to change its policies and co-operate with NGOs [(4)]. Source: Friedmann (1995, p. 279) (simplified).

CHANGE IN GOVERNMENT–NGO RELATIONSHIP Foreign NGOs

Inspired by humanism and internationalism, Oxfam started a famine relief project in 1942 (Black 1992, pp. 1–2, 13–15). At that time NGOs were mostly involved in helping the poor materially; b ut from the 1960s on, Western European NGOs began a new social movement, protesting against existing nation states and industrial society in a radical fashion (Habermas 1987, p. 412). After this new social movement had influenced development theory, NGOs came up with an “alternative development” concept towards participatory democracy, sustainable economic growth, and social equality of the sexes and age groups (Friedmann 1995, pp. 273–74). This alternative development concept coincides with the philosophy of NGOs in Bangladesh. Furthermore, NGOs are seeking cosmopolitan solidarity of people to solve the north–south problem. So naturally northern hemisphere NGOs are dedicated to helping their southern hemisphere counterparts. Foreign Governments and International Aid Agencies

The World Bank with other international agencies and the de veloped countries have formed the Bangladesh Aid Consortium and have given the Bangladeshi Government huge amounts of ODA funds. Nevertheless, the © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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Bangladeshi economy has not de veloped in the least. The World Bank complains that the Bangladeshi Government is not able to carry out a structural adjustment policy. While criticizing the weak government system and undisciplined civil servants, the World Bank has praised the performance of the NGOs (World Bank 1998). Foreign governments have also complained about the inef ficiency of assisted projects and have “grown tired of ODA”. According to a Japanese official, foreign governments have changed the direction of aid to NGOs “in order to force the Bangladeshi government to reform” (Tanimoto 1998, pp. 77, 89 –90). In 1989 J apan started the Grant Assistance for Grass Roots Projects, an ODA programme for NGOs. The Overseas Economic Cooperation Fund loaned money to the Grameen Bank project in 1995; and Sweden and Denmark started to help BRAC in 1986. The United Nations Social Development Summit, held in Copenhagen in 1995, came out with a paradigm shift, preferring social development to economic development (Yamamori 1996, pp. 206 –8). Since the ne w paradigm and the above-mentioned alternative development concept have points in common, government–NGO co-operation has progressed. After the Summit, the United Nations Development Programme praised the NGOs for improving the Bangladeshi human development index and proposed the co-ordination of government policy at the macro-level and NGO projects at the micro-level (UNDP 1996, vol. 2, pp. 70–72). Bangladeshi Government

In the midst of this paradigm shift, the Bangladeshi Government has had to change its policy. Shimozawa (1998, pp. 71–72) says that the government changed its attitude towards NGOs between the third and fourth Five Year Plans. In the third Plan (1985/86 –89/90) the g overnment ignored NGO education projects and merely requested local governments to build schools and distribute textbooks in as smooth a manner as possib le (Planning Commission 1985, pp. 39, 340 –43). However, the fourth Plan expressed appreciation for non-formal primary education in raising literacy rate. On the other hand, the government ordered the NGOs to follow the directives of local officials (Planning Commission 1995, pp. XV–16). The fifth Plan (1997/98–2001/02) took a more NGO-friendly stance: To get foreign aid, the g overnment has to compete with NGOs and increase the efficiency of its poverty alleviation project. Both the government and the NGOs should raise © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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efficiency, transparency, and accountability. From the fifth Plan, the government will break with centralised planned economy and aim at participatory development at the local level through active government –NGO co-operation. (Planning Commission 1998, pp. 43, 137) Examples of Government–NGO Co-operation

Learning from NGO Projects

With know-how gained from NGOs, the Bangladeshi Go vernment has instituted micro-credit projects. The Bangladesh Rural Development Board implemented its biggest project, RD-12, during 1988 –96 with help from the Canadian International Development Agency. Khandker (1998), in a comparative study of micro-credit under BRA C, the Grameen Bank, and RD-12, concludes that RD-12 performed as well as the others. Division of Labour

The Bangladeshi Government is also helping NGO micro-credit projects. The Palli Karma Sahayak (Rural Entrepreneurship Support) Foundation, founded by the government in 1990 and supported by the World Bank, the Asian Development Bank, and the United States, lends “partner NGOs” funds for their micro-credit projects (BRDB 1998, pp. 8, 48–63). Here, the government secures money and goods from donors, and leaves delivery at field level to NGOs. Education and health care projects often use this method, as in the case of polio vaccination. Another example is the government-built cyclone shelters that have been handed over to NGOs for management. In other words, the go vernment provides the hardware, and NGOs the software. Vulnerable Group Development

The Bangladeshi Go vernment, NGOs, and World Food Programme (WFP) co-operate in Vulnerable Group Development. At BRAC’s microcredit project, samity members must go through training for a few months before getting loans. During the training period, they have to live on their own income; but very poor women do not have income sources they can depend on. Through food grants from the WFP, the government gives extremely poor persons 30 kg of wheat per month © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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for one and a half years, in order to encourage them to take part in micro-credit projects. Union Parishads (village assembly), BRAC, and local government officials form VGD Committees, which select samity members from among local residents. Not only BRAC, but over 500 NGOs have participated in VGD as partners of the WFP. Now many developed countries contribute wheat grant. The WFP praises VGD as one success story of government–NGO co-operation. The Rural Road Maintenance Programme is another example of the co-operation, which is implemented under contract between Union Parishads and CARE, a Belgian NGO. Consultation on Policy-Making

Some 886 NGOs no w form the Association for Development Agencies in Bangladesh (ADAB), the apex body of the NGO sector founded in 1974. Befor e preparing the budget, the government talks with ADAB and the Federation of Bangladesh Chamber of Commerce and Industries. The government and the NGO and market sectors often meet to enhance co-operation. GOVERNMENT REGULATION OF NGOs

Foreign donations to NGOs are so large that the first thing the government wants to do is trace the money flow. Monitoring Foreign Donations to NGOs

NGO Byuro (Bureau) (1993), a NGO management handbook published by the government, instructs NGOs to obey the following five laws: 1. Societies Registration Act of 1860; 2. Voluntary Social Welfare Agencies (Registration and Contr ol) Ordinance of 1961; 3. Foreign Donations (Voluntary Activities) Regulation Ordinance of 1978; 4. Foreign Donations (Voluntary Activities) Regulation Rules of 1978; 5. Foreign Contributions (Regulation) Ordinance of 1982. Under the Act of 1860, organizations had the choice of registering with the government or not; but the Ordinance of 1961 makes registration by all voluntary social welfare agencies compulsory. © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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The Ordinance of 1978 states: “All volunteer activities require government approval in adv ance.” Interestingly, the Ordinance def ines volunteer activities in a very peculiar manner as “welfare services carried out with foreign donations”. The Rules of 1978 determine a pplication formats, from FD-1 to FD-9, which NGOs use to get the government approval for projects. FD means foreign donation. Not only the government, but ordinary citizens see NGOs as rich groups getting money from foreign countries. In this case, the “rich group” includes both NGO staff members and samity members. Even illiterate people hold to this definition. The Ordinance of 1982 forbids NGOs from receiving cash, goods, and services from f oreign donors without g overnment approval in ad vance. Foreign donors also need pr ior approval for contributions (Halim 1993, pp. 138–52). NGO Bureau

In amending the Rules of 1978, the government set up the NGO Bureau in 1990. Now NGOs do not have to go around to many ministries, but merely submit their FD application forms to the NGO Bureau. NGOs file FD-6s to get approval for yearly project plans. The NGO Bureau has to reply to FD-6s within forty-five days. After receiving a FD-6, the NGO Bureau sends it to the authorities concerned. If the authorities do not give the NGO Bureau a response within twenty-one days, the bureau regards that as a silent appro val. When NGOs want to send emer gency relief to the victims of natural disasters, floods, cyclones, and so on, they must apply using the FD-7 application form to get replies within twentyfour hours. NGOs have to renew their registration every five years. The NGO Bureau can enter NGO of fices and project sites for on-the-spot inspections, and can cancel re gistration when illegalities are found. Ho wever, the NGO Bureau has only eighteen staff members with a fourth grade qualification or higher, so it would be impossible for them to read FD application forms from over 1,000 NGOs v ery carefully. In April 1999 Gono Shahajo Shangstha (People’s Support Association) (GSS) suddenly closed its office and dismissed 2,588 full-time staff members. The staff members now accuse the GSS president of embezzling Tk400 million, which came from foreign donors. The NGO Bureau inspected the GSS office only after the scandal had been exposed. Therefore, the NGO Bureau is far from strong enough to control NGOs. In September 1996 the Director General of the NGO Bureau was transferred for harassing NGOs. Although the Ordinance of

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1982 tells NGOs to get prior approval for foreign donations, the NGO Bureau generally approves all the FD application forms filed. Frustrated by such a liberal NGO policy, the Ministry of Commerce and Industry drew up the Bangladesh Voluntary Social Welfare Organisations (Registration and Control) Bill in 1993, in an attempt to contr ol and intervene in NGO affairs. However, ADAB easily defeated the ministry and quashed the Bill (Holloway 1998, pp. 143–47).

NGO SUCCESSES AND FAILURES

Although it was said, “NGOs are good, ODA is bad”, it is difficult to apply such an idea to Bangladesh, especially since 1990, because the go vernment now has developed close r elations with the NGO sector f inancially and carries out the same projects as NGOs.Therefore, separating the government from NGOs makes little sense. Moreover, “NGOs have also become bad ”. The newspapers are filled with NGO scandals, and many people criticize micro-credit, because NGOs exclude those who are really poor from the samity, and samity members do not use funds for women empowerment. NGO Staff Members as Salaried Workers

Through micro-credit, NGOs can serve the poor and keep their organizations solvent at the same time. Before adopting micro-credit, the NGOs had used funds coming directly from foreign donors, k eeping the former hea vily dependent on the la tter; but now, the money first goes to the poor , then comes back to the NGOs with interest. BRAC seeks or ganizational sustainability because poor comm unities need continuous service. As Table 2.3 shows, repaid micro-credit loans account for 54.5 per cent of BRAC head office’s income. BRAC wants to raise that percentage to increase financial sustainability. BRAC field-level offices have adopted a self-supporting accounting system. Table 2.4, containing the accounts of a BRA C field office, shows that interest from micro-credit loans pays staff salaries and other expenses. Field offices have to borrow funds for micro-credit from the head office with interest. Many young people want to work for NGOs because they seek high salaries and stable employment. In Bangladesh university graduates cannot find sufficient jobs in either the market or the government sector. Graduates without powerful connections can get a chance to become well-off only in

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TABLE 2.4 BRAC Narail Field Office’s Accounts in 1998 (In taka) Income Interest on micro-credit Bad loan recovery

Total Loss (made up by reserve fund)

Expenses 6,393,840 816

6,394,656

Interest on savings (repaid to samity members) Interest on micro-credit fund (repaid to BRAC head office) Staff salaries Office servant salaries Staff training Travel Utilities Office stationery Office maintenance General expenses Depreciation Provision for bad loans Share of expenses of BRAC head office Rent for office (paid to BRAC head office) Total

550,256 1,546,644 2,672,009 68,913 45,323 266,588 54,815 34,926 34,004 64,110 47,183 1,891,440 689,267 43,230 8,008,708

1,614,052

Source: Income and Expenditure Statement, gi ven by Daud Ali Khan, Manager of Narail Field Office.

the NGO sector. Now we find NGO staf f members trying to increase their organizations’ sustainability mer ely in or der to secur e their o wn employment. Many people ha ve criticized the interest rates c harged by NGOs in their micro-credit programmes. Rates can be as high as 16 –34 per cent a year (BRDB 1996, p. 2). The more samity members fail to repay the loans, the more unsta ble NGO staff members’ employment becomes. So the staff search for people who can repay the loans at high interest rates. It is in this way that the really poor are excluded from micro-credit. Such staff therefore do not share Prof. Yunus’ ideals. High repayment rates for NGO micro-credit does not reflect good perf ormance, but rather means that NGO staff members have become mere salaried workers and that the NGOs themselves have been turned into mere business enterprises seeking maximum management efficiency and profit.

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While BRAC has expanded its commercial enterprises, such as housing loans for the urban middle class and Internet provider services, it cannot staf f its f ield offices sufficiently. Staff members, as mer e salaried workers, do not want to work in inconvenient rural areas (Watanabe 1997, pp. 50–52). As a result, BRAC has been facing difficulty in selecting samity members, forcing it to co-operate with the government sector under the VGD scheme and lea ve samity member selection to the VGD Committee. Only in this way can BRAC carry out its micro-credit business at the field level smoothly. The chairmen and members of the Union Parishads also profit greatly from VGD. Lacking the will and the ability to balance their budgets, Union Parishads cannot serve their residents sufficiently. However, through VGD, the government brings wheat and the NGOs bring micro-credit funds to the Union Parishads. These resources help the Union Parishads chairmen and members to serve the residents better and raise their hopes of re-election. Officially, the government and NGOs co-operate to empo wer women, but in actuality, they use their partnership to benefit themselves.

Alternative Development Realized

Nevertheless, VGD has empowered women for three reasons. First, at the field level the resource distribution channel of the NGO sector has replaced the government sector channels, which had formed pyramids of patron – client relationships. Secondly, since NGOs get financial help from foreign donors, they have to be accountable to these donor s. This accountability prevents NGOs from neglecting their official aim, alternative development. Moreover, since Union Parishads get resources from NGOs, they have to be accountable to these NGOs.Thirdly, the more resources Union Parishads distribute, the more interest residents have in their activities. So the Union Parishads are forced to be accountable also to residents. The chairmen and members of Union Parishads are no longer patrons reigning over residents; rather, the NGOs and residents now watch the Union Parishads to see that they allocate resources fairly. When 4,400 union held elections for the Parishads in December 1997, many poor women entered the race. A Pardah-dominated society could never imagine such activity by poor women (Khan and Mamoon 1998, p. 12). According to ADAB, 4,179 BRAC samity members stood for the elections, and 1,349 of them won (ADAB 1998, p. 18), which shows clearly that participatory democracy and sexual equality are being realized.

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Clashes with the Establishment

The changes mentioned above also threaten the interests of the rural establishment. From the very beginning, the Target Approach has held that the existing social structure needs to be abolished. In Western Europe and Southeast Asian countries the enemies of NGOs turn out to be the government and the market. But in Bangladesh society is the NGOs’ greatest enemy. The rural establishment, landowners, and religious extremists use Islam to resist alter native development. The Coordination Council for Human Rights (1996, pp. 49 –61) says fatwa, the interpretation or judgement of Islamic law by nature, violently opposes women who take part in NGO samity. Today in Bangladesh the esta blishment interprets Islamic la w to suit its own convenience, and sometimes e xecutes women. While NGOs have actively expanded micro-credit since 1990s, fatwa murder has also increased. Islamic extremists have launched many attacks on ADAB events since the end of 1998. Pointing to European ifnancial aid to NGOs, Jalalzai (1998) says, “Christian countries use NGOs to invade Islamic countries in a new mode of colonialism.” But Islam itself has never clashed with alternative development. Finance Minister S.A.M.S. Kibria says, “Islamic extremist propaganda that NGOs teach anti-Islamic values to women is completely wrong. We should share in NGO benefits and be proud of them ” (Kibria 1999, pp. 251–54). Many Muslim people agree with Kibria. It is in this w ay that NGOs and the establishment are embr oiled in a passionate feud. In the union where poor women can stand for Parishad election, the struggle turns to the NGOs’ advantage. My field research area, Bansgram Union in Narail District,is an example of an NGO victory . The establishment had ruled Bansgram Union continuously up through the 1980s; but in the Parishad election of 1992, a young rebel defeated an establishment candidate and won the chairmanship. The newly elected chairman attracted votes from the younger generation because he was a member of the national football team. Facing obstruction by the establishment, the new chairman joined hands with BRAC, which had started projects a t Narail in 1994. VGD members also supported the chairman. Human rights awareness and legal training further weakened the legitimacy of the establishment, and the chairman won re-election in 1997 (Nobusue 2000b, p. 31). In fact, this chair man is a lando wner. In Bangladeshi rural society many mid-sized lando wners fight each other f or political po wer and

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limited resources; so the rural establishment’s unity is weak (Khan 1989, pp. 104–5). Through the Permanent Settlement of 1793, the zamindar, or feudal landlords, obtained legal ownership of their land, by agreeing to pay land taxes. However, the tax burden was so heavy that many landowners went bankrupt and sold their land. On the other hand, tenant f armers prospered through their managerial skills (Riaz 1994, pp. 38–40). Such an unstable class system has prevailed in rural Bangladesh since then. Because the NGOs have brought new and rich resources to rural society, the mode of struggle among landowners has changed. While the dominant landowners try to exclude NGOs to maintain the status quo, the others try to use NGOs to make breakthroughs. Such inferior camp –NGO alliances have won in some Union Parishads elections. On the other hand, most of the Pakistani establishment has succeeded in excluding NGOs from rural society. In Pakistan inequality in land ownership is so large that landowners have not only consolidated their power in the rural areas, but also hold formal state power, enabling them to strengthen their overall power base (Yamanaka 1992, pp. 26–38). In Bangladesh, because rural landowners are not as strong as their Pakistani counterparts, it is the urban middle class who holds state power. Therefore, rural landowners have adopted a“weak state” strategy to exercise informal power as the power elite. Although both Bangladesh and Pakistan are Muslim-dominated South Asian countries, trends in the establishment– NGO struggle are opposite.

CONCLUSION

Today, Bangladeshi intellectuals have organized many advocacy groups, such as the Fair Election Monitoring Alliance, Bangladesh Environmental Lawyers’ Association, and Centre for Policy Dialogue; but this chapter has focused only on development agencies like BRAC. Making up for the smallness of the government and the market, the NGO Target Approach and micro-credit have served the rural poor. Since the philosophy of Bangladeshi NGOs agrees with the alternative development theory of the global new social movement, foreign donors have helped them f inancially. Now NGOs are co-operating with the government sector and ha ve succeeded in w omen empowerment in some villages. At the same time, by absorbing many educated members of the urban middle class, NGOs are expanding their commercial enterprises to reduce their dependence on foreign donor s. To secure jobs, NGO staf f members have commercialized micro-credit projects, thus excluding the real poor. However,

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it is not possible that NGOs will turn into profit-making companies by breaking off with foreign donors in the future. As of 2001, BRAC’s micro-credit project accounts f or 79 per cent of its total budget, indicating its level of self-sufficiency; but the remaining 21 per cent, which goes to health care and education projects, still depends on foreign donors. This financial structure will continue in the near future (The Daily Star, 4 September 2000). We can praise the NGOs’ lasting dependence, because Bangladeshi NGOs keep solidarity with the “global network for human liberation movement” (Kawata 1988, p. 136). As the global mark et weakens the nation state ’s governability and legitimacy, NGOs of the ne w social movement have adopted the saying “think globally, act locall y”. In Bangladesh village comm unities have attracted resources from both the g overnment and NGOs through VGD, realizing alternative development. Although Bangladesh is a least developed country, some union are very developed areas from the viewpoint of the new social movement. References

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Chen, Martha Alter. A Quiet Re volution: Women in Transition in Rur al Bangladesh. Dhaka: BRAC Prokashana, 1986. Chowdhury, Aditee Nag. Let Grassroots Speak: People’s Participation Self-help Groups and NGOs in Bangladesh. Dhaka: University Press Limited, 1989. Chowdhury, Pijush Kanti, M. Ameerul Huq, and Syed Aminur Rahman. Cooperatives as Institutions for Development of the Rural Poor. Comilla: Bangladesh Academy for Rural Development, 1987. Coordination Council for Human Rights. Human Rights Report 1995. Dhaka: Coordination Council for Human Rights in Bangladesh, 1996. Friedmann, John. Empowerment: The Politics of Alternative Development. Cambridge, Mass.: Blackwell, 1995. Fujita, Koichi. Bangladesh nogyo hatten r on josetsu [Introduction to the study of Bangladesh agricultural development: Institutional constraints]. Tokyo: National Resear ch Institute of Agricultural Economics, 1993. Fujiwara, Kiichi. “Kanryo to kaihatsu — keizaihatten no seijiteki joken ni tsuite” [Bureaucrats and de velopment: The political conditions of economic growth]. In Asean shokoku no anryosei [The bureaucracy in ASEAN countries], edited b y Ikuo Iwasaki and Yoshiyuki Hagiwara, pp. 203–46. Tokyo: Institute of Developing Economies, 1996. Grieve, Roy H. “Health for All by 2000?: Some Issues of Health and Health Care in Bangladesh”. In Bangladesh Strategies for Development, edited by Roy H. Grieve and M. Mozammel Huq,pp. 111–47. Dhaka: University Press Limited, 1995. Habermas, Jurgen. The Theory of Communicative Action (Japanese edition of Theorie des kommunikativen Handelns , translated by Michihaya Kawakami et al.). Tokyo: Miraisha, 1987. Halim, M. Abdul. Social Welfare Legislation in Bangladesh. Dhaka: Oihik, 1993. Holloway, Richard. Supporting Citizens’ Initiatives: Bangladesh’s NGOs and Society. Dhaka: University Press Limited, 1998. Jalalzai Musa Khan. The NGOs Conspiracy in Pakistan.Lahore: Classic, 1998. Kato, Tetsuro. Kokumin kokka no ergology [The er gology of the na tion state]. Tokyo: Heibonsha, 1994. Kawata, Tadashi. Kokusai seiji k eizai gaku wo mezashite [Towards an international science of political economy]. Tokyo: Ochanomizu Shobo, 1988. Khan, Shakeeb Adnan. The State and Village Society: The Political Economy of Agricultural Development in Bangladesh. New Delhi: Monohar, 1989. © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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Khan, Zarina Rahman and Muntassir Mamoon.A Report on the Democracy Education for Effective Local Elected Bodies Project of Bangladesh Nari Progati Sangha. Dhaka: Bangladesh Nari Progati Sangha, 1998. Khandker, Shahidur R. Fighting Poverty with Microcredit: Experience in Bangladesh. Dhaka: University Press Limited, 1998. Kibria, Shah A.M.S. Bangladesh at the Crossroads. Dhaka: University Press Limited, 1999. Lovell, Catherine H. Breaking the Cycle of Poverty: The BRAC Strategy. Dhaka: University Press Limited, 1992. Ministry of Finance, Bangladesh. Bangladesh Economic Survey 1993/94. Dhaka: Ministry of Finance, 1994. ———. Flow of External Resources into Bangladesh. Dhaka: Ministry of Finance, 1998. Murayama, Mayumi. “Banguradeshu ni okeru enjo no shakai-seiji teki imi” [Social and political implications of economic cooperation in Bangladesh]. In Kaihatsu enjo to banguradeshu [Development cooperation and Bangladesh], edited by Hiroshi Sato, pp. 5–18. Tokyo: Institute of Developing Economies, 1998. NGO Byuro (Bureau), Bangladesh. Bangladeshe Karmarat Bideshi o Boideshik Shahajjyopusta Bagladeshi Besar kari Swechhasebi Sangstasamuher (NGO) Khhetr e Anusaraniya Karjapranali [Laws regulating Bangladeshi NGOs which get foreign donation]. Dhaka: NGO Byuro, 1993. ———. NGO Directory Bangladesh 1994. Dhaka: NGO Byuro, 1994. Nobusue, Kenichi. “Banguradeshu-chukan kaikyu taisei no henyo ” [Bangladesh: Change of the middle class regime]. In Ajia shokoku ni okeru chukanso ron no genzai [Recent developments in the study of the middle class in Asian countries], edited by Tamio Hattori, Takashi Torii, and Tsuruyo Funatsu, pp. 131–59. Tokyo: Institute of Developing Economies, 2000a. ———. “Banguradeshu: josei senyo senkyoku seido no igi ” [Bangladesh: Implications of the women’s reserved constituency system]. In Structural Change of Societies in South Asia, edited by Norio Kondo, pp. 17–36. Tokyo: Institute of Developing Economies, 2000b. Ohashi, Masaaki. “Yori yoki kyoryoku heno mosaku” [Groping for better cooperation]. In Motto shiritai Bangladesh [Knowing Bangladesh better], edited by Masayuki Usuda, Hiroshi Sato, andTaniguchi Shinkichi. Tokyo: Kobundo, 1993. Osada, Mitsue. “Banguradeshu keizai to kaihatsu enjo ” [The Bangladesh economy and de velopment aid]. In Kaihatsu enjo to bangur adeshu

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[Development aid and Bangladesh], edited by Hiroshi Sato, pp. 20–54. Tokyo: Institute of Developing Economies, 1998. Planning Commission, Bangladesh. The Third Five Year Plan 1985–90. Dhaka: Planning Commission, 1985. ———. The Fourth Five Year Plan 1990–95. Dhaka: Planning Commission, 1995. ———. The Fifth Five Year Plan 1997–2002. Dhaka: Planning Commission, 1998. Prather, Cynthia J., ed. Primary Education for All: Learning from the BRAC Experience: A Case Study. Dhaka: Advancing Basic Education and Literacy, 1993. Riaz, Ali. State, Class and Military Rule. Dhaka: Nadi New Press, 1994. Sato, Hiroshi. “Bangladesh no kenryoku kozo: juzoku teki gun kanryo kokka ni okeru kenryoku to keneki” [The power structure in Bangladesh: Power and authority in a dependent military-bureaucratic state]. In Bangladesh: teikaihatsu no seiji k ozo [Bangladesh: Political dimensions of underdevelopment], edited by Hiroshi Sato. Tokyo: Institute of Developing Economies, 1990. Shigetomi, Shinichi. “Kokka to NGO — mondai ishiki tobunseki shikaku” [The state and NGOs: Issues and analytical framework]. In Kokka to NGO — ajia jugo kakoku nohikaku shiryo [The state and NGOs in Asia: A comparative study of fifteen countries], edited by S. Shigetomi, pp. 1–18. Tokyo: Institute of Developing Economies, 2000a. ———. “NGO gensho wo dou toraeru ka — Ajia kara no shiten” [How to grasp NGO phenomena — from Asian viewpoint]. Ajiken World Trend, no. 59 (2000b), pp. 2–6. Shimozawa, Takeshi. “Banguradeshu no NGO no genjo” [Current situation of NGOs in Bangladesh]. In Kaihatsu enjo to banguradeshu [Development aid and Bangladesh], edited by Hiroshi Sato, pp. 55–75. Tokyo: Institute of Developing Economies, 1998. Sobhan, Rehman, ed. Debt Default to the Development Finance Institutions: The Crisis of State Sponsored Entrepreneurship in Bangladesh. Dhaka: University Press Limited, 1991. Tanimoto, Toshio. “Banguradeshu ni taisuru enshakkan no yakuwari” [The role of yen loans to Bangladesh]. In Kaihatsu enjo to banguradeshu [Development aid and Bangladesh], edited by Hiroshi Sato, pp. 77–100. Tokyo: Institute of Developing Economies, 1998. United Nations Development Programme (UNDP). Human Development Report. Dhaka: UNDP Bangladesh Office, 1996.

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Watanabe, Tatsuya. Minami kara no kokusai kyoryoku: Grameen ginko no chosen [International cooperation from the south: The challenge of the Grameen Bank]. Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten, 1997. World Bank. Partnership in Development: The World Bank’s Assistance to Bangladesh. Washington, D.C.: World Bank, 1998. Yamamori, Masami. “Kaihatsu enjo to b unka jinruigaku” [Development aid and cultural anthropology]. In Enjo kenkyu nyumon: enjo gensho heno gakusaiteki apur ochi [An introduction to the study on development aid: An interdisciplinary approach], edited by Hiroshi Sato, pp. 203–46. Tokyo: Institute of Developing Economies, 1996. Yamanaka, Ichiro. “Pakisutan no shuy o seiji erito” [Introduction: Major political elites in Pakistan]. In Pakisutan ni okeru seiji to kenryoku [The power structure in Pakistan: A study of the political elites], edited by I. Yamanaka, pp. 3–106. Tokyo: Institute of Developing Economies, 1992. Yunus, Muhammad. Banker to the Poor: The Autobiography of Muhammad Yunus, Founder of the Grameen Bank. Dhaka: University Press Limited, 1998.

© 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

This chapter is reproduced from The State and NGOs: Perspective from Asia , edited by Shinichi Shigetomi (Singapore: Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, 2002). This version was obtained electronically direct from the publisher on condition th at copyright is not infringed. No part of this publication may be reproduced, translated, stored in a retrieval system, or transmi tted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies and Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo.

INDIA—NGOs: INTERMEDIARY AGENTS OR INSTITUTIONAL REFORMERS? 57

3 India NGOs: Intermediary Agents or Institutional Reformers? Hiroshi Sato INTRODUCTION: NEED FOR STATE–NGO SYNERGY

Along with such internationally well-known environmental movements as the Chipko Movement and Nar mada Bachao Andolan (Save Narmada Movement), the estimated tens of thousands of non-governmental organizations (NGOs) in India give that country an important place in the NGO movement worldwide. If one looks at India’s long tradition of voluntarism — a tradition rooted in religious activities and the independence movement — the number of organizations, and the great variety of their activities, one would seem to find here the existence of an ideal coexistence between voluntary and nongovernmental organizations (henceforth VO/NGOs)1 and the government. However the wide-ranging legal and administrative regulations that will be discussed below indicate that the government regards the NGOs as docile intermediaries or subsidiaries for its own policies and that these regulations are putting many restrictions on NGO activities. Particularly strict regulatory measures are taken in India with respect to the overseas funding that provides an important funding source for VO/NGO activities. These regulations tend to limit VO/NGO activities to basicall y intermediary functions, and in this controlled environment many VO/NGOs in India indeed seem to find their raison d’être in intermediary functions. Of course this is not to say that, as long as grass-roots public administration does not function and poverty-alleviation programmes are not effectively carried out for the targeted social stratum, this kind of intermediary function is insignificant or irrelevant.

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However, the per spective of VO/NGO activity is not conf ined to an intermediary function posited on the existing market and governance systems. In fact, a function of institutional reform, that is, vigilance, criticism, and reform of the market and governance systems, is an indispensable element of VO/NGO activity, particularly that based on voluntarism. Indeed, it can be further argued that there is a complementary relationship between these two functions whereby it is necessar y to ensure the VO/NGOs’ institutional reform function in order to perfectly realize their intermediary function. Thus a substantive synergy of VO/NGOs and the state in India is er alized only when this institutional reform function ofVO/NGOs is also guaranteed. Given the present situa tion in India, the e xistence of these e xtensive restrictions on NGOs indicates that syner gy, at least in this fundamental sense, is yet to be established.This chapter, after giving a historical overview of VO/NGO activities in India fr om the abo ve point of vie w, will demonstrate, based on a r ecently published directory, the pr evalence of intermediary VO/NGOs. It will then identify a polic y of regulation and co-option of VO/NGOs by the government and indicate the points at issue. In conclusion, the prospects for a more substantive synergy will be drawn. HISTORICAL OVERVIEW AND THE ROOTS OF VOLUNTARISM Voluntarism in the Colonial Period2

Traditional voluntarism in India can be discussed in terms of a tradition of charity and philanthrop y seen in common among the v arious religious organizations. In the Christian and Muslim communities, in par ticular, charity is inseparable from the proselytizing mission. The charitable institutions among the Hindus, called dharmashala (dharma, religion or norms; shala, room), and Sikhs, called langalkhana (langal, free meals; khana, room), are for non-believers as well as believers. However, social activism among the Hindus in the modern period, especially their social reform movements, can be regarded as not so much a tradition as a reaction against Christian or Islamic proselytism. Today’s voluntarism can also be seen as a le gacy of the na tionalist movement. Mahatma Gandhi promoted a spirit of self-sacrifice or satyagraha that emphasized relative freedom from the state as the basis of the movement. Expression as an act of self-sacrifice is disinterested service (seva), and the one who performs such an action is a servant (sevak).

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Furthermore, a major theme of Indian nationalism was the reconstruction of rural society, impoverished under British r ule. Along with the left or socialist-oriented peasant movement, rural reconstruction mo vements in various forms were attempted in villa ges throughout India, particularly during and after the Great Depression of the 1930s. Many VO/NGOs active today began their activities during this period. VO/NGOs in the Post-Independence Period

The development of post-independence VO/NGO activities is divided into three stages: (1) up to the mid-1960s, (2) the mid-1960s to the 1970s, and (3) from the 1980s. It is also possible to see the period of economic liberalization that began in the 1990s as a new period (Sen 1998, 1999). The first period in the 1960s, or up to the middle of the decade, was a time of co-operative or complementary relations between the government and VO/NGOs. The institutional framework mediating tha t relationship was the Central Social Welfare Board on the feder al level, and the State Social Welfare Boards on the state level. During the second period, from the mid-1960s to the beginning of the 1980s, post-independence Congress rule faced an economic and political crisis as seen in the food and foreign exchange crises and the party’s setbacks in the fourth general elections. In the midst of this crisis,the party gradually began to lose political leadership on the state level. In the states of Kerala and West Bengal the vacuum was filled by the communist and other leftist parties. And dissatisfaction among the peasant class of fered a base of action for the so-called “peasant revolutionaries”, the Naxalites. As the movement declined, the youths who had participated in it shifted their base of action to the so-called Social Action Groups (SAGs). The activities of these SA Gs formed one of the streams that supported the VO/NGOs from the 1980s. The third period covers the 1980s to the present. During this period a limited coexistence began from the time of the seventh five-year plan (1985–90), when co-oper ation with VO/NGOs was called f or in the national planning (Section IV). From the second period, the issue of poverty emerged as a par ticularly big political problem. The Indira Gandhi government sought to weather the political crisis with radicalsounding campaigns, particularly the Garibi hatao (Remove poverty) campaign. Here can be found the roots of the proliferation from the 1970s of various subsidizing schemes aimed at rural development and the eradication of po verty. These schemes broadened the stage of

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VO/NGO activities on the one hand , but, on the other, they led many VO/NGOs to settle down in an intermediary role as subsidiaries of government policies, subject to the pressures of regulation and standardization (Sections III and IV). The author’s statement on the prevalence of this intermediary function in the activities of VO/NGOs today is neither negative nor exaggerated. In the next section I will examine the features of VO/NGO fields of activities and financing, based on a r elatively comprehensive and well-researched directory of Indian VO/NGOs,3 and will try to show that VO/NGO activities in India as a whole lean towards intermediary roles. INTERMEDIARY ROLES OF VO/NGOs Types, Targets, and Areas of Activities in Relation to Central Schemes

VO/NGO activities can be classified in terms of types, targets, and areas (DAINET 1998a, 1998b; see Table 3.1). With respect to types of activities, almost all the or ganizations are enga ged in education and campaign activities, with some one-third involved in advocacy activities. A high percentage also carry out networking activities. It figures out to an average of three or four types of acti vities per or ganization. The main targets are women, children, the rural population, tribal people, and slum, or urban, dwellers, reflecting the poverty-reduction policies in rural and urban areas since the 1970s. And on the average, a single organization has activities aimed simultaneously at four target groups. Finally, with respect to types of activities, there is a high percentage of economic activities aimed at lo w-income groups, such as incomegeneration, appropriate technology, agriculture, and micro-cr edit, besides activities in social sectors suc h as health, population issues, and the environment. Naturally, the per centage for mor e specialized fields is lower. In these fields a single VO/NGO operates, on average, in six or seven areas. The most important aspect about this table, however, is the comparison between the activity areas and the central schemes in each area. A rather close relationship can be inferred between the number of active organizations and the number of schemes. This indicates that VO/NGO activities are being developed on the basis of a strong relationship to government schemes in the social and other sectors. This becomes clear as well if funding aspects are analysed. © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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TABLE 3.1 VO/NGO Activities Number Number of Schemes of VO/NGOs (Central Government) Total Types of Activities Education/training Campaigns/activism Research/surveys Policy advocacy/advice Networking Technical assistance Technology development Marketing Total Targets of Activities Women/children Rural population Tribal/indigenous people Slums Urban population Disabled/handicapped Craftspeople Displaced persons Citizens/consumers Total Areas of Activities Health/nutrition Environment/pollution Income generation Water/sanitation Rural/appropriate technology Population issues Agriculture Micro-credit/entreprise development Forestry Housing Wasteland development Ecosystems/protected areas Wildlife Livestock management Disaster management/rehabilitation Energy Industry/business Economic policy issues Biodiversity Media Biotechnology Global warming/climate change Total Source: Enumerated from DAINET (1998a, 1998b). © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

3,287 3,107 1,975 1,461 1,087 991 989 762 713 11,085

96 86 41 35 12 46 23 5 344

3,057 2,495 1,709 1,330 1,163 1,019 787 560 510 12,630

77 62 15 5 15 9 6 1 2 192

2,439 2,301 2,031 1,577 1,420 1,401 1,344 1,070 1,004 978 882 648 619 595 570 543 531 500 472 458 305 200 21,828

28 16 45 6 17 15 24 15 10 4 7 2 2 4 9 4 2 4 0 0 2 0 216

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Dependence on Foreign and Government Funds

Here I e xamine first the f inancial scale distrib ution by sta te. Taking the percentage of organizations funded at the level of more than one crore (10 million) rupees as the standard, the f irst aspect tha t emerges is the extremely high percentage of large organizations in Delhi (13.8 per cent). This indicates a fea ture of the VO/NGO sector, namely concentration in the capital. Secondly, in the southern states the percentage of relati vely large organizations in terms of funding is high (8–9 per cent). In this group can also be included such places as Rajasthan (7.0 per cent) and Gujarat (7.3 per cent). Thirdly, states where small-scale organizations account for an overwhelmingly large percentage include Uttar Pradesh (only 1.0 per cent for large organizations), Bihar (1.6 per cent), Orissa (0.8 per cent), and Madhya Pradesh (3.0 per cent), places where the number of VO/NGOs mushroomed from the 1980s. It is dif ficult to f ind comprehensive data on VO/NGO funding procurement. Here I will examine the makeup of funding sources from DAINET (1998a), comparing Uttar Pradesh and Delhi (Tables 3.2 and 3.3). Of 167 organizations in Delhi, foreign funding accounts for more than half of the fund sources of 71 or ganizations (42.5 per cent). The corresponding figure for Uttar Pradesh is only 23.3 per cent. And the number of organizations in Uttar Pr adesh which are registered under the Foreign Contributions Regulation Act (FCRA) in order to r eceive contributions from abroad is onl y 91, as opposed to 153 in Delhi (computed from DAINET 1998a). One can also gather fr om this that the larger the financial scale and the more po werful the organization, the more apt it is to be funded to a high degree by foreign sources. One could also say tha t the Delhi VO/NGOs are in a sense a windo w for foreign funding. But, on the other hand, looking at the situation as a whole, 44 per cent of the or ganizations in Delhi and 72 per cent in Uttar Pradesh operate only on domestic funding (from the central or state government, donations, membership fees, sales income, etc.). In Table 3.4 I have attempted, for Uttar Pradesh, to organize the situation with regard to de pendency on go vernment funding of or ganizations that look to domestic sources for the greater part of their funds. On average, 56 per cent of these or ganizations depend on g overnment funding for more than half of their funds. Ev en rather small organizations depend to a large extent on government funding. About one-third of the organizations, and these are only small organizations, operate solely on funding from such sources as contrib utions,

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TABLE 3.2 Share of External Resources in Delhi VO/NGOs Annual Budget (rupees)

Foreign Fund Share 100 50–99 0–49 0 (percentage)

VO/NGOs (total number)

Ratio of VO/NGOs with more than 50% Foreign Funds

5 crores + 1 crore + 1 million + 0.5 million + 1 lakh + less than 1 lakh

0 1 6 2 0 0

8 10 22 13 8 1

4 1 9 6 2 0

3 8 22 12 21 8

15 20 59 33 31 9

53.3 55.0 47.5 45.5 25.8 11.1

Total

9

62

22

74

167

42.5

Notes:1. External resources include those from the government and foreign NGOs, donations, and other foreign funds. 2. Crore = 10 million; lakh = 100,000. Source: Enumerated from DAINET (1998a), vol. 1—Delhi.

TABLE 3.3 Share of External Resources in Uttar Pradesh VO/NGOs Annual Budget (rupees)

Foreign Fund Share 100 50–99 0–49 0 (percentage)

VO/NGOs (total number)

Ratio of VO/NGOs with more than 50% Foreign Funds

5 crores + 1 crore + 1 million + 0.5 million + 1 lakh + less than 1 lakh

0 0 0 1 2 0

0 2 22 20 19 4

0 0 3 4 5 1

0 1 12 18 90 96

0 3 37 43 116 101

0.0 66.7 59.5 48.8 18.1 4.0

Total

3

67

13

217

300

23.3

Source: Enumerated from DAINET (1998a), vol. 3—Uttar Pradesh (minor adjustments made).

membership fees, and sales income. From these tables one can see the centre–regional gap, the importance of government funding, and the inverse relation between voluntarism and funding supply in the VO/NGO sector. Seen as a whole, the Indian VO/NGOs’ subsidiary or complementary role to government schemes is clear.

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TABLE 3.4 Share of Government Fund in Uttar Pradesh VO/NGOs with Domestic Fund Majority Annual Budget (rupees)

Share of Government Fund Ratio of VO/NGOs 100 50+ 10+ less than 10 VO/NGOs with more than 50% (percentage) (total number) Government Fund

5 crores + 1 crore + 1 million + 0.5 million + 1 lakh + less than 1 lakh

0 1 7 7 36 21

0 0 3 10 30 14

0 0 3 2 12 8

0 0 2 3 17 54

0 1 15 22 95 97

0.0 100.0 66.7 77.3 69.5 36.1

Total

72

57

25

76

230

56.1

Notes: 1. Table includes 230 bodies in Table 3.3 with domestic fund majority. 2. Government includes both central and state governments. Source: Same as Table 3.3.

STATE REGULATION AND CO-OPTION VIS-À-VIS VO/NGOs

As we ha ve seen in the abo ve sections, with the rapid increase in VO/ NGOs since the 1980s the state has, on the one hand, recognized the work of VO/NGOs and, on the other hand, established re gulations to contr ol their activities and fund r aising. While the government depends to some extent on the NGOs as implementing or gans of its rural and lo w-income group programmes, it also exercises strict surveillance over any deviation from its own policy goals and over the foreign funding, which represents an important source of NGO funds. The framework of this sur veillance will be the next item to be examined. Main Regulatory Legislations

VO/NGO Registration

The legal framework for accreditation in India lies generally either in central legislation, namely the Societies Registration Act, 1860 (SRA), the Public Trust Act, 1882, and the Charitable and Relig ious Trust Act, 1920, or in state legislation conforming to these. There are also someVO/NGOs which have been established on the basis of the Co-operati ve Societies Acts or Trade Union Acts. The SRA, the purpose of which was to keep colonial order after the so-called “Sepoy Mutiny” of 1857, makes it mandatory for any association © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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with more than seven members to register. The fact that accreditation of VO/ NGOs in India is rooted in this kind of security legislation from the colonial period gives rise to two problems. First is the arbitrary or political nature of accreditation, and second is the incongruity with the realities of today in the VO/NGO activities. The first problem is inherent in the legislation itself, but it is further exacerbated by the frictions betw een VO/NGO activities and the government and by the strengthening of attempts to regulate on the part of the government. The problematic issues r egarding registration of organizations that have been pointed out by Voluntary Action Network India (VANI), an Indian VO/NGO forum engaged in publicizing the legal problems facing VO/ NGOs, can be grouped into the three areas of accreditation, administration, and others, as listed below (VANI 1994, 1996). Accreditation • Federal and state home ministries, the bodies that issue accreditations, raise objections about articles of incorporation that they do not like. • While it is the organization’s responsibility to ascertain that its name is not the same as that of an e xisting organization, the authorities do not have the necessary records to enable organizations to check. • With no time limit prescribed for the accreditation process, the process can be drawn out. Administration • The accrediting authority can exercise unlimited (arbitrary) supervision over the organizations. • In some states the organizations are obliged by law to get a renewal of accreditation (for example, every five years). • Drawing up the required financial and other reports is a big burden on small organizations. • Organizations are politicized by the involvement of administration or party officials in internal disputes o ver election or appointment of organization officials. • Regulations with respect to r emuneration for of ficials of the organizations differ from sta te to sta te, giving rise to confusion and corruption. Other problems • Re-examination of regulations on the appointment of administrators whom the accrediting body assigns to deal with improperly managed organizations. © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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• Re-evaluation of the limits of the authority of the accrediting body to dissolve an organization. These points raised b y the VO/NGOs indicate that the system of accreditation and supervision under the SRA indeed forms the basis of the surveillance by the government. In this respect, what VANI is asking for in demanding a shift to a basically automatic accreditation system is public space for VO/NGOs to carry out their work that is relatively independent of the state. Regulation on Funding

Along with the problem of accreditation rights for VO/NGOs is that of the system of regulating the financial side of the or ganizations, particularly such things as f inancial contributions from overseas. In this re gard, the VO/NGOs consider the Foreign Contribution Regulation Act, 1976 (FCRA) as being very important. There are a great number of specific regulations, but as with the SRA, I will attempt to summarizeVANI’s points of criticism (VANI 1994, 1996). • As with the SRA, the FCRA requires registration, using what is called the FC-8 Form, in order to receive funds from overseas. There is also the same problem of arbitrariness in the procedure. • The FCRA is under the jurisdiction of the f ederal Home Ministry, connoting here too an intent in the law to not so much control foreign currency as to exercise political surveillance. • When receipt of funding is involved, delay in registration amounts to refusal of permission to receive. • The requirements for registration are also arbitrary, so that, for example, while the law requires an organization to have operated for three years, this requirement is not strictly enforced. • Here, too, the accrediting bodies arbitrarily exercise powers of surveillance, giving rise to cases of interf erence in the activities of VO/NGOs. • A regulation that foreign funds must all be deposited in a single account hampers the organization’s flexibility in its activities. The Income Tax Act is another funding-r elated law that pr esents problems. It is clear from the SRA and FCRA examples that the relationship between the state and VO/NGOs is f ar from being one of co-oper ation © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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between equal partners. It may be an exaggeration to say that allVO/NGOs are under pressure from the government on a daily basis, but in the relationship between the two, the balance of power is heavily loaded against the VO/NGOs. And the imbalance in the relationship is mor e and more obvious the closer you get to the actual grass-roots activities of the organizations. State Co-option of VO/NGOs

The government’s policy of co-option of VO/NGOs was spelled out in no uncertain ter ms at the stage of dra wing up the se venth five-year plan for the 1985–90 period. The plan explicitly makes the participation of VOs the pillar of the r ural development and po verty-alleviation programmes (Indian Journal of Public Administration 1987). A list of eleven overall activities appended to this section of the plan enumerates the roles that the VOs are expected to play (things like complementing the government’s poverty-alleviation policies, technology transfer, and providing information). Most important are the following definitions that are stipulated for VOs: • The organization must be a legal entity. • It is based in a rural area and has three or more years of experience in the field of its activity. • It operates on a no-profit and no-loss basis with broad activity goals of serving the social and economic needs of the community as a whole, particularly its weaker sections. • Its activities must be open to all Indian citizens, irrespective of religion, caste, creed, sex, or race. • It has the flexibility, specialized capabilities, and organizational skills necessary to carry out its programmes. • Its officers and staff may not be elected or appointed of ficers of any political party. • It declares that it will employ constitutional and peaceful means in activities aimed at rural development. • It is committed to secular and democratic principles and management methods in pursuit of rural development goals. With stipulations such as these on the na ture of the or ganizations that are allowed to participate in its schemes, the government intrudes on even the organizations’ principles. Requiring a non-political and non-violent

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stance in their activities in the local communities would seem to be justified for the limited objective of carrying out rural-development and povertyalleviation programmes, but in fact these regulations can be used as the rationale for eliminating reform-oriented VO/NGOs. Up until now, the relation between VO/NGOs and the government has been limited to co-operative relations in the conte xt of specific schemes. There is no ongoing consultative mechanism or machinery for the two sides, extending from the centre to the local communities, only consultation between VO/NGOs and individual government agencies on the le vel of specific schemes or projects.

CONCLUSION: A VISION FOR STATE–VO/NGO SYNERGY

From the above examination it is clear that the go vernment expects VO/ NGOs to be lo yal and docile subsidiaries of its rural-de velopment and poverty-alleviation programmes. So in spite of the lar ge number of organizations and the great variety of activities that are undertaken, or the high repute some of the organizations enjoy internationally, the Indian VO/ NGO sector as a whole has no place where it can systematically hold a dialogue, as an equal, with the government. The government may allow the participation of VO/NGOs in specific schemes, but it does not trea t them as partners in its policies. In order to break out of this situation, a network of leading VO/NGOs, including VANI, drew up an Action Plan in March 1994 on the governmentVO/NGO relationship in collaboration with the g overnment-related agencies, with the Planning Commission as media tor. The main points of the plan are as follows: • The relationship between the two sides is open, transparent, and visible, entails accountability, and is mission-oriented. The government must make public relevant information. • A relationship as partners must extend from the centre to the level of the local community. At the centre the Planning Commission is responsible for mediating between the two. • In order to suppor t constructive social acti vities of VO/NGOs, the government will respect the v ariety of the VO/NGOs and not for ce standardization. • VO/NGOs will fulfil the two roles of “mobilization and organization” and “delivery of services”. © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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• VO/NGOs must have their own action ethics. • The existing legislation and rules are confusing and should be reviewed for simplification. In this agreement the VO/NGOs are seeking confirmation that their activities are not limited to deli very of services, and that the y occupy an equal position with the government. But this Action Plan is still just a piece of paper. Relationships between the government and VO/NGOs in the context of schemes of specific agencies or states are still all that exist. In spite of the efforts of VANI and other organizations, the pattern since the 1970s of the granting of funds by subsidy schemes centred on rural development and po verty alleviation, and the emer gence, in response, of numerous VO/NGOs, has not basically changed. As seen in the seventh plan, there is still a wide gap between the position of the government — seeing VO/NGOs as lo yal followers of its o wn programmes — and tha t of a number of proacti ve VO/NGOs, for whom strategies of voluntarism, mobilization, and organization are most important. Not that new possibilities cannot be seen in some re gions. In Kerala State a large-scale campaign in the context of the ninth five-year plan (1996– 2001), a campaign emphasizing planning from the villa ge level (People’s Plan), has involved Kerala Shastra Sahitya Parishad (KSSP), a VO that has been active in the liter acy movement in the state. De vising projects that meet the needs of the local communities starting at the village level is the aim of this People’s Plan, and some 40 per cent of the sta te’s funding for the plan has been set aside for use by local bodies at the district level and below. In the process KSSP, other VO/NGOs, and various individuals such as retired teachers and bureaucrats got involved in the scheme at the local level by offering their various skills and participated in the ref orm of the local system. This kind of co-operation with local bodies at the state level and below is seen as important in terms of the future direction ofVO/NGO activities.4 It is now generally recognized from the long experience of the ruraldevelopment and po verty-alleviation programmes that, as the literac y movement has clearly demonstrated in classic fashion in the social sector, the quality of the implementing or ganization at the local le vel largely determines the success or f ailure of a pr oject. Thus to eliminate the VO/ NGOs’ functions in the institutional renovation of the market system and political control system, and to give them only an intermediary function, is to jeopardize their ability to carry out smoothly even the intermediary © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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function with which they are tasked. In the Indian context, with its competitive party system, when VO/NGOs are able to participa te along with political par ties and other intermedia te organizations as catal yst agencies connecting the state and the individual in institutional renovation through public action, substantive state–VO/NGO synergy becomes a reality. Such participation in institutional renovation is a part of political action in a broader sense (as distinct from party-based action), and is better termed as the “collaborative politics” propounded by Amarty Sen in his various works.5 In India toda y, it is only in K erala where this kind of development can be seen. Notes 1

2 3

4

5

In India the term “NGO” only came into common use r ecently, and organizations often prefer to be called “voluntary organizations (VOs)”. In this context, it seems appropriate to use “VO/NGO” in this chapter. For the evolution of VO/NGO activity in India, see Sen (1998, 1999). DAINET (1998a) is far superior to CAPART (1992) as a dir ectory of VO/NGOs. Sen (1998, pp. 240–41) refers to several other directories. Isaac (2000) gives a detailed appraisal of the People’s Plan movement, from his standpoint as a planning organizer in the Kerala State Planning Board. For example, see Drèze and Sen (1995).

References

Council for Advancement of People’s Action and Rural Technology (CAPART). Directory of Voluntary Organisations. 4 vols. New Delhi, 1992. Development Alternative Information Network (DAINET). DAINET NGO Directory. 15 vols. New Delhi, 1998a. ———. DAINET Funding Sources Directory. New Delhi, 1998b. Drèze, Jean and A. Sen. India: Economic De velopment and Social Opportunity. Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1995. Indian Journal of Public Administration 33, no. 3 (July-September 1987). Isaac, Thomas (with R.W. Franke). Local Democracy and Development: People’s Campaign for Decentralized Planning in Kerala. New Delhi: LeftWord Books, 2000. Sen, Siddhartha. “The Nonprofit Sector in India”. In The Nonprofit Sector in the Developing World: A Comparative Analysis, edited b y Helmut © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

INDIA—NGOs: INTERMEDIARY AGENTS OR INSTITUTIONAL REFORMERS? 71

K. Anheier and Lester M. Salamon, pp. 198–293. Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1998. ——— . “Some Aspects of State–NGO Rela tionship in India in the Post-Independence Era”. Development and Change 30 (1999): 327–55. Voluntary Action Network India (VANI). Report of the Task Forces to Review and Simplify Acts, Rules, Pr ocedures Affecting Voluntary Organisations. New Delhi, 1994. ———. Laws, Rules and Regulations for the Voluntary Sector, Report of the South Asian Conference 6–10 March 1996. New Delhi, 1996.

© 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

This chapter is reproduced from The State and NGOs: Perspective from Asia , edited by Shinichi Shigetomi (Singapore: Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, 2002). This version was obtained electronically direct from the publisher on condition th at copyright is not infringed. No part of this publication may be reproduced, translated, stored in a retrieval system, or transmi tted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies and Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo.

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4 Sri Lanka Community Consultants in an Underdeveloped Welfare State Etsuyo Arai INTRODUCTION

Of all the developing countries, Sri Lanka is often cited as a country exceedingly advanced in social development. Low-cost education, medical service, food aid to broad sections of the population, various public charges reduced to low levels, agricultural aid policy, and other measures continued until the start of economic liberalization in 1977. Because of this, the economic space for non-governmental organizations (NGOs) in the areas of medical service and education had been limited. However, social welfare budgets were substantially cut after 1977, while the government promoted the privatization of medical service and education. The deterioration in the political and economic environments due to the falls in prices of plantation crops, the activities of anti-government guerrillas, and other reasons, had begun early in the 1970s, and it may be said that the economic liberalization of 1977 provided momentum to the expansion of the scope of economic activities of the NGOs. According to a survey of the NGOs which had been established in the country by 1990 (IRED 1991), 60 per cent had been set up after 1978. The purpose of this chapter is to describe how the NGOs acted and what role they played between the government and residents in Sri Lanka, where the government had a clear intention to provide services widely and at low prices. What was wanted of NGOs by the state,which was the main provider of resources, and the inhabitants, who were their recipients?

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Even before 1977, the activities of NGOs were indispensable where government welfare policy was lacking, although the areas of their activities were circumscribed. In the following sections the writer will clarify the relations of NGOs with the government and the inhabitants by studying on a period-by-period basis the welfare policy of the government and the changes in its development policy, together with the development of NGO activities. In discussing NGOs in Sri Lanka, it is necessary to clearly distinguish NGOs from community-based organizations (CBOs). According to a survey in 1991, in Sr i Lanka ther e were about 30,000 or ganizations calling themselves “NGOs” (World Bank 1995, p. 129). They were classified as such because they were non-governmental and non-profit organizations, and so-called CBOs, which ought to have been classified otherwise, were included. In Sri Lankan communities there were professional, religious, and other associations aimed at mutual aid and agrarian development, but there were great regional differences in character in these or ganizations. Such organizations were established on a village basis and were organized by members of communities and villagers for their own benefit. Two-thirds of the 30,000 organizations are believed to have been such CBOs. In this chapter non-governmental, non-profit organizations excluding CBOs are called NGOs.

DEVELOPMENT OF NGOs Colonial Period

The welfare system of Sri Lanka has been greatly influenced by the British colonial policy. Towards the end of the nineteenth century, Fabian socialist ideas were introduced into Sr i Lanka e xperimentally. Furthermore, the introduction of welfare policy by Britain may be said to have been a kind of industrial policy. The British colonialists mana ged plantations where low-wage Indian workers had been brought in to work as plantation labourers. In those days plantation labourers worked under unsanitary conditions and were easily susce ptible to infectious diseases. Therefore, the health preservation of labourers was an important task as it directly affected their productivity.1 A training school for doctors and a nurses’ training school were established in 1870 and 1878 respectively, and health units were introduced in 1926 to extend guidance in health preservation. Health care had been free of charge.

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The earliest NGO activities in those days were probably educational work aimed at the propagation of Christianity by Christian missionary organizations. The colonial government supported their work partly with a view to getting Ceylonese officials trained in the use of English (de Silv a 1965). The oldest domestic NGO is the Colombo Friend-in-Need Society , established in 1831 (at present engaged in medical services related to artificial legs and surgical operations). Feeling a sense of crisis from the activities of Christian missionaries, Ceylonese Buddhists, Muslims, and Hindus began to establish their organizations in the latter half of the 1880s. As an overseas NGO which was not a Christian missionary organization, the Rockefeller Foundation started its activities in Sri Lanka in 1915, contributing to the stamping out of the hookworm disease and malaria (Uragoda 1997, p. 65).As an American organization operating in a Britishruled colony, the Foundation at first met with difficulties in its activities in ways different from other organizations. However, the colonial government came to co-operate in its work to invite doctors from the United States, and also to train local doctors and hold educational seminars, after realizing that the health of the plantation labourers was a problem that directly affected their productivity. After the promulgation of the Donoughmore Constitution in 1931 up to Ceylon’s independence, the country was administered as a semiautonomous government. The constitution itself stipulated fundamental provisions related to the eradica tion of po verty, social security , education, and health preser vation. Furthermore, universal suffrage, which was introduced in Ceylon for the first time in Asia, resulted in further expanding Sri Lanka’ s welfare policy. This is because the parliament members elected by the people, who were given powers to decide domestic matters, adopted welfare-related measures one after another and institutionalized them, practically without due consideration for the financial resources necessary for the implementation of these measures and of their effect (Jayasuriya 1996, p. 4). The Poor Law2 was formulated in 1939 on the basis of the Wedderburn Report, a law which was aimed at extending relief to the unemployed, paupers, aged people, orphans, and other needy people in urban areas where the traditional family system and mutual-aid systems had collapsed (SLG 1947, p. 22). Ho wever, the implementation of the system was limited to the three cities of Colombo, Kandy, and Galle, and the system itself consisted mainly of the provision of funds to the NGOs3 which operated their institutions, and funds necessary for their upkeep (SLG 1947, p. 25). © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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Post-Independence Period — Promotion of Centralized Welfare and Development Policy and NGOs

Sri Lanka won its independence in 1948 from Britain without experiencing a war of independence tha t other Asian countries had to under go, and its independence was not acquired through voluntary and positive demand. 4 After independence Ceylonese leaders, unable to present a clear-cut policy for nation-building, resorted to the continuation and strengthening of the distribution of resources to wide-ranging areas centred on free education and medical service, as a means of national unif ication.5 The financial resources for the implementation of this policy were obtained from plantations (Hirashima 1989, p. 260). Sr i Lanka’s political and electoral systems attached importance to welfare measures and measures for the poor, not just for a relatively short period but for a long time after independence. The eligible voters were strongly interested in elections, taking it for granted that the members of parliament and local council members should fulfil their commitments to local people. There are two major parties in Sri Lanka, the United National Party (UNP) and the Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP). The opposition party would criticize the governing party at elections and win power by presenting a new, attractive policy — a political pattern that has been repeated regularly until today. In this situation since 1956 the SLFP , co-operating with socialist par ties, has endeavoured to distinguish itself from the UNP by hammering out a socialist policy. When in power, the UNP did not a bolish the welfare measures and subsidies instituted b y the SLFP, so tha t each time the SLFP became the governing party, the role of the state in the national economy expanded. As a result, by the mid-1970s schools and land had been nationalized, and the distribution of land to landless peasants, distribution of seeds and fertilizer as aid to small farmers, agricultural finance, a guaranteed rice purchase system, and other similar measures had been implemented by the state. For twenty years after independence, the outlay for public services6 — such as education, medical service, transportation, electric power, and water services — and food subsidies accounted for 40 per cent of public expenditure (Jayasuriya 1996, p. 6). Free medical service was continued, and Western and traditional medical services were managed and controlled in parallel by the government (Jayasuriya 1996, p. 9). A high literacy rate, a low mortality rate, and a high average life expectancy were attained thanks to the spread of education and free medical service. However, a social security system for the socially vulnerable section of the population was neglected. Unemployment insurance and a pension

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system were only introduced for the benefit of urban workers and public officials. However, the government delayed taking true welfare measures, for instance, measures for the handicapped, economically weak people, and measures for the victims of natural disasters, including relief. The few measures taken were disproportionately favourable to people in the urban areas, while measures taken for agrarian communities were poor in scale and quality. Relief measures for agrarian people were neglected, as is clear from a government report, which stated that relief measures should be taken on a priority basis for needy people in cities where the family system had collapsed. It was the NGOs tha t made up for this inadequac y of social security . Therefore the government was not in a position to exclude the NGOs, and consequently both the NGOs and the government helped and co-operated positively with each other (SLG 1959,p. 107). The government went so far as to say that where government spending was concerned, it was more effective for the government to extend subsidies f or the upkeep of NGOrun facilities. Thus, the government expenditures for the four governmentrun homes for the aged throughout the country amounted to 659,000 rupees, while the amount of government spending on thirty NGO-run homes for the aged totalled 432,000 rupees. In terms of the number of persons taken care of, those in the NGO-run homes for the aged accounted for two-thirds of the total number of the aged in such homes (SLG 1959, p. 100). NGOs were also ahead of the government in providing services to the physically handicapped. Six NGOs were given subsidies amounting to 134,000 rupees, and sixty-six NGO-run day nurseries were given government subsidies totalling 286,000 rupees, while government subsidies were also given to NGOs engaged in relief activities for the refugees of natural disasters. These NGOs were managed by wealthy people in urban areas, and it is supposed that contributions were also made by such people. For them, such NGO activities were acts of c harity, so that the y did not de velop into an “advocacy type” movement calling for expanded relief measures for the socially weak.7 Furthermore, if we examine the government’s agrarian policy, we will note that it presented a sharp contrast to its welfare measures for the socially weak, as its agrarian policy covered wide sections of the agrarian population. It must be emphasized at the same time that central government agencies carried out their own projects along the lines of vertical administration. In concrete terms, the government pursued an income-supplementing policy, such as food subsidies,8 agrarian finance, distribution of agricultural products at low prices, and rice purchase guarantee. It is true that these services © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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covered wide-ranging social sections and that the scope of persons covered was widely specified, but this did not mean that it was easy to receive services. The services were gi ven by different government agencies, not from a unified government organ. This was because the recipients of services were agrarian organizations9 established by the government in villages to facilitate reception of services as well as CBOs. Even in policy areas outside the income-supplementing measures, in infrastructure and agrarian development policy10 which were supposed to create employment, it was the government which distributed public resources and enlisted agrarian people into government projects by utilizing and revitalizing11 existing CBOs in village communities. However, many of these CBOs found it necessary to attach importance to the maintenance of a patron–client relationship with the members of parliament and local leaders, so that they were strongly politically tinged. 12 Unfair distribution of goods to particular groups was frequently criticized. In addition to the abo ve-mentioned politically inclined or ganizations, there was an overwhelmingly large number of less politically inclined CBOs, including professional, religious, and mutual-aid associa tions, organized on a community-level basis for the benefit of local inhabitants and villagers. In the 1980s Gramodaya Mandalaya associations were established 13 as community-level organizations to unite the villag e communities. These associations were composed of representatives who were non-political and voluntary rural leaders. Shown in Table 4.1 are organizations qualified as constituent members of Gramodaya Mandalaya.14 The functions of CBOs were man y and varied. There were many savings and finance associations in the form of CBOs, and some of them had formed their national organizations. Their activities were significant in the areas of informal education and the improvement of the position and training of women. It is true that although compulsory education was free of charge in Sri Lanka, the rate of dropouts was high because of poverty and other reasons. CBOs played the role of supplementing government policy by giving vocational and religious education to such children and youths (Jayasinghe 1982, p. 207). It may thus be said that CBOs were par tially in char ge of resources distribution within communities. Therefore, the adequac y of r esources distribution was related to the ability of CBOs. However, because of their nature, CBOs had limitations regarding technical knowledge and management ability. In view of this NGOs helped CBOs, which aimed to provide social services to their members by finding and training community leaders and leading them to acquire knowledge about managing community affairs and resources distribution. The government placed high expectations © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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TABLE 4.1 NGO Members of Gramodaya Mandalaya 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10. 11. 12. 13. 14. 15. 16. 17. 18.

Young Farmers Club Branch Communities of Multi-Purpose Co-operative Societies Dayaka Sabhas Buddhist Associations Christian Associations Hindu Associations Muslim Associations Cultural Societies Arts Societies Schools Development Societies Fisheries Societies Consumer Societies Hospitals Societies Red Cross Societies Rural Development Societies Handicraft Societies Carpentry Societies Community Centres

19. 20. 21. 22. 23. 24. 25. 26. 27. 28. 29. 30. 31. 32. 33. 34. 35.

Sarvodaya Societies Credit Societies Mahila Samithis Sports Clubs Kulangana Samithis Sahanadara Societies Sucharitodaya Societies Social Welfare Societies Mutual Benefit Societies Death Donation Societies Rate Payers’ Associations Shramadana Societies Societies for the Prevention of Crime Bus Travellers’ Associations Lions Club Rotary Club Jaycees Organizations

Source: Leitan (1990, p. 42).

on the possibilities of CBOs and NGOs’ funds and their expertise in such matters and took the role of leading NGOs to organize CBOs in an attempt to get local inhabitants to participate in development projects. Sarvodaya is a typical example of the above-mentioned characteristics of NGOs. Not only did Sarvodaya penetrate about one-third of all the villages in Sri Lanka, but it also had a great influence on the later NGOs devoted to agrarian development through its organization of activities.15 Sarvodaya began with the shramadana camp movement which was launched in agrarian villages by Dr Ariyaratne, a high school teacher in Colombo, together with his students. Shramadana means “donation of labour”. Since olden times, villagers in the agrarian communities of Sri Lanka had been engaged in the unpaid labour of construction and repairing of roads and irrigation facilities as well as other activities within their own communities (Mizuno 1988, p. 157). The main aim of Sarvodaya was to make villagers aware of their individuality, their families and communities, with special emphasis on communities. A CBO called a Sar vodaya society w as formed in eac h community, to strengthen the internal unity of a community by training

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community leaders and developing shramadana camp activities. 16 Next, the Sarvodaya society planned and carried out necessary projects (training, education, small-scale finance) for separate groups of mothers, young people, and children. It also aimed, in its later stage of development, to promote self-reliance in communities through the creation of employment and other economic activities. The central unit of Sarvodaya activities was a community or a group. Many of the NGOs engaged in agrarian development in Sri Lanka adopted this form, developing their activities on the basis of groups which depended on existing CBOs or groups. Here, too, CBOs were expected to receive external services, including those other than government services and to distribute such services to communities or individuals.17 However, this did not mean that all the people were members of one CBO or another who received government services or services through NGOs. It was more difficult for the socially weak who were unable even to form CBOs to access services and r esources. There actually existed such NGOs which were specially devoted to serving the poorest sections of society. Economic Stagnation in the 1970s and Economic Liberalization in 1977

In the 1970s industrialization for import-substitution, dependence on plantations, and high level welfare began to strain Sri Lanka. Due to the spread of the education system, the labour market was supplied with highly educated school gr aduates every year, but the countr y failed to cr eate a private labour market to absorb them, and rising levels of unemployment and a lowered living standard began increasingly to attract public dissatisfaction. Anti-government revolts (in 1971) of young people from agrarian Sinhalese communities also a ggravated social unrest. 18 Welfare and social service spending was beginning to become a burden on the government. If we examine the number of NGOs established in this period, we will note that the NGOs involved in the areas of social welfare, medical service, and guidance in nutrition began to grow (Table 4.2). Furthermore, there was an increase in NGOs engaged in vocational training, which also developed relief activities for the unemployed, who were beginning to cause a social problem. It was also in the 1970s that research and enlightenmenttype NGOs were formed, with the aim of studying the fundamental causes of continued low economic growth and low development, and to present guidelines for action.

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Elders’ homes/ orphanages Education and adult education Handicapped/disabled Poverty alleviation Social welfare Urban poor Counselling Housing

Social Welfare

Women and Youth

Gender awareness Women and development Youth activities

Child Education Children/child care

Agriculture Animal husbandry Farmers’ organizations Fisheries Minor irrigation Organic farming Plantation activities Rural development Rural technical services Community development Shramadana

Rural Development

Area of Activity

1 2

1

1 1 1

1

2

1

2 1

2

4 1

1

1 3

4 1

1

2

2

2

2 1 3

1 1

2 1

2

1

1

1 3 4

4

1

1 1 4 1

1

1 1

1 2

1 1

6 8

3

7 3 2 1

2 2

2

6 9

2

3

9 3

7 2

1

3 5

2 4

2 2

1 1

4 1 4 6

3 2

4 3

1 14 12

4

1 1 16 5 3 5

2

2 9

7 7 1 3 3 2 2 12

22 16

10

8 3 1 14 9 4 8

3

12 8

8 6 1 2 4 1 4 17

2 20 19

6

22 5 3 11

13 3

1

17 16

5 5 2 3 18

17 12

1800s 1900–20 1921–30 1931–40 1941–50 1951–60 1961–70 1971–77 1978–83 1984–90

TABLE 4.2 NGOs’ Areas of Activities

4 77 74

33

32 12 3 80 29 13 30

15

43 33 2 13 15 5 12 62 1 41 50

Total

80 ETSUYO ARAI

Energy management Environment protection

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Human rights/ minority rights Legal literacy, legal aid

Appropriate technology Technology development Training—vocational Training enterprise development Training management

Law

Technical Training

2

Entrepreneurship development Handicraft/small industries Market/marketing Savings/credit/rural banking Self-employment/income generation 1 Small enterprise/business development

Economic Activities

2

Family planning Health and nutrition First aid Indigenous medicine Water and sanitation

Health and Sanitation

Refugees and Refugees, relief, Rehabilitation and rehabilitation

Environment

5

1

1

3

1

2

1

3

1

2

1

2

1

4

4

3

1

1 1

2

1

1

2

2

2

1

3 1

1

2

6

1

2 1

1

5

1 1 6

1

1 6

8

1 1

3

1 8

1

1

7

2

3

1

7

2

1 4 26 1 2

1 2

5 3

4

20

13

1 7

1 12

1 23

22

1 8

1 7 17

9 2

1

12

6

6

4

3 10

10

3

6 5

5 27

10 3

17

39

3 15 2 22

1 30 1 2 13

25

1 18

Continued

8 15

3 17 98

28 9

26

89

4 38 3 52

6 79 3 3 35

82

3 32

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2

1

4

Total number of NGOs

Source: Prepared by the author with data from IRED (1991, 1996).

6

2

1

5

1

3

1

10

2

3

19

5

5

1

1

1

Peace and harmony

Art Cultural activities International relations Religious activities Sports and recreation activities

2

Peace

4

Cultural Activities

3

1

1

1 1

1 3

1

2 4

Research and Advocacy

1

19

3

5

1 4

1 3

3

5

43

9

8

2

2

2 2

20

12

1

1

61

3

3 1 8

2

5 6

19

11

3

111

9

5

2 3

3

11 13

23

19

2

5

1800s 1900–20 1921–30 1931–40 1941–50 1951–60 1961–70 1971–77 1978–83 1984–90

Awareness creation Consultancies, research, and studies Communication/ documentation/media Seminars and workshops

Networking Training programmes for NGOs, NGO animators

NGO Alliance

Area of Activity

TABLE 4.2 (continued)

281

34

3 13 1 39

9

21 25

75

58

3

10

Total

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After the economic liberalization of 1977, the government was required to reduce fiscal deficits through structural adjustment, carrying out cuts in welfare and promoting privatization. Privatization first proceeded in the areas of bus service and state-run industries. The doctors in state service were allowed to work part-time outside of their medical work in state-run hospitals. In the provision of government services to agrarian communities, the principle of all-round service to wide sections of society was abandoned in favour of selective service, for instance, by introducing an income limit system (Jayasuriya 1996, p. 15). In the development of agrarian communities, distribution of goods was either discontinued or curtailed, and the supply of agricultural products was promoted on the basis of market principle. Although the government advocated liberalization, the promotion of privatization, and the independence of agrarian communities, at the same time reverse tendencies were also in e vidence. The system by which parliament members and local leaders influenced the distribution of resources was preserved by the establishment of a minister in char ge of districts. Therefore, in spite of v arious budget-cutting measures, the flow of resources through CBOs continued. Era of Diversification in the 1990s

The problems faced by Sri Lanka diversified in the 1990s. Urbanization proceeded, though not with so serious an impact as in other developing countries, and the life-styles of Sri Lankan people also diversified. Ethnic conflict continued from 1983, and the impact of the long-drawn civil war took diverse forms, including a lar ge number of refugees, physically handicapped people, and orphans due to battles and land mines. Not only physical relief but also mental care for them were needed. Furthermore, Sri Lanka supplied a large number of workers to Middle Eastern countries, and their remittances were a means of earning foreign currency. As many of the workers were women working as maids, caring for people left in their home country became important. 19 Such care was of a nature which the government’s traditional all-round relief measures wer e unable to respond to. A process was necessary to identify those who suf fered from problems and deserved such care, and to determine the degree of relief they needed. The government, recognizing the seriousness of this problem, began developing projects for the education and vocational training of physically handicapped persons, and projects to address the problem of the aged. This was done partly in r esponse to the ser ious discussion of these problems in the United Nations and other international organizations.

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The need for a change in the quality of services began to be recognized in other areas, too. As the government lacked the expertise in providing such services, representatives of NGOs wer e urged to par ticipate in go vernment committees concerned and extend their co-operation. Furthermore, NGOs mediated between the government and the recipients of government services, assisting in project adjustment, the education of recipients and the promotion of self-reliance among the r ecipients. What the recipients demanded of NGOs was their ability to obtain resources from the government and foreign donors, and to have practical knowledge, including legal knowledge, for their self-reliance. The government also expected NGOs to specify ne w demands for government services from communities. Another significant change in the 1990s was the decentralization of government authority. As stipulated by the Indo–Sri LankanAccord of 1987, Provincial Councils were instituted. Consequently , the province became the unit of regional administration to which government powers were partially delegated. Due to this change in the administrative system, the powers of members of parliament, who had previously played a core role in the distribution of resources, were reduced.20 On the other hand, provincial governments, although it was pointed out that their authority was limited (Cooray 1995, p. 552), began to provide services in the areas of medical service and education, which the central government had failed to extend. This served to make up for the inefficiency of vertical administration, which continued even after the decentralization of authority. Furthermore, even if a provincial government was to start a project, in most cases it lacked the necessary knowledge in project planning, not to speak of subsequent processes. In this situation NGOs functioned mainly to do research work through CBOs on what kind of services were desired and to select the recipients of services.

LEGAL SYSTEM: FREE ACTIVITIES AND CO-OPERATION OF NGO ACTIVITIES TO SELECTIVE REGISTRATION

For a long time, the registration of NGOs was voluntary, though the provision of subsidies by the go vernment served as an incenti ve to re gister. The registered NGOs were sometimes audited in cases where the government or the irregularities investigation committee had asked them to submit a report or conduct an in vestigation on suspicion of briber y (World Bank 1995, p. 131), but NGOs were basically free to manage their funds for

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activities and select the areas and content of their acti vities. Those NGOs which did not receive subsidies from the government had only to register themselves as corporations in case it was necessary for them to manage their funds, but were not obligated to register themselves. They were also allowed the following choices regarding the forms of registration and the organizations with which to register themselves. 1. Registration with the Societies Ordinance Office 2. Registration as non-profit organizations under the Corporation Act 3. Make a formal report to the government agency concerned according to the content of their activities (in case they were managing projects jointly with the government or receiving government subsidies) 4. International NGOs were required to exchange memoranda with ministries concerned with policy planning and implementation21 5. Registration under the Voluntary Social Service Or ganizations Act (VSSOA) The Societies Ordinance, which was formulated in 1891, stipulated the functions and conditions for an or ganization to qualify as an ordinary corporation. It was last revised in 1949. Article 3 of this ordinance provided that organizations engaged in the promotion of the economy , saving, and providing relief to those suffering from disease and emergency aid as well as aid to widows and orphans, and other organizations regarded as proper by the government, should be qualified as corporations. NGOs were registered as such only if they presented papers describing the content of their activities, their rules, and the scale of their activities, to the Divisional Secretariat. They were audited, b ut only if the authority considered it necessary would a notice be given to an NGO requesting it to submit the necessary papers. These were general provisions for registration of NGOs as ordinary corporations, while this ordinance provided for the rights of NGOs as corporations. The VSSOA was enforced after 1970 in response to an increase in the number of NGOs and the inflow of funds from foreign donors. It provided for the registration and auditing of NGOs, which were controlled mainly by the social welfare bureau. The VSSOA provided that all organizations were obligated to register themselves. It was possible for them to register with a county-level authority. It also provided that in case a complaint was made about personal misappropriation in the management of an NGO or bribery, the minister concerned should designate a b ureau to car ry out

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investigations. Furthermore, according to one of its provisions, anyone who violated the law or ignored a government order would be punished by a fine not e xceeding 250 rupees. As of 1995, 2,100 or ganizations were registered under this act. However, up until the 1980s,there had been hardly any case of refusal without reason of registration or auditing by the authorities. No NGOs had been fined for failure to register themselves, so that in effect the VSSOA had been merely a registration law. In other words, the government felt little need to control the NGOs, and legal regulations were extremely relaxed. However, the situation changed suddenly in the 1990s. The Regulation Concerning Non-Government Organizations, promulgated in December 1993, obligated NGOs with an annual fund of 50,000 rupees or more to register themselves with the Director of Social Services, while NGOs with an annual fund of more than 100,000 rupees had to submit a detailed report of annual activities22 audited by a qualified auditor. The officers responsible for any NGO violating this stipulation were punished by imprisonment of less than five years or a fine of less than 50,000 rupees. If it violated the act, the NGO concerned would forfeit its registration and was not permitted to register anew for one year. The Regulation’s definition of an NGO was broader than tha t of the VSSOA, as it co vered organizations concerned with local development, improvement of the livelihood of people, research, study, and training facilities as well as environmental protection organizations. The act did not cover co-operatives and funeral assistance associations. The VSSOA was revised in 199823 to further strengthen the auditing of NGOs. According to the revised act, if it was found that there was a problem in an NGO as a result of an investigation by the bureau, the minister concerned was authorized to appoint a provisional control organization to take over the function of the decision-making organ of the NGO. About 400 NGOs lodged a protest with the Ministry of Social Services against the VSSOA amended bill, stating that the pr oposed bill gr ossly violated a freedom of association guaranteed by the Constitution.The protest letter took particular issue with the fact that the scope covered by the proposed bill was too wide and that there was a danger that it might be applied retroactively to past violations. The NGO Secretariat was established in 1999 within the Ministry of Social Services to fulfil the duty of registering NGOs, accepting donors, functioning as an NGO information centre, and overseeing the activities of NGOs. However, according to this writer’s survey, as of October 1999, it was not functioning in actual practice as e xpected. An act for re gulating

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NGOs was formulated in the 1990s, but it is questionable if the government intended to regulate all NGOs. This is because the act w as thought to be intended to regulate certain NGOs and NGOs engaged in activities in particular areas. In concrete terms, it expressed the government’s precautions against the expansion of the Sar vodaya Movement. This expansion was facilitated by large funds provided by foreign donors. The other NGOs the government intended to regulate included some Christian NGOs, and organizations which were thought to be dir ectly or indirectly supporting the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), which was at war with the government, demanding separ ation and independence f or Tamils in the country.

RELATIONS BETWEEN THE STATE AND NGOs: COMPLEMENTARY AND ANTAGONISTIC

As explained above, it appears that the relationship between the state and NGOs in recent years, as seen from the standpoint of the legal systems, was tense. However, the relationship was not the same in all cases. NGOs co-operated with and complemented the government in some areas, and were in antagonistic relations with the government in other areas. As we have seen, the government formulated the VSSOA in 1982 and began to show its intention of controlling the NGOs. This was because, after the 1970s’ increase in NGOs and overseas NGOs, there were NGOs engaged in anti-government activities, NGOs whose activities duplicated the government’s development projects. There were also some cases in which large sums of money were misappropriated by individuals from the funds of NGOs. However, the NGOs to which the go vernment took a cautious a ttitude changed from time to time according to government policy and social situations, so that there were cases in which the government applied the regulations arbitrarily in many cases. For instance, Sarvodaya was subjected to harassment by President Premadasa early in the 1990s. Under presidential order, state media be gan attacking Ariyaratne, the leader of Sar vodaya organization and the founder of the movement. An investigation committee was set up within the government, and the activities of Sarvodaya were suspended for a time. The suspension ended only after President Premadasa was assassinated.24 The Regulation of 1993 was based on recommendations by this investigation committee.

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The conversion of poor sections of society by fundamentalist Christian organizations aroused repulsion against them on the part of various religious organizations, which led to a social problem. The government was most cautious about the activities of NGOs in the areas related to the ethnic conflicts. In the regions where the civil war was raging, there were places which the go vernment officials were unable to enter, so that the g overnment could not b ut depend on NGOs to e xtend relief to refugees. These were the areas where onl y NGOs could develop relief activities. However, at the same time ther e were, as it turned out, organizations which, apart from their ostensible activities, extended financial aid to LTTE and assisted it covertly. The areas where these NGOs developed their activities were remote from the residential areas of ordinary people, so that it was difficult to obtain accurate information about the use of large sums of money that flowed into such areas. The government could not but be wary about those human rights-advocating NGOs which appealed to the international community about the violations of the human rights ofTamils victimized by the long-drawn civil war. Mentioned above are instances of antagonistic relations between the Sri Lankan Government and NGOs. Basically, however, the relations between the government and NGOs were not so critical. As explained earlier in the chapter, the Sri Lankan Government concerned itself positively with more welfare and a wider distribution of resources. Members of parliament from the government party and influential local leaders played important roles in the distribution of resources. Benefits were distributed through CBOs run by the supporters and thereby welfare distribution became an avenue for the maintenance of patron–client relationship. NGOs provided CBOs not only with resources but also with expertise and legal knowledge related to income-earning, construction of infrastructure, and technical assistance on management and control. In other words, they played the role of development consultants to CBOs. In the areas of welfare services for the socially weak — where the government was inept – NGOs filled the gap and the government evaluated their activities as necessary and indispensable, paying subsidies to them, although the amount was negligible. Furthermore, even in the 1990s emphasis was laid by the government on development plans to r aise the living standard of the poor , by measures such as the Janasaviya, Samurdhi, and other plans. In other words, the governments, both central and provincial, wanted to introduce some welfare services and a system of income distribution even after the move to economic liberalization, whenever an opportunity w as offered. Thus, they did not © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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intend to totally deny all the activities of NGOs which served as a means of low-cost and effective implementation of resources distribution. Moreover, there appeared to be an intention on the part of the government to strengthen the functions of NGOs.There were cases in which NGO leaders participated in training systems offered by the various ministries concerned, and there was also a system for exempting NGO facilities from taxation (World Bank 1995, p. 131). Strongly territory-minded, Sri Lankan government agencies moved to control or suppress NGOs which were regarded as infringing upon the authority or powers of the government, or in case where there was clear evidence that an NGO was assisting LTTE or criticizing the government. Nevertheless, the government did not arbitrarily take strong suppressive action against NGOs. Thus, NGOs were selectively allowed to participate in policy-making and implementation, while they endeavoured to upgrade their skills and gather and supply information as groups of specialists. However, inasmuch as NGOs had seen Sarv odaya societies suppressed severely by the government in the past, they were always aware of the possibility of arbitrary application of repressive laws against them, even though they understood well that the particular regulation adopted was targeted at particular NGOs. Thus, the federations of NGOs made efforts to maintain cordial relations with the government, exchanging information and adjusting their projects, in order not to worsen relations unnecessarily.

CONCLUSION

As we have seen, Sri Lanka has been attaching importance in its policy to resources distribution, centred on medical care and education, since before its independence. In spite of the fact that there were areas where resources did not sufficiently reach people in need of them, as in the case of its welf are policy for the socially weak people, it may be said that the state satisfied people’s needs to a cer tain extent. For the recipients of resources, CBOs were formed to distribute resources from the state to their members. Therefore, what was required of NGOs in Sri Lanka was not to provide resources, but to function as consultants linking the government and CBOs to provide advice and assistance to both, so that the resources might be better distributed and more effectively utilized after distribution. After the economic liberalization of 1977, the government weakened its function of resources distribution, so that NGOs were required to play a more important role. © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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In short, the relationship between the state and NGOs in Sri Lanka is complementary. However, it is also a fact that this relationship has become somewhat tense in recent years, because it is now entangled with the national ethnic problems. Notes 1

2

3

4 5

6

7

8

9 10

11

12

The situation changed after independence and the living standard of Tamil and other labourers on the plantations was lowered compared with that of people in urban areas and agrarian communities. However, their demand for a higher living standard did not surface, as they lived in geographically separated places, were deprived of freedom of movement, and were disenfranchised as immigrant labourers. This law was patterned after the Poor Law of Britain in the 1830s. Under the impact of the Great Depression, there was an increase in unemployment in those days. The report uses the term “voluntary organization”, but we use the term “NGO” here. There were also Sri Lankans opposed to independence. The promotion of Sinhala nationalism was another means of national unification. The discontent of middle-class Sinhalese (public of ficials, teachers, Buddhist priests) from agrarian community origins was growing against the Tamils, who were active in urban areas, earning high income by utilizing their knowledge of English and their special a bilities. The SLFP government won the 1956 election, calling for the adoption of Sinhalese as the official language of Sri Lanka. Although this is not classified in the category of welfare, it tends to be regarded as a link in the chain of welfare policy in the sense that it facilitates access to other services. There were NGOs which appealed for the abolition of child labour at the same time; however, they were rare cases. Emergency food rationing (rice and wheat flour) introduced duringWorld War II continued in the post-war period as a permanent system. Agricultural co-operatives, agriculture service centres, etc. Settlement programme, Mahaveli project, IRDP (Integrated Rural Development Programme), etc. Rural development societies and other organizations formed in villages with the support of the government. Therefore, the service was large in scale as one for agrarian communities, but it is doubtful as to how much it benefited them. It may have had

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14

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16 17

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19

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some effect in cushioning the impact of cuts in distr ibution, economic downturn, and unemployment, in the patron–client relation (Jayantha 1992). Some people evaluated it, saying that it had the effect of ruining the traditional ruling circles and of promoting the modernization of rural communities. A report said that it would have been more successful and effective if local residents were able to submit their demands directly to administrative authorities instead of through members of parliament. In this case, the report said, it would have been better if CBOs and other organizations were utilized rather than indi viduals (Warnapala and Woodsworth 1987, p. 12). Opinions and recommendations concerning development, which were gathered by Gramodaya Mandalaya, were submitted to county-level administrative authorities. The Sarvodaya Headquarters (no. 19) is engaged in activities which could be classified as those of NGOs. However, village-level Sarvodaya societies are formed separately in different villages, and are registered as corporations separately. Furthermore, Mahila Samithis, which were once NGOs of wealthy women in rural communities working for the improvement in living conditions, is organized in each village. Sarvodaya has expanded organizationally today and is engaged in broadranging activities, outside of rural community development, such as the protection of orphans, relief to the victims of natural disasters, day nurseries, technical education, education of the physically handicapped, agrarian projects, agrarian finance, education of community leaders, consultation on legal matters, etc. “Rules of Sarvodaya Shramadana Societies” by Sarvodaya. Its role as an agent to communicate the people’s will is still weak. In the early 1990s such a movement was seen in some areas. Sinhalese youths from rural communities, who were not satisfied with the socialist parties which had become government supporters, took part in a nationwide revolt to overthrow the government. The revolt was so large in scale that it took two months for the government, with military aid from foreign countries, to quell it. It has become clear in recent years that Sri Lanka has the highest suicide rate in the world. The government has started investigations, aware of a need to extend mental care to the people. A budget remained, called Decentralized Budget, which was allocated to parliament members individually to be spent on development projects. A total of fifty-nine organizations were registered in 1999, according to data obtained from Mr Rahubaddha of the Ministry of Social Services.

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Including (1) all receipts; (2) names of suppliers of resources and funds; (3) names and addresses of the recipients of funds and services; and (4) financial statements of NGOs as of 31 December. It was actually passed by parliament in 1999. It was reported that a case of misappropriation of funds occurred involving Sarvodaya in those days.

References

Agrarian Research and Training Institute (AR TI). Approaches to Development: The NGO Experience in Sri Lanka. Colombo, 1991. Cooray, Joseph A.L. Constitutional and Administrative Law of Sri Lanka. Colombo, 1995. de Silva, K.M. Social Policy and Missionary Organizations in Ceylon 1840– 1855. London: Longmans, Green and Co. Ltd, 1965. Hirashima Shigemochi. “Kaihatsu to puranteshon sakumotsu — Suriranka ni okeru kocha seisan no jirei” [Development and plantation products — A case of tea production in Sri Lanka]. In Ichiji sanpin mondai no shintenkai — Johoka to juyo henka eno taio [A new development of primary products issues — Responses to informatization and changes in demands], edited by Hirashima Shigemochi, pp. 229–68.Tokyo: Institute of Developing Economies, 1989. Initiative in Research and Education f or Development in Asia (IRED). Development NGOs of Sri Lanka: A Directory. Colombo, 1991. ———. Development NGOs of Sr i Lanka: A Directory. 3rd ed. Colombo, 1996. ———. A Directory of Foreign NGOs with Direct Programme Implementation. Colombo, 1995. Jayantha, Dilesh. Electoral Allegiance in Sri Lanka. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992. Jayasinghe, C.H. de Alwis. Integrated Rural Development: Country Profile, Inventory of Programmes, Institutions and Biblio graphy, Sri Lanka. Comilla: Center on Inte grated Rural De velopment for Asia and the Pacific, 1982. Jayasuriya, Laksiri. The Sri Lankan Welfare State: Retrospect and Prospect. Colombo: Center for Development Studies and Institute of Policy Studies, 1996. Leitan, G.R. Tressie. Political Integration through Decentralization and Devolution of Power: The Sri Lankan Experience. Colombo, 1990.

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Mizuno Masami. “Suriranka no sarubodaya shumuramadana undo ni miru noson kaihatsu” [Rural development seen in Sarvodaya Shramadana movement in Sri Lanka]. In Ajia no noson soshiki to shijo [Rural organizations and mark ets in Asia], edited by Yamamoto Hiromi, pp. 145–68. Tokyo: Institute of Developing Economies, 1998. Sri Lanka Government (SLG). Report of the Commission on Social Services 1947. Colombo, 1947. ———. Administration Report of the Director of Social Services for 1959. Colombo, 1959. Uragoda, C.G. “Rockefeller Philanthropy in the Development of Public Health in Sri Lanka”. In Philanthropy and Cultural Context, edited by Soma Hewa. Maryland: University Press of America, 1997. Wanigaratne, Ranjith. “The State–NGO Relationship in Sri Lanka: Rights, Interests and Accountability”. In NGOs, States and Donor s, edited by David Hulme, pp. 217–31. New York: St. Martin’s Press Inc., 1997. Warnapala, W.A. Wiswa and D.E. Woodsworth. Welfare as Politics in Sri Lanka. Montreal: Center for Developing-Area Studies, 1987. World Bank. Sri Lanka Poverty Assessment. Washington, D.C.: World Bank, 1995.

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This chapter is reproduced from The State and NGOs: Perspective from Asia , edited by Shinichi Shigetomi (Singapore: Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, 2002). This version was obtained electronically direct from the publisher on condition th at copyright is not infringed. No part of this publication may be reproduced, translated, stored in a retrieval system, or transmi tted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies and Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo.

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5 Pakistan Regulations and Potentiality in a Fragmented Society Susumu Nejima INTRODUCTION

“South Asia remains a re gion divided — di vided between the hopes of the rich and the despair of the poor . A region where the richest one-f ifth earn almost 40 per cent of the income, and the poorest one-f ifth make do with less than 10 per cent” (Mahb ub ul Haq Human Development Centre 1999, p. 2). Pakistan society, like other countries in the subcontinent, has serious internal divisions. These divisions are not limited to economic disparities, but are prevalent at various levels in society. National policies clash with provincial interests, and enmities between ethnic and tr ibal groups or religious sects often erupt into violence. F actional rivalry in re gional communities also imposes a tense atmosphere on social life. This chapter begins by addressing the di visions in the society under w hich nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) are supposed to undertak e their activities. Since the latter half of the 1980s political corruption, the economic slump, and a r apid increase in population ha ve all combined to broaden the economic space for NGO acti vities in Pakistan. At around that time the government, at the prodding of aid donors, began to advocate collaboration with NGOs, a mo ve that promised to ensur e political space for NGO activities. However, compared with other South Asian countries, NGO activities in P akistan are generally seen as lo w-key. In f act, though the terms and discourses being created in the transnational world of development abound in the English publications of NGOs, the y do not easily permeate through to local residents, who have various regional languages and dialects

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as their mother tongues. On the other hand, NGOs that rely solely on ethnic or sectarian values have to remain very narrowly focused in terms of their scope of activities. Where and how to place NGO activities in this divided social situation is discussed in the second section of this chapter. THE ENVIRONMENT AND DEVELOPMENTS OF NGO ACTIVITIES Characteristics of Pakistan Society

The Pakistani population can be classified into the following: (1) tribal peoples; (2) peasants-farmers; (3) urban residents; and (4) refugees. (This section basically follows the discussions developed by the most prominent Pakistani anthropologist, Akbar S. Ahmed [Ahmed 1986, ch. 13; Ahmed 1992].) Tribal peoples are made up of Pakhtuns and Baluchis, who live in the North-West Frontier Province and Baluchistan Province. The paramount values held b y tribal peoples are honour , revenge, and hospitality. For Pakhtuns, honour depends on fighting for “women, money, and land” (zan, zar, zamin) (Spain 1962, ch. 14).This can raise problems directly related to participatory development. Since the reputation of women has a direct bearing on the honour of the whole f amily, the men of a f amily carefully protect women under the customary practice called purdah. What women will or can do is strictly regulated by their families, and this practice makes it hard for individual women to participate in any organization. These tribal values are preserved in other categories of peasants and urban residents as well, though to varying degrees (Chaudhary 1999, ch. 2).Thus, NGOs face difficulty beginning with the stage of organizing, which provides the basis for individual development programmes. Peasants are made up mainly of Punjabis, and also include Sindhis and Kashmiris (as well as Bengalis until 1971). They tend to be independentminded and hardworking, but highly value material gains. Also, they have a remarkably strong tendency to form factions based on family backgrounds and patron–client relationships. Urban residents were the least developed category before 1947. Peopl e— later called Muhajirs — who immigrated to Pakistan with high expectations for the building of a new nation formed the core of this group. Most of the urban residents who came from India also had, to an equal de gree, the characteristics of refugees. Refugees flowed into P akistan in la ter years, too. After Bangladesh became independent in 1971; a massive number of Biharis flowed into Karachi as refugees. The Soviet Union’s invasion of Afghanistan, for its

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part, produced more than 3.5 million refugees. Pakistan began as a nation in a confused situation not only because of its geo graphical irregularity, being divided into separate eastern and western parts, but also in terms of the population composition. It was the Punjabis who serv ed as the dri ving force of the nation. Punjab Province, which possessed v ast networks of irrig ation canals developed by the British during colonization, became the centre of the agricultural development of the green revolution. In the province large landowners basically controlled the peasants. However, the number of mid-sized and small farmers gradually grew into a new source of power for development through social participation as bazaar merchants, administrative officials, and military of ficers. However, the situa tion in which one ethnic group, with the sole interest of pursuing its o wn immediate profits and wholly de voted to forming its o wn factions, controlled the centre of the state alienated other ethnic groups and invited strong resentment. Ev entually, the Bengalis left P akistan and built their own country. Muhajirs, who felt that their interests had been undermined, also began to assert their interests as an ethnic g roup in the 1980s. This rapid formation of a politically moti vated ethnic consciousness among the descendants of people who had come to Pakistan with ardent nation-building dreams was very symbolic of the fragmentization of the country (Verkaaik 1994). Amidst the strong voices in favour of ethnic autonomy, national leaders such as Zulfikar Ali Bhutto (1971–77) and General Zia-ul-Haq (1977–88) tried to maintain the le gitimacy of their go vernments and the bonds of national unity by taking drastic policy measures. The important development in relation to NGO acti vities is that the foundation of urban and secular civil society organizations was undermined by the nationalization of major industries carried out by Bhutto and the policy to turn Islamic values into a political ideology by Zia-ul-Haq (Qadeer 1997). Furthermore, in the latter period religious sects were divided by disputes over the question of “Which Islam is authentic”. The Development of NGO Activities

In Pakistan the term NGO became well known only in the 1990s. Usually, it is understood to signify “a non-profit organization composed of voluntary members engaged in de velopment or assistance acti vities”. In Urdu, Pakistan’s national language, ghair sarkari tanzeem, which means “nongovernment organization”, is the term that is used. © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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As discussed in the chapter on India, a tradition of charity and volunteerism existed in British India. As the independence mo vement rose and spread, voluntary organizing activities continued in various parts of the country.1 It is hard to say that Pakistan has fully inherited the tradition, however. The reason for this can be traced to the fact that the territory of Pakistan, while it was a part of British India, consisted mainl y of economically bac kward agricultural regions. In post-independence India, the share of man ufacturing industry in national income was 15 per cent and the ratio of the urban population to the total population was 17 per cent. However, these ratios were just 6 per cent and 10 per cent, respectively, in Pakistan. There were only eleven cities which had a population of over 100,000 (Kagaya and Hamaguc hi 1977, pp. 176, 177). What were seen in Pakistan at that time were charity activities by the rich, and activities to rescue and support displaced people from India (NGO Resource Centre 1991, p. 5). Within communities based on religion, ethnicity, or tribes, mutual-aid activities were observed. It is necessary to make a brief reference here to the relationship between Islam and volunteerism. Islam is the foundation for the search by Pakistanis, most of whom are Muslims, for a “just society”. Their devotion to other people derives from their brotherhood as Muslims. In f act, some 90 per cent of volunteer activities by Pakistanis are believed to be religious practices, such as the construction of mosques ormadrasa (Islamic religious schools). The practice of zakat (alms) has played the role of a social safety net for the poor. Though it is far from sufficient, zakat has great potential (Aga Khan Development Network 2000; Social Policy and Development Centre 1999, ch. 5). The event that provided a turning point for NGOs in Pakistan to reach their present stage of activities was the invasion of Afghanistan by the Soviet Union in 1979. As many Afghan refugees flocked to Pakistan, numerous international NGOs were deployed for operations along theAfghan border. However, not many Pakistanis were involved in these activities as volunteers (Hussain 1996, p. 2). The invasion of Afghanistan led to massi ve amounts of Western aid pouring into Pakistan. The government of then President Zia-ul-Haq took advantage of these funds to boost social de velopment projects. Man y members of the National Assembly and Provincial Assemblies encouraged the growth of ne w NGOs to absorb the special funds a vailable for the development of their respective constituencies (NGO Resource Centre 1991, p. 5). Today, NGOs in Pakistan depend on external sources for most of the funds to finance their activities. This structure was probably engendered in that period. © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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In the 1980s, meanwhile, two epoch-making organizations were founded in Pakistan, and became essential players in the w orld of NGO activities. First, in 1980, the Orang i Pilot Project (OPP) w as launched in Orang i Township, the biggest katchi abadi (squatter settlement) in Karachi. After many dialogue sessions with local residents, OPP acti vists came to understand that their priority should be to improve the katchi abadi’s sanitary conditions, and they provided instructions on the laying of se wer pipes. Local residents themselves dug up alleyways and laid sewer pipes, building a vast sewerage network. This is a good e xample of the process thr ough which residents penetrated into the domain of administration and, on the basis of successful efforts, gained direct dialogue with the authorities (Hasan 1990). Currently, OPP is also pro viding consultation services, mainly in the area of improvements to slum living conditions, at the request of CBOs (community-based organizations)/NGOs or municipal governments across Pakistan (Orangi Pilot Project 2000). The Aga Khan Rural Support Programme (AKRSP) devised the model for participation in rural areas. AKRSP, which was established in 1982 in Gilgit in the Nor thern Areas, was successful in pro grammes involving residents’ participation, including the construction of link roads, afforestation, and cultivation and marketing of cash crops suitable for the cold climate (Khan and Khan 1992). The AKRSP model, developed after trial and error in collaboration with 100,000 mountain f armers, was later adopted by the government for implementation throughout all the provinces of Pakistan. These two internationally reno wned organizations are nearly always mentioned when NGO activities in Pakistan are brought up for discussion. In actuality, however, their activities are very different from those of the average NGOs in P akistan, as will be discussed belo w. Furthermore, the fact that the former was created by Akhtar Hameed Khan and the latter by Shoaib Sultan Khan (a celebr ated teacher–student duo), sho ws that the leading NGOs in Pakistan are being driven by an extremely small number of outstanding personalities. The Current Status of NGO Activities

Number and Regional Distribution

As of 1997, there were 11,648 organizations across Pakistan registered under the Voluntary Social Welfare Agencies Ordinance. By pr ovince, 50 per cent were in Punjab, 39 per cent in Sindh, 6 per cent in North-West

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Frontier, 3 per cent in Baluchistan, and 2 per cent in other s. Of the total, 70 per cent were located in urban areas and 30 per cent in rural areas (almost in inverse proportion to the population distribution) (National Council of Social Welfare 1999). Typically, NGOs operate indi vidually in villa ges or specif ic neighbourhoods of towns. No more than 25 per cent of all NGOs co ver even an entire district. It is estimated that just 5 per cent of NGOs operate on a nationwide scale (Zia 1996, p. 3). One report that covers NGO activities in detail is NGO Resource Centre (1996). It includes data from a total of 1,768 r egistered organizations in four divisions (Larkana, Hyderabad, Mirpurkhas, and Sukkur) of Sindh Province. Of the 1,768 organizations, the Centre was able to locate 1,446. Out of these, 1,073, or 61 per cent, were in active service (all subsequent figures are set against this base of 1,073). Since the combined population of areas covered by the 1995 survey was approximately 21 million, there was one NGO per 20,000 population. Of the total, approximately 770 had no liaison with other organizations. About fifty organizations had at least one branch outside their home distr icts. About half of the or ganizations had a membership (meaning those who participated in general meetings) of twenty-one to fifty, while 16 per cent had fifty-one to 100 members. While nearly 900 organizations had held leadership elections in the previous three years, nearly 100 had never had such elections. Nearly 500 organizations had paid staff, but in most cases the number was limited to just one or two. Just 6 per cent of the total had a staff of six or more. Fields and Contents of Activities

The main areas of NGO activities in Pakistan today include social welfare, rural development, and women’s problems (Mumtaz 1997, pp. 172–78). In recent years adv ocacy-type NGOs ha ve ventured into such f ields as environmental conservation, human rights, and labour. New donor-led types of NGOs have also emerged. Many of the principal figures at leading NGOs have higher education and are professionals, such as lawyers, doctors, and scholars, as well as former government officials in charge of development policies; they all belong to the urban elite. In the field of social welfare, the Abdul Sattar Edhi Welfare Trust is well known. It is devoted to providing relief to the socially weak, such as orphans and widows, and embodies the tradition of charity (Durrani 1996).

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For rural development, there are sixteen NGOs that follow the AKRSP model across the country. They have formed the Rural Support Programme Network, to promote exchanges of information and personnel. The National Rural Support Programme (NRSP) is a member of the Network (Khan 1998, ch. 7). It is a government-organized NGO (GONGO) established in 1992 with funds of 500 million rupees contr ibuted by the Pakistan Government. As its name suggests, its aim is to spread the AKRSP model throughout the country. It cannot be said , however, that the Netw ork is r apidly extending throughout the rural areas. According to Osamu Yasuno, who conducted hearings on NGOs in the summer of 2000 at many places in Pakistan, there are many active operations under w ay, independent of the Netw ork, by CBOs/NGOs that were established through traditional councils of tribal peoples and peasants. The number of NGOs trying to r aise the sta tus of w omen increased remarkably during the 1980s. This can be partly explained by the fact that the Islamization Polic y promoted b y the g overnment of Zia-ul-Haq incorporated items which were oppressive towards women.2 An extensive storm of protests broke out against the policy, giving rise to the formation of women’s groups. As this coincided with the period of the promotion of WID (Women in Development), NGOs had rather easy access to suppor t from donors. Created in 1949, the All Pakistan Women’s Association (APWA) is a long-established organization for women. It operates vocational aid centres and schools across the country. The Family Planning Association of Pakistan (FPAP) is engaged in job training and efforts to raise income as well as the promotion of family planning. Shirkat Gah (meaning “place for partnership” in Urdu) is involved in surveys and research, publication, and networking. This group now serves as the secretariat for the Pakistan NGO Forum (see page 104). In Pakistan there are often signif icant class differences and economic gaps between those who undertake NGO activities and the beneficiaries of their services. The gaps appear more e vident for w omen. Many female activists are women who are free from social restrictions, such as purdah, who do not live in rural villages or slums, nor share the values preserved there. This is one of the reasons why w omen have failed to g enerate a strong sense of solidarity transcending the boundaries of social classes. Some new trends ha ve emerged among the NGOs cr eated under the leadership of donors (Hussain 1996, pp. 14–17). The role of these NGOs is

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to provide funding, undertake training, and strengthen the institutional aspects of smaller NGOs/CBOs. Strengthening Participatory Organization was established under an agreement between the Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA) and the P akistan Government, with the purpose of supporting NGOs/CBOs in rural areas. The Trust for Voluntary Organization was created by the Pakistan Government to provide financial support to NGOs under an a greement with the United Sta tes Agency for International Development (USAID). The South Asian Partnership was set up as the Pakistani affiliate of an association of voluntary agencies in Canada and South Asia. This organization promotes participatory de velopment. The NGO Resource Centre was established by the Aga Khan Foundation for the distribution of development-related information and the promotion of networking. These organizations have development professionals working as fulltime employees, and excel in research and the pro vision of information. Serving as liaison with international aid organizations or overseas NGOs, they have a strong voice over trends in domestic social developments. GOVERNMENTAL AUTHORIZATION AND LEGAL REGULATIONS ON NGOs Legal Regulations for Authorizing NGO Registration

Contents of Legal Regulations

There are no registration requirements in Pakistan for undertaking NGO activities. Organizations not registered with the government can engage in activities and receive financial support from donors. For registration, non-profit private-sector organizations are authorized under the following legal regulations (Association for Promotion of International Cooperation 1998, p. 99; NGO Resource Centre 1991, pp. 7–24; Salahuddin 1997, pp. 88–107): 1. Societies Registration Act, 1860 This act provides for the registration of voluntary organizations engaged primarily in activities in the areas of culture, science, and charity. 2. Trusts Act, 1882 This act provides for the registration of certain assets as a trust and authorizes activities for charitable objectives. Trusts are granted a high degree of independence.

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3. Cooperative Societies Act, 1925 This act authorizes acti vities of economic or ganizations such as Consumer Society, Housing Society, and Banking Society. 4. Voluntary Social Welfare Agencies Registration and Control Ordinance, 1961 This ordinance author izes institutions established for social welf are services such as education, health, and women. 5. Companies Ordinance, 1984 This ordinance provides for the registration of non-profit companies which undertake activities promoting commerce, art, science, religion, sports, social services, and charity. Features of the Legal Regulations

Under the existing legal framework, as seen abo ve, NGOs are c lassified and authorized as five different types of organizations, under five different legal regulations. It is up to each NGO to decide under which law to file an application for registration. Many seek r egistration as social welf are agencies. What judgments do NGOs mak e in deciding on re gistration? The NGO Resource Centre (1991, pp. 34, 41, 44) has survey-based data on this point. Prior to r egistration, NGOs expect to gain several benefits through registration. As a matter of course, they regard the legal status as a major benefit of registration, because it clarifies the nature of their organizations and provides them with social credibility. The next hopedfor benefit is easier access to contrib utions from donors. NGOs also expect registration benefits related to land acquisition and tax exemptions. But their replies to a question on actual benef its of registration indicate that other than the le gal status, the re gistration brings about few direct benefits. In particular, income tax exemptions are handled on a case-by-case basis and the interpretation and administration of tax la w are f ar from transparent (Association for Promotion of International Cooperation 1998, p. 101). Post-Registration Obligations

Registered NGOs are required to file statements of accounts and to meet other obligations. The registration offices with which they register oversee whether they are fulfilling the obligations in accordance with the relevant laws (NGO Resource Centre 1991, p. 39). The following obligations exist: © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9.

Establishment of registered office Maintenance of audited accounts Maintenance of administrative records Submission of annual progress report to registration office Submission of annual audit report to registration office Publication of annual progress report for general information Publication of annual audit report for general information Communication of any change of address of the agency Obtaining approval of r egistration authority before amending constitution or amalgamation with another society 10. Adherence to the clauses of the trust deed Among them, the Voluntary Social Welfare Agencies Registration and Control Ordinance and the Companies Ordinance require everything from (1) to (9). The Societies Registration Act and the Cooperative Society Act do not require (4) (submission of annual progress report) or (6) (publication of annual progress report). The Trusts Act makes only (10) (adherence to the trust deed) mandatory. Theoretically, these obligations can be said to encourage the growth of the organizational culture of NGOs by requiring the submission of certain documents and records. Of course, the government at the same time tries to keep track of NGOs’ activities through these requirements. In reality, however, many NGOs do not have any contacts with administrative offices after registration, and do not get penalized for the failure to make contact. In a sense the y are allo wed to act freely . However, the a bsence of the monitoring mechanism only means that NGOs dedicated to lining their own pockets can ha ve their o wn way. Many people in volved in development issues admit that corruption is a constant problem in Pakistan’s NGO business.

RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN THE GOVERNMENT AND NGOs

In recent years, partly because of the powerful influence of donors, the Pakistan Government has begun giving greater weight to the activities of NGOs. One concrete example of this c hange of attitude was the Eighth Five-Year Plan (1993–98). During the period of this plan the go vernment promoted the Social Action Programme (SAP) with support from the World Bank and the Asian Development Bank. Under the SAP, a policy was laid to facilitate activities through community organizations in the four fields © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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of basic education, basic health and sanitation, waterworks and sewerage systems in rural villages, and population planning. The chapter on the SAP in the Eighth Plan made repeated references to the participation of NGOs (Zia 1996, p. 7). While acknowledging the r ole to be played by NGOs, however, the government was looking for ways to restrict their scope of activities or to control flows of aid funds from foreign countries. A string of developments concerning a ne w law that was f irst proposed in 1994 re vealed the government’s real intentions, though in a somewhat disorderly fashion. In the meantime NGOs for their part pushed ahead with networ king their activities. In that sense 1994 proved to be an epoch-making year for NGOs in Pakistan. In July of that year the Ministry of Social Welfare announced a bill for the Social Welfare Agencies (Registration and Regulation) Act of 1994, which contained the following clauses (Zia 1996, p. 20): 1. Check and dissolve fraudulent NGOs 2. Monitor and make accountable all NGOs 3. Monitor and ha ve information on all for eign funding to P akistani organizations The abruptly announced government bill contained many points that were in sharp conflict with the opinions of NGOs. At the time the NGOs had no forum to co-ordinate their opinions,so representatives of forty-one organizations got together hastily and issued a statement opposing the bill. In 1995 and again in 1996 the government submitted similar bills, in total disregard for the positions of NGOs. By this time the NGOs had established consultative councils at provincial and national levels, and the Pakistan NGO Forum, the national organization, unanimously rejected the 1996 government bill. Subsequently, the Forum has established itself as a liaison entity for negotiations with the government or donors (Zia 1996, pp. 23, 24). In 1999 the government of Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif was overthrown by a military coup after losing popular support as a result of its extreme corruption. It was the fourth military rule in Pakistan, and it thr eatened to under mine the f oundation of the countr y’s civil society, which should be independent of the government. However, after new military leader General Pervez Musharraf announced a devolution plan and recruited NGO f igures such as Attiya Inayatullah and Omar Asghar Khan to serve in government positions, some NGO people seem to have come to regard the inauguration of the military government as

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an opportunity to expand NGO activities. They do not necessarily regard the military’s intervention in politics as a sta te of emergency, nor do they take actions to demand democratization as one of the important roles to be played by NGOs. These developments say something about the depth of disappointment created by the civilian government that ruled the country for the previous twelve years.

CONCLUSION

The conditions that govern NGO activities in Pakistan can be characterized as follows: 1. Pakistan’s history since its foundation has w orked to leave it a di vided nation. Consequently, the creation of an identity and norms to unite various social groups existing in the country remains an unfinished task. 2. There are a variety of factors that have brought about the division. Pakistan society has deep splits that cross the lines of ethnicity, class, and language. Islam, the symbol of unity, has a high potential for social development, but on the other hand sectarianism is a source of conflicts. The central go vernment’s policies have often w orked to deepen the division. 3. Intellectuals are the principal players in NGOs. Still,unless they follow the norms of other groups, NGOs cannot demonstrate noticeable results. In particular, it is an extremely difficult proposition to reflect the views of women in development. Given these circumstances, it is hard to imagine that NGOs will be able to fundamentally change Pakistan society in the short term. In f act, most NGOs emerged as g roups to pro vide social services in place of the government, and this holds true even at present. While the country is plagued with the structural problems of poverty and discrimination against women, there are few NGOs that take a clear stand to confront the government over these issues. This seems to be very much associated with the situation where the principal NGO players, and particularly the most influential among them, come from the v ery elite class that contr ols existing society. Furthermore, considering the fact that successive governments destroyed the modern autonomous space and organizations, actions by rural people to try to defend tr aditional organizations and customs or to occasionall y reject the intervention of NGOs cannot be dismissed simply by the shallow

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description of them as uneducated people. Rather , it is possible to f ind in their behaviour reasonable individual judgments to defend and preser ve their ways of life. Nonetheless, if asked to cite the most prominent feature of NGO activities in present-day Pakistan, it must be pointed out that NGOs have been gradually improving their capabilities and broadening the scope of their activities. There have been major developments, particularly in recent years. It has to be admitted that there is a type of strong external pressure which gives much weight to the acti vities of donor -led NGOs, and the ne w developments could prove superficial after all.Yet, it is also true that people in Pakistan, who find it increasingly dif ficult to defend e ven what little they have, are beginning to accept the activities of NGOs into their way of life, albeit little by little. In this sense the articulation of NGO activities and traditional councils as witnessed by Yasuno is an interesting phenomenon (see page 100). A high potential can be found in the process of local residents transfiguring existing organizations through their own accord. In fact, it seems that this point can be observed by looking at the two outstanding NGOs of P akistan. There were man y Biharis among those who sympathized with OPP’s activities in its early years, and who joined in its actual activities. 3 Biharis are the people who fled Bangladesh, and they generally have high educational backgrounds. Akhtar Hameed Khan was well known among Biharis as the leader who devised the Comilla model of rural de velopment in East P akistan. AKRSP, meanwhile, produced results in the very early years of its activities by focusing on the Ismailis, a Shia Muslim community. The Ismailis follow a hereditary spiritual leader, Aga Khan, who w as the founder of the Aga Khan Rural Support Programme and the very person who catapulted Shoaib Sultan Khan into prominence (Khan and Khan 1992; Nejima 1998). What was it that allowed NGO activities to produce quick results that were elevated to the status of universal models? It was, most importantly, the fact that specific ethnic groups or religious communities undertook the initial activities most important to NGOs. However, what is important to note here is that the two successful NGOs did not make ethnicity or religious sect, which are fast becoming exclusionary identities in Pakistan today, the principles of their organizational formations. It can be said that they were seeking to establish a methodology applicable to broader areas, while skillfully articulating activities in an experimental stage to highly capable and coherent ethnic or religious communities. © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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There are few signs on the horizon of Pakistan’s divided situation being resolved. Thus, the important thing that will determine the future of NGO activities in Pakistan will be whether they can bring out the organizational energy that has its r oots in ethnicity or r eligion, and guide it into a constructive direction. Notes 1

2

3

See section one of the chaper by Hiroshi Sato in this volume and Ohashi (1997). Actually, the gender gap, which narrowed steadily in the 1970s, widened again during these years, particularly in primary education (Social Policy and Development Centre 1999, p. 53). This is the impr ession Nejima got w hen he visited Orangi in August 2000. Masaaki Ohashi, who has e xtensive knowledge about NGOs in Bangladesh, formed a similar impr ession after paying a visit to OPP . There needs to be discussion on this point on the basis of more detailed surveys. See also Rashid (1998).

References

Aga Khan Development Network. Philanthropy in Pakistan: A Report of the Initiative on Indig enous Philanthropy. Pakistan: Aga Khan Foundation, 2000. Ahmed, A.S. Pakistan Society. Karachi: Oxford University Press, 1986. ———. “Social Structure and Flows”. In Foundations of Pakistan’s Political Economy, pp. 58–80. New Delhi: Sage Publications, 1992. Association for Promotion of International Cooperation. Tojokoku ni okeru enujio no kaihatsu kyoryoku uk eire no g ennkyo [Acceptance of development co-operation by NGOs in de veloping countries]. Tokyo: Association for Promotion of International Cooperation, 1998. Chaudhary, A.C. Justice in Pr actice: Legal Ethnography of a P akistani Punjabi Village. Karachi: Oxford University Press, 1999. Durrani, T. Abdul Sattar Edhi: An Autobiography. Islamabad: National Bureau of Publications, 1996. Hasan, A. “Development through Partnership: The Orangi Project in Karachi”. In The Living City: Towards a Sustainable Future, pp. 221–26. London: Routledge, 1990. Hussain, M. Government/Donor/NGO Collaboration: Lessons Learnt and the Action for the Future. United Nations Pakistan, 1996. © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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Kagaya, Hiroshi and Tsuneo Hamaguchi. Minami ajia g endaishi II: pakisutan·banguradeshu [Modern history of SouthAsia II: Pakistan and Bangladesh]. Tokyo: Yamakawa Publishing Co., 1977. Khan, M.H. Climbing the Development Ladder with NGO Support. Karachi: Oxford University Press, 1998. Khan, M.S. and S.S. Khan. Rural Change in the Third World: Pakistan and the Aga Khan Rural Support Program. New York: Greenwood Press, 1992. Mahbub ul Haq Human Development Centre. Human Development in South Asia 1999. Karachi: Oxford University Press, 1999. Mumtaz, K. “NGOs in P akistan: An Overview”. In Just Development: Beyond Adjustment with a Human Face, pp. 171–90. Karachi: Oxford University Press, 1997. National Council of Social Welfare. Directory of Voluntary Social Welfare Agencies. 4 vols. Islamabad: Government of Pakistan, National Council of Social Welfare, 1999. Nejima, Susumu. “Isuraamu to noson kaihatsu (pakisutan)” [Islam and rural development (Pakistan)]”. In Enujio ga kaeru minami ajia — keizai seicho kara shakai hatten he [South Asia under transformation by NGOs: From economic growth to social development], pp. 85–118. Tokyo: Commons, 1998. NGO Resource Centre. NGO Registration Study: Policy Research Report. Vol. 1. Karachi: NGO Resource Centre, 1991. ———. NGOs in Four Divisions of Sindh. Karachi: NGO Resource Centre, 1996. Ohashi, Masaaki. “Enujio taikoku indo, sono katsudo, rekishi, nettowaku” [India, the NGO superpower: Activities, history and networks]. In Enujio taikoku indo [India, the NGO super power], pp. 21–53. Tokyo: Akashi Shoten Co., 1997. Orangi Pilot Project. 82nd Quarterly Report. Karachi: Orangi Pilot Project, 2000. Qadeer, M.A. “The Evolution of Civil Society and Social Transformation in Pakistan”. Paper prepared for Pakistan Society of De velopment Economists, Islamabad, 1997. Rashid, A. “Ghaziabad, Orangi”. In Community Initiatives: Four Case Studies from Karachi, pp. 139–57. Karachi: City Press, 1998. Salahuddin, S. “La ws and Re gulations Governing Non-Governmental Organisation in P akistan”. In Report of South Asian Conference on “Laws, Rules and Re gulations for the Voluntary Sector”. New Delhi: Voluntary Action Network India, 1997. © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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Social Policy and Development Centre. Social Development in Pakistan. Karachi: Oxford University Press, 1999. Spain, J.W. The Way of the Pathans. London: Robert Hale, 1962. Verkaaik, O. A People of Migrants: Ethnicity, State and Religion in Karachi. Amsterdam: VU University Press, 1994. Zia, S. A Policy and Le gal Framework for Non-Go vernmental Organisations. United Nations Pakistan, 1996.

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This chapter is reproduced from The State and NGOs: Perspective from Asia , edited by Shinichi Shigetomi (Singapore: Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, 2002). This version was obtained electronically direct from the publisher on condition th at copyright is not infringed. No part of this publication may be reproduced, translated, stored in a retrieval system, or transmi tted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies and Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo.

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6 The Philippines From Agents to Political Actors Takeshi Kawanaka INTRODUCTION

Historically, non-governmental organizations (NGOs) in the Philippines emerged as agents of the government and other dominant forces.1 However, as they experienced the authoritarian regime of President Ferdinand Marcos from 1972 to 1986 and the subsequent democratization process, they gradually transformed themselves into independent entities. Today, the Philippines can be described as an advanced country in terms of NGOs. Not only is the number of NGOs large, but the vigour and scale of their activities are also impressive. To understand Philippine NGOs, we need to delve into the country’s history and also note the role that Philippine institutions, and the state system in particular , have played in relation to NGO activities, especially in the post-Marcos democratization period. On the one hand, the American-style political system of the Philippines, which limits the role of b ureaucrats and emphasiz es elected posts, has helped extend the scope of NGO acti vities from the social to the sta te area. This system in f act has opened up opportunities f or NGOs to par ticipate in elections, to get their of ficers appointed to go vernment posts, and to do contracting work as consultants to government agencies. On the other hand, this same system has allowed election-conscious politicians to k eep state resources under their control. This latter aspect certainly works negatively for NGO activities. In this chapter we will examine the characteristics of Philippine NGOs, relating them to the institutional frame work of the Philippine sta te as it formed over the course of history. We will discuss the topic with reference

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to three factors: history, laws and institutions, and the relationship between NGOs and the state. SPECIFIC FEATURES IN THE EVOLUTION OF NGOs Historical Development

The stages of historical e volution of Philippine NGOs bear c lose 2 correspondence to the periods of political history of the country as a whole. The origin of Philippine NGOs in their embryonic form can be traced back to the period between the end of the Spanish rule (the late 19th century) and U.S. rule (until 1946). During that period charity or ganizations were founded and operated on the basis of co-operation among local elite philanthropists, the church, and the colonial government. During American rule, a legal framework was set for civic organizations (the 1906 Philippine Corporation Code), within which social or ganizations were estab lished under the leadership of civic organizations of U.S. origin. After the country achieved independence in 1946, NGOs were compelled to function as government agents. The major problem of post-independence Philippines was political unrest in the countryside. Rural unrest had been serious since the 1930s, as the result of a rising peasant movement, but this movement developed into an armed struggle against the government as the communistled anti-Japan guerilla movement Hukbalahap (the Huk Re bellion) emerged during the Japanese occupation. After independence, Hukbalahap continued the armed struggle from its strongholds in Central Luz on. The Philippine Government conducted pacification campaigns using its armed forces. Recognizing that rural poverty was the source of the anti-government movement, the government felt a strong need to implement counter -poverty measures. For this purpose, it helped or ganize several social welf are organizations to promote r ural development. Under the Elpidio Quirino government, the Science Act of 1952 (RA No. 2067) w as enacted, including clauses for non-profit organizations. The same year the pioneering Philippine NGO, Philippine Rural Reconstruction Movement (PRRM), was established with government backing. In this period the National Movement for Free Elections was set up, withAmerican support, as a voluntary election-monitoring mechanism to facilitate the election of Ramon Magsaysay to the presidency. The authoritarian regime introduced by President Marcos with his declaration of Martial Law in 1972 emphasized de velopment as its goal and as the basis of its legitimacy. His regime sought to maximize the state’s

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presence in development work. Along this policy, the government intervened in rural development and all other aspects of de velopment activities. The roles of NGOs were visibly curtailed in this process. Marcos did not permit NGOs to participate in go vernment-initiated projects, and dr astically cut their budgetary quotas. He also founded g overnment co-operative associations, and set up the Ministry of Human Settlement (MHS) in an attempt to encroach upon this tr aditional NGO activity area. Under the impact of this change, NGOs tha t were closely related to the government were financially drained, and found it difficult to continue their activities. It should be noted, however, that in this same per iod two new types of NGOs came into being: NGOs independent from the government, funded by private foreign assistance; and left-leaning NGOs link ed to antigovernment movements. A representative example of these new NGOs was the Task Force Detainees of the Philippines (TFDP), which was organized in 1974 with the support of the Catholic Church. The Marcos regime crumbled in Fe bruary 1986, and Corazon Aquino assumed the presidency. This political change — which triggered a ne w wave of democratization throughout Asia — marked a major turning point for Philippine NGOs. Those that had joined the anti-Mar cos movement actively participated in the formation of the ne w government. Some participated in the Constitutional Commission set up for dr afting a new constitution. Their members were also appointed to Cabinet and other official posts. Foreign assistance funds, private and official, began to arrive in massive quantities as democratization proceeded, and the impro ved financial situation invigorated NGO activities. The number of NGOs also increased rapidly. Clarke (1998, p. 70) estimated that the number of NGOs increased from 27,100 in January 1986, immediately before the political change, to 70,200 in December 1995. The government gradually reduced its policy role and sought to integrate NGOs and other ci vic groups into its pr ogrammes. The Medium-Term Philippine Development Plan 1987–92 made by the Aquino government and the subsequent plan for 1992–98 by the Ramos government contained positive provisions for active participation by NGOs and other civic groups in policy-making processes. Laws were also made to this effect. The 1987 Constitution has provisions commending NGOs and people’s organizations (POs), and the Local Government Code of 1991, RA No. 7169 provides for the participation of NGOs and POs in local polic y-making and implementation processes. With democratization and the backing of increasing foreign assistance and legal and administrati ve support, NGOs be gan to seek to influence © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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policy-making processes. They soon went further than this le vel of participation, to election politics. In the 1992 presidential election, an NGO alliance supported and campaigned for Jo vito Salonga and Aquilino Pimentel, Jr as its presidential and vice-presidential candidates, though they were defeated. After the party list system was introduced for the House of Representatives prior to the 1998 general elections, NGOs or ganized their own political parties and participated in the elections. They succeeded in returning some of their candidates. PRRM, which had appointed noted leftist activist Horacio Morales its pr esident, carried out an internal organizational reshuffle, and in the 1998 presidential election supported and campaigned for Jose ph Estrada as its presidential candidate. After Estrada won the presidency, Morales himself was appointed Secretary of the Department of Agrarian Reform (DAR).3 NGOs and Related Groups

In looking back on the historical evolution of NGOs, we find that Philippine NGOs have been al ways supported by some e xternal establishment. According to Clarke (1998, pp. 102–18), there were four major NGO backers: philanthropists; the Christian church; overseas donors interested in creating new NGOs (active in the Marcos and post-Marcos period); and the left movement. The government may also be added to this list. The traditional forces, that is, the philanthropists and the church, originally promoted NGOs in or der to secur e social sta bility. However, with the establishment of the Marcos martial law regime and the influence by the theology of liberation, the Christian church began to create its own anti-government groups. On the philanthropist side, the major force is the Philippine Business for Social Progress (PBSP), the most wealthy NGO in the Philippines. In addition, the Association of F oundations (AoF), a coalition of the Ayala Foundation and other groups, may well be counted as a representative philanthropist agency.4 There are also many Christian church-related groups. Worthy of special note is the Basic Christian Community movement which was launched in 1975. It served as the basis for the formation of various local NGOs and POs. The TFDP and other human rights groups also have ties to the Christian church. Overseas donor agencies were relative latecomers as NGO support forces. These groups can be r oughly divided into two: private and governmentfunded organizations. The Ford Foundation is a representative private donor which has bac ked Philippine NGOs. Ho wever, it is said that after the declaration of martial la w in 1972, European founda tions rushed in to © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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increase funding to support progressive NGOs. Foreign government assistance increased in the 1980s, especially after the 1986 change of government. But assistance of this type, which is broadly cate gorized as official development assistance (ODA), is made available to NGOs subject to their ha ving co-operative relations with the Philippine Go vernment. The increased ODA has generated new interest for NGOs. It is reported that some NGOs ha ve registered with the go vernment or entered into co-operative relations with it simply to facilitate access to ODA funds. As regards the leftist mo vement, it began to promote NGO acti vities following the establishment in 1973 of its front organization, the National Democratic Front (NDF). But after the 1986 political change, the mo vement became divided into the mainstream tha t still emphasized rural guerilla struggle and the opposition f actions that preferred legal struggle. It split openly in the 1990s. This caused rifts in the peasant and labour organizations as well as within left-influenced NGOs.The influence of left-related NGOs declined during that period, in sharp contrast to the rise of foreign donor-supported NGOs. GOVERNMENT SYSTEMS OF RECOGNITION AND MONITORING OF NGOs

Government–NGO relations can be divided into two categories — those based on laws and those involving only practical administrative procedures. They can be outlined as follows: Laws

Historically, two NGO-related laws were in force, namely the Philippine Corporation Law of 1906 and the Science Act of 1952. The relevant laws that currently apply are the following:5 1. 2. 3. 4. 5.

The 1980 Corporation Code of the Philippines, BPB68 Securities and Exchange Commission Reorganization Act PD No. 902-A The 1987 Constitution of the Philippines The Local Government Code of 1991, RA No. 7160 The Tax Reform Act of 1997, RA No. 8424

The position of NGOs in Philippine society is defined by the 1987 Constitution. The NGO-related constitutional clauses, among other things:

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(1) commend the activities of NGOs and POs for the enhancement of the people’s welfare (Art. II, Sec. 23); (2) def ine NGOs as members of the Regional Development Council (Art. X, Sec. 14); and (3) recommend respect for POs and pro vide for the estab lishment of consulta tion mechanisms to facilitate the participation of the non-go vernmental sector (Art. XIII, Sec. 15–16). In compliance with these clauses, NGOs are granted the status of “non-stock, non-profit corporations”, to be registered as such with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) under the 1980 Corporation Code of the Philippines and the SEC Reorganization Act. This means that NGOs are registered at the same level as other corporations. When registered, NGOs are entitled to tax privileges under the Tax Reform Act of 1997. A remarkable feature of the NGO–state r elationship in the Philippines is that the Local Government Code of 1991 stipulates the participation of NGOs in local decision-making processes. The law: (1) ensures the participation of NGOs and POs in local school boards (Sec. 98), local health boards (Sec. 102), local development councils (Sec. 102), and local peace and order councils (Sec . 116 and EO No. 309); (2) provides for representation in local assemblies of three sectors of the population, namely (a) women, (b) agricultural and industrial workers, and (c) the urban poor, indigenous cultural communities, and disabled persons (Sec. 446, 457, 467); (3) provides for the holding of consultations with NGOs (Sec. 26–27); and (4) stipulates that the local government shall promote the establishment and operation of POs and NGOs, may enter into joint ventures with NGOs and POs, and may provide assistance, financial or otherwise, to them (Sec. 34–36). Government Monitoring and Control

On the legal grounds cited above, NGOs are generally placed under the supervision of the SEC. NGOs are r egistered with the SEC as non-stoc k, non-profit organizations, but beyond this ne gative definition they are recognized by the SEC in reference to the positive purposes they profess, such as charity, religious, or educational. Each of these categories includes non-NGOs such as educational institutions. To register, NGOs are ask ed simply to submit the necessary documents.6 The SEC supervises NGOs as it supervises other corporations. It can cancel the er gistration of NGOs, but only when an NGO contr avenes the non-profit rule.7 As NGOs are also protected by the 1980 Corporation Code of the Philippines, in actual practice it is very difficult for the SEC to use its powers arbitrarily against NGOs.

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When NGOs enter into partnership relations with government agencies, the latter carry out accreditation procedures.8 These procedures vary from agency to agency, and involve different degrees of red tape. The accreditation procedure for local governments is unique. The Local Government Code of 1991 stipulates that NGOs can participate in local councils. It allo ws local governments to run joint businesses with NGOs and to pay subsidies to them. However, these rights can be exercised only by local governmentaccredited NGOs.9 Accreditation is done by each local assembl y. NGOs asking for accreditation should in principle be SEC-registered NGOs, but non-registered groups can also enter into a relationship with the local government with the local assembly’s approval. Formerly, tax privileges were accorded automatically to all non-prof it organizations, but under the Tax Reform Act of 1997, reflecting the tight state budget, the privileges (excluding those on income tax) were limited to organizations approved by the Philippine Council for NGO Certification (PCNC).10 As a matter of for mality, it is the Bureau of Internal Re venue (BIR) that takes the administrative measure of according tax privileges to groups that have secured the PCNC’s approval. Although BIR officers sit in its board, the PCNC itself is an NGO registered with the SEC as a nonstock, non-profit organization. It is an NGO coalition f ounded on the initiative of lar ge NGOs. The PCNC system ma y be appreciated as an expression of the determination of Philippine NGOs to establish selfregulating discipline.11 Registration with the SEC and accreditation by g overnment agencies are significant to Philippine NGOs, as these statuses are the basis for receiving tax pri vileges. They are also necessary requirements for participating in government projects and sharing ODA funds. Registration and SEC super vision do not entail the prohibition of political acti vities. The only limiting clause in this r espect is in the Election La w, which prohibits NGOs from collecting donations for election campaigns (Philippine Omnibus Election Code, BPB881, Sec. 95). MUTUAL ENGAGEMENT BETWEEN THE GOVERNMENT AND NGOs The Development of Mutual Engagement

The state–NGO relationship in the Philippines begins at the level of government administrative units, usually departments. All departments of the Philippine Government now have sections for liaison with NGOs. In addition, quite a fe w people with NGO or igins have occupied leading © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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government posts since theAquino period. The initial Aquino administration had several ministers (Cabinet members) and deputy ministers recruited from NGOs. The subsequent Ramos go vernment had tw o former NGO officers as department secretaries.12 It is claimed that these NGO individuals were recruited on the merits of their personal capacities, but in reality a certain relationship tends to develop between the NGO whose former officer is now a high of ficial and the de partment controlled by him/her (Clar ke 1998, p. 87). This kind of relationship often leads to a situation where that department preferentially gives contracts to that particular NGO or , conversely, where the of ficial hires staff from that NGO as conf idential aides. It is hard to believe that NGO people are being recruited to government posts genuinely as individuals, and that the presence of ex-NGO officers in high government posts is not connected to the benef its of the NGOs of their origin. Of the Philippine go vernment departments, the De partment of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) proba bly has the c losest relations with NGOs. They are deepl y involved in the planning and enforcement of its programmes. Reflecting growing international concern about the environment, an increasing amount of ODA is now being sent to the Philippines to run environment projects. However, the government lacks sufficient staff to carry out ODA-supported projects and so must seek the help of NGOs. During the Ramos period the Philippine Council for Sustainable Development (PCSD), w hich included some NGO representatives, worked out the Philippine Agenda 21 to help ac hieve the 1992 Rio Earth Summit goals. DENR’s forest conservation project, which has absorbed massive foreign assistance, is being carr ied out mainly by NGOs. But critics doubt whether these numerous NGO-enga ged projects are being properly and effectively managed. At the final implementation ends of the DENR projects, typically forest conser vation projects, large numbers of NGOs set up by local politicians are employed to do the work. Critics suspect that these NGOs ma y in f act be a thin v eneer to co ver profiteering by politicians (Vitug 1993, pp. 157–65). As important as the NGO–department relations are those between NGOs and local governments. The enforcement of the Local Go vernment Code of 1991 is considered an important milestone of the democratization process triggered by the 1986 political change.This law has attracted public attention not only because it decentralized f iscal, administrative, service, and regulatory powers to local governments, but also because it enabled nongovernmental sector representatives, NGOs and POs, to participate in local government. As explained earlier, this law assures the participation of NGOs © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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and POs in local boards and councils, provides for the representation in the local assembly of three sectors of the population, provides for the holding of consultations with NGOs, and stipulates that local governments should positively commend the activities of NGOs and POs. The institution of this law was enthusiastically welcomed by Philippine NGOs. As at the end of 1993, 16,834 NGOs and POs were accredited by local assemblies. But on the other hand, a number of local assemblies failed to establish the legally prescribed boards or commissions. Even where they were established, many local governments do not con vene meetings. In addition, the local commission on elections has suspended the sector representatives (George 1998; Legaspi 1995a, 1995b). In some of these cases,local NGOs failed to have sufficient staff or information to justify their participation in polic ymaking. In other cases, the local government chiefs wanted to preserve the local governments’ monopoly of resources. They found the idea of NGO intervention in resource disposal abhorrent. Factors Defining the Mutual Relationship

There are four factors that define the Philippine Go vernment–NGO relationship. They are the political en vironment, the character of the Philippine political institution, the government’s capacity as a provider of administrative services, and politicians’ control over resources. The first is the most crucial factor. It effectively explains the deepening of the go vernment–NGO relationship, particularly during and after the Aquino period. During that period landmark changes occurred in the political environment, redefining the government–NGO relationship. First, because NGOs were one of the forces tha t helped br ing the Aquino government to power, the entry of NGO personalities into the government was considered quite na tural. Second, the Aquino administration, in an effort to give the government a democratic appearance, moved to establish a system to guarantee the participation of forces from outside the conventional political arena. In f act this policy had g reat appeal to the public. An additional factor was at work. Given the limitations of its own technical and human capacities, the g overnment found it dif ficult to independently carry out all the projects tha t had received the burgeoning ODA, and so had to seek the help of NGOs. The donor agencies on their part favoured NGO participation. Also, the Aquino and Ramos governments wanted to shift as many public services as possible to the private sector in order to meet the requirements of the economic liberalization and privatization policies they were promoting. © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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Another factor explaining the deep involvement of NGOs in the government is the American-style political institution that has been adopted in the Philippines. It ensures political po wer holders (elected of ficials) a position of superiority over the administration mechanism (bureaucracy). Under this public service system, the president has br oad powers of appointment, and as a result a large-scale turnover of public servants occurs every time a ne w president is sworn in. Man y officials are political appointees. This system is quite unlike that followed in Japan. Under it, it is a common and accepted practice for private sector persons to be appointed as high officials or as presidential aides. NGO people ar e no exception. Also, since elected officials and their appointees are granted large powers, they can freel y exercise their influence without obstr uction from the bureaucracy. Under these circumstances, people from NGOs appointed to official posts can hope to influence polic y-making processes if the y maintain good rela tions with the elected of ficials who appointed them (Kawanaka 1996). The inadequacy of administrative service capacity is the reason why the government has to depend on NGOs. When the go vernment lacks the necessary human and financial resources in a specific area of administrative sez)!ce, while NGOs have these capabilities thanks to foreign support, the government has no real alternative but to go to NGOs for help. This is the only way for it to provide the service. The government has to be conciliatory towards NGOs. On the other hand, we must also examine a factor working against good government–NGO relations — the heavy presence of politicians who have long monopolized state resources. In order to win elections, they need to safeguard their long-term monopoly over state resources. They are therefore strongly motivated to oppose an y intervention by outsider s in resource utilization. This motivation is expressed most strongly at the local le vel. Despite legal guarantees, NGOs are often unable to participate in locallevel policy-making. This is not so much because their ca pacities are insufficient as because local politicians jealously guard their monopol y over local resources. Institutionally, the local government chief has stronger powers than NGOs.13 The chief can use his/her powers to exclude NGOs.

CONCLUSION

Philippine NGOs have modified their character and activities in response to changes in the political environment. To summarize, historically NGOs

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started as agents of the government, church, and/or corporate groups. Under the Marcos regime, anti-government NGOs emerged (as agents of the forces of the left). During the Aquino period, they began to exert influence over policy-making processes as inde pendent entities and in close m utual relations with the go vernment. The fact that NGOs ar e oriented towards independence and autonomy is clearly shown by the establishment in 1991 of the Caucus of De velopment NGO Netw orks (CODE-NGO) as a mechanism to maintain NGOs’ self-discipline and quality of w ork.14 As was stated earlier, changes on the part of NGOs have had close bearings on changes in the political environment. In the Philippines, lik e in other countries, civil society has become a topic of active discussion. But the discussion centres almost exclusively on how NGOs can and should influence polic y-making processes.15 The participants in these debates are concerned with the creation of systems to facilitate the participation of NGOs in polic y-making and enf orcement processes, by means of consultation mechanisms, appointments to public posts, or by elections. In addition to appointments of NGO officers to high government posts and the institutionalization of NGO–go vernment consultations, the party list system introduced in the 1998 election had symbolic importance in this conte xt. It is a unique system tha t excludes major political parties and facilitates the participation of NGOs and small groups. In fact, most of the parties that participated in the 1998 elections using this system were founded by NGOs and POs. NGOs are enthusiastic about participating in policy-making and electoral politics because they know that the state controls the overwhelming portion of the country’s resources and monopolizes the power of regulation. In a late-starting industrial country like the Philippines, NGOs can only expect to get their ideal programmes implemented by utilizing the resources of the state. The Philippine political system, which is modelled after the U.S. system, is useful to them as it keeps the power of the bureaucracy subdued and imparts great power to elected and appointed officials. It contains, so to speak, a window through which NGOs can get effective access to state resources, bypassing bureaucratic hurdles. NGOs are thus motivated to take part in elector al campaigns, g et their officers appointed to public posts, win elected or appointed officials over to their side, and otherwise engage in politics. They believe that this is the way to gain access to state resources. While NGOs possess this motivation, politicians, particularly local ones, stand in their way. It is they who have long monopolized state resources. They see NGOs as intruders into their sanctuar y. Traditional politicians

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stubbornly cling to their institutionally protected vested interests. State resources remain under their control. Though NGOs ha ve shifted their position from agents of other force to independent entities, their influence is still limited. Philippine NGOs in this sense still have tough obstacles to overcome.

Notes 1

2

3

4 5

6

7 8

9 10

11

In the Philippines NGOs are generally understood in the following way: the non-governmental sector, as clearly distinguished fr om the government sector, comprises corporations and non-profit organizations; the latter are subdivided into NGOs w orking for the public good and POs working f or their own interests. But these distinctions are often confused. In some cases, government offices use the term NGO to refer to all non-profit organizations, including POs. In other cases NGOs are subdivided into different categories. In this chapter we take the general definition as the basis of our discussion: non-prof it organizations distinguished from POs. This chapter relies on Clarke (1998, pp. 52–95) when observing changes over time in the character of NGOs. After the 1986 political change, Morales departed from the political line of the Communist Party of the Philippines and opted for a “popular democracy” line, meaning democracy from the grass-roots up. With regard to philanthropists, see Katsumata (1997) and Velasco (1995). See Lerma and Los Baños (1999) on NGO-related la ws in the Philippines. The submission of additional papers is required when setting up a foundation or a charity fund (Lerma and Los Baños 1999, pp. 246–48). For example, distribution of profit among board members. Registration and accreditation are differentiated in that the former relates to the acquisition of corporate status and the latter to the acquisition of a status enabling an NGO to undertake government services or projects. POs are also required to gain accreditation from the local assembly. This account of PCNC is based on Tanaka (1999) and Chamber lain (n.d.). The founders of PCNC inc lude AoF, PBSP, the League of Cor porate Foundations (LCF), Bishop–Businessmen’s Conference for Human Development (BBC), Caucus of Development NGO Networks

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12

13

14

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(CODE-NGO), and the National Council for Social Development Foundations (NCSD). In the Aquino government FLAG members Jok er Arroyo, Agusto Sanchez, and Rene Saguisag were appointed Executive Secretary, Labor Minister, and pr esidential spokesperson, respectively; Mita P ardo de Tavera of AKAP Social Welfare Minister; Karina David of PhilDHRRA Deputy-Minister of the Ministry of Social Service and Development; and Delfin Ganapin of the Philippine Federation for Environmental Concern Under-Secretary of the Department of Environment and Natural Resources. In the Ramos government Ernesto Garilao of PBSP was appointed Secretary of the Department of Agrarian Reform and Juan Flavier of PRRM Secretary of the Department of Health. In the Estrada government Horacio Morales of PRRM was appointed Secretary of the Department of Agrarian Reform. Karina Da vid was appointed presidential advisor on housing issues but resigned soon after, following disagreements with the President. The Ford Foundation conducts various projects involving local governments. Its officer in charge told this author tha t the success of individual projects depended decisively on whether the local government chiefs concerned really understood the projects. This remark shows how large the powers of local go vernment chiefs are . (Interviews with a foundation officer, 12 October 1999.) CODE-NGO consists of fourteen NGO networks, embracing a total of 3,000 member groups. See Wui and Lopez (1997) and ESDC (1997).

References

Chamberlain, Randall A. Regulating Civil Society: The Philippine Council for NGO Certification (PCNC). Makati: Philippine Council for NGO Certification, n.d. Clarke, Gerald. The Politics of NGOs in South-East Asia: Participation and Protest in the Philippines. London and New York: Routledge, 1998. Constantino-David, Karina. “From the Present Looking Back: A History of Philippine Non-Go vernmental Organizations”. In Organizing for Democracy: NGOs, Civil Society, and the Philippine Sta te, edited by G. Sidney Silliman and Lela Gar ner Noble, pp. 26–48. Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 1998.

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Ethnic Studies and De velopment Center (ESDC) Resear ch Team. Policy Influence: NGO Experiences. Quezon City: Ateneo Center for Social Policy and Public Affairs, Institute for Development Research and Konrad Adenauer Stiftung, 1997. George, Terrence R. “Local Governance: People Power in the Provinces?” In Organizing for Democracy: NGOs, Civil Society, and the Philippine State, edited by G. Sidney Silliman and Lela Garner Noble, pp. 223–53. Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 1998. Katsumata, Eiko. “Firipin no hi-eri katsudo” [Non-profit activities in the Philippines]. In Ajia no NPO [NPOs in Asia], pp. 213–39. Tokyo: ALC Press, 1997. Kawanaka, Takeshi. “Firipin no kanr yosei” [The b ureaucracy in the Philippines]. In ASEAN shokoku no kanryosei [Bureaucracies in ASEAN countries], edited by Ikuo Iw asaki and Yoshiyuki Hagiwara, pp. 79–120. Tokyo: Institute of Developing Economies, 1996. Legaspi, Perla E. “The State of the Devolution Process in Selected LGUs: A Comparative Perspective”. In Decentralization, Autonomy and the Local Government Code: The Challenge of Implementation,vol. 1, edited by Perla E. Legaspi, pp. 235–90. Quezon City: Local Government Center, College of Public Administration, University of the Philippines and Ford Foundation, 1995a. ———. “Summary and Conclusion”. In Decentralization, Autonomy and the Local Government Code: The Challenge of Implementation, vol. 1, edited by Perla E. Legaspi, pp. 291–97. Quezon City: Local Government Center, College of Public Administration, University of the Philippines and Ford Foundation, 1995b. Lerma, Carol C. and Jessica Los Baños. “Philippines”. In Philanthropy and Law in Asia: A Comparative Study of the Nonprofit Legal Systems in Ten Asia Pacific Societies, edited by Thomas Silk, pp. 240–75. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass Publishers, 1999. Republic of the Philippines (RP). Medium-Term Philippine Development Plan 1987–1992. Manila, 1987. ———. Medium-Term Philippine Development Plan 1993–1998. Manila, 1992. Tanaka, Yayoi. “Kenshu hokokusho: Philippine Council f or NGO Certification (NGO ni yoru NGO no menz ei ninsho kikan)” [Research paper: Philippine Council for NGO Certification (An agency of NGOs for tax exemption certification for NGOs)]. Unpublished, 1999.

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Vitug, Marites Dañguilan. The Politics of Logging: Power from the Forest. Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism, 1993. Velasco, Ma. Gisela T. “Overview of Or ganized Philanthropy in the Philippines”. In Emerging Civil Society in the Asia Pacific Community, edited by Tadashi Yamamoto, pp. 591–608. Sing apore and Tokyo: Institute of Southeast Asian Studies and Japan Center for International Exchange, 1995. Wui, Marlon A. and Ma. Glenda S. Lopez, eds. State-Civil Society Relations in Policy-Making. Quezon City: Third World Studies Center, University of the Philippines, 1997.

© 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

This chapter is reproduced from The State and NGOs: Perspective from Asia , edited by Shinichi Shigetomi (Singapore: Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, 2002). This version was obtained electronically direct from the publisher on condition th at copyright is not infringed. No part of this publication may be reproduced, translated, stored in a retrieval system, or transmi tted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies and Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo.

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7 Thailand A Crossing of Critical Parallel Relationships Shinichi Shigetomi INTRODUCTION

In Thai the term for non-governmental organizations (NGOs) is ongkan (or ongkon) patthana ekachon, which could be transla ted literally as “private development organization”. The fact that “development” is integrated into the Thai term for NGOs indicates that they are deemed to be or ganizations whose aim is to encoura ge the socially and economically disadvantaged to str engthen their autonomous development and political capacities (Prudhisan and Maneer at 1997, p. 197). Development NGOs with this motivation emerged in Thailand during the pr ocess of r apid economic de velopment launched in the 1960s. They were organized to address the needs of people suf fering from poverty, criticized the state’s development policies, and engaged in alternative development projects. In the 1980s, however, they began to be concer ned with the sta te’s development policies. Today, Thai NGOs are joining f orce with citizens’ social mo vements — which attempt to influence the state from outside or the periphery of its formal decision-making mechanisms. In this chapter we will trace the state– NGO relationship in Thailand over the past thirty years and identify the basic character istics that ha ve endured throughout the c hanges. It should be added that prior to the adv ent of de velopment NGOs, there were private charity organizations. In this c hapter these groups will be dealt with as NGOs. Ho wever, our emphasis is of course on development NGOs.

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HISTORY AND PRESENT STATUS OF NGOs Early History (until the 1950s)

Charity work in Thailand probably began at the beginning of the twentieth century. It w as conducted by r eligious groups and o verseas Chinese associations of the same original locality or the same language (Amara and Nitaya 1994, pp. 2–20). Until World War I, these groups mainly provided medical services and services for women and orphans. Many of them were formed by Christian organizations. Even after World War II, most of these groups remained as providers of social welfare services (Table 7.1). Their beneficiaries were orphans, youths, the visually impaired , and victims of disaster (Sakda 1975, p. 709). They were meant to serve the downtrodden. Many were managed by members of the royal family and other upper-class personages. The Emergence of Development NGOs (1960s to 1976)

From the 1960s through the 1970s, the Thai economy continued to grow at an annual rate of 7–8 per cent.This growth produced a large number of people who were left behind by the development process. The shared understanding at that time was that poverty was no longer a consequence of personal circumstances, but rather was being created by society itself. This awareness gave rise to ef forts to crea te a ne w stream of NGOs (development NGOs). Or ganizations set up at the be ginning of this period chose rural villages and urban slums as their fields of work, as they considered the problems of de velopment to be concentrated in these arenas. Table 7.1 shows that in the 1970s, and particularly after 1974, as many community development NGOs wer e created as were welfare NGOs. Of these early groups, TRRM (Thailand Rural Reconstruction Movement under Royal Patronage), which was f ounded in 1967, exerted a lar ge influence on the Thai NGO movement. It set an example in terms of work style, and pr oduced many experienced NGO staf f. The core of TRRM consisted of pr ogressive technocrats and intellectuals, suc h as Pue y Ungpakorn (then president of the Thai Central Bank) (Rueng 1995, p. 52). Field workers in this early period were mostly ex-bureaucrats.1 Puey also set up a Thammasat University Graduate Volunteer Service (1970) and participated in the founding of Komol Kimthong Foundation (1971). The former chiefly supported young people working in rural areas, and the latter

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those working in urban areas. The two agencies helped establish a number of NGOs and supplied development workers. As this demonstrates, the ear ly NGOs were not or ganized by people with anti-government attitudes. But since they worked for and with those who had fallen into relative poverty as a result of government development policies (or the lack thereof), they soon went beyond just complementing government work, and became critical of the state’s administration. The student uprising in October 1973 had a strong impact on Thai NGOs. Under the civilian government produced by this revolution, NGOs enjoyed a relatively free political environment. This certainly helped increase their number. In the three years from 1974 alone, forty-two new NGOs came into being (Table 7.1). Immediately after the student uprising, the Union for Civil Liberty (UCL) was set up as the first NGO dealing with human rights. The emergence of NGOs specializing in human rights and political democratization was also a product of the political environment that prevailed during that period. In the early 1970s, thus, Thailand witnessed the surfacing of two trends related to NGOs — one concerned rural problems and the other with human rights and political democracy. Though activists in the two categories had different inclinations and orientations, they shared backgrounds either as intellectuals (scholars and some progressive bureaucrats) or as socially conscientious students. They were all, to a greater or lesser extent, critical of the government. In October 1976 the military and right-wing political forces set out to turn back the tide of democrac y. The government cracked down on the student, peasant, and other popular movements. The political space of NGOs was suddenly squeezed and activities in rural areas ceased to be possible. The Resurgence of NGOs and the Diversification of Their Activities (1979 to 1992)

The activities of NGOs w ere reinvigorated by the go vernment’s 1979 declaration on the easing of ideological antagonism (Phaisan and Suwarat 1990, p. 37; Phumtham 1986, p. 24). Between 1980 and 1984, 112 NGOs were founded (Table 7.1). As poverty remained serious in the 1980s, NGO activities rapidly increased as soon as the political space was reopened. In the 1980s the consequences of development became a public concern along with the development gap. The representative issue that came to the fore in this period w as environmental disruption. Environmental NGOs began to be created in the middle of the 1980s. In the area of public health,

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9

Total

104

8 4 12 4 43 29 4

Community Development

12

0 0 0 1 6 5 0

Information, Seminar, Research

Source: Calculated from CUSRI, CMUSRI, and KKURDI (1993).

0 1 2 0 2 4 0

Before 1969 1970–73 1974–76 1977–79 1980–84 1985–90 Unknown

Human Rights

24

3 0 1 2 10 8 0

Co-ordination, Support for NGOs

4

1 0 1 1 1 0 0

Funding for NGOs

58

10 4 9 4 18 10 3

Advocacy

TABLE 7.1 Number of NGOs by Year of Establishment and Field of Activity

162

47 16 17 17 31 27 7

Social Welfare

375

69 25 42 29 112 83 15

Number of NGOs

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activities were launched promoting the use of herbs and traditional medicines. Following the first reported AIDS case in 1984, NGOs dedicated to working on this issue were also created. With regard to rural development, new groups were organized towards the end of the 1980s, in order to spread the knowledge and practice of organic, sustainable agriculture. On the other hand, NGOs aiming at political democratization re-emerged to fill the expanded political space. The once-suspended UCL was revived in 1979, and it or ganized the Campaign for Popular Democr acy, which pressed for the democra tic revision of the Constitution and opposed the extension of the service term of the Commander in Chief of the Royal Thai Army. The Present Status of NGOs

The “Black May” incident of 1992 was followed by the invigoration of a movement for democra tization and r eform in the Thai political system. Many NGOs joined this mo vement as cor e promoters. Earlier, in 1991, Prime Minister Anan Panyalachun had expressed support for NGOs (Anek c1991, pp. 18–19). As this process developed, NGOs came to be broadly known among the people and earned public recognition. At present there are 465 NGOs in Thailand, counting only those listed in 1997 by Thailand’s largest NGO coalition, the NGO Coor dinating Committee on Development (NGO-COD). Table 7.2 categorizes them by activity area. Quite a lar ge number are listed under “co-ordination and development support work”. This is partly because this category includes NGOs that under take community organizing and economic acti vities for rural development. Also impressive is the number of en vironment-, children-, and youth-related groups. The financial sources of NGOs ar e not well researched, but the 1997 directory indicates that the percentage of NGOs relying on foreign funding is the highest of all source categories. However, quite a few receive contributions from domestic sources. It is no longer rare to find groups receiving funds from the government or relying on membership dues.

LEGAL AND ADMINISTRATIVE SYSTEMS RELATED TO NGOs

In this section we will e xamine the state’s systems of NGO control. In Thailand there is no law prohibiting citizens’ associations in general. This means that the state has no means to control NGOs as long as they operate © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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TABLE 7.2 Current Distribution of Thai NGOs by Activity and Region

Activity Agriculture AIDS Children and youths Co-ordination and development support work Disabled Hill tribes Human rights Labour Media Natural resources and environment Primary health care and consumers’ protection Religion and development Slums Women Total Number of NGOs

Bangkok Lower North and and Central Vicinity Region North Northeast South

Total

10 30

10

12 31

25 15

7

64 76

32

2

23

21

6

84

43 4 6 14 6 9

7

15

19 1

10

2

1 1

1

7

94 5 26 18 7 17

28

3

24

14

21

90

16

1

14

11

3

45

6

9 1 13 131 106

1 2 1 53 46

26 23 43 618 465

10 20 12 240 180

20 1

24 21

17 170 112

Source: Wipaphan and Suntaree (1997, pp. 286–90).

as informal groups and do not contravene domestic laws. NGOs come under the state’s legal control only when they register as legal persons. System of Registration as Legal Persons

NGOs which do not pursue private profit can register for corporate status, either as associations (samakhom) or as foundations (munnithi) under the Civil Code. An association, according to the Civil Code, is a collective of individuals, with corporate status, that does not pursue profit as its goal. A foundation is a corporation which possesses assets beyond a statutory threshold, has the pursuit

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of the public good as its purpose, and does not have the intent of dividing profits among its member s.2 In 1979 the Vice-Minister of Interior issued an order that foundations should state in their articles of association that they would not conduct any political activities. The 1992 amendment to the Ci vil Code is supposed to have nullified this decree, but a manual issued in 1997 still retained the clause concerning political activities.3 For a group to obtain corporate status, it has to go through two procedural stages, namely recognition of the founding of the group and registration as a legal person. With regard to the f irst stage, the Office of the National Culture Commission, or ONCC ( Khana kammakan watthanatham haeng chat), is in char ge of screening and a pproval. Registration is handled by different government agencies, depending on the geographical location of the group and the cate gory of corporation the group falls into. 4 What we need to examine here is how the state agencies actually use their discretion in the screening process. ONCC has a section that handles a pplications filed in Bangkok. As of September 1999, seven officials staffed this section. In 1990–98, 630 new associations and foundations were approved. Since 20 per cent of them were based in Bangkok, a simple calculation shows that the seven officials handled 130 cases each year. It is said that the of fice sent investigators to the neighbourhoods of the applicant groups to collect information about their actual operations. I was told that the main objective of the investigations was to expose billiard halls trying to disguise themselves as associations.5 At the registration stage the boar d members of the applicant g roups are scrutinized. Each applicant group must submit resumés for all the board members, and the board members are then asked to present themselves for personal interviews. It is said that the police sometimes examine the career records of the board members of the applicant group. Post-registration Monitoring System

Even after registration, the ONCC and the registrar hold the power and duty to monitor the activities of associations and foundations. The registered groups are required to send in annual activity reports to be checked by ONCC, but actually only 6,000 or so of the 16,191 registered groups (April 1999) did so. With only three officials assigned to the checking work, it is impossible for the office to fully process even the 6,000 reports it received. For foundations the Ministry of Interior, as the registrar, is entitled to check reports and, if necessary, to make further investigations. The Special Branch Bureau of the National

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Police is the registrar for associations, and can check their reports. It is said that police officers can slip into meetings or conduct secret in vestigations if they suspect wrongdoing. In reality, though, the police rarely go beyond asking questions of board members who would visit the police to renew their twoyear terms. Though all the registered groups are under the obligation to present annual reports, many fail to comply with the rule. How great are the r egulatory effects of this system of screening and monitoring on NGO activities? With regard to legal aspects, the intricate and cumbersome two-stage procedure itself and the asset requirements for foundations certainly work as a discouraging factor for potential applicants, and in this sense may have some regulatory effects. As regards the contents of activities, however, decisions are lar gely left to the discretion of the officers in char ge. The procedure for the founding of associations and foundations boils down to the scr utiny of the career s of board members. This does not seem to be a substantive hindrance, as large NGOs that wish to be re gistered usually ha ve an impr essive board of distinguished personalities. The government officials are mainly concerned about billiard halls and other types of amusement facilities trying to disguise themselves as associations. In spite of the ONCC–registrar double checking system, the government is not institutionall y equipped to conduct e xhaustive monitoring of activities. In actual practice the sta te seems to be satisf ied with a system that allo ws it to selecti vely intervene in the af fairs of “suspicious” groups. It wants to maintain in place a control system, complete with a bureaucratic apparatus, so that the state can intervene at its discretion in activities by social groups. Until recently NGOs registered as foundations were prohibited from conducting political activities, but the ban had little real effect in circumventing political activities, since most NGOs were not registered. The type of political acti vities that the go vernment feels uncomfortable with depends largely on the nature of the regime as well as the political power relationships at any given time. At the moment it seems unlikely that a situation will arise that will justify state intervention in NGO activities. Furthermore, there is practically no government control on the foreign funding of NGOs.6 NGO Responses

We have so far discussed the system of corporate registration by NGOs and about how the process actually works. We also noted tha t in reality, few NGOs want to register as legal persons. Only 35 per cent or so of the groups listed in the NGO-COD table (Anuson and Suphaphan 1997) are © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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incorporated (calculated by counting those entered as associations, foundations, or co-operatives). Other groups call themselves groups or centres. Many of them are most likely voluntary organizations. In order to avoid intricate registration procedures and possible state intervention, they seem to prefer their present status. They do not have large memberships, nor do they have the assets to satisfy registration requirements. Corporate status does not seem to be very attractive for them. Of course, their informal status costs them some credibility, putting them at a disadvantage in terms of collecting donations. They may be also una ble to receive government subsidies. But some such NGOs, we are told, manage to collect adequate funds through other NGOs which are registered as corporations. THE EVOLUTION OF THE STATE–NGO RELATIONSHIP

Historically the state–NGO relationship in Thailand has swung back and forth between collaboration and antagonism. The swings have reflected the changing political and economic character of the state as well as the attributes of NGOs (the class backgrounds of their members, ideologies, and action policies). Complementary and Collaborative Relationships with Government

The Thai Government organized its f irst social welf are branch (the Department of Public Welfare, or DOPW) in 1940 (DOPW 1990, p. 160). Until the mid-1970s, the DOPW’s programmes addressed orphans, indigent households, prostitutes, disaster victims, and other people subjected to extreme living difficulties (Sakda 1975). Its services were confined to urban dwellers, and only a limited number of them benefited from its services. Though aware of this limitation, the government expected private charity organizations to complement its services. As was mentioned earlier, private charity groups were servicing the same groups of people who were targeted by government services. As the charity gr oup managers came from the same social gr oups that supplied ranking of ficials to the go vernment, it was easy to crea te a colla borative relationship between the DOPW and private charities. In 1952 the government added to the DOPW a new unit to support private charity groups. This unit has pro vided subsidies, handed out other benefits, and given awards. The DOPW also helped to pub lish NGO directories. In 1999, 57 per cent of the g overnment’s NGO support subsidies went to groups servicing children, youths, and disabled persons (DOPW internal documents). © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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Critical Parallelism

The government organized a unit in the area of rural development as well, towards the end of the 1950s, and began to undertake development projects. Until the 1970s, ho wever, the contents of these projects as w ell as the areas where they were run remained limited. Given this situation, the development NGOs that emerged in the 1960s were already groping f or alternative modes of de velopment different from go vernment-promoted development. TRRM chose some specif ic rural communities as a tar get area and launched an integrated rural development project in 1969. It is said that it wanted to run the project in linkage with the local government agency. In reality, however, they were merely working separately within the same area. They were not ready for any collaboration that went beyond exchanges of visits and m utual equipment loans. They were operating parallel projects. In urban areas as well new NGOs came into being with the support of Komol Kimthong Foundation to run public health programmes (disseminating traditional medicines) and welfare activities for school children of poor families (catering services). These activities were carried out independently from the official welfare administration. Though this parallelism was not allowed to continue in the 1970s, political spaces were opened up in the 1980s where NGOs were able to develop independent activities while maintaining a critical position towards the government’s development policies and methodology of implementation. With regard to rural development, the area where the largest number of groups were working, NGOs began in the 1980s to advocate residents’ participation and the appreciation of community values and traditional cultures (Withun 1986, p. 32). This approach was antithetical to the government’s top-down style of project implementation. On the basis of interviews with fifty-six development officers and the same number of NGO members early in the 1980s, Maniemai and Tips concluded that “the relationship between GOs and NGOs is one of mutual suspicion and tension” (1984, p. 91). Until the mid-1980s rural development NGOs concentrated on their own fieldwork. They did not join political acti vities, though they were critical of the go vernment’s development approach. Nor w as the militar ybureaucracy-dominated government prepared to listen to NGOs’ political demands. But with the exception of a few years in the second half of the 1970s, the government did not actively repress NGOs as long as they stayed out of politics. Since each NGO was able to run its projects only in several of a large number of rural communities, its activities rarely competed with

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government projects in the field. The critical parallelism generated at that time remains in place today. Critical Exchanges

The government learned from the political instability of the 1970s that rural poverty could undermine its power base. With this awareness, it set the elimination of rural poverty as a priority policy goal towards the end of the 1970s. The NESDB (National Economic and Social De velopment Board) officials in charge of policies for the elimination of rur al poverty were the ones who began to search for ways to establish collaborations with NGOs. The NESDB was friendly towards NGOs from its outset partly because Puey (the founder of TRRM) was sitting on its working committee. With a view to linking with them, NESDB officials urged NGOs to form a coalition. Earlier, NGO r ural development workers had or ganized their o wn network. This network, which was launched in 1978, facilitated the exchange of experiences and ideas by means of workshops and seminars. NGOs held their first national conference in 1981.The second conference the following year had as its main theme “g overnment and NGO co-oper ation in rural development” (Maniemai and Tips 1984, pp. 52–53). In this process NGOs came to be concerned not only with their respective projects but also with the nation’s rural development. As part of this process of convergence, NGO-CORD (NGO Coordinating Committee on Rural De velopment, the pr edecessor of NGO-COD) w as founded towards the end of 1985 as a br oad coalition of NGOs. The government and NGOs at last had established respective systems to facilitate mutual linkages in rural development. In the second half of the 1980s the Office of the Primary Health Care of the Ministry of Public Health followed suit by initia ting regular consultations with NGOs at the local le vel. In both cases, however, the government–NGO co-operation was still shallow. They held joint seminars, b ut this par ticipation by NGOs was a f ar cry from involvement in decision-making and policy enforcement. Even so, the relationship created at that time served later as the basis for political participation by NGOs. Confrontation

It was relatively easy for the government and NGOs to divide the activities between them in the areas of social welfare and rural development, but

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they clashed head-on when it came to democratization and environmental conservation. As was mentioned earlier , NGOs concerned with democratization and human rights were already in existence by the middle of the 1970s. They were sharply critical of the government. After the middle of the 1980s NGOs and the state began to confront each other more frequently over issues of the environment and resource utilization. In 1988 NGOs or ganized a br oad campaign ag ainst the construction of the Nam Choen Dam, with the participation of other groups and individuals. By holding large-scale demonstrations and with the support of the media, the campaign succeeded in forcing the government to suspend the project. In the years since then, there have been frequent similar confrontations. When state-initiated projects threatened to destroy specific local communities, NGOs felt it was their duty to stand with the victims and confront the state. The Nam Choen Dam project was a case in point. The emergence of this phase of confrontation between the state and NGOs reflected changes that were occurring in the economic space for NGOs. Earlier, when complementary and collaborati ve relations and cr itical parallelism prevailed, NGOs framed the main issue as the scar city of the state’s allocation of r esources to communities. By asserting this, NGOs, whether they liked it or not, were playing complementary roles,making up for the scarcity of state funds. However, environmental problems had to be framed in a different way. They arose precisely because the government’s resource allocations to big projects were lar ge and inappropria te. The allocation of large resources to me ga-projects was made possible by the growth of disposable resour ces, which in turn w as achieved by rapid economic growth and go vernment efforts since the 1960s. In this ne w situation, NGOs no longer directed their critical activities against the lack of government policies, but rather against the negative consequences of government policies. They also criticiz ed the process through which inadequate policies were being produced. Participation and Erosion

Increasing Governmental Presence

Given these circumstances, environmental NGOs and NGO activists more generally came to share the perception that the problem lay not in the lack of government policies but in how the government was using resources. In the 1980s the go vernment found it increasingl y difficult to depend on authoritarian methods to rule the country, and resorted instead to resource © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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reallocation politics. In the years since the inauguration of a party-based government in 1988, the state has accelerated this process of policy reorientation. In this setting the state did indeed increase resource transfers to people left behind. Nevertheless, income gaps failed to narrow and the problem of r elative poverty persisted. These circumstances forced the government to distribute resources more appropriately. In the meantime the political space for NGOs was e xpanding as the military contr ol of the government weakened (with the e xception of a brief period in the early 1990s). Within this new situation, some NGOs found it preferable to seek to participate in, rather than confront, government decision-making processes with a view to influencing them. The participation trend first emerged in the rural development area ar ound 1990, and be gan to spread to other administrative areas of acti vities in the per iod around 1992. The new Constitution promulgated in 1997 contained clear pro visions for NGO participation in administrative processes.

Participation

In the area of rural development, during the Seventh National Economic and Social De velopment Plan (1992–96) NGOs stepped f orward from merely exchanging views with the government and joined the policy-making process. In October 1989 the go vernment organized a subcommittee to draft the rural development plans for the Seventh Plan. Four individuals from NGOs were invited to participate in this subcommittee, one of them as the official representative of NGO-CORD. In the drafting process of the Eighth Plan (1997–2001) Pra wes Wasi, a theor ist leader of the NGO movement, assumed the chairmanship of a subcommittee for rural, local, and environmental development planning. Several government agencies in areas other than rural development also adopted new NGO policies. In f iscal 1992 the Ministry of Pub lic Health began to subsidize NGOs. In 1996 representati ves of the coalition of the ministry-registered NGOs were given seats on the subsidy screening and allocation committee. Aside from such general subsidies, the ministry began to subsidize NGOs working on the AIDS issue. In the area of social welfare as well, the government changed its organization to allow for NGO par ticipation. On the for ty-nine-member committee set up to make social welfare policies, nine seats were given to representatives from social welfare NGOs and four to social welfare workers © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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in an individual capacity. Most of the NGO representati ves sitting on the committee were politically close to the government, however. In terms of the environment the Enhancement and Conservation of National Environmental Quality Act, enacted in 1992, pr ovides for governmental co-operation with NGOs re gistered with the Ministry of Science, Technology and Environment (MOSTE). Articles 7 and 8 of the law, which define NGOs as bodies which assist administration, express the expectation that NGOs will play a role in conducting pub lic relations activities, supporting community movements, undertaking research, making policy proposals, and providing legal advice to residents. It also sets a quota for participation by NGOs in the state en vironment committee. NGO participation in polic y-making has thus been le gislatively endorsed. However, it is up to the government to decide which NGOs will participate. One MOSTE official in charge of NGOs mentioned to me that he considered the NGO members participating in decision-making as expert individuals rather than as NGO representati ves. Occasionally, the committee and/or subcommittee for policy formulation will ask f or NGOs’ views on their drafts. In ad dition, an Environment Fund was established, from w hich MOSTE-registered NGOs can obtain subsidies. Erosion

In the second half of the 1990s the discourse of ci vil society was introduced into the world of NGOs as a useful theoretical tool f or promoting NGO participation in decision-making. There are a diversity of theories regarding civil society in Thailand today, but the mainstream places importance on citizen participation in political and administrative mechanisms. According to this view, decision-making on public policies should not be left entirely to elected politicians and the b ureaucracy, but should be made with the direct participation of persons representing (or considered to represent) interest groups. A system to guarantee this type of participation is seen as an ideal system. It can be said that this stance, which attempts to break the monopolistic power of the go vernment, amounts to erosion of e xisting institutions rather than participation. According to this theory, NGOs are defined as the shapers of a desirable system. They are also to be actors in, and supporters for, the system. A typical example of this can be found in provincial-level civil society organizations (prachakhom changwat).7 These are organizations through which representatives of local residents can monitor and make proposals to provincial administrations. However, they remain informal organizations. Their status © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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and membership requirements are not def ined by law. In actual practice, the core members are college teachers, lawyers, medical doctors, and other intellectuals as well as NGOs. They were created through the desire of local people to directly influence the local administration’s decision-making process through channels outside of the elected provincial assemblies. Several government agencies are encouraging the creation of similarprachakhom (civil society organizations) through policy. New NGOs have been set up specifically to promote civil society and train the human resources to achieve this. Though NGO participation in administration is making strides forward, the participation is still qualified. First, although it is NGOs that are supposed to be participating, in many cases this role is played not by NGOs as such but rather by indi vidual activists. These individuals participate on the strength of their personal e xpertise or personal r elationships with bureaucrats. Second, the go vernment offices that welcome NGO participation tend to be those with progressive bureaucrats, such as NESDB and MOSTE, or those r esponsible for rectifying the ills of de velopment. Not all government agencies are like-minded. Third, in most cases NGOs participate in drafting policies and holding public hearings only at the subcommittee level. In this sense the y are still on the fr inges of policymaking. Fourth, NGOs themselves have no intention of becoming polic y enforcers. Rather, they are eager to cr eate institutions outside of administrative and political mechanisms so that the y can exert influence on, and effectively monitor, the administration from outside. This style of mar ginal participation in politics stems lar gely from the present state of the Thai political and administrative systems, as well as to the ideological orientation of NGO activists. On the political side, the shift to party politics has failed to produce any political party with which NGOs could identify. All the parties have essentially identical positions. Moreover, rampant vote-buying has made NGOs distrustful of electoral politics. On the other hand, the Thai bureaucracy hires young staff members through examinations and promotes them. It is a closed system, and entry from the outside is practically impossible (Riggs 1966).

CONCLUSION

Thai NGOs f irst emerged as c harity organizations serving the socially disadvantaged. As economic growth occurred, NGOs began to work for the interests of the masses of people left behind in the process of development. Until the mid-1970s the government provided only meagre © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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social services, trifling in fact compared with the number of people who needed them. NGOs found in this gap a vast economic space. While critical of the government’s poor performance, NGOs began to carry out their own development programmes. The government did not welcome NGOs, b ut neither did it repress them (with the exception of a short period in the second half of the 1970s) as long as they concentrated on social and development activities. The government and NGOs wer e in a rela tionship of cr itical parallelism. However, as the go vernment began to emphasize income distrib ution policies and to undertak e larger and larger development projects, NGOs came to realize that there were problems with the government’s method of distributing resources. NGOs and the government clashed head-on over issues involving the environment and resource utilization. In the second half of the 1980s NGOs went as f ar as to play a central role in mass demonstrations, joining hands with local residents and students (confrontational relations). On the other hand, some NGOs initiated moves to influence the government’s policy-making processes instead of merely opposing policy consequences. Already in the early 1980s the government and NGOs began to grope for contacts through e xchanges of views. The system of party politics introduced in 1988 helped to enlar ge the NGOs’ political space, and the government also increased resource allocations to the poor. These circumstances created favourable conditions for, as well as the necessity of, NGO participation. During the political and administrative reform resulting from the 1992 May uprising, models and theories of civil society began to appear attractive to NGOs and the public.The participation of NGOs and local people’s organizations gathered such momentum that they began to erode the erstwhile sanctuary of politicians and bureaucrats. However this has been multilinear, rather than unilinear, development. As illustrated by Figure 7.1, all of the different types of state–NGO relationships which emerged at different times and in dif ferent areas of activities have survived until today. They continue to function side by side. Despite these changes over time, and despite their diversity, Thai NGOs have by and large stuck to critical positions of the government. This criticism has taken place from outside the formal political and administra tive structure. In other w ords, the NGOs ha ve been reluctant to enter into parliamentary politics based on representative democracy (decision-making by the parliament) 8 or into the b ureaucracy’s decision-making and enforcement processes, preferring instead other ways of influencing policies. They have chosen alternati ves (in rural de velopment, for instance) or pressured the government from outside (as in the anti-dam movement) to © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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FIGURE 7.1 The Development of State–NGO Relationships in Thailand Categories of State–NGO Relationship

1960

1970

1980

1990

2000

Major Fields/ Issues

Complementary/ collaborative relationships

Social welfare

Critical parallelism

Rural development, public health, social welfare

Confrontation

Democracy, human rights, environment

Critical exchanges

Rural development, public health, social welfare

Participation

Rural development, public health, social welfare, environment

Erosion

Local administration

Source: Compiled by the author.

change its policy. Even after participation became a focus, NGOs remained at the margin of decision-making, choosing, for instance, to participate in their capacity as individuals. In eroding the formal decision-making areas, they seem eager to b uild mechanisms to check and monitor the state and local administration’s decision-making processes from outside. On this point, the practice of Thai NGOs stands in stark contrast with the Philippines, where NGOs are eager to become full-fledged actors in formal politics and administrative structures. This difference may reflect the awareness of Thai © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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NGOs that the existing political and administrative systems in their country lack basic mechanisms for responding to people’s needs and demands. Notes 1 2

3

4

5

6

7

8

Interview with a former TRRM worker (Bangkok, August 2000). See Nanthawat (1998) for a detailed interpretation and analysis of NGOrelated laws. This author directly confirmed with a registration officer at the Ministry of Interior that political acti vities by NGOs are no long er prohibited. The manual is quoted in DOLA (c1997, p. 29). In Bangkok the screening is done by the Commander, Special Division 2 of the National Police for associations and the Vice-Minister of Interior for foundations and in local areas by the provincial governors for both associations and foundations. Thai law regulates the number of billiard tables and their use by different entities. Associations are allowed to own up to five tables. Commercial halls sometimes try to ab use this la w by disguising themselv es as associations. Foreign NGOs are encouraged, but not obligated, to register with the Department of Technical and Economic Cooperation (DTEC), which is attached to the Prime Minister’s Office. The government does not seem interested in intervening in the flow of money of registered foreign NGOs. This system was pr epared by the Working Group f or Civil Society (WGCS), which originated in the Pra wes subcommittee set up during the drafting of the Eighth National Economic and Social Development Plan. After the plan was launched, the subcommittee changed its title to WGCS and continued its activities. Reflecting this background, the Rural Development Coordination Division of the NESDB functions as its secretariat. The government’s policy is to or ganize a WGCS in each province. As of Se ptember 1999, twenty-nine out of the countr y’s seventy-six provinces had local versions (interview at the NESDB in September 1999). Some NGO activists ran in the first popular elections for seats in the Upper House in March 2000. The new Upper House is expected to be a watchdog over political and bureaucratic decision-making, and this seems to be a suitable place for Thai NGOs, which want to have a stake in the state’s administration but at the same time hope to remain outside of dirty politics.

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References

Amara Pongsapich and Nita ya Kataleeradabhan. Philanthropy, NGO Activities and Corporate Funding in Thailand. Bangkok: Social Research Institute, Chulalongkorn University, 1994. ———. Thailand Nonprofit Sector and Social Development. Bangkok, 1997. Anek Nakhabut. “Adit-patchuban-anakhot: Khwam ruam mu rawang rathaban kap ongkon phatthana ekachon” [The past, present, future: The co-operation between government and NGOs]. Thang Mai [New road] 5, no. 5(c1991): 15–21. Anuson Chaiphan and Suphaphan Phalangsak, eds. Thamniap ongkon phatthana ekachon 2540 [NGO directory in 1997]. Bangkok: Khana kammakan phoei phrae lae songsoem ngan phatthana, 1997. CUSRI, CMUSRI, and KKURDI (Social Research Institute, Chulalongkorn University; Social Research Institute, Chiang Mai University; Research and Development Institute, Khon Kaen Uni versity). Tham niap nam ongkan phatthana ekachon thai [Thai NGO directory]. Bangkok, 1993. DOLA (Krom kan pok khrong).Khumu kan chat thabian munnithi [Manual for registering foundation]. Bangkok, c1997. DOPW (Krom pracha songkhro) 50 pi Krom pracha songkhro [Fifty years of Department of Public Welfare]. Bangkok, 1990. Gohlert, Ernst W. Power and Culture: The Struggle Against Poverty in Thailand. Bangkok: White Lotus, 1991. Maniemai Tongsawate and Walter E.J. Tips. “Coordination between Governmental and Non-governmental Organizations in Thailand’s Rural Development at the Local Level”. Research Monograph no. 5. Bangkok: Division of Human Settlements De velopment, Asian Institute of Technology, 1984. Nanthawat Boromanan. Rai ngan kan wichai ruang naeo thang nai kan songsoem kan damnoen kan khong ongkon phatthana ekachon: Suksa choepho korani kotmai lae rabiap tang tang thi pen upasak to kan phatthana [A study report on the perspecti ves for promoting NGO acti vities: With emphasis on the laws hindering development]. Bangkok: Munnithi asia lae phakhi khwam ruam mu phua sanap sanun kan phatthana, 1998. Phaisan Channarong and Suwarat Sukwatno. “Botbat khong ongkon ekachon nai kan phatthana chonnabot ” [The role of NGOs in rural development]. Warasan sethakit lae sangkhom 27, no. 5 (1990): 37–41. Phumtham Wechaichai. “Ongkan phatthana ekachon: adit-patchubananakhot...rao cha pai thang nai kan” [NGO: The past, present, future…where are we going?]. Pacharayasan 13, no. 5 (1986): 21–28.

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Prudhisan Jumbala and Maneerat Mitprasat.“Non-governmental Development Organizations: Empowerment and Environment”. In Political Change in Thailand: Democracy and Participation , edited by Kevin Hewison, pp. 195–216. London and New York: Routledge, 1997. Riggs, Fred W. Thailand: The Modernization of a Bur eaucratic Polity. Honolulu: East-West Center Press, 1966. Rueng Suksawat. “Behind the Thai NGOs”. In Thai NGOs: The Continuing Struggle for Democracy, edited by Jaturong Boonyaratthanasoonthorn and Gawin Chutima, pp. 51–67. Bangkok: Thai NGO Support Project, 1995. Sakda Pookgamarn. Public Welfare and Non-governmental Organizations in Thailand. Bangkok: Department of Public Welfare, 1975. Wipaphan Korkeatkachorn and Suntaree Kiatiprajak, eds. Directory of Nongovernmental Organizations 1997. Bangkok: Thai Development Support Committee, 1997. Withun Phoemphongcharoen. “Sen thang phatthana kan naeo khwam khit kan phatthana chonnabot khong ongkon phatthana ekachon nai thosawat 2530” [The transformation of ideas on r ural development of NGOs in the decade after 1987]. Pacharayasan 13, no. 5 (1986): 30–35.

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This chapter is reproduced from The State and NGOs: Perspective from Asia , edited by Shinichi Shigetomi (Singapore: Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, 2002). This version was obtained electronically direct from the publisher on condition th at copyright is not infringed. No part of this publication may be reproduced, translated, stored in a retrieval system, or transmi tted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies and Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo.

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8 Vietnam Control of NGOs by NGOs Chizuko Suzuki INTRODUCTION

Economically, Vietnam is introducing a market economy, but politically it holds fast to socialism. Therefore organizations outside the go vernment are placed under the guidance of either the government or the Communist Party, and such being the case, one would expect that basically neither the non-governmental organization (NGO) concept nor NGO activities could exist. But in fact international NGOs constitute the heart of the NGO sector and play a sustaining role in Vietnam’s social development. Why and how does Vietnam accept and host interna tional NGOs? The answer to this question reveals the relationship between the state and NGOs in this country. THE HISTORY OF INTERNATIONAL NGOs IN VIETNAM Before Vietnam’s Unification (up to 1975)

Activities by international NGOs in Vietnam go back to the da ys of the Vietnam War, before North-South unification. International NGOs were active in both the f ormer North Vietnam and South Vietnam during the resistance to the United Sta tes in this w ar, which was also known as the Second Indochina War. When the country w as still split into North and South, the activities of international NGOs in North Vietnam, a socialist country under the leadership of the late Ho Chi Minh, consisted of the same kind of humanitarian aid conducted even now in regions with conflicts and other disturbances. Those activities did not go beyond sending in relief supplies, providing special donations, and the lik e, and had hardl y any influence either politically or economically. By contrast, international NGO activities had a major influence in SouthVietnam under the Ngo Dinh Diem © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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government, said to be anAmerican puppet regime, and the U.S.-supported free economy. American NGOs in par ticular received enormous sums of money from their backers in the United States and carried out development assistance programmes in South Vietnam. Building of a Socialist State (1976–86)

But a momentous change occurred when the Vietnam War ended in 1975. The official unification of Vietnam’s northern and southern parts in June 1976 also unified the activities of international NGOs, but that turned into a major tr ial for them. To the interna tional NGOs that had been in the South, the former North Vietnam was a totally unknown quantity in terms of both its political machinery and its g eography. Nevertheless, the new government pushed through the implementation of projects in undeveloped areas of the former North’s northern and central regions. After unification, furthermore, the rapid socialist transformation imposed on the former South included a policy shift towards international organizations, thereby making project implementation difficult for international NGOs as well. As a result, the American NGOs and the international NGOs that had had an alliancelike relationship with the former South were e xpelled from Vietnam, or moved their headquarters to Thailand, or could only carr y on with their projects indirectly from their base countries. During this period international NGOs merely pr ovided development funding, while the Vietnamese Government actually implemented the projects. International NGOs were therefore practically unable to monitor their pr ojects, and could conf irm their implementation only from the accounting reports submitted by the Vietnamese Government. It was also no longer possible for employees of international NGOs to stay inVietnam for long periods (Ministry of Foreign Affairs 1995, p. 63). The Vietnamese invasion of Cambodia be ginning in December 1979, the conflict with China, and other changes in the political situation brought an end to economic aid from China and the West, resulting in Vietnam’s international isolation. Conditions for international NGO activities further deteriorated, and those acti vities were considerably limited e ven for humanitarian aid. Changes in diplomatic relationships in the realm of international politics elicited economic sanctions from the West, and a number of international NGOs were forced into switching to indirect activities from neutr al countries and refugee camps in order to a void sanctions from governments.

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Doi Moi and Beyond (1986 to the Present)

After the adoption of doi moi (renovation), the activities of international NGOs in Vietnam underwent a major chang e because the go vernment’s adoption of doi moi in 1986 changed diplomatic policy to an omnidirectional orientation, and initiated economic development that incorporated the market mechanism. The biggest change was that the government recognized the potential of international NGOs and applauded their activities. In particular the government took pains to welcome international NGOs with specialized knowledge and experience in commune development.1 It is safe to say that this symbolizes the state–NGO relationship in Vietnam. Behind this course of action by Vietnam, which lack ed development funds due to insufficient foreign currency, were expectations for economic development by the entry of foreign businesses for the purpose of opening markets, as w ell as e xpectations for social de velopment by obtaining development and technical assistance , and other help, w hich would be accomplished by actively incorporating the activities of international NGOs that are de velopment project specialists. The Vietnamese Government directed special hopes towards international NGOs for the development of farming villages in remote, hard-to-de velop regions. The reason for this was that unlike urban areas, where the government could expect a spillover effect from economic development propelled by the presence of foreign businesses, the de velopment of outlying rur al areas required social development that included the element of economic development. Owing to these socio-economic circumstances, the Vietnamese Government relaxed its restrictions and in 1989 established a specializ ed co-ordinating body called the P eople’s Aid Coordinating Committee (PACCOM) in a bid to encourage acti vities by international NGOs. Subsequently, international NGO activities in Vietnam became the primary vehicle for NGO activities in Vietnam’s social development.

VIETNAM’S NGO DEFINITION AND REGULATION SYSTEM Definition of NGOs

Table 8.1 shows the position of international NGOs among the governmental and non-governmental organizations in Vietnam. It is evident that except for Communist Party government organizations (GOs), all or ganizations are considered to be non-g overnmental, that is, NGOs, w hich are further

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TABLE 8.1 Classification of Governmental and Non-governmental Organizations in Vietnam, and the Position of International NGOs (As of September 1999) Government organizations (GOs)

Socialist Republic of Vietnam, Vietnamese Communist Party Government

Vietnamese mass organizations

Non-governmental organizations (NGOs)

Local NGOs

Foreign NGOs

1. Vietnam Motherland Battlefront (Mat Tran To Quoc Viet Nam) 2. Vietnam General Labour’s Union (Tong Lien Doan Lao Dong Viet Nam) 3. Vietnam Farmers’ Union The six major (Hoi Nong Dan Viet Nam) mass organizations 4. Vietnam Women’s Union (Hoi Lien Hiep Phu Nu Viet Nam) 5. Ho Chi Minh Youth Communist Party Union (Doan Thanh Nien Cong San Ho Chi Minh) 6. Vietnam Retired Officers’ Union (Hoi Cuu Chien Binh Viet Nam) 1. Vietnam Boys’ Group Union Other social 2. Vietnam Communist Youth organizations Union and groups 3. Vietnam Youth Union 4. Aged Vietnamese Association 1. Vietnam Union of Friendship Organization (VUFO) Control 2. People’s Aid Coordinating Committee (PACCOM) 1. City- and commune-level chapters of the Vietnam Women’s Union Counterparts 2. City- and village-level People’s Committees in each province 3. Vietnam Red Cross 1. U.N. organizations (UNICEF, WHO, U.N. Population Fund, etc.) 2. International NGOs 3. International Red Cross 4. Christian-affiliated religious groups 5. Foreign individuals and municipality-level foreign volunteer groups

Note: Vietnam still has no clear definition of foreign NGOs or a concept of NGOs, and it uses the term “foreign NGOs” for all international organizations and foreign groups, including U.N. organizations, that transfer development funds and technologies for Vietnam’s social and economic development. Source: Prepared by the author.

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divided into Vietnamese mass or ganizations, local NGOs, and foreign NGOs. International NGOs fall into the last category. However, although the mass or ganization called Vietnam Motherland Battlefront is in the NGO category, a high-ranking Politburo member serves as its top r epresentative, and the top representati ves of the other f ive organizations in that group are appointed by the Party’s Central Committee. Just a look at those or ganizations’ representatives shows that in a strict sense it w ould be hard to den y indirect governmental involvement, and thus regarding mass or ganizations as NGOs is ar guably a uniquely Vietnamese interpretation. Also included in f oreign NGOs are the United Nations De velopment Programme (UNDP) and other U .N. organizations, the International Red Cross, Christian-affiliated religious g roups, and other s such as for eign individuals and municipality-level foreign volunteer groups. “Local NGOs” is a general term for the Vietnamese organizations that are associated with these foreign NGOs in the area of development. Organizations that receive development assistance funds through international co-operation are often required to be non-prof it, non-governmental organizations, but Vietnam has no or ganizations that fit the def inition of NGO tha t is cur rent in international society. As a last resort, therefore, Vietnam uses “local NGOs” as a catch-all term for comm une organizations, municipalities, and other bodies that serve as counterparts to foreign NGOs in development activities. Hence, international NGOs are perceived as being in the foreign NGO category, which also includes U.N. organizations. As far as the Vietnamese Government is concerned, U .N. organizations, GOs, and NGOs are all welcome if they provide the funds, personnel, technologies, and knowledge for Vietnam’s development. However, a condition is that international NGOs must conduct their activities in co-operation with local NGOs in the localities where development projects are implemented. NGO Regulation System

International NGOs must have local NGO partners to gain approval for their activities in Vietnam, and the system for this approval forms the basis of Vietnam’s system for supervising interna tional NGOs. The Vietnam Union of Friendship Organization (VUFO) and PACCOM, which function as local NGOs responsible for managing and controlling international NGOs, perform duties that are directly connected with granting authorization to international NGOs and all other foreign NGOs in Vietnam to establish their offices and conduct their acti vities. Both VUFO and PACCOM are © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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organizations built around the nucleus of the Vietnam Women’s Union (VWU), one of Vietnam’s mass organizations. PACCOM’s duty is be the intermediary that accepts foreign NGOs, while VUFO’s is to supervise the development project acti vities of f oreign NGOs after the y receive authorization. Activities by international NGOs in Vietnam are made possible by Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with theVietnam Women’s Union, which are perfunctory agreements between private organizations. Simply put, the government’s permission is merely secondary. While an MOU is virtually an authorization for NGO activities within Vietnam, the Vietnamese Government’s condition for granting authorization is tha t international NGOs already be legal organizations that have received authorization as incorporated organizations from their home countries or from the countries that host their headquarters. For this reason there is little advantage in going to all the trouble to get incorporated in Vietnam, making MOU acquisition more significant than local incorporation. PACCOM decides on local partners and introduces them to international NGOs. At this selection stage the geographical area of development activities is considered more important than the de velopment activity category. To avoid the concentration of international NGOs’activities in certain regions, and to see that de velopment funds are fairly and appropriately allocated throughout Vietnam on the basis of the sta te’s social development policy, PACCOM gives precedence to undeveloped regions and co-ordinates the selection of counterparts while giving serious consideration to the regions where international NGOs wish to wor k. Behind this process is the government’s intent to pr ioritize the de velopment of difficult-to-access interior and mountainous re gions, where social infrastructure is dela yed due to insufficient state fiscal resources. In addition to counterpart selection, another important function of P ACCOM is to be the intermediary that accepts the development assistance which international NGOs bring. Even after international NGOs begin their activities, they are under VUFO’s supervision. VUFO keeps track of how development assistance funds are used and the state of acti vities in assistance projects, and reports these to the Ministry of Finance and other government ministries and agencies. In comm une development the funds and e xpertise are provided by international NGOs, but it is commune-level members of the VWU who actually sustain the on-site activities. Accordingly, their activity reports are routed to VUFO headquarters through the union’s network. Because international NGOs also encour age participatory development in order to achieve sustainable development, it is desirable © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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that union members who live in the communes play the leading role in project implementation. VIETNAM WOMEN’S UNION AND INTERNATIONAL NGOs Vietnam Women’s Union

VWU is a huge, nationally organized social organization made up of women 16 years and older. Its local chapters also serve as local NGOs that are the counterparts of international NGOs. VWU was founded in Hanoi as Hoi Lien Hiep Phu Nu Viet Nam in 1930, the year the Vietnam Communist Party was formed. Thus it has been in existence long enough to sa y that its history has ad vanced in parallel with Vietnam’s independence and the subsequent b uilding of the socialist state. This is because it is a mass organization, representing Vietnam’s women, which includes women of all social strata throughout the country. From the day of its founding until 1945 when Vietnam became an independent country, VWU mobilized w omen in the struggle for independence against French colonialism, and between 1954 and 1975, when the country was split into North and South, it mobiliz ed women in the struggle against U.S. imperialism to liberate the South and reunify the country. In 1960 a w omen’s organization for libera ting the South w as formed, and after reunification in 1975 VWU began to mobilize its women for their own benefit, shifting them from the war effort to a nation-building effort. Since the launch of doi moi, VWU has set the goal of its activities to be “protecting women’s legal rights under the law and their interests, and creating the conditions that will bring about equality and development for women”. Hence, VWU’s role throughout time has changed with the context of Vietnam’s history, from the nation’s founding, through its unif ication, and to post-doi moi development policy. VWU’s national headquarters is in Hanoi, and under this come branches in the provinces, counties, and districts, and under them at the extremities come the branches active at the commune level. Even during the more than thirty years of war, after the women left at home had seen their husbands off to the battlefield, the VWU national network remained in existence as a widespread organization for protecting the nation. That network stretches from Hanoi to the branches out in remote areas. The existence of a network that is connected by such strong bonds is a major f actor in the success of development co-operation with international NGOs. © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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Although the VWU is seen as an NGO , it has seats in the Comm unist Party and conducts activities jointly with international NGOs, and for those reasons it also performs a supervisory role in place of VUFO. VWU and International NGOs

Currently VWU performs an important duty as the primary vehicle for local social development in tandem with theWorld Health Organization (WHO), United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), and other U.N. organizations, and international NGOs. In fact, owing to VWU participation in the 1995 World Summit for Social Development and the United Nations Fourth World Conference on Women in Beijing, the Vietnamese Government gained a strong awareness of, and has acce pted, international society’s consensus on social development. VWU therefore has a strong in volvement in nation-b uilding and has become an organization that completely covers Vietnam’s local government mechanism even down to the lowest level. Further, it is nominally an NGO. For these reasons the Vietnamese Government has assigned the VWU to be a counterpart for international NGOs.VWU was given the job of authorizing international NGOs and giving them introductions to domestic counterparts, which are mainly VWU commune-level branches. Local branches serving as counterparts directly supervise development assistance by participating in the on-site activities of international NGOs. Specifically, VWU branches participating in commune development give steady reports to their higherechelon organizations on the activities of international NGOs at the lowest level of commune development and relay information on the development projects implemented there. Ultimately, these reports reach the headquarters in Hanoi. As this shows, the social services that the Vietnamese Government is supposed to be providing as a socialist state have been left to international NGOs’ development assistance, and the go vernment has totally entrusted their acceptance and supervision to the VWU. COMMUNE DEVELOPMENT AND INTERNATIONAL NGOs CDF Development in Commune Development

Vietnam is consider ed a success story of de velopment under the U.N .’s Comprehensive Development Framework (CDF). CDF is a framework that comprehensively harmonizes economic de velopment and social © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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development. The idea is to implement development policy that takes into account a balance between economic development and social development in order to assess the harmony between the two, which is accomplished by actually spelling out the policies for the tw o side b y side on a balance sheet, and implementing policy in accordance with the state of development progress. The place of comm une development in Vietnam’s social development has a vital significance in light of the facts that 80 per cent of the country’s population lives in the rural districts, and that about half of that percentage consists of w omen. A central pr oject in comm une development is the development of household economy ( kinh te gia dinh ) in the farming villages. It is called VAC System in Vietnam (V: vao = garden; A: ao = pond; and C: chuong = domestic animals). VAC Ho Chi Minh Association was established in 1988 by VWU, with the g oal of encouraging smallscale efforts in the smallest economic unit — the home — thr ough economic activities, including r aising a f ew chickens and pigs at home , planting medicinal herbs, raising fish in ponds, and planting fruit trees. It is inevitable that Vietnam’s development balance sheet must seriously consider not only the balance between economic and social development, but also the de velopment balance betw een its urban and r ural regions. Because foreign capital is concentrated in the cities, that capital and its spillover effects allow social development there to proceed comparatively well. But the absence of foreign capital and outside economic stimuli in outlying rural regions made it necessary to comprehensi vely develop communes, both socially and economically. And that was when international NGOs with development funds and programmes came knocking at the door of the socialist state of Vietnam. Soc-Trang Project in the Southern Mekong River Delta

What kind of social de velopment projects are actually being conducted with co-operation between interna tional NGOs and the VWU in rural communes? Let us examine a project in Soc-Trang Province, located in the southern Mekong delta region, as a specific example of international NGO activities. This is a project implemented by the French international NGO Medecine du Monde to pro vide education and guidance on basic medical car e and public health to w omen of communes in Soc-T rang Province, located in the southern Mekong delta region. It actually comprises two projects: one to prepare an instr uctional guidance te xt, and another to pr ovide actual © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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guidance using that te xt. Text preparation is highl y significant to international NGOs. Currently in developing countries WHO is carrying out programmes for pre ventive medicine by g iving vaccines and for nutritional guidance in or der to pre vent malnutrition. However, lending guidance at development sites in developing countries makes it essential to have instructional te xts suited to the de velopment recipients because guidance must be tailored to each ar ea’s customs of daily lif e and diets. Further, guidance becomes possible only after preparing te xts written in local languages. Figure 8.1 uses this project to illustrate how international NGOs and VWU organizations are connected with and accommodate Vietnam’s commune-level participatory development. Soc-Trang Province comprises Soc-Trang City and communes in six to wnships. The townships have communes that are made up of villages of various sizes. First of all, Soc-Trang Province VWU staff members were educated by project managers, after which Soc-Trang City specialists in health and medical care provided education and guidance to se ven VWU staff members who would be project manag ers. Then, as shown in F igure 8.1, the commune trainers from each to wnship who were gi ven training used the instructional te xts to pr ovide guidance in pub lic health and nutrition to the 200 VWU members in each commune o ver many occasions. These public inf ormation and guidance acti vities were a beneficial opportunity for people living in remote regions. THE STATE–NGO RELATIONSHIP AT PRESENT Rapid Increase in International NGOs and the Reasons

Table 8.2 shows the number of international NGOs in Vietnam in 1992/93 and 1998/99 (June 1992 and August 1998). Over the more than six years from 1992 to 1998 the number of interna tional NGOs in Vietnam more than doubled, from 114 to 234. Ho wever, these figures are certainly not large in comparison with those of other developing countries.2 One reason is that Vietnam is a country that still holds fast to a socialist system, but another factor is that the VWU has played an NGO-like role at the commune level within this poor socialist society. But after the adoption of doi moi, the appearance of foreign businesses in Vietnam as part of its economic development expanded the disparity in wealth between the cities and farming villages. In 1994 the United States removed its economic sanctions, and since then the domestic economic disparity has further worsened. This has become a source of major social © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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FIGURE 8.1 Vietnam Union’s Commune-Level Organizational Network as Seen in the Soc-Trang Project (June 1995 to December 1996)

Soc-Trang Project Medecine du Monde Project Head Manager Ho Chi Minh City

Soc-Trang Province Soc-Trang Project Text Editing and Printing

Soc-Trang City Vietnam Union Project Managers (5)

Soc-Trang City District A VWU Commune trainers (26 trainers)

Soc-Trang City District B VWU Commune trainers (26 trainers)

Soc-Trang City District C VWU Commune trainers (26 trainers)

Soc-Trang City District D VWU Commune trainers (26 trainers)

Soc-Trang City District E VWU Commune trainers (26 trainers)

Soc-Trang City District F VWU Commune trainers (26 trainers)

Soc-Trang City District G VWU Commune trainers (26 trainers)

Commune (200 people)

Commune (200 people)

Commune (200 people)

Commune (200 people)

Commune (200 people)

Commune (200 people)

Commune (200 people)

Source: Prepared by the author based on interviews conducted during the visit to the Soc-Trang City Vietnam Union on 15 August 1996.

unease in Vietnam. By 1992 Vietnam had author ized 114 international NGOs, and after 1994 that number quickly increased. The reasons for this were not only Vietnam’s creation of a system to accept NGOs, b ut also these changes in economic cir cumstances. The Vietnamese Government, which was aware of the commune development problem, tried to solve it © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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TABLE 8.2 Number of International NGOs Co-operating in Vietnam’s Development (1992/93 and 1998/99) 1992/93 (June 1992)

1998/99 (August 1998)

Countries Co-operating with Development in Vietnam

Number of International NGOs in Vietnam

United States The Netherlands Belgium Britain France Australia Switzerland Thailand Japan New Zealand Others

57 7 7 5 5 5 3 3 2 2 18

Total international NGOs

114

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

Countries Co-operating with Development in Vietnam 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

Number of International NGOs in Vietnam

United States Australia Britain France The Netherlands Belgium Switzerland Japan Germany Canada Others

75 17 16 15 11 10 8 7 7 6 62

Total international NGOs

234

Sources: Prepared by the author based on Sa ve the Children Fund (1992, pp. 7–252) and Vietnam NGO Directory Office (1998, pp. 1–234).

by accepting international NGOs’ development funds and their specialized knowledge and technologies for commune development. Provision of Development Funds and Technologies by International NGOs

Tables 8.3 and 8.4 show the allocation of development funds as seen in the total number of projects by interna tional NGOs in Vietnam according to activity categories and geographical regions. From Table 8.3 it is clear that the increased number of international NGOs brought abundant development funds and technologies to the various categories. Table 8.4 indicates that development funds have been alloca ted evenly among regions, and tha t development projects are being implemented in the outlying rural regions as well. It is evident from these tables that although the Vietnamese state has already become unable to allocate r esources in some cate gories and regions as it did in the socialist er a, it is now mobilizing the development funds and technologies of international NGOs. © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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TABLE 8.3 Allocation of Development Funds and Projects by International NGOs in Vietnam (By activity, August 1998) Activity Annual Development Health Co-operation and Budget Medical Household Commune (US$ million) Care Education Environment Economy Development Number of projects Development funding (US$ million)

703.69

204

114

93

105

66

203.04

113.47

92.56

104.51

65.69

WID etc. 125

124.41

Source: Prepared by the author based on Vietnam NGO Directory Office (1998, pp. 1–234).

TABLE 8.4 Allocation of Development Funds and Projects by International NGOs in Vietnam (By geographical region, August 1998) Region Annual Development Co-operation Red Budget Northern River Central Central Mekong (US$ million) Highlands Delta Northern Central Southern Southern Delta Number of projects Development funding (US$ million)

703.69

146

189

149

90

49

138

163

110.83

143.47

113.11

68.32

39.48

104.76

123.73

Source: Same as Table 8.3.

Next I shall examine the extent to which the provision of international NGOs’ development funds is r eflected in state f inances. Owing to its inadequate state cof fer, Vietnam incorporates NGO assistance into its national budget, and in accordance with its the management system of state finance, VUFO supervises3 the disb ursements of NGO funds. Table 8.5 © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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TABLE 8.5 Vietnam’s Treasury Expenditures and International NGO Development Funding (By category, 1997/98)

Vietnam’s 1997 expenditures National (million dong) Social development (US$) Development funding provided by international NGOs in 1999 (US$) NGO-provided funds in government expenditures (%)

Education and Job Training

Health and Medical Care

Culture and Information

Sports

6,719,918

2,335,674

390,347

200,284

671,991,800

233,567,400

390,347

200,284

303,570,000

203,040,000

–

–

45.2

86.9

–

–

Notes: 1. Vietnam’s currency: 10,000 to 11,000 dong = US$1.00 (average rate in August 1997). For a clear contrast the rate 10,000 dong to the dollar has been used here. 2. Development funding provided by international NGOs includes education as well as funds provided to commune development and women in development (WID) as job training. 3. Dashes (–) mean that international NGOs do not conduct development assistance in these categories. Funding for culture and other categories comes from sources that include bilateral aid between governments. Sources: Prepared by the author from Tong Cuc Thong Ke (1999, p. 18) and Vietnam NGO Directory Office (1998, pp. 1–234).

contrasts the 1997 national expenditures with the funds provided by international NGOs in 1999, and shows that international NGOs’ funds for health and medical care accounted f or about 87 per cent of go vernment expenditures in that area. The percentage for education and job training was nearly half, at about 45 per cent. In the culture and information category, most funds came from bila teral aid between go vernments, while most

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assistance for sports was contributed by foreign foundations and individuals. This indicates that the greater part of funds for health, medical care, and education, which are chief ar eas in social de velopment, come fr om international NGOs’ development funds, making the presence of international NGOs essential to Vietnam’s social development. The 20–20 Agreement adopted at theWorld Summit for Social Development obligated developing countries to allocate 20 per cent of their na tional budgets to social development, and developed countries to allocate 20 per cent of their official development assistance (ODA) to social de velopment. Vietnam meets its 20 per cent of national b udget obligation by incorpor ating international NGOs’ development funds into its state budget management system.

CONCLUSION

Since the adoption of doi moi, the Vietnamese Government has been pressed with the job of balancing economic development with social development, or diminishing the urban – rural economic differential. As the government lacks sufficient resources for tha t purpose, it has acce pted international NGOs in an attempt to direct their funds and technologies towards social development. At the same time, however, the government cannot loosen its political control over NGOs, so it has entr usted the super vision of international NGOs to local citiz ens’ organizations that ar e under government control. Specifically, when an interna tional NGO applies to conduct activities in Vietnam, a citizens’ organization such as VWU grants authorization for the activities with priority given to remote areas that have pressing needs for social de velopment, and once acti vities begin, that organization becomes the NGO’s counterpart and supervises its activities. The result of this government strategy is that international NGOs play the central role in social de velopment, which c haracterizes Vietnam’s NGO sector. At the same time citizens ’ organizations, or groups that are much like government-created organizations, are regarded as local NGOs. Notes 1

Because of the historical linguistic culture from the colonial period, Vietnam uses this French-derived word in place of “community”. Hence “commune development” has the same meaning as the English “community development”.

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In Pakistan more than 10,000 NGOs are registered, and in Indonesia the number is nearly 4,000. Even in China, which has a socialist system like that of Vietnam, there are nearly 6,000 NGOs (see the respective chapters on those countries in this volume). On many occasions OD A funds for humanitar ian aid and bilateral assistance have been unaccounted for , and in vie w of the connection with bribery and corr uption among Vietnamese government officials, the Vietnamese have been more responsible for the w ay international NGOs’ development assistance has been used in social de velopment. Authorization and supervision by PACCOM and VUFO, which are built around the nucleus of the local citizen-comprised Vietnam Union, have been considered suitable for properly and soundly conducting social development, and it has also been thought suitable that interna tional NGOs be the ones to implement pr ojects as development specialists with an interest in implementation for proper ends.

References

Kajita, Takamichi, ed. International Sociology. 2nd ed. How Do We Conceive Phenomena That Transcend Nations? Nagoya: Nagoya University Press, 1995. Ministry of F oreign Affairs, Japan. Study of Problems and Potentials Regarding Japan’s Economic Cooperation in International Society. 1995 ed. State of NGO Development Cooperation Acceptance in Developing Countries (Vietnam, the Philippines, Cambodia, and Laos). Tokyo: Association for Promotion of International Cooperation, 1995. Save the Children Fund. Vietnam NGO Directory 1992/1993. Hanoi: GIOI Publications, 1992. Suzuki, Kouji, trans. Vietnam’s Civil La w/Bo Luat Dan Su: Text and Explication. Tokyo: Japan External Trade Organization, 1996. Tong Cuc Thong Ke, Cong Hoa Xa Hoi Chu NghiaViet Nam. So Lieu Thu Chi Ngan Sac h Nha Nuoc Nam 1997 v a Du Toan NSNN nam 1999 [Revenues and Expenditures of 1997 National Budget and Draft of 1999 National Budget]. Hanoi: Nha Xuat Ban Chinh Tri Quoc Gia, 1999. Vietnam NGO Directory Of fice. Vietnam NGO Directory 1998/1999: International Non-Governmental Organizations, Foundations and Trusts in Vietnam. Hanoi: Nha Xuat Ban Chinh Tri Quoc Gia, 1998. World Bank. Document of the World Bank/ Vietnam: Deepening Reform for Growth — An Economic Report. P overty Reduction and Economic Management Unit. Hanoi: East Asia and Pacific Region, World Bank, 1997. © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

This chapter is reproduced from The State and NGOs: Perspective from Asia , edited by Shinichi Shigetomi (Singapore: Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, 2002). This version was obtained electronically direct from the publisher on condition th at copyright is not infringed. No part of this publication may be reproduced, translated, stored in a retrieval system, or transmi tted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies and Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo.

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9 Indonesia Flexible NGOs vs Inconsistent State Control Yumiko Sakai INTRODUCTION

Why were non-governmental organizations (NGOs) in Indonesia able to increase to such an extent and to develop so many types of activities under the authoritarian Suharto re gime (1965–98)? Meticulous research on Indonesian NGOs has already been conducted by Eldridge (1995), Hikam (1995), Sinaga (1995), Shuto (1997), and Riker (1998), but this question has not been adequately addressed. To find the answer, it is necessar y to grasp the concrete measures by which the Indonesian state controlled NGOs during the Suharto years and how the NGOs responded to those measures. It will then be seen that behind the “strong state” image of the Suharto regime was an inconsistency in the state’s control and the systema tization of that control. This inconsistency made it possible for the r egime to deal with the acti vities of NGOs to its own advantage, but it also created space in which NGOs were able to operate freely. These characteristics have not changed fundamentally since the end of the Suharto regime. This study will clarify, from this per spective, the reasons f or the Indonesian state’s inconsistency in its control of NGOs and the domestic and overseas factors that promoted NGO activities. It is further noted that the environment in which NGOs operate in the post-Suharto era is rapidly changing, and at the conclusion I would like to comment briefly on this. In Indonesian “NGO” has been called “LSM” ( Lembaga Swadaya Masyarakat, Self-Reliant Social Or ganization) or “LPSM” ( Lembaga Pengembangan Swadaya Masyarakat, Self-Reliant Social De velopment Organization). With these a ppellations, organizations sought to e vade © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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repression under the Suharto regime, which interpreted “non-government” as “anti-government” (Setiawan 1996, pp. 336–37). But with Suharto’ s departure it is no longer necessary to exercise self-restraint in this way, and now the term ornop, a direct translation of “non-government organization”, is used as well as LSM (Setiawan 2000).

HISTORICAL DEVELOPMENT AND PRESENT STATE OF NGOs Historical Development

The concept of the NGO was introduced in Indonesia in the 1970s, but the background against which NGOs took root and spread in Indonesia has a much longer history. I would now like to look at the development of NGOs in each period of Indonesian history (Eldridge 1995; Riker 1998). Pre-independence Era

Before its colonization, there existed in Indonesia traditional values and organizations of m utual aid and social educational training, such as the pesantren (Islamic boarding school), lumbung desa (collective rice storage in Javanese villages), and subak (water irrigation control system in Bali) (Hikam 1999, p. 6; Eldridge 1989a, 1995). During the Dutch colonial period spontaneous organizations had alr eady sprung up at the end of the nineteenth century, mainly in such f ields as social welfare and education (Riker 1998, p. 123). But the organizational and psychological roots of present-day Indonesian NGOs are generally considered to lie in the early twentieth century, when modernization began in earnest. The modernizers were the Westerneducated elite and middle class leaders, w ho fused the abo ve-mentioned traditional organizations with Western organizations to push for social and cultural reforms that could counter colonial r ule. Particularly important were the development of movements by various organizations that came with the rise of nationalism after Budi Utomo (1908) and Sarekat Islam (1909), and the establishment and gr owth of the tw o major Islamic organizations, Muhammadiyah (1912) and Nahdlatul Ulama (1926).These developments form the bac kground of the forma tion of leaders of independent spirit, the b uilding of netw orks among them, and the development down to the present NGOs in Indonesian society (Hikam 1999; Eldridge 1995; Riker 1998). © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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Sukarno Era (1945–66)

There was no appreciable development of NGOs during the Sukarno years, but I w ould like to look at the relationship between the state and social organizations at this time. Dur ing the years of the independence struggle and of parliamentary democracy in the newly independent republic (1945–59), the state encouraged the formation of many mass organizations to mobilize a wide range of the population, from labourers to peasants. These organizations penetrated into the local communities. But as these were for the purpose of consolidating and representing the interests of their various constituencies, and were also closely linked to political parties, they cannot be called NGOs in the sense that the term is used here. Ho wever, these organizations were given a certain, though by no means unlimited, autonomy. In the Guided Democracy era from 1959 this changed, and all social organizations were firmly brought under state control. From 1950 to 1965 a f ew well-educated leaders from the middle class established social welfare organizations out of humanitarian or relig ious motivation. PKBI (Perkumpulan Keluarga Berencana Indonesia, Indonesian Planned Parenthood Association),1 established in 1957, is considered to be the first NGO independent of both the state and any political party (Eldridge 1995; Riker 1998). Suharto Era (1966–98)

It was in the 1970s that Indonesian NGOs began activities in earnest. There are four main reasons for this. First is increasing poverty in both the urban and rural areas. Second is the change in the domestic political environment in the 1970s. In the be ginning Suharto had considered NGOs “latent elements of instability tha t could only di vide society”, making it v ery difficult for NGOs to go into the villages (Cleary 1997).The mood softened in the 1970s, and an environment emerged that made it relatively easy for NGOs to operate. Third is the existence of a strategic group of people as leaders. Many of those who had been active in the student movement found in NGOs a place to pursue their ideals. Man y of them came from various parts of Indonesia and were cr itical of the go vernment’s development policies. And since they were from the middle class and above, they were able to f orge personal r elationships with go vernment officials and politicians, ties which enabled them to ne gotiate with and influence the state.2 Fourth was the flow of technical and f inancial assistance from the international community that stimulated the formation of NGOs as recipients of that assistance (Riker 1998, pp. 136–40). © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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In the 1980s the number of NGOs in Indonesia increased further, and there was a growing diversity in their fields of activities as well as an expansion in scale. The number of NGOs nearly doubled in the latter half of the 1980s.This was against a background of (1) increasing assistance to NGOs from overseas, (2) constricted government revenues, dependent on oil income, due to stagnant oil prices from 1982, resulting in (3) the necessity for the Indonesian Government to expand its public recognition of, and co-operation with, NGOs, which were important conduits of foreign e xchange. From 1973, r egional development became an important item in the g overnment’s five-year plans, but regional development in a country with over 66,000 villages was impossible without the co-oper ation of NGOs and other social or ganizations. The government had up until then forbid den independent activities in r egional development, but it gradually began to look favourably on co-operation with NGOs in such limited fields as family planning, disease prevention, and the promotion of elementary co-opera tive activities. A fourth factor w as the establishment of an en vironment protection law in 1982 with the help of the then State Minister for Population and Environment, Emil Salim, a law in which, for the first time, NGOs received official recognition. The role of NGOs in development had been gi ven legitimation. As a result of the tremendous increase in the number of NGOs and their acti vities, (5) networks formed around the leading NGOs and systems were set up for consultation, co-ordination of activities, planning, and financial co-operation. The networks of the leading NGOs with their accumulated experience not only helped build up the organizations and activities of small- and medium-siz ed NGOs, but also served the important function of protecting these other NGOs from the power of the government and security officials (Shuto 1997). In the 1990s advocacy work became conspicuous, reflecting a change in so-called “political vie ws” (Riker 1998). Indonesian NGOs became a principal instrument of diffusing into society, through their activities and in co-operation with the media, ideas on “alterna tive development” — development based on equality and people’s participation, rural self-help, and sustainable development — as well as such fundamental principles of civil society as democratization and human rights. Relations between the state and NGOs became more confrontational than in the 1980s, and adv ocacy NGOs took on a strong er colouring as pressure groups. Two incidents that sparked these changes were the Ombo Dam issue (1982) and the Dili massacre (1991). Both incidents dre w the attention of the international community and were taken up by Indonesia’s aid donor group. During the Ombo Dam affair, religious personalities and NGOs supported residents who lost their land to the dam construction. In © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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the massacre in Dili, the capital of EastTimor, Indonesian troops shot down hundreds of unarmed civilians. In the wake of these incidents, the government tightened its control over, and repression of, the NGOs that were in volved (Riker 1998). However Indonesian NGOs, with the support of worldwide public opinion, student organizations, the media, and other forces cr itical of the status quo, and overseas NGOs, did not tone down their advocacy work. Although, in terms of numbers, there were not that man y legal or environmental advocacy NGOs, their arguments and struggles in court were frequently reported by the media, giving them a high profile both domestically and abroad. This is why NGOs are called “catalysts”. Present Situation of NGOs

From a statistical grasp of Indonesian NGOs today, the following features can be seen. 3 First, although the estimates of the number of NGOs in the mid-1990s range from 6,000–7,000 to over 12,000 (Hikam 1999, p. 9; Riker 1998, p. 145), only some 10–20 per cent of these ha ve been confirmed in official data. Yet there are also reports that NGOs officially registered with the Directorate General of Socio-political Affairs of the Interior Ministry numbered 1,810 in 1985, 3,251 in 1989, and 7,000 by the mid-1990s (Sinaga 1995, pp. 61–62; Riker 1998, pp. 143–44). The second feature is that most Indonesian NGOs have been incorporated and take the organizational form of founda tions (yayasan) (Riker 1998). By becoming a foundation, an NGO can open a foundation account at a bank, making it easier to receive funds from abroad.4 The third feature has to do with the regional scope of activities. Most organizations are small-scale NGOs w orking at the kabupaten and kecamatan levels and below. There are a sizable number of medium-sized NGOs working at the provincial level or in more than one province, but almost all Indonesian NGOs consist of small groups of members working to directly meet the needs of local communities (T able 9.1). This prevalence of NGOs working at the local level is seen as being related to the weight given by the government since 1973 in its five-year plans to development programmes in isolated communities, a factor which served to encourage local NGOs to participate in these programmes. This proactive stance by the government was a favourable factor in the increase of NGOs from the 1970s to the 1980s. 5 There is, ho wever, a r egional imbalance in the development of NGOs, there being much fewer in Eastern Indonesia than in Sumatra and Java. © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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TABLE 9.1 Estimated Number of Indonesian NGOs by Administrative Level (Mid-1990s) Level of Activity Range National Propinsi Kabupaten Kecamatan Desa Estimated total

Type of NGO LPSM and their network LPSM and LSM LSM LSM LSM and KSM (self-help group)

Estimated Number 100–200 1,200–1,400 2,900–3,200 1,000–1,200 6,000–7,000 6,000–7,000

Source: Compiled by the author.

TABLE 9.2 Number of NGOs by Fund Source Membership dues Subsidies from the government Assistance from abroad Assistance from domestic sources Income from activities Others

240 110 160 130 160 60

Sources: Compiled by the author from LP3ES (due to be published in 2000, obtained by the author in November 1999); survey of the twentysix provinces (after East Timor’s independence).

The fourth feature has to do with funding sources. Although all NGOs are developing various funding channels, there is still a heavy dependence on outside funds. Besides domestic and foreign donors, much of these outside funds come from income from projects jointly conducted with government bodies, indicative of just ho w many NGOs there are which have a close w orking relationship with the g overnment (Table 9.2). According to Shuto’s analysis (1997), 43 per cent of NGOs operate on an annual budget of Rp 20 million or less, and the majority of small- and medium-sized NGOs complain of insuf ficient funds. However, there are also large-sized NGOs operating on a national le vel or in more than one province which obtain sufficient funds on a stable basis. The fifth feature is the range of activities, and as Figure 9.1 shows, these are quite varied, with a single NGO being involved in a number of fields. The variety of projects is a natural result of the NGOs’ responses to local needs, but it is also an important strategy for obtaining outside funding.6 As will be discussed below, advocacy has gained in importance, © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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FIGURE 9.1 Indonesian NGOs’ Fields of Activities

Number of Activity Fields

200 180 160 140 120 100 80 60 40 20

Others

Children

Religious education

Labour

Informal sector

Urban development

Democracy

Environment

Human rights

Gender Population/family planning Legal aid

Water/sanitation

Women in development

Marine/fishery

Community forest Small businesses/ co-operatives Health

Dairy farming/livestock

Agriculture

0

Fields

Sources: Compiled by the author from LP3ES (due to be published in 2000, obtained by the author in November 1999); survey of the twenty-six provinces (after East Timor’s independence).

particularly since the 1990s, as a role for NGOs as agents of civil society empowerment, and the number of advocacy-type NGOs has actually increased. But overall, NGOs dealing with social and economic development are still the most numerous, with advocacy-type NGOs in such fields as human rights and labour issues being still a minority. Types of NGOs

The types of Indonesian NGOs can be roughly classified into three groups, that is, from the points of view of areas of activities, attitudes towards the government, and period of acti vities.7 The first group consists of NGOs which emerged to deal with po verty issues (Bina Desa, Dian Desa, Bina Swadya, etc.). Many NGOs that appeared in the 1970s fall into this group. Dian Desa, for instance, which is based in Yogyakarta and mainly targets rural villages in places like Central Java and East Nusa Tenggara Province, © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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is involved in poverty alleviation through providing basic needs and improving the standard of living based on the appropriate technology approach. Its activities also involve the urban poor , and it is eng aged in promoting small businesses and employment opportunities as well as providing training for small NGOs. It works in co-operation with or independent of the government and shies away from proactive consciousness-raising activities or criticism of the government. Bina Desa, based in Jakarta, is at the opposite end of the spectrum. It has been involved in poverty issues through programmes to develop a critical, independent rural population and solve land issues, through village leadership training and organization, and admits to being se verely interfered with b y the security apparatus. The second group consists of NGOs oriented towards the empowerment of civil society that emerged in response to pressure to depoliticize (Riker 1998; Hikam 1999). They go be yond development activities that supplement those of the government and develop activities combining advocacy and development aimed at raising the consciousness of ordinary people as well as persons related to the government. Typical of this group is LP3ES (Institute for Social and Economic Research, Education and Information, established in 1971), based in Jakarta, which is active in fields such as publishing, research, education, promotion of community-based industries, and family planning. The organization is religiously neutral, but it has a wide netw ork of Islamic leaders and uses traditional organizations like the pesantren to work for gradual technological improvement and modernization in thinking. If LP3ES can be said to have a relationship of critical co-operation with the government, LBH (Le gal Aid Institute, established in 1970) is an example of an organization that develops activities that are more independent and critical of the go vernment. LBH has branches in major cities and in Jakarta operates the YLBHI (Indonesian Legal Aid Association). It supports the side of the people in court cases over human rights, labour issues, and land disputes. The need for le gal aid organizations arises because of the arbitrary nature of the le gal system and the a bsence of an independent judiciary in Indonesia. Many NGOs in the legal field like LBH work not to criticize the government or its policies per se, but to use their legal expertise to protect the rights of the people from state power. The government could therefore do nothing to restrict these activities as such. INFID (International NGO Forum on Indonesian Development) is an example of an NGO that developed advocacy that was directly critical of the Suharto regime. INFID worked out a style to enable it to keep its advocacy work going, taking steps such as locating its headquarters overseas (first in the Hague, later in © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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Brussels) and always preparing alternative meeting sites to thwart the repressive measures of the authorities. The third type consists of NGOs that emerged from the 1980s to the 1990s, with the Indonesian en vironmental movement as catalyst. An Environment Ministry was established in 1978, and the f irst minister, Emil Salim, was a supporter of environmental NGOs. Backed by Salim’s actual support and under the slogan of sustainable development, environmental NGOs prospered. While there had been no more than seventy-eight organizations in Indonesia in 1978, by the mid-1990s the f igure had increased to an estima ted 750, groups like WALHI and ELSAM being among the better known. LEGAL SYSTEMS RELATED TO NGOs

In Indonesia there has never been a specific, comprehensive law on NGOs. As noted above, most NGOs registered as foundations, for which they had to get approval by showing the organization’s prospectus, address, and names of the representative and treasurer to a notary public (under the jurisdiction of the court). Thus the government has virtually no control over the setting up of NGOs. But there are three la ws which play an important role in the government’s recognition of, and control over, NGOs (Riker 1998, p. 236). 1982 Environmental Management Law

Though restricted to the en vironmental field, with this la w NGOs in Indonesia for the f irst time obtained of ficial recognition as a gents of development. Article 19 of the la w clearly states that NGOs play a complementary role to that of the government in the control and protection of the environment and that, by their involvement in the issues of poverty and environmental degradation at e very level of society, they pursue a heightened awareness of environmental issues and promote de velopment which is not detrimental to a healthy environment (Riker 1998, p. 236). 1985 Social Organization Act8

This law not onl y makes it compulsory for e very social organization to register with and report regularly to the Interior Ministry, but it also requires government consent to receive financial assistance from abroad, an issue of vital concern to NGOs, which tend to rely on foreign funding. Another serious problem is that the law gives the government the power to dissolve, or remove the heads of or ganizations judged by the g overnment to be © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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unsuitable, meaning organizations considered to be disturbing security and public order, receiving funds from abroad without approval, disturbing the unity of the state, upholding communism or Marxism/Leninism, or opposed to the state ideology, Pancasila. NGOs, deeply concerned about the implica tions of the Act, protested strongly to the go vernment from the time it w as first proposed in 1983, raised it as an issue throughout the country, and after its enactment, sought ways to e vade its pernicious ef fects through their o wn, creative interpretation. The acronym for the 1985 Social Organization Act is Ormas, the mas of which gradually came to be misunderstood as massa, meaning “the masses”, which left the name of the la w open to misinterpretation as the Masses Organization Act. NGOs which, compared to the masses, are small organizations by anybody’s reckoning, could then claim tha t they were not the objects of the Act and therefore need not register.9 At the time that this Act was established, the Indonesian economy was in dire straits due to low oil prices, and the government had lost an incentive for controlling the flow of foreign currency to the NGOs. In that sense too, the 1985 Social Organization Act turned out to have less of an impact than the government had intended (Billah and Hakim 1989). 1990 Interior Minister’s Instruction on the Fostering of NGOs10

This instruction ordered provincial and kabupaten governors to collect information on NGOs. Aimed at strengthening control over them, it required them to re gister with the g overnment, giving the composition of the organization, its activities, its sources of funding, etc. At first, the NGOs were adamantly opposed to this control by the government and refused to register. But in 1994 the of ficial in char ge in the Inter ior Ministry was replaced, and the ne w administrator was able, through dialogue with the NGOs, to get the major ones to co-operate and re gister. A Social Organization Directory was even compiled, but it did not list the categories of NGOs, and from the estimated number of NGOs, seems to include only a small percentage. Ev en those that did re gister at tha t time did not necessarily comply in subsequent years.11

STATE CONTROL AND THE NGO RESPONSE

In general the relationship between the state and NGOs in Indonesia during the Suharto years can be said to be one of confrontation. Even in the cases © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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of development NGOs which had co-operative relations with the government, the NGOs always had to deal cautiously with the state . The non-existence of an exhaustive NGO directory is proof of this. The origins of this situation lie, f irstly, in the memories of the all-out anti-communist repression and violence of the 1965 “30th of September” incident and its aftermath. An estimated 300,000 to 500,000 persons who were members or sympathizers of the Communist Party, which was charged by Suharto as being the instigator of the incident, and ethnic Chinese scapegoats were slaughtered, and as many as 500,000 people were thrown in prison. A second factor lies in the system of local community control which Suharto set up after this reign of ter ror. First there was control by Golkar (functional group). Civil servants, military personnel, and their families all had to join Golkar and to vote for Golkar in elections. Village heads being civil servants, they automatically became Golkar members and at election time strongly pressured the villagers to v ote for their party. Furthermore, village meetings could onl y be held with of ficial permission. To hold a meeting, one had to first report to the local police, then obtain a permit from the social-political section of the kecamatan office, after which one had to obtain the approval of the village head. It was thus impossible to hold a meeting around a topic that was likely to be frowned on by officialdom. Furthermore, military personnel were stationed in every village. A system of surveillance through the village chief and the military was thus set up. Even in urban areas there was a neighbourhood association called RT, and, for instance , if anyone in the neighbourhood had a guest from the outside for more than twenty-four hours, the particulars of the individual had to be reported to the RT head. Elements that fell outside this system of surveillance were subject to direct government control. For instance, the police and military were mobilized to violently put down strikes, demonstrations, and attempts by persons and groups to file legal appeals. Freedom of assembly was severely restricted. Only three political parties were allowed, and any organization could be outlawed if it were deemed to be anti- Pancasila. Only one, an official, labour union was allowed to exist. Almost all of these kinds of controls were not so much control through the laws as at the discretion of the authorities. As mentioned above, for all practical purposes there was not an actual law directed specifically at NGOs that controlled their registration or activities. But the government, intent on suppressing activities critical of itself, was able to do so through discretionary measures. © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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So NGOs exercised self-control and avoided actions that were clearly anti-government. Particularly in the field of rural development, being in a relation of confrontation with the village head would make it impossible for the NGO to car ry out its progr amme. This is why rural development NGOs avoided advocacy work and concentrated on their development programmes, keeping any anti-government ideas to themselves. On the other hand, some activities by Indonesian NGOs opposed to the government did take place, notably in the legal and environmental fields. There were two factors in the international environment that allowed this to happen. Firstly, with the breakup of Eastern Europe and the So viet Union in 1989, it became impossible to equate criticism of the government with communism. And then, with the end of the Cold War, the industrialized countries of the West became more sensitive to issues of human rights and democratization in the allocation of official development assistance (ODA) as well as in private investment policies. The Indonesian economy is largely dependent on foreign investment, making it essential for the government to avoid international criticism of its repression of human rights and the democratization forces. Repression of NGOs would have led to the loss of international confidence. In addition to these outside factors, another important factor is the strength of the Indonesian NGOs themselves. NGO activists had, using school, local, family, and relig ious ties, and tapping into gains made in the course of some two decades of negotiations, built up networks with bureaucrats and the political elite. As we have said, since governmental control of NGOs was of a discretionary rather than a strictly legal nature, such an informal network of individuals helped to narrow the scope of control. Also, many NGOs help design projects in collaboration with government bodies, and they ensure that they can carry out their own projects and expand their funding sources by avoiding confrontation with the government.

CONCLUSION AND PROSPECTS

The Suharto regime tried to root out anti-establishment forces, at times employing brutally violent measures. It viewed NGOs with suspicion but lacked consistency in its methods of control. Because there was no comprehensive law to crack down on them, NGOs were able to find loopholes in the laws. Also, although administrative restraints were left to the discretion of of ficials, allowing for the occur rence of e xcessive interference, NGOs could often get around state control and complicated © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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procedures by using the personnel networks that existed at the grass-roots level between officials and the NGOs. However, one must not overestimate the power of NGOs in Indonesian politics. NGOs, after all, are not mass organizations and thus cannot mobilize the masses the way that religious organizations and the labour and student movements can, and thus they do not present a serious threat to the government.12 While there has been a drama tic increase in the number of NGOs over the past fifteen years, what Putnam calls“social capital” (Putnam 1993) is still lacking in Indonesia, which means that the strength of that number cannot be full y called into pla y (Hikam 1999). And in fact, the mindset of the political elite reflected in the political changes since 1998 has been just as strong as ever. What, then, is the state –NGO relationship in the post-Suharto period? Here I would like to refer to two points that should be noted. The first is the relation between the central government and NGOs. Former President Wahid himself was the founder of several major NGOs, and Hikam and several other former Cabinet members, as well as a number of reformist leaders such as the then Speak er of the MPR Amien Rais either had NGO backgrounds or had close ties with NGOs. Under the Wahid regime, then, NGOs were expected to strengthen co-operation with the government and to exert influence on the formation and carrying out of policies, conflict resolution in a number of regions, and on economic development programmes. On the other hand, expectations of advocacy NGOs would rise. This is because w hat used to be the anti-esta blishment forces were now part of the establishment and might no longer function as an effective force of criticism of the government. Another point to be noted is the rise in the role of NGOs in the districts. There are two reasons for this. First is the establishment of a law on selfgoverning local bodies. With this law, passed in the final days of the Habibi administration, local governments (provinces, special regions, kabupaten) are given a considerable degree of autonomy in matters of f inances and policy planning and execution. This will make for freer and more efficient programmes by NGOs through, for instance, simplification of procedures for registering and obtaining a pproval for programmes. And when one considers the shortages of personnel and funding sources of local governments, the co-operation of the NGO sector in policy-making and execution with respect to social and economic development in the regions is expected to become mor e important than ever. In fact, co-operation of local governments with NGOs in areas such as training has already begun to some extent. A second reason is the w orsening of armed conflicts in © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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regions such as Aceh, Maluku, and West Papua. The Wahid administration had not yet come up with an ef fective response, so that the go vernment’s response in these conf licts had been as inadequate as e ver in areas lik e humanitarian assistance and inf ormation gathering and dissemination, to say nothing of mitiga tion or resolution of the conf licts themselves. But NGOs are developing programmes in the f ields of netw ork formation, promotion of dialogue, and the gathering and dissemination of information. Notes 1

2

3

4

5

In the beginning PKBI was regarded with hostility by President Sukarno, who envisioned a large nation through population growth. But after 1966, the government switched to a favourable attitude when Jakarta Governor Ali Sadikin expressed his support for the or ganization, and under the Suharto regime the importance of family planning in economic development was acknowledged and, indeed, became sta te policy (Eldridge 1995; Riker 1998). From the end of the 1970s to the be ginning of the 1980s, NGOs b uilt close ties with influential personalities in the government, such as former Minister of Education and Culture Salino Mangunpranoto, then Minister of Population and Environment Emil Salim, and former Go vernor of Central Java and Interior Minister in the mid-1980s Suparjo Rustam (Riker 1998, p. 140; Setiawan 1996). The sources used here are Dirjen-Sospol (1999), LP3ES (2000), JANNI (1996), and Bina Desa (1988). According to interviews conducted by the author in Dian Desa in November 1999. Until recently foundations were not taxed, but a number of foundations said to be co vers for the Suhar to family fortune came under criticism, and from around the mid-1990s founda tions have become subject to taxation. The NGOs w ere favourable to this development. On this analysis, see Shuto (1997). But as stated above, as the NGOs see it, the centralized, top-down development approach of the Suharto regime aggravated the poverty problem, and in response, the number of NGOs increased in the latter half of the 1970s. The author believes that the number of local-le vel NGOs incr eased with the con vergence of interest between the NGOs and the regional development emphasis of government policy. Also, considering the difficulty for NGOs in obtaining funds and personnel, most of them were of necessity small-scale.

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According to interviews conducted by the author in Dian Desa in November 1999. Here I have used a combination of types from Eldridge (1995) and Riker (1998). In Indonesian, Undang-Undang Republik Indonesia Nomor 8Tahun 1985 tentang Organisasi Kemasyarakatan dan Peraturan Pelaksanaannya. The author confirmed this when she interviewed attorney Hakim, one of the authors of Billah and Hakim (1989) and former head of LBH, in November 1999. In Indonesian, Instruksi Menteri Dalam Ne geri Nomor 8 Tahun 1990 tentang Pembinaan Lembaga Swadaya Masyarakat. According to interviews by the author in November 1999 at the Directorate of Community of the Directorate General of Socio-political Affairs of the Ministry of Home Affairs. In an interview with the author INFID head, Binny Buchori, stated that NGOs did not play a conspicuous role in the demonstrations that forced Suharto to resign. Tosa (2000) also refers to this.

References

Arinanto, Satya. “Indonesia”. In Philanthropy and La w in Asia: A Comparative Study of the Nonprofit Legal Systems in Ten Asia Pacific Societies, edited by Thomas Silk, pp. 125 –30. San Francisco: JosseyBass Publishers, 1999. Billah, M.M. and Abdul Hakim G.N. “State Constraints on NGOs in Indonesia: Recent Developments”. Prisma, no. 47 (1989), pp. 57–66. Bina Desa. Katalog: Profil LSM-LPSM Indonesia. 4th ed. Jakarta, 1988. Cleary, Seamus. The Role of NGOs under Authoritarian Political Systems. London: MacMillan, 1997. Dirjen-Sospol. Direktori Organisasi Kemasyarakatan [Directory of social organizations]. Jakarta: Departemen Dalam Negeri, Direktorat Jenderal Sosial Politik, Direktorat Pembinaan Masyarakat, 1999. Eldridge, Philip J. “NGOs in Indonesia: Popular Mo vement or Arm of Government?” Working Paper no. 55, Centre of Southeast Asian Studies, Monash University, 1989a. ———. “NGOs and the State in Indonesia ”. Prisma, no. 47 (1989 b), pp. 34–56. ———. NGOs and Democratic Participation in Indonesia. Kuala Lumpur: Oxford University Press, 1995.

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Hikam, Muhammad A.S. “The Role of NGOs in the Empo werment of Indonesian Civil Society: A Political Perspective”. Paper presented at the Twelfth INFID Conference on Challenges for NGOs: The Role of Civil Society in a Changing Indonesia, 14–17 September 1999. ———. “The State, Grass-roots Politics and Civil Society: A Study of Social Movements in Indonesia’s New Order, 1989–1994”. Ph.D. dissertation, University of Hawaii at Manoa, 1995. Ibrahim, Rustam, ed. The Indonesian NGO Agenda: Toward the Year 2000. Jakarta: CESDA, LP3ES, and INFID (Inter national NGO F orum on Indonesian Development), 2000. INFID Statement to the Consultati ve Group on Indonesia (CGI) and the Go vernment of Indonesia, CGI Meeting, 1–2 February 2000, Jakarta. JANNI (Japan NGO Network on Indonesia). Indoneshia NGO dairekutori [Indonesian NGO directory]. Tokyo: JANNI, 1996. LP3ES. Directory of Non-Governmental Organizations in Indonesia . Jakarta: LP3ES, 2000. Mahasin, Aswab. “On the Outskirts of the Periphery: Popular Movements in the New Order”. Prisma, no. 47 (1989), pp. 25–33. Mas’oed, Mohtar. “The State Reorganization of Society under the Ne w Order”. Prisma, no. 47 (1989), pp. 3–24. Nadj, E. Shobirin. “Memperkuat Posisi Organisasi Non P emerintah” [Strengthen the position of NGOs]. Paper presented at Seminar Regional LSM untuk Wilayah Sulawesi, Kalimantan dan Maluku, 27–28 August 1999, organized by LP3ES. Putnam, Robert D. Making Democracy Work: Civic Traditions in Modern Italy. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1993. Republika. “Pengamat Pesimis LSM Bisa Beroposisi ”. Republika, 8 November 1999. Riker, James van. “The State, Institutional Pluralism, and De velopment from below: The Changing Political Parameters of State–NGO Relations in Indonesia”. Ph.D. dissertation, Cornell University, 1998. Setiawan, Bonnie. “Organisasi Non-Pemerintah dan Masy arakat Sipil” [NGO and civil society]. Prisma 25, no. 7 (1996), pp. 35–52. ———, ed. Perjuangan Demokrasi dan Masyarakat Sipil: Reposisi dan Peran Ornop/LSM di Indonesia [Struggle for democracy and civil society: Reposition and role of NGOs in Indonesia]. Jakarta: INFID, 2000. Shiraishi, Takashi. Shinpan Indonesia [Indonesia: State and politics]. Rev. ed. Tokyo: NTT Shuppan, 1996.

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Shuto, Motoko. “ASEAN shokoku no NGO: Katzudo jokyo to kokusai kankei” [NGOs in ASEAN countries: Their activities and international relations]. Komazawa Daigaku Hogakubu Seijigaku Ronshu 45 (1997): 1–57. Shwarz, A. and J. P aris, eds. The Politics of Post-Suharto Indonesia. New York: Council of Foreign Relations Press, 1999. Sinaga, Kastorius. “Neither Merchant nor Prince: A Study of NGOs in Indonesia”. Sociological Bulletin 42, nos. 1 and 2 (1993): 137–56. ———. NGOs in Indonesia: A Study of the Role of Non Go vernmental Organizations in the De velopment Process. Saarbruecken: Bielefeld Studies on the Sociology of Development, 1995. Tosa, Hiroyuki. “Gurohbaruka to atarashii ariran – Indoneshia no minshuka katei ni tsuite no kaishaku — Sakae Maotani ”. Gendai Indoneshia no kaihatsu to seiji-shakai hendoh, Keiso Shobo, 2000 nen, pp. iv and 307 wo yominagara [Globalization and aliran politics: Interpreting democratization in Indonesia]. Ajia Keizai 41, no. 12 (2000): 62–74.

© 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

This chapter is reproduced from The State and NGOs: Perspective from Asia , edited by Shinichi Shigetomi (Singapore: Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, 2002). This version was obtained electronically direct from the publisher on condition th at copyright is not infringed. No part of this publication may be reproduced, translated, stored in a retrieval system, or transmi tted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies and Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo.

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10 Malaysia Dual Structure in the State–NGO Relationship Yoshiki Kaneko INTRODUCTION

Non-governmental organizations (NGOs) in Malaysia are not necessar ily more active than those in other Southeast Asian countries. The country’s relatively well-developed administrative system, inherited from the colonial days, coupled with its fairly abundant natural resources and small population of 22.0 million, has limited the economic space for NGO activities (Loh 1994, p. 47; Tan and Singh 1994, p. 1). Ho wever, by looking at NGOs in relation to the political, economic, and social str uctures of the country, it becomes clear that the state–NGO relationship, in spite of the small size of the NGO sector, has peculiar dynamism, and that NGOs in Malaysia ar e performing rather peculiar roles. Important among the factors dictating the activities of NGOs in Malaysia are: (1) they are subjected to strict supervision and regulation at the hands of the political system with its strong authoritarian leaning; (2) a f airly well-planned development policy has been in place since the 1970s, sustained by a well-developed administrative mechanism and by the ruling party’s organization, which e xtends to the grass-roots le vel; and (3) Malaysian society is characterized by its typically multi-ethnic social structure (with bumiputra, namely Malays and other indigenous ethnic groups, constituting 61.7 per cent of the population; ethnic Chinese 27.3 per cent; and ethnic Indians 7.7 per cent [Malaysia 1996 a, p. 106]), and that the government has actively pursued policies favouring Malays. Under this situation, NGOs in Malaysia have performed peculiar roles and functions. One salient feature is that, by operating within the anomalous economic space created by a combination of an authoritarian type of © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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government and its special ethnic policy, they act in ways that clearly reflect the society’s ethnic features. The delicate inter-ethnic relationships in the country have far-reaching effects on many facets of its society, including politics, economics, and foreign af fairs; and these ef fects are also felt very typically by the country’s NGO sector. Another characteristic of NGOs in Malaysia is that, given relatively strong popular concern regarding environmental, human rights, and welfare issues, NGOs, despite the limited political space available to them, have been seen as possible v ehicles for dealing with these issues. This explains why the Malaysian NGO sector , though small in size, has continued to make its presence felt in, and exert a degree of influence over, the country’s political processes. This chapter will address two questions, from the perspective of two dual structures that exist in Malaysia. First, how has the difference in the size of economic space a vailable for dif ferent ethnic g roups given the Malaysian NGO sector its peculiar structure? And second, how has the state–NGO relationship in the country changed as a result of the overall expansion of economic space from the beginning of the 1990s? It was during the 1970s that pri vate-sector organizations began to be established in Malaysia with the explicit purpose of taking part in state-led development policies. It was not until the 1980s, ho wever, that the name “NGO” (or its direct translation in Malay, Pertubuhan-Pertubuhan Bukan Kerajaan) began to strike roots in society, inspired by growing environmental and human-rights protection activities, which led to increasing awareness about the existence of international networks of NGOs. This chapter focuses on what we call development-oriented NGOs, meaning those which, conscious of the development policies of the government, endeavour to take part in, or influence, the formulation and implementation of such policies. HISTORICAL DEVELOPMENT OF NGOs AND THEIR CHARACTERISTICS Period of Laissez-faire: Era of Mutual Aid Organizations (until the 1960s)

The Alliance — a coalition of political parties representing different ethnic groups — which took power at the time of the country’s independence in 1957, made it a principle that the vested interests of various ethnic groups be duly protected, with each group entitled to manage its own interests autonomously, free fr om interference from others. In the ear ly postindependence days, the government only involved itself in economic © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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development to a limited extent, and there was a tendency for the traditional economic systems of the various ethnic groups to play important roles in managing the people’s economic lives. Social organizations which were active at the time consisted mainly of mutual aid societies,philanthropic organizations, and religious organizations, which were organized along ethnic lines. Among the different ethnic groups, the Chinese wer e by far the most active. Chinese immigrants and their descendants had maintained mutual aid organizations in various localities established by pang, which wer e groups organized by people from the same ancestral lands. Eac h of these organizations actively undertook various public services, such as helping its members find jobs, building and managing public f acilities, offering support in ceremonial occasions, and establishing and managing schools. Ethnic Indians were also socially active. Since many were fluent in English and were Christians, not a f ew held important posts in the Young Men’s Christian Association (YMCA) (established in 1905) and Young Women’s Christian Association (YWCA) (1921). They were also active in the trade union movement, playing leading roles in the Mala ysia Trades Union Congress (established in 1945) and other labour organizations. On the other hand, the Malays, who constituted a majority of the population, were relati vely inactive. In the eastern coastal ar ea with its relatively high concentration of Malays, the Parti Islam Se-Malaysia (PAS), the first Malay-Islamic NGO, was established in 1951 with the professed objective of establishing an Islamic na tion. However, the party f ailed to spread its influence across the country. In the case of the Malay population, the long-standing patron–client relationship between the ordinary people and the hereditary sultans who reigned over nine states seems to have had the effect of limiting the room for social organizations. Period of the New Economic Policy: Emergence of Advocacy-Type NGOs (1970–90)

Following the eruption of the racial riot in 1969 (clashes between Malays and ethnic Chinese, which resulted in a few hundred deaths), the government adopted the bumiputra policy, and began to take steps to change the allocation of the country’s political, economic, and social resources drastically in favour of the Malays. The New Economic Policy (NEP; 1971–90), which was meant to give an institutional shape to the pro-Malay pr inciple, was put into effect (Kaneko 2001, pp. 308–18). It was during the NEP period that developmentoriented NGOs in Malaysia made their full-fledged appearance, against the backdrop of the following factors. © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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First, the socio-economic development policies pursued by the government led by the United Mala ys National Organization (UMNO), a party supported by Malays, were so discr iminately in f avour of Mala ys that they opened a lar ge economic space for NGOs in non-Malay communities, which were not receiving sufficient resources for development and administrative services. Second, the political system which re volved around the Barisan National (BN), a multi-party ruling coalition that grew by absorbing opposition parties, took on corporatist features, as well as a strong authoritarian tendency. The result was that the government failed to develop the capability to listen to and absorb demands and complaints voiced at the grass-roots level (Tan and Singh 1994, pp. 5–6). Third, the growth of the urban middle class and an increase in the number of overseas-educated youths led to inflows of thoughts and activities of Western-style citizens’ movements as well as Islamic revivalism. These factors together stimulated the emergence in the 1970s and 1980s of advocacy-oriented NGOs, active mainly among the ethnic Chinese and Indian communities. By challenging the authoritarian g overnment and expanding their scope of activities, these NGOs established themselves as aggressive NGOs. This period saw the establishment of a series of wha t still remain major and v ery active NGOs in the country: the Consumers’ Association of Penang (CAP; established in 1969); the Federation of Malaysian Consumers Association (FOMCA; 1973); the En vironmental Protection Society Malaysia (EPSM; 1974); SahabatAlam Malaysia (SAM; 1977); Aliran Kesedaran Negara (Aliran, active in human r ights and democratization issues; 1977); and the All-Women’s Action Society of Malaysia (AWAM; 1988). Period of Emphasis on Private-Sector Initiatives: Coexistence of Advocacy-Oriented and Public-Services-Augmenting NGOs (1991–)

In 1991 Prime Minister Maha thir Mohamad announced a plan, “Vision 2020”, which aimed to earn the country membership in the league of advanced countries by 2020, by steering its economy along a high-growth (7 per cent per annum) path. Concurrently, he announced that his government, under a new state strategy entitled the National Development Policy (NDP), would henceforth take a more realistic approach towards the task of economic development, by prioritizing: (1) gr owth and efficiency for the country as a whole rather than fairness through the favouring of Malays, and (2) the utilization of private-sector initiatives over government © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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1 4 3 5 13

2 5 9

2

5 4 9 19

1 1 4 7 11 23 5 6 16

1 4 1 2 3 6 4 18

2 1 6 5 3 5 12 32

1 1 3 2 2 4 7 20

2 2 5 9

3 14

2 2 3 2 2

1 1 2 3 3 10

5 7 15 18 27 41 70 183

Human Economic/ Health Education Rights Environment Social Women Religion Welfare Care and Children Youth Others Total

Source: Compiled by the author based on Adicom (1999).

1930s and earlier 1940s 1950s 1960s 1970s 1980s 1990s Total

Consumer Movement

TABLE 10.1 Distribution of NGOs among Various Areas of Activities by Period of Establishment (Unit: Number of NGOs)

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initiatives (Malaysia 1991a, 1991b). In response to this shift of attitude, a number of NGOs oriented towards supplementing administrative services in the areas of social welfare and health care were established during the 1990s. They included the Malaysian MedicalWelfare Fund and Association of Medical Social Workers (established in 1997) and the Welfare Organization for Special Children and Adults, Selangor (established in 1990) (see Table 10.1). Basic Characteristics of Existing NGOs

According to the only a vailable, and f airly comprehensive, directory of development-oriented NGOs in Malaysia, Directory of Development-Based Non-Profit Organizations in Malaysia (abbreviated hereafter as the Directory),1 a majority of NGOs can be classif ied into one of two types: advocacy-oriented NGOs, w hich are working for the protection of consumers’ rights, human rights, and the environment, or are addressing various social and economic prob lems; and those or iented towards supplementing administrative services in the areas of social w elfare and health care. It is noteworthy that a large number of NGOs are eng aged in the consumer movement. On the other hand , very few are active in rural development, in contrast to Thailand and Indonesia. In terms of geographical distribution, NGOs are heavily concentrated in Kuala Lumpur, the capital, which holds a 51 per cent share of the total, and the surrounding state of Selangor (27 per cent), f ollowed by the state of Penang (6 per cent), which is fairly urbanized and has a high concentration of non-Malays. Years ago, businessmen and benef actors were the main support and driving forces behind NGOs; since the 1970s, however, people from the urban middle class ha ve taken on the leading roles. Most of the staff members of NGOs are well educated, with not a few of them having studied abroad in the United States, Europe, and Australia. NGOs are also marked by signif icant differences in the de gree of involvement among different ethnic gr oups, with ethnic Chinese and Indians holding pr edominant shares of both total NGO staf f members and total r ecipients of NGO services. Ethnic Indians, in particular, are highly represented on both the supply and receiving ends of NGO services, and NGOs serve as important employers for them. In the case of CAP , for instance, only a handful of its approximately fifty-member full-time staff are Malays, with approximately 70 per cent and 30 per cent of the balance being taken up by Indians and Chinese, respecti vely.2 In the case of ethnic Chinese,

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development-oriented NGOs are staf fed mainly by the English-educated (who constitute a minority of the ethnic Chinese population), while the traditional mutual aid or ganizations are sustained b y Chinese-educated people with strong attachments to their ethnic community. In the case of Malays, too, those active in NGOs come from urban middle-class backgrounds. For many years, the Angkatan Belia Islam Malaysia (ABIM), as a Mala y-Islamic organization, had maintained an enormous and f arreaching influence over relatively well-educated Malays living in the city, such as students, civil servants, professionals, and businessmen. During the 1990s, however, a new Islamic organization, the Pertubuhan Jamaah Islah Malaysia (JIM), was formed with the purpose of organizing younger Malays. On the question of NGO funding, no documents are publically available, but according to the author’ s interview surveys, the main sources are: (1) donations; (2) membership fees; (3) fees for services paid by beneficiaries; (4) revenues earned from the publication and distribution of books and periodicals; (5) funds raised for individual projects (including those procured from abroad); and (6) government subsidies. NGOs in Malaysia are less dependent on assistance from abroad than their counterparts in other Southeast Asian countries. Government subsidies are provided on a project-by-project basis, but advocacy-oriented NGOs are not only discriminated against in the allocation of government subsidies, but often face difficulty raising funds from the private sector because of government pressure. At present, moreover, the government does not give tax breaks to the incomes NGOs earn from their business undertakings, and contributions to NGOs, with the e xception of those to philanthropic or ganizations, are very seldom granted tax concessions.

SYSTEMS FOR GOVERNMENT APPROVAL AND SUPERVISION OF NGOs

The Constitution of Malaysia, promulgated at the time of its independence in 1957, guarantees equality under the law and the freedoms of expression, assembly, and association as fundamental rights of the population. It also provides for the establishment of a representative democratic system based on the principle of separation of po wer. There exist, however, other constitutional clauses and statutory la ws that directly or indirectly put restraints on these constitutional prescriptions. In addition to Articles 3 and 153, which stipulate that the population be classified into two categories, © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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Malays and non-Malays (consisting of mainly ethnic Chinese and Indians), and that the rights accorded to the two groups be different, there are a series of laws that give priority to the maintenance of public peace and order, and limit the freedoms of expression, assembly, and association. The launching of an NGO and its activities are subject to legal and institutional restrictions prescribed by these restrictive laws. Legal Status of NGOs and Registration Systems

The relationship between the state and social organizations is defined most explicitly by the Societies Act of 1966 (revised in 1983). In its def inition “‘society’ includes any club, company, partnership, or association of seven or more persons whate ver its na ture or object, whether temporary or permanent”, and the law makes it mandatory for all pertinent organizations to register with the government, in accordance with specified procedures. The scope of organizations required to register under this law is extensive, including NGOs, political parties, mutual aid associations, and clubs, but it excludes organizations under the jurisdiction of the Trade Union Act, the Consumer Cooperatives Act, and the Companies Act. The execution of the Societies Act is entrusted to a royally appointed Registrar of Society (ROS), with the Ministry of Interior taking char ge of pr actical matters in the registration process. Of a total of 183 organizations listed in the Directory, 127 (70 per cent) are registered under this law. The ROS can reject an application for registration filed by a new organization if he judg es that the or ganization “is lik ely to be used for unlawful purposes or any purpose prejudicial to or incompatible with peace, welfare, security, public order , good order or morality in Malaysia” (Article 7). Moreover, when the Minister of Interior judges that a egistered r organization is being used for “any purpose prejudicial to or incompatible with the interest of the security of Malaysia or an y part thereof, public order or morality”, he can declare the organization illegal (Articles 5 and 17). Furthermore, if an or ganization which is either unre gistered or has been declared illegal engages in acti vities, its staf f and members can be prosecuted. In addition to organizations registered in accordance with the Societies Act, there are a n umber of organizations registered with the Re gistrar of Companies (ROC) in accordance with the Companies Act of 1965. Applications for r egistration under the Companies Act, which is administered by the Minister of Domestic Trade and Consumer Affairs, do not have to win g overnment approval, and are thus far less complicated © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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and time-consuming than applications filed under the Societies Act. Of the 183 organizations listed in the Directory, forty-one obtained their corporate status through registration with the ROC. Other methods of registration include registration as a trust company under the Trustee Act (an example being the Amanah Ikhtiar Malaysia), and re gistration as a branc h of an overseas organization, on the basis of a special memor andum exchanged with the go vernment (an e xample being the Consumers International Regional Office for Asia and the Pacific, or CIROAP). Government Monitoring and Control

As is clear from the above descriptions of the registration systems for NGOs, the government has strong power to closely monitor and control the existence and activities of NGOs. The Societies Act allows it not only to refuse to give approval to the establishment of NGOs, but also to compel them to change the contents of their activities. A compulsory system requiring NGOs to submit annual activity and financial reports enables the government to monitor their activities and financial situations, and even to cancel their registrations or declare them illegal without going through court proceedings. The government is applying pressure on NGOs already registered under the Companies Act, trying to force them to register afresh under the Societies Act. It is also planning to revise the Companies Act and other laws in such a way that they cannot be used as a cover for NGOs trying to evade the Societies Act (New Straits Times, 6 May 1999). In addition to the Societies Act there are a number of laws that, with the concern to maintain public peace and security, restrain or produce psychologically inhibiti ve effects on social organizations. They include: • Sedition Act of 1948: This law has been used to control speec h and writing activities which are deemed to agitate antagonism between the social classes and among ethnic groups. • Printing Press and Publications Act of 1948: Under this la w printing, publishing, and ne wspaper publishing and similar oper ations are required to obtain from the Ministry of Interior licences in order to carry out business. These licences must be renewed every year. The law entitles the Minister of Interior to ban the pr inting and distribution of publications which are judged to pose threats to public peace and order as well as good morals. • Internal Security Act of 1960: With the purpose of preventing attempts to overthrow the government and organized violence, the law authorizes © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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the Minister of Interior to detain indi viduals accused of these charges for up to two years without going through court proceedings, and to extend the period of detention when necessary. • Official Secret Act of 1972: Originally established with the purpose of preserving the secrecy of classified information of the government and preventing espionage activities, the law may now act as an obstacle to information disclosure. Some of these laws were legislated in the period from the late 1940s to the early 1950s, as means to cope with the rising tide of anti-go vernment subversive activities, which were being staged by the Malayan Communist Party. Since inde pendence, however, they have been put to use mor e extensively as means of maintaining internal public peace in a broad sense. The tendency towards the gr eater restriction of basic human rights was further stimulated in the aftermath of the 1969 racial riot, when the Constitution was revised to ban speech and writing on the“sensitive issues” related to ethnic conflicts (for example, the privileges enjoyed by Malays, the status of Malay as the national language, the status of sultans, and the civil rights of non-Malays). The result was that, since the 1970s, the abovementioned laws have come to be used e ver more vigorously as means of social control, including the monitoring and r estriction of social or ganizations. This being the case, even small moves by social organizations are so closely watched and so rigorously held in check by the state that the space available for free NGO activities is very limited. STRUCTURE OF THE STATE–NGO RELATIONSHIP: TWO DUAL STRUCTURES Ethnic Gaps in the NGO Sector

As noted earlier, one salient feature of the situation surrounding NGOs in Malaysia is that as they are under close surveillance and rigorous control by the state, they have only a very limited political space. The situation has grown especially severe under the rule of the Mahathir government, which came to power in 1981. While vigorously pursuing policies for economic development and social restructuring under strong government leadership, the Mahathir government has dealt severely with NGOs, essentially seeing their existence and activities as potential obstacles to the maintenance of internal peace and security, and to the very existence of the establishment. The government’s basic attitude towards NGOs has been: (1) to characterize

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voluntary social organizations as illegitimate, in that they have not received an authentic mandate of the people through elections, and thus to closely guard against their intervention in politics (meaning applying pressure on the policy-making process and staging anti-government activities) as a potential threat to national security;3 and (2) to approve of only those NGO activities which the NGOs themselves, after checking against the stipulations of pertinent laws, explicitly declare to be of no harm to the country’ s security (if the government finds those activities untrustworthy, if contains them by mobilizing various laws) (Tan and Singh 1994, p. 14). Another very peculiar characteristic of NGOs in Malaysia is that the economic space available differs significantly from one ethnic g roup to another, and this makes the distribution of NGOs among dif ferent ethnic groups very skewed. There are also big gaps among ethnic g roups with regard to the importance they attach to NGOs, the type of services xe pected from NGOs, and the overall assessment they have of NGOs’ performance. These gaps betw een ethnic groups strongly ref lect Malaysia’s basic characteristic as a multi-ethnic society , as w ell as the bumiputra policy which was put in place ostensibly to rectify original economic imbalance among different ethnic groups in society. Bumiputra Policy and NGOs

The total economic space for NGO activities in Malaysia, just like the political space, is not v ery large. This can be e xplained largely by the existence of an administrative system which is in a much better shape than those of other countries of Asia, a carefully thought out development policy, and a netw ork of ruling coalition party or ganizations which spread out extensively to the farthest corners of the countryside, serving as linkages between community r esidents and administr ative offices. In the Mala y community protected by the bumiputra policy, especially those living in the countryside, the government and the Malay-supported ruling party, the UMNO, have tried hard to minimize the economic space by funnelling in funds and implementing policy measures favouring Malays. On the other hand, ethnic Chinese and Indians, who were neglected by the government under the bumiputra policy, found themselv es in a completely different situation. Not onl y did de velopment funds and administrative services supplied by the government to non-Malay communities continue to fall short of their needs, they were also discriminated against in the issuance of official permits and licences. Their chances of employment as civil servants were drastically curtailed. In the © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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educational and cultural spheres, opportunities for receiving education in non-Malay languages were reduced, while the imposition of an excessively stringent quota system reduced the share of non-Malay youths eligible to receive higher education. The skewed distribution of administrative services drove a wedge between the Malay population, which was protected by the government, and the non-Malay population, which was not fully supplied with administrative services. It is safe to say that development-oriented NGOs in Malaysia emerged with a view to narrowing the widening gap in the administrative services supplied to the Malay and non-Malay communities, as well as the g ap in the right of access to resour ces in the government’s possession. This was precisely why, as if in parallel with the process by which the bumiputra policy was implemented during the 1970s, gathering further momentum during the 1980s, a number of NGOs sprouted up one after another with the manifest purpose of supporting the li velihood of ethnic Chinese and Indians. This has given rise to a dual str ucture, consisting of non-Malay communities with thriving NGOs, on the one hand, and the Malay community in which NGOs are very inactive, on the other. Functions Performed by Consumer Organizations

Symbolic of the lopsided characteristics of NGOs in Malaysia, which differ significantly from one ethnic group to another, are the activities of consumer organizations, a type of NGOs which boast of long histories, and rich and extensive experiences. Some of them are inter nationally famous, such as CAP in Penang, and have branches in almost all of the states. Man y also belong to a nationwide umbrella organization called the FOMCA (although CAP is not affiliated with it). Unlike consumer organizations in advanced countries, which are concerned primarily with monitoring the safety of consumer goods and making complaints against companies which produce defective goods, those in Malaysia are involved in a much wider range of activities in suppor t of comm unity residents. These activities include handling complaints from people against administrative offices and private companies (on housing, urban development, medical and health care, and the environment), offering legal support, and carrying out surveys, making proposals, and educating consumers on v arious social issues. 4 Another characteristic of these consumer NGOs is that both their staf f members and beneficiaries are predominantly non-Malays. These characteristics of the consumer or ganizations can be e xplained by the ethnically lopsided supply of administrative services mentioned above. It © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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should be pointed out, moreover, that non-Malays are frequently discriminated against in informal w ays as well. With most low-ranking civil servants and policemen being Malays, non-Malays seeking administrative services tend to encounter inhospitable treatment, have their requests flatly denied, or be forced to wait for extended periods. Given this state of affairs, privately run consumer organizations which offer an extensive range of support services to community residents have a good reason to exist.5 However, these acti vities which cater to the needs of specif ic ethnic communities are undertaken not only by NGOs; traditional m utual aid organizations and ethnicall y based political parties also pro vide similar services. Especially among the ethnic Chinese, there are a number of organizations that acti vely perform self-help functions to mak e up for deficient administrative services. They include two Chinese-supported parties in the ruling coalition (the Malaysian Chinese Association [MCA] and the Gerakan), a Chinese-supported opposition party (the Democratic Action Party, or DAP), dialect/territorial associations, clan or surname associations, and the Chinese Chambers of Commerce.These organizations, along with NGOs, are instrumental in filling the gap between Malays and ethnic Chinese, as they address the needs of the Chinese community in a multi-layered and mutually reinforcing manner. Another characteristic feature of consumer organizations in Malaysia is that, in addition to carrying out activities to make up for the shortage i n administrative services, they also actively pursue advocacy-oriented activities together with other NGOs that are active in the human rights and democratization movements. It is important to note that, in order for NGOs catering mainly to the needs of non-Malays to gain the confidence of their communities, it is essential that they take a critical attitude towards the pro-Malay policy pursued by the government and administrative offices. As evident from voting patterns in various past elections,6 the non-Malay communities are almost equall y divided into pro- and anti-g overnment camps. In the ethnic Chinese community, the members of the community opposed to the government have pinned their expectations on the opposition party and NGOs as vehicles for change. Even among the supporters of the parties in the ruling coalition, there are not a few who, out of indignation at being discriminated against by the bumiputra policy, harbour a latent desire for reform. Under this situation, it has been natural for activists harbouring critical views towards the government to be attr acted to NGOs and their activities. NGOs, for their part, have been able to win the support and

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confidence of community residents by openly voicing their criticism of the government. NGOs in the Malay Community

As the beneficiaries of the bumiputra policy, Malays see NGOs from a completely different perspective from that of non-Malays. It has been quite rare for Malays to be involved in the activities of NGOs, which cater mainly to the needs of non-Malays, let alone to join advocacy-oriented NGOs with their anti-government leanings. Given the advantage of easy access to administrative services, which are available on a preferential basis, and the security provided by the existence of a closely spanned support network of the UMNO, Malays have not felt muc h need to ha ve NGOs of their o wn. In the countr yside, moreover, the struggle for power and influence between the UMNO and the PAS has given added impetus to the government and the ruling coalition parties to improve administrative services meant for Malays. Consequently, not only has the economic space for NGO activities in the Malay community failed to grow, but a tendency has been allowed to emerge, which regards advocacyoriented NGOs as potential threats to the vested interests of Malays. It should be pointed out, ho wever, that these de velopments relate in some sense to the w ay Islamic organizations have been treated . Islamic organizations have relatively long histories. The ABIM, which was formed in 1971 at the initiative of Anwar Ibrahim and other leaders of the student movement, grew in size as an urban-based NGO with strong appeal among students and middle-class Malays. However, the Mahathir administration perceived the rapidly growing Islamic organization as potentially dangerous, and moved to co-opt it as part of the establishment. In 1982 Maha thir made a dramatic move, appointing Anwar as one of the leaders of the UMNO and also as a member of his Ca binet. He made the ABIM part of the government’s administrative system by absorbing its entire organizational structure and members as part of the ruling coalition, while simultaneously starting to aggressively implement a government-led Islamization policy, with Anwar at the helm. Because of this, Malaysia has not seen the emergence of Islamic NGOs similar to those in Indonesia, which are basically independent from the g overnment. Consequently, autonomous NGOs have remained v ery inactive among Malays. In other w ords, as Malays and non-Mala ys have continued to look at and assess NGOs differently, the inter-ethnic dual structure concerning the density of NGOs and the intensity of their activities has remained intact.

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Dual Structure of Confrontation and Co-operation

Measuring the state–NGO relationship in terms of confrontation versus co-operation brings into focus another dual structure. For years the government tried to incorporate NGOs into the framework of its developmental policy, but as it be gan to emphasize the need to utiliz e privatesector initiatives in the early 1990s, it has been redoubling its effort towards this end (Tan and Singh 1994, pp. 16–17). Its attitude to wards NGOs has become increasingly characterized as a tw o-track policy, aimed at monitoring and regulating them, on the one hand, while using and supporting them on a selective basis, on the other. In response to this change, the NGO sector is being increasingly divided between NGOs that are critical towards the government and those willing to co-operate with the government.

Advocacy-Oriented NGOs

Those NGOs which remain critical towards the government are of the advocacy-oriented type. They are active in movements for environmental conservation, human rights pr otection, and democratization. As many of them came into being when the g overnment was becoming increasingly authoritarian, and as they endeavoured to expand the scope of their activities in the face of the oppressive pressure of the government, these NGOs have earned the status of aggressive NGOs, which, though small in size, are proud to be autonomous and critical of the government. These features are, more or less, shared by most of the r epresentative NGOs in the countr y. People who have found themselves disgusted by the process by which the ruling coalition has reduced democratic party politics to an empty shell and has secured its political base by continuously politicizing ethnic issues, and who have given up counting on the ruling coalition an y longer, have instead looked upon NGOs as effective vehicles for political reform. Movements in opposition to the large-scale development projects of the Mahathir g overnment are a case in point. Gi ven the formidab le power that the ruling coalition wields in the political arena, which precludes any chance of settling issues through parliamentary processes, great expectations were pinned on NGOs to champion the causes of environmental conservation and human rights protection. Given, however, the fact that most of the e xisting advocacy-oriented NGOs were small in size and individually powerless, it became conventional for a number of NGOs to join hands and form united fronts on an issueby-issue basis. Typical cases fought by suc h united fr onts include a © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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campaign staged between 1983 and 1994 in Ipoh, in the state of Perak, against the dumping of radioactive wastes by Asian Rare Earth (ARE), a joint venture under part Japanese ownership, as well as the campaign to stop the construction of the Bakun Dam in the state of Sarawak, which peaked in the mid-1990s. The latter campaign, in which NGOs impressively demonstrated their professional expertise and organizing and networking capabilities, became a model case for NGOs when launching subsequent campaigns for environmental and human rights protection. As these activities picked up momentum, the government countered them with increasingly harsh crack-downs. In October 1987 the government staged a wholesale assault on anti-government movements under the Internal Security Act (ISA), arresting and detaining mor e than 100 leaders of anti-establishment opposition parties and social organizations, including around ten NGO activists. After this assault, a phenomenon that might be called an “exodus” from NGOs took place, both on the part of staff members and beneficiaries, with some NGOs even sustaining a loss of cohesiveness.7 Despite the unfavourable wind, there were some developments that boosted the NGOs, helping them to maintain their activities for human rights protection and democratization at a certain level. Important among them were the establishment of the Suara Rakyat Malaysia (Suaram), an organization formed to support those arrested in the 1987 incident, and the expansion of an interna tional support network, which was stimulated by growing international concern about human rights and by the rapid spread of the Internet (Suar am 1998). Subsequentl y, the Anwar incident of September 1998 (when he was dismissed by Mahathir from the post of Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister, arrested under the ISA, and charged with corruption and sodomy) marked a turning point for NGOs, whose activities then began to gather momentum again. Under the rallying cry of Reformasi (reform), NGOs cr iticized the Mahathir go vernment, joining hands with each other and networking their acti vities. NGOs and their members began to pursue political activities quite openly. For instance, they organized a campaign to demand democratization jointly with opposition parties (such as the DAP and the PAS), and a large number of NGO activists joined a ne w opposition party, Parti Keadilan Nasional (Keadilan), which was formed on the basis ofAnwar’s followers within the UMNO and his o wn stronghold, the ABIM.8 In the gener al election of November 1999, many NGOs supported an opposition coalition, Barisan Alternatif, in the hope of bringing a two-party system into reality. © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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NGOs Augmenting Administrative Services

On the other hand, NGOs augmenting administrative services have been expanding their sphere of activities since the 1990s. As the government’s policy to pr ivatize administrative services has made headw ay, and as people’s needs have diversified, the economic space for NGOs has gradually expanded, even in the Malay community where it was once very small. For NGOs supplying such privatized administrative services, maintaining close co-operation and collaboration with the go vernment and administr ative offices is indispensable. There have been some co-operative aspects to the state–NGO relationship, with the most typical manifestation being the appointment of NGO representatives as members of advisory committees. In fact, it is an established practice for the government to appoint NGO representatives, along with those of economic associations and citizen groups, to sit on advisory committees and ask them to deliberate on guidelines in preparation for new laws or institutional arrangements. Early examples of this practice were the FOMCA’s participation in an advisory council established in preparation for the 1974 revision of the Price Adjustment Act, and the EPSM’s in an advisory committee that deliberated on how to enforce the Environmental Protection Act (Tan and Singh 1994, pp. 17–18). Ho wever, given the fact that members of these advisory bodies lack an y veto power, the actual influence NGOs can hope to bear on the policy-making process through this channel of co-operation cannot but be limited. The government, for its part, can capitalize on a spurious facade of a due “democratic” decisionmaking process based on “citizens’ participation”, and steamroller its own plans, overruling objections raised by NGOs. In the case of the National Economic Consultative Council (NECC), which was established in 1990 to dra w up a post-NEP economic de velopment plan, Aliran and other NGOs, as well as some opposition parties, withdrew from the advisory body, criticizing the government for hypocrisy in making m uch of “democratization in form only”. The number of NGOs undertaking joint projects with the government on specific issues, or for specif ic purposes, is also on the increase. The largest NGO in this area is Amanah Ikhtiar Malaysia (AIM). Established in 1986 with the purpose of undertaking participatory programmes for poverty eradication by supplying low-interest loans similar to the microcredits supplied by the Grameen Bank in Bangladesh,AIM now has branches in every state, with a staff of approximately 700, and has extended loans to some 32,000 f amilies. The full funds for the loans ar e supplied by the

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government (Ishida and Shahid 1999, pp. 44–45; Malaysia 1996,p. 73). As people left out by development in the countryside grew in number, and as the gap between the ha ves and have-nots grew wider, the PAS and other Islamic organizations began to ad dress the needs of discontented r ural residents, and the g overnment and the ruling coalition, alarmed by the growing influence of Islamic organizations, started to deal with the poverty in the countryside, adopting a new approach. In exchange for cutting back on inefficient direct subsidies, it adopted the a bove-mentioned AIM programme – which had originally started as an experimental programme of the Universiti Sains Malaysia (USM) — as part of its own farming village developing programme, and aggressively helped the AIM to expand.9 In addition to projects undertaken jointly by the central government and NGOs, there are others carried out at the local level. For instance, a project for the preservation of historic relics in Penang has been undertaken jointly by three groups: the state government, the Socio-economic and Environmental Research Institute (SERI), which is an NGO established by the state government, and the Penang HeritageTrust and other NGOs. Each party bears a share of the responsibilities for the supply of funds, coordination (for such work as enlisting the support of overseas contributors), and the supply of technical e xpertise and manpower.10 Penang is leading other states in terms of institutionalizing these arrangements for co-operation between the state government and NGOs. CONCLUSIONS

In this chapter we have described the state–NGO relationship in Malaysia as being characterized by two dual structures. One refers to the existence of a large gap between different ethnic groups with regard to the economic space available for, and the intensity of acti vities undertaken by, NGOs. The other refers to the fact that there are both confrontational and co-operative aspects to the state–NGO relationship. These two dual structures explain why the NGO sector in Malaysia has performed a political role, without confining itself to the role of a sector that is supposed to “fill in the gap between the state and the market”. On the one hand, NGOs have braved severe government repression, consistently working to form a political force capable of serving as an alternative to the current power establishment. And on the other, they have also collaborated with the government from time to time, performing practical functions such as supplying community residents with the kind

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of public services that the go vernment in power has failed to deliver. In other words, while standing opposed to the state at all times, they have played the role of setting right and making up for all the skews and shortcomings produced by the country’s authoritarian, corporatist, and ethnically lopsided political system. Though their number and the e xtent of their activities are still limited, NGOs in Malaysia and their activities are of no small political significance. Before concluding this chapter, it may be worthwhile to say a few words about the future prospects for the state–NGO relationship. One development worthy of mention is that following the 1998 incident, Malays have become politically awakened, and NGOs run mainly by and for Malays, which have the potential to serv e as a receptacle for discontented Malays, have become remarkably energized. In the aftermath of the Anwar incident, the ABIM, after years of affiliation with the ruling coalition, not only began to support the opposition K eadilan, but also launc hed vigorous advocacy campaigns in the Malay community forMasyarakat Madani (civil society). The JIM is also taking similar actions. As the Malay comm unity, once apparently monolithic and cohesi ve under the pr otective cover of the bumiputra policy, has split in the aftermath of the Anwar incident, the camp that is critical of the government is being sustained by Malay-based NGOs. It is also important to note that these Malay-based NGOs ha ve joined hands with adv ocacy-oriented NGOs run mainly by and for nonMalays in order to support the opposition coalition BarisanAlternatif, and thus seem to ha ve started moving towards pursuing co-operation acr oss ethnic lines with other NGOs. Even though this development is unlikely to bring about an immediate change of political power, the very fact that a point of cross-ethnic contact has been opened among NGOs, w hich have long been partitioned along ethnic lines, is of great significance.11 Another important factor for the future of the state–NGO relationship in Malaysia is the question of what role NGOs should play in preparation for the post-bumiputra policy era. In order to pursue its priority objecti ves of economic rehabilitation and bringing the economy back onto a high-growth trajectory, the government has found it impera tive to relax the bumiputra policy and pri vatize various services of the go vernment sector. The favourable protective packages that the Malays have enjoyed for years are being slashed, and various administrative services targeted at them are being privatized. As these developments gather further momentum, the need for NGOs in the Malay community will cer tainly grow, and the y will be expected to play greater roles.

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Although the NGO sector in Malaysia is much smaller in size and less active than those in otherAsian countries, new developments in the making seem to point to the probability that NGOs may emerge as important players in the country’s political and economic arenas.

Notes 1

2

3

4

5

6

7

As a result of the very slow progress being made on the disclosure of information concerning NGOs, an officially published directory of NGOs is not yet available. The Directory referred to here was compiled in 1999 by the Asian Institute for Development Communication (Aidcom), an NGO of journalists, and other or ganizations, with the support of the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and the Economic Planning Agency. Based on an interview conducted by the author in December 1999 at CAP’s office. A similar tendency was also e vident in other consumer groups, such as FOMCA and the Education and Resear ch Association for Consumer (ERA-Consumer). Immediately after taking of fice, Prime Minister Mahathir condemned pressure groups and their lobbying activities as being “one of the worst aspects of a democrac y” (New Straits Times, 16 July 1981), and ever since he has expressed the view from time to time that people who ar e willing to stage political activities should do so only after joining political parties and passing the test of elections. Based on interviews conducted by the author in December 1999 at CAP, FOMCA, ERA-Consumer, and other consumer organizations, and Idris (1986). CAP devotes part of its floor space to offering consultation and counselling services to ordinary community residents; a majority of its staff members, other than clerical workers, are licensed as lawyers. The percentages of the votes captured in recent general elections by the two Chinese-supported parties in the ruling coalition (the MCA and Gerakan) and by the Chinese-supported opposition DAP remained very close, standing at 17.8 per cent to 20.8 per cent (1986), 13.3 per cent to 17.6 per cent (1990), and 18.6 per cent to 10.4 per cent (1995), with the DAP outperforming the coalition member parties in the 1986 and 1990 general elections. Based on the author’s interview surveys in December 1999.

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At the inauguration of K eadilan, Chandra Muzaffar, head of the International Movement for a Just World (JUST), an NGO involved in human rights and democratization issues, as well as former head of Aliran, was appointed chief vice president of the ne w party, while Chua Tian Chan, an activist from an NGO for human rights protection, was appointed deputy vice president. Based on an inter view by the author in December 1999 at USM. AIM’s programme is highly appraised as an outstanding success story among the poverty-eradication projects undertaken by NGOs as part of the Seventh Malaysia Plans (1996–2000) (Malaysia 1996, pp. 73, 93, 180). Based on interviews by the author with leaders of the Penang Heritage Trust. Most of the NGOs run mainly b y and for non-Malays intervie wed by the author, such as CAP, Aliran, FOMCA, ERA-Consumer, and Suaram, were taking note of these de velopments, and were of the opinion that the space for their activities had grown.

References

Aidcom. Directory of De velopment-Based Non-Profit Organizations in Malaysia. Kuala Lumpur: Aidcom, 1999. Idris, S.M. Mohamed. Malaysian Consumers and Development . Penang: CAP, 1986. Ishida, Akira and Shahid Hassan. “Guramin ginkou housiki niyoru sankagata hinkonbokumetsu program no seika to kadai: Malaysia’s AIM no jirei” [Outcomes and problems of participatory poverty-eradication programmes through the Grameen Bank system], Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA). Kokusai Kyouryoku Kenkyu [Journal of International Cooperation] 15, no. 1 (1999): 41–50. Kaneko, Yoshiki. Malaysia no seiji to ethnicity: kajin-seiji to k okumintougou [Politics and ethnicity in Malaysia: Chinese politics and national integration]. Kyoto: Kouyou shobou, 2001. Kua Kia Soon. 445 Days under Operation Lalang. Kuala Lumpur: Orient Group Sdn. Bhd., 1989. Loh Kok Wah, Francis. “ASEAN NGOs in the Post-Cold War World”. In Asia — Who Pays for Growth?: Women, Environment and Popular Movement, edited by J ayant Lele and Wisdom Tetty. Kingston: Department of Political Studies, Queen’s University at Kingston, 1994.

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Malaysia. The Second Outline Perspective Plan, 1991–2000. Kuala Lumpur: Government Printer, 1991a. ———. Sixth Malaysian Plan 1991–1995. Kuala Lumpur: Government Printer, 1991b. ———. Seventh Malaysia Plan 1996–2000 . Kuala Lumpur: Percetakan Nasional Malaysia Bhd., 1996a. ———. Sedition Act 1948. Kuala Lumpur: International Law Book Service, 1996b. ———. Federal Constitution. Kuala Lumpur: International Law Book Service, 1998. ———. Societies Act 1966 (Act 335) & Re gulations. Kuala Lumpur: International Law Book Service, 1999. Means, Gordon P. Malaysian Politics: The Second Generation. Singapore: Oxford University Press, 1991. Ministry of Home Affairs, Malaysia. Towards Preserving National Security. Kuala Lumpur: Government Printer, 1988. Suaram. Malaysian Right Report. Kuala Lumpur: Suaram, 1998. Syed Hussin Ali. “Comparative Experiences of Non-g overnmental Organizations in ASEAN”. Arena Bulletin 6, no. 2/3 (1989): 45–57. Tan Boon Kean and Bishan Singh. Uneasy Relations: The State and NGOs in Malaysia (The Role of NGOs in De velopment, Monograph 1: Malaysian Case Study). Kuala Lumpur: Asian and Pacific Development Center (APDC), 1994.

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This chapter is reproduced from The State and NGOs: Perspective from Asia , edited by Shinichi Shigetomi (Singapore: Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, 2002). This version was obtained electronically direct from the publisher on condition th at copyright is not infringed. No part of this publication may be reproduced, translated, stored in a retrieval system, or transmi tted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies and Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo.

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11 Singapore Subtle NGO Control by a Developmentalist Welfare State Yayoi Tanaka INTRODUCTION

Since independence in 1965, Singapore has achieved a remarkable degree of economic development relying on its own distinctive policies and today boasts a national income that is second only to that of Japan inAsia (World Bank 1997, p. 21). Some 78 per cent of Singa pore’s total population of 3,865,000 are Chinese , but there are also impor tant Malay and Indian minorities, each constituting a distinct ethnic community. Even among the Chinese majority, the English-educa ted elite and those w ho speak only Chinese form two different social str ata. The island nation has a voided serious inter-ethnic or inter-class conflict, however, and Singaporeans have harnessed their collective energies to the task of achieving rapid economic progress. This developmental state has been r un by the one-party r ule of the People’s Action Party (PAP). The government has kept Singaporeans in line by severely limiting their freedom of expression and imposing harsh controls in other areas of social life, but at the same time it has managed to distrib ute the countr y’s wealth through a wide rang e of social services in such areas as health, welfare, and education. For this reason, Singapore’s non-governmental organization (NGO) sector has generally been regarded domestically and internationally as underdeveloped and anemic. Since the 1990s, however, slowly but surely, new types of NGOs have appeared in the field of social advocacy, utilizing as their byword civil society.

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This chapter seeks to explain the peculiarities of and subsequent changes in NGO behaviour in Singapore by examining the evolution of the statedirected distribution of resources and the mechanism of national social control since the country’s independence. STATE MANAGEMENT AND THE DEVELOPMENT OF NGOs

In Singapore organizations falling into the six categories defined in chapter one of this volume (non-governmental, non-profit-making, voluntary, of a solid and continuing form, altruistic, and philanthropic) are generally called NGOs, but so are self-help groups, clubs, and associations that benefit only specific groups. Singapore’s corporate registration laws place all of these in the same category and call them NGOs, even self-help groups. Moreover, to judge from the founding members, the major source of funding, and the composition of the boards of dir ectors, many prominent associations in Singapore clearly are government-related, but in this chapter they, too, are treated as NGOs. Almost all NGOs are re gistered under either the Societies Act or the Companies Act. In 1998, 5,279 associations were listed under the Societies Act (Ministry of Information and Arts 1999). Some NGOs are re gistered under the Companies Act, but their exact number is not kno wn. In order to receive tax-exempt status, an association must also seek recognition under the Charities Act. In 2000 there w ere 1,446 such groups. The Charities Act requires associations to file under one of four categories, depending on their orientation (poverty, education, religion, or community). In 1988 mor e than 50 per cent of such organizations were categorized under religion.1 NGOs deal with a number of problems, including the environment and nature conservation; gender issues and the human rights of women; social welfare; education and research; culture and the arts; and ethnic g roups. Some also offer advice or criticism to the government. A defining feature of Singapore is that unlik e in Indonesia, the Philippines, and Thailand, they are no NGOs active in rural development. From the Colonial Period to Independence (1918–65): Private Group Activities

During this period n umerous associations were energetically involved in community-based self-help activities, although they did not see themselves as targeting an unlimited number of people to fulfil a specific public-interest

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purpose as do NGOs today. A prime example of such an organization was the Chinese clan association (bang). This is the generic name for the Chinese self-help groups established by wealthy businessmen on the basis of province and patronym. Bearing the name of a place of origin or clan (for example, the Fujien Bang), these self-help associations engaged in a wide range of community work. Bang groups founded as secret societies to pro vide housing and social assistance for destitute migrant workers often developed into large regional service organizations once the basic needs of their constituents had been met. Such organizations built houses for impoverished members, schools, hospitals, and even temples, performing essential community services. At this time most Chinese were seasonal labourers li ving in Sing apore but intending to return to their homeland. As such, they were excluded from the services ordinarily offered by the city’ s colonial ruler s, but for that same reason, the colonial g overnment did not a ttempt to r egulate bang activities, adopting a hands-off attitude. Just prior to independence, these localized bottom-up activities had spilled into the political sphere, exercising an important influence there. Reflecting the growth of nationalist sentiment and the desire for independence, such private groups as bang, labour unions, trade feder ations, and student or ganizations became especially active. Channelling popular aspirations into political action, these associations supported the major political parties either openly or behind the scenes. At this juncture, partisans of the PAP found themselves bitterly opposed by their communist rivals. Private associations also split along these lines and supported those parties. From Independence to Nation-Building (1965–90)

Following the PAP’s rise to political po wer just prior to inde pendence, self-help and service-oriented groups lost muc h of their ear lier vitality. There are two major reasons for this decline: the P AP government’s own comprehensive programme of social ser vices and its suppression of the freedoms of expression and association. Social services in Singapore are highly developed by world standards.2 The government offers its citizens a sophisticated and complete range of services in the areas of education, health and medical care, and welfare. In education, for instance, the government sets aside 4 to 5 per cent of the nation’s annual GNP for Edusa ve, a fund that pr ovides all Singa porean nationals between the ages of six and sixteen with what amounts to free schooling from primary through secondary school. The fund also equips © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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the schools fully. For instance, by the year 2002 all primary and secondary schools will be connected by online wide-area networks, and there will be one computer for every two pupils (Singapore 21 Committee 1999). The school system, however, is entirely elite-oriented, and education is tracked from the primary level, with the brightest students attending courses tailored to meet uni versity entrance requirements and the other students placed in occupational training courses. Ultimately, a mere 10 per cent will enter Singapore’s ultra-elite universities (Ramesh and Asher 2000, p. 128). Because education is designed to produce an elite, however, does not mean that the government neglects occupational training or the educational needs of its workers. Singapore’s business community is determined to produce a highly competent and qualif ied labour force, and the state fully shar es that commitment. Not only does the government create vocational schools and training institutes, but each corporation or company establishes its own on-the-job-training programme for employees and encourages workers to acquire higher skills through a national accreditation system. Thus, in the field of education, the government allots ample resources to Singaporeans, but its emphasis on elitism and its inter vention even at shop-floor le vel give it considerable leverage over the individual. The government has assigned health and medical care a somewhat lower priority than educa tion and, as discussed belo w, housing. Nonetheless, Singapore ranks high in this field by world standards. For example, in 1988 the country had the lowest infantile death rate among the ten newly industrialized economies (NIEs).3 In 1990 it ranked thirteenth among the twenty-four Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) members (Toh and Low 1992, p. 211). The government policy is to guarantee health and medical care to all citizens regardless of discrepancies in income. In 1984, however, Singaporeans were asked to assume a share of that burden to offset mounting health-care costs. Under the new system all employees are required to contribute 6.8 per cent of their monthly salary to Medisave. This obligatory savings plan pays the medical expenses of the employee and his or her family, even after retirement. MediShield, which covers chronic illnesses requiring long-term treatment, and Medifund, which protects low-income workers, operate on identical principles. In the field of health and medical care, then, the government makes its resources available to all citizens, but the system is run under close government supervision and obliges Singaporeans to shoulder some of the expenses. Among the various services offered to citizens, the one most f aithfully reflecting government policy is housing. The Housing and De velopment Board’s housing service, the pre-eminent agent in this field, has provided © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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700,000 homes to Singaporeans, benefiting 86 per cent of the na tion’s population. In the 1990s the housing policy shifted from its earlier emphasis on quantity to quality. The government intends to replace old-style oneand two-room structures with spacious four- and five-room homes. In order to achieve a wider di versity in design and e xpand the range of models available, it has author ized the private sector to participa te in designing and building public housing. Apartments built by the public corporation were rented out at first, but in 1964 a policy change encouraged citizens to become homeowners, and from that point public housing has been gradually sold off. As a result, the proportion of o wned to rented pub lic dwellings has grown steadily, expanding from 42 per cent in 1980 to 64 per cent in 1985 and reac hing 80 per cent in 1990. Subsidies are also a vailable for low-income families wishing to pur chase homes.4 The government’s generous housing policy has paid lar ge dividends: today, nine out of ten Singaporeans own their own home (Tremewan 1998, p. 83). While working to improve a broad complement of services, the government also strives to augment the control it wields over ordinary citizens. In 1988, for instance, twenty-three town councils were created under the Housing and Development Board to oversee and maintain public housing on a nationwide basis. The town councils are composed of r esidents’ representatives appointed by the Member of Parliament of each electoral precinct, with the Member of Parliament taking the role of chairperson of the council. The councils are responsible for creating community consensus through various recreational activities. They are also in charge of housing, parking lots, open-air street stalls, pub lic facilities, garbage collection, cleaning, and landsca ping. The cost of these acti vities is borne by local residents. In the 1960s Citizens’ Consultative Committees and Residents’ Committees were established under the Ministry of Community Development in each of the country’s eighty-one electoral precincts. The Citizens’ Consultative Committees provide a link between the government and local residents, and through them the government explains its various policies, state-initiated campaigns, and comm unity planning f or each precinct. The Residents’ Committees maintain local security, organize sports and recreational activities, promote volunteer activities, and mediate between the government and the town councils. In addition, Singapore has more than 100 community centres, each equipped with a librar y, gymnasium, dance studio, and other f acilities designed to encourage a broad range of cultural and athletic activities. It also maintains

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nursery schools, kindergartens, and clubs for the elderly, extending social and cultural services to all age groups. The government began promoting the centres in the 1950s, subsidizing 75 per cent of the costs. Many of the people who chair these committees also serve as Members of Parliament and belong to the PAP. Thus, the committees are intimately linked to the ruling party, enabling the government to closely regulate the lives of the citizenry (Iwasaki 1998, p. 117). Comprehensive government services and the high degree of centralized social control they entail have constricted the scope of NGO acti vities in Singapore. There are also pri vate non-profit organizations established in the 1970s and 1980s, but these are charitable or self-help groups, such as Soroptimist International of Sing apore, associations for the elderl y, and women’s saving groups. They are obscured by the panoply of public services and have not been prominent actors on the Singapore scene.5 The bang, too, have lost their former dynamism. As of 1999, there were some 350 Chinese clan associations, but among those 164 were not active or were dormant. The reason is that the g overnment has stepped in and monopolized services formerly provided by the clan groups. In education, for example, the state establishes a unified curriculum, which all schools are obliged to adopt. Fur thermore, government policy supports English education, making it difficult to operate Chinese-language schools. A similar situation exists with respect to hospitals and, as described above, housing— traditional concerns of the bang.6 Another factor impeding NGO activity is the PAP’s suppression of the freedoms of association and speech. Ev en before independence, pr ivate organizations (labour unions, the media, gr ass-roots groups) came under party control as a result of the PAP’s efforts to monitor communist groups. Yet even today, when the Communist Party no longer poses a threat, stringent controls over these basic freedoms remain f irmly in place. When the so-called Marxist Conspiracy occurred in 1987, the go vernment not only intensified these controls but also came to view NGOs with deep-seated suspicion.7 The 1990s: Easing of Social Controls and the Rise of New NGOs

Changes in Government

In 1990 the charismatic symbol of the Singapore state and its founder, Lee Kuan Yew, stepped down as Prime Minister , becoming Senior Minister .

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That event marked an impor tant change in the g overnment’s approach to national stewardship. The new Premier, Goh Chok Tong, pledged as one of his ten-year nation-building goals to practise a more constructive, participatory-style democracy. He also increased the opportunities for dialogue between the government and non-government professionals and set about building the organizational structures required by a civil society. For instance, so-called Feedback Units were established in order to promote exchanges of views between the government and the people. In 1998 twenty-one of these units were created, and regular meetings were held, presided over by a nongovernment chairperson. In addition, Goh set up the Institute of Policy Studies to conduct research on civil society and its values. At the same time the term civil society began to appear in government policy pronouncements. In 1991 Minister f or Information and the Arts, Brigadier General George Yeo, gave a speech emplo ying the concept f or the first time. He prefer red the word ci vic to civil and avoided the term NGO but nevertheless talked of a civil society mediating between the state and the indi vidual. More importantly, he openly criticized the pre vious behaviour of the PAP. Comparing the party to the banyan tree of Bengal, he noted that it had gr own so big and mighty tha t nothing would grow in its shadow. The party, he said, had obstructed the de velopment of a genuine citizenry and its spontaneous civic or civil institutions (Tay 1998, p. 248). In 1997 Prime Minister Goh declared the promotion of a civil society to be a national priority, and in “Singapore 21”, the government’s vision in the twenty-first century, he has included a civil society as one of five pillars on which the society of the future will be built (Singapore 21 Committee 1999). Changing NGOs

As the government revised its views of civil society, the NGO sector, too, began to change. A new type of pri vate association appeared, dif ferent from the benevolent and self-help groups that had flourished during the colonial era and the early phase of nation-b uilding. The new groups are involved in environmental, gender, and human rights issues and are led by young elite-oriented Chinese with an English education. A look at some of the NGOs formed during this period will give us some idea of the factors behind this change. 1. Nature Society of Singapore (NSS): The NSS was formed in 1992 as an en vironmental NGO to implement locall y the Green Plan

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adopted by the 1992 Earth Summit at Rio (the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development). It actively lobbies the government and opposes the construction of golf courses in conservation zones. The group has actually succeeded in ha ving such projects cancelled. 2. Association of Women for Action and Research (AWARE): AWARE addresses such issues as g ender equality, women’s participation, and domestic violence and to that end engages in publishing, operating help lines, and advocacy work. The organization receives extensive press coverage, making it a par ticularly high-profile NGO. AWARE was launched in 1985 by a group of working women, and today it boasts 600 members, among them scholars, lawyers, clerical workers, and students. Its representative, Kanwaljit Soin, is a Nominated Member of Parliament who highlights gender issues in Parliament. She sponsored a member’s bill on domestic violence, which did not become law but it strongly influenced the Women’s Charter adopted subsequently. 3. Roundtable: Roundtable was established in 1994 to propose policies and scrutinize national politics. In the general elections of 1997, it criticized Singaporean electoral practice in the media as a private group not affiliated with any party. After the elections the organization attacked the PAP’s electoral strategy in The Straits Times for having packaged the electoral v ote with a pr ovision for impro vements to the v oters’ housing precincts. The PAP responded by telling Roundtable to direct its criticisms through party channels and attempted to cast doubt on its non-partisanship. Of particular interest, ho wever, is the fact that tw o members of Roundtable were later appointed Nominated Members of Parliament. 4. Singapore Institute of International Affairs (SIIA): SIIA was founded in 1961 by academics to conduct research on international economic and political problems and recommend policies, but in the late 1990s it changed course, including in its pur view civil society and NGOs as well, and is now one of Singapore’s rare think tanks. It currently works with fellow ASEAN NGOs. SIIA is a so-called Track 2 policy think tank that proposes policies to the ASEAN countries from the pri vate sector side. In 1998 it began co-operating with Indonesian NGOs and now deals with human rights issues and transboundary haze pollution. The organization’s goals are to help Indonesian NGOs r each a wider world audience and generally to encourage young professionals to raise their awareness of international problems.

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The preceding discussion has examined the historical development of Singapore’s NGOs during three distinct periods, of which the third,beginning in the 1990s, has witnessed the most spectacular growth. Nonetheless, the government continues to exercise control over the spontaneous activities of NGOs and other citizens’ groups. Indeed, it has imposed additional legal and extra-legal constraints on such organizations, although recently, it has come to prefer more informal methods.

GOVERNMENT’S PERCEPTION OF NGOs AND THE SYSTEM OF LEGAL CONTROLS

The Singapore legal system is based on English common la w. Reflecting the historical process of winning independence from Britain and securing Singapore’s separation from Malaysia, statutes are based on an admixtur e of English (Charities Act), Australian (Companies Act), and endogenous laws (Societies Act). The Societies Act, a g enuinely Singaporean creation, w as enacted to facilitate the suppression of secret societies and communist organizations during the transition from colonialism to national independence. In principle Article 14 of the Sing apore Constitution guarantees the freedom of association. In fact, however, organizations consisting of more than ten members and committees with more than ive f members are required to register under one of the corporate laws detailed below. Corporate Law

NGOs acquire corporate status by registering under either the Societies Act or the Companies Act. The Charities Act recognizes benevolent organizations as tax-e xempt institutions, but to be elig ible for such recognition, a group must be registered under one of the other statutes.8 Societies Act

The most orthodox method of acquir ing NGO status is registration under the Societies Act. The Societies Act regulates associations working in the areas of peace, social welfare, and social order and which also contribute to the national interest. Most of the or ganizations filing under this la w, however, are club-like associations of a different nature from NGOs, which have solid and continuing for m and are altruistic in nature . There are no

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data on the breakdown of these associations, making it difficult to form a clear idea of the NGO sector’s demography. The Societies Act operates on the pr inciple of accredita tion, and the registration of a society or charity is not automatic. The Registrar of Societies is empowered to exercise discretion with regard to registration and to impose conditions governing recognition. This enables the government effectively to suppress the activities of groups it considers inimical to its interests. Societies may be dissolved by order of the Minister or gazetted as having ceased to exist for infringements of the Societies Act or other laws. In 1998 two associations were denied accreditation, one was dissolved, and sixteen were placed under surveillance (Ministry of Information and Arts 1999, p. 108). For example, Roundtable was not accredited for one year after it registered. People Like Us, an association that def ends the rights of homosexuals, was refused accreditation altogether. Foreign-based NGOs also experience difficulty acquiring legal status. Oxfam, Plan International, and a human r ights NGO r un by American lawyers all ha ve seen their applications rejected.9 The government refuses to divulge the reasons for denying these requests, but to date, no group has challenged the authorities in court. Companies Act

An NGO may r egister either as a compan y limited by guarantee or as a company limited by shares. Most choose the former. Company registration proceeds strictly by the rules and is virtually automatic. Both the government and even the NGOs harbour doubts about registering under the Companies Act, for acquiring recognition under this Act or the SocietiesAct may foster erroneous interpretations of both la ws. Nonetheless, NGOs choose the Companies Act for the following reasons: 1. Accountability: Under the Companies Act associations are required to issue public financial statements. The Societies Act, on the other hand, is looser and makes no such demands. Thus, by registering under the Companies Act a gr oup makes itself more accountable to society at large, earning greater public trust. 2. Asset holdings: For groups holding assets, procedures are less cumbersome here than under the Societies Act . 3. Efficiency: Registration procedures are quicker and more efficient than under the Societies Act.

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Tax System

NGOs do not benefit from specific tax exemptions (income tax deductions, exemptions as a donee institution). In f act, groups pursuing charitable or public-interest goals are eligible for income-tax e xemptions if the y are registered under the Charities Act, but the criteria for recognition under this statute are not clear, and the state is able to manipulate the accr editation process through its discretionary po wers. AWARE, for instance, is listed under the Societies Act. In order to qualify for a tax break, it attempted to register under the Char ities Act but was turned do wn. The Registrar of Charities explained that it w ould recognize the or ganization only if it abandoned its advocacy programme and reoriented its goals towards servicerelated activities, such as a hotline for w omen and counselling. AWARE has not reapplied. If an association is eligible for tax exemption as a donee institution, donors are able to deduct contributions to that association from their personal income-tax returns. In order to qualify as a donee institution, however, a group must apply to the Finance Minister for recognition as an Institution of Public Character (IPC), and r ecently few, if any, private associations have been awarded IPC status. Those holding IPC accreditation are almost exclusively government-affiliated organizations, many of them umbr ella groups involved in community-based projects or the arts, such as the National Council of Social Service, the National En vironmental Council, and the National Arts Council.

STATE–NGO RELATIONS

In addition to legal constraints, the government controls NGOs through a series of more subtle , almost deviously ingenious, expedients. Here, too, however, changes are apparent, reflecting changing relations between the state and NGOs. Belo w, we e xamine the various types of NGO control exercised by the authorities, paying special attention to the new relationship between the state and the NGOs that has developed since the 1990s. State Control of NGOs

Government Umbrella Groups

One of the state’s primary means of keeping the NGOs in line has been to establish a government-influenced umbrella network through which NGO © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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activities can be monitored and re gulated. While NGOs ar e not le gally obliged to join such groups, there are strong inducements for doing so. By belonging to an umbrella group, for instance, an organization may benefit from that group’s tax-exempt status and f ind easier access to funding. Specifically, it may recei ve a share of the go vernment subsidies that are regularly doled out to these higher -level networks. Consequently, a majority of NGOs in the welf are field belong to umbrella groups, as do most environmental NGOs, including those that ar e openly critical of the government. The National Council of Social Service (NCSS), which is composed of groups in the social-welfare field and community-based volunteer service organizations, was established in 1988 by a Cabinet la w. The NCSS has close ties with the Community Chest and is heavily involved in the subscription of government funds and their distribution to volunteer groups. The Community Chest is an accredited IPC, the tax-exempt status coveted by, but rarely accorded to, pr ivate associations, and serv es as fund-raiser for the NCSS. The Community Chest is able to raise large sums of money, and it solicits contributions from occupational groups (1,900 participating companies) and through its salary-deduction system. In 1996 alone, it raised S$132 million. Funds subscribed through these aggressive campaigns are distributed to groups under the NCSS umbrella (Ang 1997, p. 16). The Singapore Environment Council (SEC), which is composed of environmental NGOs, is a government-related network established in 1995. It is the only organization in the environmental field with IPC status. While the SEC does not gi ve subsidies or other dir ect monetary aid to member NGOs, it uses its IPC status to help such gr oups raise their own funds. It does this through the Central Fund Scheme, whereby financial gifts made to a specific organization through the SEC are deductible, thus pro viding would-be donors with the incentive to make monetary contributions. In 1998 the NSS, the Singapore Underwater Federation, and another NGO successfully utilized this scheme to raise S$114,280 (Singapore Environment Council 1999). In other words, NGOs cannot make use of the Central Fund Scheme unless they are recognized by the SEC, whic h in effect controls their access to potential contributors (Tanaka 2000, p. 208). Quasi-NGOs

Another reason NGOs tend to be conservative is the presence of governmentrelated quasi-NGOs. The government encourages the estab lishment of quasi-NGOs to solve problems that local residents normally would tackle © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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themselves. For instance, although Malays, Indians, and Chinese have created a number of small ethnic self-help associations, many others have been established by the government as umbrella groups. Examples of such quasi-NGOs are the Yayasan MENDAKI (for Malays), the Chinese Development Assistance Council (CD AD), the Sing apore Indian Development Association (SINDA), and the EurasianAssociation Singapore (EAS). The government assists these groups by providing matching funds. In other w ords, if an or ganization raises a cer tain amount of mone y to support its activities, the state matches that sum with a subsidy according to a fixed formula. The government began assisting ethnic self-help gr oups in an effort to compensate for the lack of supplementary educational services. In education as elsewhere, Singapore pursues a policy of extreme elitism, but recently the government has also be gun to assist children who do not do well in school. Children attending non-elite schools traditionally have tended not to achieve at the same le vel as children in the elite-trac k English school system. Those ethnic self-help groups attempt to redress this imbalance by working to help improve the classroom performance of these pupils (Ramesh and Asher 2000, p. 130). The government has also established NGOs designed specifically to supplant anti-government NGOs. A prime example is the Academy of Law. In 1986 an independent NGO, the Law Society, criticized the government’s proposed revision of a la w regulating the mass media. The authorities responded by revising the law to ban political statements by the Law Society and removed Francis Seow from his position as chairman of the Society.10 The government then had a group of legal experts create the Academy of Law as a counter-organization to compete with the Law Society. Control through Financial Support

The government also attempts to bring active, privately led NGOs into its fold by offering financial inducements. For example, the Association of Muslim Professionals (AMP) was created by private initiative to protect the rights and interests of Singapore’s Malay Muslim community. The state has some welfare programmes for ethnic Malays but not enough to satisfy the Malay population, and in 1990 young Muslim professionals established the AMP (Iwasaki 1998, p. 89). The state recognizes the AMP’s independence but also provides it with subsidies. This enables it to intervene in the organization’s activities and influence its leadership, pre venting the AMP from adopting anti-go vernment © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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attitudes. The subsidies effectively act as a powerful constraining force on the organization’s behaviour.11 Legal Curbs on NGOs Other than the Non-Profit Law

Singapore imposes rigid controls on fr eedom of speech and associa tion. One of the la ws stifling fr ee expression is the Ne wspaper and Printing Press Act. Enacted in 1974, theAct gives the government partial ownership of newspapers and publishing houses, by means of which it is able to exert its influence over editorial policy and staff assignments. This statute was revised in 1986, extending censorship controls to the foreign media as well. Specifically, the revision empowered the government to suspend the sale of foreign newspapers and journals whose reporting was alleged to have interfered in Singapore’s internal affairs (Davies 1999). A similar battery of restrictions apply to NGOs, limiting the scope and nature of the polic y proposals they can make and the questions they can raise. The example of the Law Society cited above illustrates what can happen to an NGO when it crosses the line and openly criticizes the authorities. Concerning freedom of expression, groups of ten members or more are obliged to register with the go vernment or face criminal penalties. In an extreme case, under the Internal Security Act, violators can be placed in preventive detention by order of the Minister concerned without due process or the benefit of a court hearing. This provision enables the state to utilize its police powers in monitoring NGO acti vities. In the so-called Marxist Conspiracy of 1987, the state invoked its preventive detention powers to arrest twenty-two young Chinese men and women for alleged antigovernment and communist activities. In fact, their crime was simply to have defended publicly the rights of foreign maids and other manual workers in Singapore. The Internal Security Act has not been in voked since then, but its existence acts as a potent chilling effect on NGO activities, conveying the message that the state and the NGOs are not on an equal footing. Should an NGO step out of line and infringe on state prerogatives, the state stands ready to respond immediately and resolutely. Soft Control

In addition to legal restrictions, the government attempts to inculcate social and ethical norms designed to influence the ideas and behaviour of NGOs and citizens in general. By emphasizing what it calls “shared national values”, the government seeks to avoid direct confrontation with civil society © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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and the NGOs. This expressly fostered informal social constraint is politically motivated. The state has also r efined the concept of “out of bounds” (OB), a term that it borrowed from golf but which it interprets to mean behaviour exceeding not only legal limits but what is “socially acceptable”. In other words, the government reserves the right to intervene in civil society when it considers that certain behaviour is likely to cause a social problem or threaten the social norms it energetically propagates. No doubt other societies, too, have the equivalent of OB, but in Singapore, the state has created this concept for its own purposes and consciously interprets and manipulates it to serve state ends. One example is the case of Catherine Lim, a popular female writer, who publicly criticized the Goh administration in The Straits Times. Goh’s press officer responded with a blistering rebuttal. Clearly, the Prime Minister considered her remarks OB . Since then, Lim has not written articles on political issues in the newspapers, and now devotes herself to her novels. Ordinary citizens supported Lim, and her action was indeed a bold one in Singapore, but as her case illustrates, the government has many subtle ways of silencing dissenters. Political Co-optation

In 1990 the government introduced a system whereby it nominates nine Parliamentary representatives in ad dition to those elected by popular v ote. Candidates are selected by a special Cabinet search committee and, with the President’s approval, become Nomina ted Members of Parliament (NMP). Such Members do not need to represent an electoral precinct or a political party. Of the nine NMPs, three are chosen from big business, trade associations, and academia, and the remaining six are selected at large. What is interesting is that members of AWARE, the NSS, and Roundtable have been asked to serve as NMPs. The government clearly intends to co-opt these individuals and their groups and utiliz e their talents and r esources. Those elected see their ne w position as a golden opportunity to criticize government policy effectively, but of a total of ninety-three Members of Parliament, only four represent NGOs, so that any influence they exert is likely to be minimal. Changing Relations between the State and NGOs

Breathing Space for NGOs

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government-administered services. In the 1990s, however, a very different type of NGOs appeared. Jealous of their independence, these groups do not hesitate to criticize na tional policies and mak e policy proposals. The NSS has successfully forced the government to abandon plans to build a golf course, and AWARE was able to put its imprint on the Women’s Charter. Until very recently, Singaporeans could not even dream of successfully opposing a state initiative. In the 1990s, however, several NGOs did just that, and surprisingly, the government grudgingly rewarded their efforts with a degree of recognition. Government methods of media control, too, have begun to change. During the tenure of Lee Kuan Yew, Lee insisted tha t the nation’s survival required intervention by the state to impose social order , and that under emer gency conditions, the authorities could not allow the people to express “irresponsible” political opinions or criticize the government freely (Iwasaki 1998, p. 179). In 1997, however, Roundtable publicly lambasted the PAP’s electoral campaign in The Straits Times. The government riposted verbally but did not attempt to forcibly suppress the NGO as it had the Law Society some ten years earlier (1986). Indeed, shortly afterwards, it even selected a Roundtable member to serve as a NMP. Moreover, NGOs are now contemplating ways of using the legal system to their advantage. Although none have yet devised a means of doing so, in principle, government policies and Cabinet bills can be challenged in the courts. With NGO representatives now sitting in Parliament, it also becomes possible to participate in the political pr ocess from inside the system. When the government formulated its environmental protection project, Green Plan, in 1992, the NSS pro vided crucial surv ey data and of fered other ad vice. Furthermore, the Working Committee on Civil Societies, a network of NGO organizations, was represented on the drafting committee for Singapore 21, to work on a new national vision for the twenty-first century. Policy Shift and the Search for New Forms of NGO Control

The changing relationship between the state and the NGOs seems to reflect a major policy shift, observable in three areas. The first area of change is fiscal policy. Here, the government, anxious to curb burgeoning outlays for health and medical services, has be gun to privatize these activities, asking the people to shoulder a gr eater share of the costs. At the same time it is working through volunteer organizations to encourage the elderly themselves, their families, and the local community to care for the aged, shifting a part of that burden from the public to the private sector. © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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A second target for reform is the extreme reliance of Singaporeans on the government. The government is attempting to lessen popular dependency vis-à-vis the state and produce a more independent-minded citizenry, since it believes such attitudes to be responsible for the declining quality of the nation’s human resources and the increasing cost of social ser vices. The promotion of a civil society by Singapore 21 is an attempt to remedy this overdependence. Finally, important changes in leadership patterns may also be discerned. Lee Kuan Yew was a c harismatic leader, but following his retirement, Singapore’s elite realized that it was necessary to seek alternatives to strong one-man rule. Since then, the government has gradually sought ways of incorporating public opinion in the polic y-making process r ather than impose its will unilaterally. In the past NGOs, subjected to strong centralized surveillance and control, were confined to a very narrow range of activities. Recent policy shifts and the change in leadership, however, have encouraged the emergence of independent NGOs and expanded the political sphere in which they can operate. The government no longer attempts to restrain their activities by force . Rather, it is e xperimenting with new modes of social control, granting these associations greater recognition and attempting to draw them into the fold of establishment politics.

CONCLUSION

Singapore’s NGO sector, as the NGOs themselv es are the f irst to admit, has not enjoyed the degree of development achieved by NGOs in other countries. There are several reasons for this. First, the government continues to discourage and suppress dissenting opinions and acti vities that go be yond its o wn narrow political agenda. NGOs have been effective in a few limited areas where private initiatives can have an impact and where go vernment services are insuf ficient, but even organizations working in these f ields must contend with sta te supervision and interf erence. Today, the authorities ha ve switched from open repression to a system of subtle and indirect b ut nonetheless potent measures to keep the NGOs in line. Among these are the creation of umbrella groups and counter-organizations, which attempt to either co-opt or supplant “unruly” independent service groups. NGOs are also under strong pressure to exercise self-restraint and limit their pr ogrammes to those the r uling elite considers “socially acceptable”. Such informal constraints not only

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restrict the range of citizen volunteer activities but limit the goals NGOs may set for themselves. Other inhibiting factors are also at work. The very demand for NGOs is skewed. The historical change in Chinese self-help groups and the bang is a case in point. During the transition from colonial rule to independence, the bang developed rapidly, assuring a wide range of vital community services, but during the early nation-b uilding period, these acti vities declined precipitously as the state introduced its o wn comprehensive system of social services. At the same time young Chinese , particularly those with elitist ambitions, began to leave the bang. Today, many young Chinese pronounce themselves satisfied with their affluent lifestyle and show no interest in bang activities. Thus, paternalistic state services have provided Singaporeans with a relatively high level of contentment, providing little incentive for citizens to organize themselves and undertake their own relief and welfare activities. What, then, are the future prospects for Singapore’s NGOs? Since Lee Kuan Yew’s stepping aside, the go vernment, while not a bandoning its policy of surveillance and control, has sought to regulate NGO behaviour by less obvious means. As a result of this policies shift, NGOs are leaving the service field to propose policies and criticize government initiatives. Since the 1990s they have enlarged little by little the political space in which the y can safely operate. Of particular interest is the fact that some NGOs, particularly in the environmental field, now possess more expertise than the government, which increasingly relies on their surveys and assessments. They are skillfully utilizing their new margin of freedom to enhance their visibility and influence. In the interviews conducted for this chapter, NGOs and quasi-NGOs all told the author, albeit in dif ferent ways, that Singapore’s civil society is growing apace. Today, Singapore is an economically affluent society that meets the needs of a majority of its citizens. The pattern of governmentdirected growth and centralized authority is unlik ely to change soon, b ut within that framework NGOs, by becoming more knowledgeable or skillful than the government in some areas, will continue to evolve as they struggle to enlarge their sphere of action (Association of Muslim Professionals 1997). Notes

* I would like to e xpress my appreciation to Simon Tay, who kindly provided me with abundant and up-to-date information. His advice also contributed substantially to the perspectives presented in this chapter. 1 Interview with Simon Tay in 1999.

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The government, however, criticizes European social-w elfare policies for weakening familial ties, undermining worker morale, and straining national treasuries and refuses to characterize itself as a welfare state. The ten NIEs are Brazil, Hong Kong, India, Indonesia, Malaysia, Mexico, Singapore, South Korea, Taiwan, and Thailand. For example, when purchasing a flat previously rented, buyers pay 30 per cent less than the market value or receive a discount of S$10,000. Moreover, there is no down payment, and a loan can be secured easily to cover the whole amount. When a family earning less than S$1,000 per month wishes to acquire a home, the Housing and Development Board is authorized to buy the property at market value and sell it to the prospective homeowner at a reduced price, in ef fect subsidizing the purchase. NGOs established during these years include Soroptimist International of Singapore (1983), Singapore Action Group of Elders (SAGE, 1977), and Development of Economy of Women (1981). Interview with P ang Cheng Lian (First Vice-President and Special Assistant to the Chairman) of Fujien Bang. In June 1987 a conspiracy to topple the government by illegal means was allegedly uncovered, and twenty-two men and women were arrested under the Internal Security Act. Those arrested included Catholic lay activists and members of a drama group. All were young professionals who had received an English education and studied abroad (Iwasaki 1998, p. 87). In addition, NGOs may also re gister under the Labour Union Act and the Co-operatives Act, but such groups are under the dir ect control of the PAP regime and so ar e not included in surv eys of the non-prof it legal system. Interview with Nicole Tan, Singapore representative for the Comparative Survey of the Asian Non-profit Legal System. NGOs engaged in international co-operation are in the minor ity. One reason is the tight control exercised over the flow of funding from outside the country. The current tax system for charitable contributions penalizes groups involved in activities abroad. A licence is r equired to receive contributions earmarked for international assistance; moreover, 80 per cent of such funds must be spent inside the country. In 1986 the government revised the law enabling it to suspend the sale of foreign newspapers and publications alleged to have “interfered” in Singapore’s internal affairs. This measure was intended to muzzle foreign journalists assigned to Singa pore. The Law Society char ged that the

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law’s provisions were vague and unduly strengthened the government’s discretionary powers (Iwasaki 1998). Interview with Simon Tay (NMP).

References

Ang, John. Civil Society Resource Organization Development in Asia: The Case of Singapore. Synergos Institute, 1997. Association of Muslim Professionals. “Future of Civil Society in Singapore”. Remarks and Panel Discussion with Simon S .C. Tay et al. Association of Muslim Professionals Occasional Paper Series, no. 4–97, 1997. Chan Tse Chueen. “NGOs in Singapore”. In Emerging Civil Society in the Asia Pacific Community, edited by Tadashi Yamamoto, pp. 215–37. Singapore: Institute of SoutheastAsian Studies and Tokyo: Japan Center for International Exchange, 1995. Chew, Phyllis. The Singapore Council of Women and the Women’s Movement. Singapore: Singapore University Press, 1999. Chua Beng Huat. Communitarian Ideology and Democracy in Singapore. New York: Routledge, 1995. Commissioner of Charities. Davies, Derek. “The Press”. In The Singapore Puzzle, edited by Michael Hass, pp. 77–106. London: Praeger, 1999. Iwasaki, Ikuo. “Singapore, Itto shihai taisei-ka no kibishii seiyaku” [Harsh restrictions under the People’s Action Party regime]. In Ajia to Shimin Shyakai [Civil society in Asia], edited by Ikuo Iwasaki, pp. 77–108. Tokyo: Institute for Developing Economies,1998. Jichitai kokusai kyoukai Singapore Jimushyo. “Shingaporu no kokka seido” [The government system of Singapore]. In Ajia syokoku no chihou-seido (IV) [Local government systems in Asian countries (IV)], pp. 177–205. Tokyo, 1995. Kaneko, Yoshiki. “Shingaporu: kaiha tsu seisaku ni taiousuru shosuha musurim no jijo doryoku to jiritu” [Muslim minorities in Singapore: Self-help and self-reliance under a development-oriented regime]. In ASEAN syokoku ni okeru Isuramu no seiji keizai he no eikyo: nihon no tai ASEAN rikai no Sokushin [The Japan f orum on international relations: Islamic impact on politics and economy inASEAN countries], pp. 31–53. Tokyo, 1998. Kartida Mekani and Heike Stengel. The Role of NGOs and Near NGOs, in Environment and the City. Singapore: Times Academic Press, 1995.

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Koh, Gillian and Ooi Giok Ling. State-Society Relations in Sing apore. Singapore: Oxford University Press-IPS, forthcoming. Ministry of Information and Arts, Singapore. Singapore 1998/1999. Singapore, 1999. Ooi Giok Ling and Gillian Koh. State-Society Synergies: New Stakes, New Paradigms, in Re-engineering Success. Singapore: Oxford University Press-IPS, 1998. Ramesh, M. with Mukul G. Asher. Welfare Capitalism in Southeast Asia: Social Security, Health and Education Policies. New York: St. Martin’s Press, 2000. Silk, Thomas, ed. Philanthropy and Law in Asia: A Comparative Study of Nonprofit Legal Systems in Ten Asia Pacific Societies. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass Publishers, 1999. Singapore Department of Statistics. Singapore Census of Population 1990. Statistical Release 4. Singapore, 1990. Singapore Environment Council. Annual Review 1998/1999. Singapore, 1999. Singapore Parliament. “Let me know which rules stifle; PM: Let’ s make this the Finest Nation”. In Singapore Parliamentary Reports, 5 June 1997, pp. 401–11. Singapore 21 Committee . Singapore 21 Report. Singapore: Government of Singapore, 1999. Tanaka, Yayoi. “Singaporu k enishugi teki fukushi kokka no takumi na kontororu” [Singapore: Subtle NGO control by a developmentalist welfare state]. In Kokka to NGO – Ajia iskakou no hikaku shiryo , pp. 199–218. Tokyo: Institute of Developing Economies, 2000. Tay, Simon S.C. “Towards a Singaporean Civil Society”. Southeast Asian Affairs. Singapore: Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, 1998. ———. “The Future of Ci vil Society: What Next?”. In Singapore in the New Millennium: Challenges Facing the City-State , pp. 69–107. Singapore: Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, 2002. The Straits Times, “Chok Tong’s three goals for the ‘90s”, 7 January 1990. ———, “Gov’t to disclose info used in formulating policies”, 30 April 1991. Toh Mun Heng. “Human Resource Development Policies in the 1980s”. In Public Policies in Singapore: Changes in the 1980s and Future Signposts, edited by Linda Low and Toh Mun Heng, pp. 225–44. Singapore: Times Academic Press, 1992. Toh Mun Heng and Linda Low. “Health Policies in the 1980s”. In Public Policies in Singapore: Changes in the 1980s and Future Signposts, edited

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by Linda Lo w and Toh Mun Heng, pp. 205–24. Singapore: Times Academic Press, 1992. Tremewan, Christopher. “Welfare and Gov ernance: Public Housing under Singapore’s Party-State”. In The East Asian Welfare Model: Welfare Orientalism and the State, edited by Roger Goodman, Gordon White, and Kw on Huck-ju, pp. 77–105. London and Ne w York: Routledge, 1998. World Bank. World Bank Development Report 1997. New York: Oxford University Press, 1997. Yeo, George. “Civic Society — Between the Family and the State”. Speeches 15, no. 3 (1991).

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This chapter is reproduced from The State and NGOs: Perspective from Asia , edited by Shinichi Shigetomi (Singapore: Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, 2002). This version was obtained electronically direct from the publisher on condition th at copyright is not infringed. No part of this publication may be reproduced, translated, stored in a retrieval system, or transmi tted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies and Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo.

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12 China Social Restructuring and the Emergence of NGOs Kenji Otsuka INTRODUCTION

While China has achieved rapid economic growth under its policy of reform and opening, the adv erse effects of this gro wth, among them income disparities and en vironmental problems, are be ginning to manifest themselves. At the same time as the state has reduced its function of resource distribution, including in the area of social polic y, it has found itself compelled to seek the co-opera tion of non-go vernmental orgnizations (NGOs) in order to moderate the unfavourable effects of growth. In the past the term “social association” (shehui tuanti or shetuan) was in common use, meaning an association of people with a certain common objective, and actually such organizations existed in various forms (Wang et al. 1993). However, a process of selection occurred in the course of the socialist revolution following the establishment of the People’ s Republic of China (PRC), and only some of these or ganizations were officially approved by the go vernment and allowed to continue their e xistence as formal social associations. Meanwhile, after the government began its policy of reform and opening, these of ficially approved NGOs de veloped and changed, and new NGOs, which were outside the earlier framework, made their debut. The Western concepts of “NGO” and “NPO” (non-prof it organization) came to be applied to these organizations. At present the state is seeking a way to structure a new system for these organizations, starting from the premise that the conventional political system be protected. Before looking at the conditions of NGOs in China during the current transitional period of social restr ucturing, it is necessary to dra w a

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general historical picture of social organizations.1 In view of this, this chapter will draw a clear line of demarcation between previous social associations and the new NGOs which made their appearance in the period of reform and opening, while tracing the process of reor ganization of social associations from around the time of the establishment of the People’ s Republic up to the present da y. This is done in or der to characterize the relations of NGOs to the state before and after the policy of reform and opening. In particular, this chapter will focus on what form the NGOs took as they made their appearance in a situation in which the social functions managed by the state were being liberated and where new social needs were arising — and this under conditions in which the state maintained its political control. CHANGES IN SOCIAL ASSOCIATIONS AND THE EMERGENCE OF NGOs Before 1948: The Flourishing of Charities

In China non-g overnmental charity organizations called “charity societies” (shang hui) were organized by local elite w ho began to gain power about 300 years ago, in the late Ming–early Qing period. In addition, facilities called “charity homes” (shang tang) were established to provide relief benefits for orphans and widows. Later, in the latter half of the nineteenth century, as the power of the Qing Dynasty waned, these charity homes further strengthened their activities. During the earl y Republic, early in the tw entieth century, charitable activities diversified both in scope as well as in the character of their supporters. Furthermore, organizations of people hailing from the same localities and people engaged in the same trades (guilds) also began to carry out charity work. However, in the course of prolonged social confusion caused by w arlord rule, the war against Japan, and the civil war, some of them, in collusion with local rulers, became tools to help rule the people, others were ordered dissolved, and still others managed to continue their activities, avoiding interference from the ruling powers (Kohama 2000). Meanwhile, in the areas under the control of the Communists during the war years, political or ganizations and mass or ganizations which were friendly to the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) were formed. These became the foundations for later democratic parties and mass organizations (Wang et al. 1993, pp. 29–30). It w as during this period that the system w as instituted which became the model for the later er gistration and management of social associations.

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1949 to 1977: The Reorganization of Associations after the Communist Revolution

In 1949 the CCP under the leadership of Mao Zedong established the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference, a united front or ganization formed together with the People’s Liberation Army — which had fought the revolutionary war together with the CCP — democratic parties, and representatives of various circles. With this, it founded the PRC. The new government upheld the principle of “Democracy for the people, dictatorship for the enemies of the people” (Mori and Kokubu 1994, pp. 20–21). Not only did the CCP directly participate in the decisions of important government policies, b ut it also established party or ganizations in administrative organs, enterprises, and public service units. Furthermore, it managed the personnel af fairs of officials in important posts in these organizations to carry through its guiding policy (Tang 1997, pp. 262–66). Later, a planned economic system was esta blished through the collectivization of agr iculture and pub lic ownership of industr ial, commercial, and handicraft enterprises (Kojima and Ishihara 1994, pp. 37–38; Chi and Tian 1998, pp. 86–165). Furthermore, under the planned economy system that was totally controlled by the party organs, enterprises, factories, schools, and all other places of production and industrial activities were made into cells — work units (danwei)2 — subordinated to the state administration.The work units guaranteed social standing and social security for life. Furthermore, the work units operated cafeterias, hospitals, schools, barber’s shops, and other facilities, and became small societies w hich replaced local communities. On the other hand, neighbourhood committees ( jumin weiyuanhui) were set up for urban people (youths, handicapped persons, lonely elderly people, etc.) who did not belong to the work units, and people’ s communes (renmin gongshe) for the farming communities. These committees and communes performed many functions similar to those of the work units.3 In this situation non-governmental associations, which had e xisted in various forms before the establishment of the PRC, were reorganized into democratic political or ganizations or people’s organizations (qunzhong tuanti or renmin tuanti), government-operated social welfare facilities, social associations, etc. The political organizations which had co-operated with the CCP before the establishment of the PRC w ere reorganized into democratic political organizations, and others into mass organizations (people’s organizations), which were incorporated into the system of the ne w regime through

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membership in the Political Consultative Conference. Representative organizations were the All-China Federation of Trade Unions (ACFTU, gonghui), the Young Communist League (YCL, gongqingtuan), and the All-China Women’s Federation (ACWF, fulian). Party organizations were formed within the mass organizations, and important leaders were appointed by the central party , thus making them part of an or ganizational system integrated within the party.4 In the early days of the Republic the party and the government moved to reorganize charity organizations, while crushing anti-g overnment forces and working to reconstruct the country’s impoverished society. Governmentrun welfare and relief facilities were established in large and medium-sized cities throughout the country, while charity homes and charity facilities set up with overseas donations, which had existed during the pre-revolutionary period, were taken over (Bai and Wu 1996, p. 125). In 1950 the government formulated the Provisional Method of Registration of Social Association, and on this basis the Interior Ministry formulated detailed enforcement rules for the la w in the follo wing year. Social associations w ere selectively registered under this act; academic societies, cultural and art societies, and social, public welfare, and religious associations which were friendly to the party were r egistered as social associations.5 In this process guilds, organizations of people hailing from the same regions, folk religious sects, secret societies, and other groups regarded as reactionary organizations were suppressed (CABIC and CAS 1971, pp. 42–45; Xin and Zhang 1999, pp. 86–87). In this way in the course of the formation of the socialist planned economy system after the establishment of the PRC, the officially authorized social associations became the onl y NGOs. Ho wever, given that all political, economic, and social domains were integrated into the state system, there was not much room for the development of social associations (Wang et al. 1993, pp. 33–34). It w as mainly the mass or ganizations that carried out public service activities during this period.6 However, after 1966, with the launching of the Cultural Revolution, many mass organizations were involved in destructive class struggles and their functions became paralyzed. The organizational reconstruction of the mass organizations started gradually in 1972, as the Cultural Re volution began to wind down. However, it was not until 1978 that their acti vities were renormalized (Chi and Tian 1998, pp. 350–53). Further more, the Interior Ministry, which had been in charge of registering social associations, was abolished in the turmoil of the Cultural Re volution, and the system for managing social associations collapsed. Not only did it become impossible © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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to organize new social associations, b ut many existing associations were forced to close after being branded “counter-revolutionary organizations” (Wu and Chen 1996, pp. 24–25).7 After 1978: The Development of Social Associations and the Emergence of Various Private Institutions under Market Reform

Beginning with the Third Plenum of the Ele venth Central Committee of the CCP, held in December 1978, the social confusion caused yb the Cultural Revolution was critically reviewed, and a policy line of reform and opening was adopted. Attempts to create farm contract systems were made in agrarian communities in various parts of the countr y, and commune and brigade enterprises (township and village enterprises) were established, and later recognized by the party and the government as faits accomplis. Furthermore, special economic zones were established in coastal districts, allowing for the active introduction of foreign investment and foreign technologies. The country’s economic ref orm was later e xpanded to wider areas, as individually operated and private enterprises became officially recognized, a factory contract system introduced, pr ices liberalized, a social secur ity system introduced, and housing and labour markets formed (Kojima 1997, pp. 94–142; Amako 1999, pp. 131–37). As the state’s unified system of resources distribution collapsed, the work units, which had been subordinated to state administration, turned into independent profit-making groups operating in the mark et economy. Likewise, government agencies came to establish their own respective social associations in order to maintain and expand their own interests within this situation. The party and the government began to consolidate these social associations early in the 1980s, out of fear that their numbers might multiply endlessly, causing social confusion. The Ministry of Civil Affairs (minzheng bu), which was newly established in 1978, during the prepar ation period for reform and opening, has been charged with the administration of social associations since 1988 (Wu and Chen 1996, pp. 6, 24). Furthermore, in the 1980s reforms began to be undertaken not only in the economic system but in the political system as well. Ho wever, after the clashes betw een students and citizens in Beijing demanding democratization and units of the People’s Liberation Army in Beijing on 4 June 1989, the party and the government retreated on the reform of the political system and voluntary political organizations. Democratization movements came to be str ictly regulated (Okabe and Amako 1994, pp. 227–75). In October of the same year the Regulation of Registration and Management on Social Associations © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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was issued in order to strengthen the administrative management of social associations (Wu and Chen 1996, pp. 6–7; Xin and Zhang 1999, pp. 93–94). However, after Deng Xiaoping’s “Lecture on the Occasion of the Tour of South China” in 1992, the trends towards reform and opening were accelerated, and the number of officially recognized social associations continued to grow in number (Xin and Zhang 1999, p. 107). Meanwhile, due to the liberalization of social services and growing demand for them, a large number of private institutions emerged, mainly in urban areas, running schools, hospitals, homes for the aged, community centres, research institutes, legal information centres, and other f acilities. In view of this in 1998 the government established a system for registering and managing these or ganizations as non-g overnmental and non-prof it institution units (minban fei-qiye danwei). Furthermore, the adverse effects of economic growth — a widening income gap as well as environmental and urban problems — came to be recognized as social problems. In response to the 1992 Rio Summit, the government issued a national version of Agenda 21 in 1994, calling for sustainable development as the basic principle for the socio-economic development strategy of the state, and for the active participation of public organizations and social associations in this programme (LGCA 1994, pp. 177–91). Later, when the NGO Forum of the Beijing World Conference on Women was held in 1995, the term “NGO” came to be known widely throughout the country, and heated discussions were kicked off regarding what NGOs w ere.8 In 1998, when the areas along the Yangtze River and Nenjiang Ri ver were struck by large-scale flooding, the China Charity Foundation, a social association, organized a nationwide donation collection campaign. Then, on 1 September 1999 the Act for Compensation and Grants for Public Service Organizations of the PR C 9 was proclaimed. Also, in October 1998 an NGO Research Centre was established at Tsinghua University. In the following year the research centre and the Asia Foundation jointly sponsored the International Conference on Non-Profit Sector and China’s Development, resulting in widening the cir cles of exchange for NGOs and NPOs. Furthermore, government agencies were being reformed in order to improve government functions, and the go vernment itself came to r aise the slogan “Small government, big society”. In the course of these developments, areas were opened up in which a diversity of NGOs could develop activities. Emerging NGOs in the Era of Reform

As NGOs gained wide recognition in China, not only the social associations and non-governmental, non-profit organizations which had been allo wed © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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to operate in the past, but also organizations formed by volunteers came to develop their activities, using the title of NGOs. According to my view,10 NGOs in China can be classif ied into the following four types: (1) social associations (hereafter social association-type NGOs), (2) social service units (service unit-type NGOs), (3) gr ass-roots organizations (grass-roots NGOs), and (4) international NGOs. The social association-type NGOs are the archetype of Chinese NGOs. They include, for e xample, the China F amily Planning Association (established in 1980), the China Population Welfare Foundation (1987), the China Youth Development Foundation (1989), the China F oundation for Poverty Alleviation (1989), and the China En vironmental Protection Foundation (1993). These organizations were established by the leaders of related government agencies and other influential per sons (for example, the China Youth Development Foundation is led by the leaders of theYCL, which in turn is under the leadership of the CCP), and have close relations with the government, complementing its acti vities. However, because of the government’s fiscal shortfalls, they are unable to r ely on government subsidies alone and are compelled to seek assistance from individuals and enterprises at home and abroad, and from private funds and other sources as well. In this way the social association-type NGOs are really semigovernmental organizations. There are about 200,000 such NGOs throughout the country (Wu and Chen 1996, p. 7). Service unit-type NGOs are non-governmental, non-profit organizations which operate private schools, hospitals, homes f or the a ged, nongovernmental community centres, research institutes, legal information centres, etc. Many of these or ganizations are not re gistered as social associations but are subsidiaries ( guakao in Chinese) of e xisting organizations, such as government agencies, enterprises, schools, research institutes, social associations, and neighbourhood committees. They are not in a position to receive government subsidies or to receive payment for their services, so they appear to de pend on private funds from home and abroad. Included among these are the Tianjing Erdong Old People’s Home (1995); the Centre f or Legal Study and Service for Women, Peking University (1995); and the Centre for Legal Assistance to Pollution Victims, China University of Political Science and Law (1998) (Yang and Tan 1998; Wang 2000). These organizations are estimated to number about 700,000 (GFZ and MMG 1999, p. 1). Representative grass-roots NGOs in China include Friends of Nature (1994) and the Global Village of Beijing (1996), which ar e engaged in environmental protection activities. These two NGOs ar e carrying © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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out activities not only in the areas of environmental education and non-governmental international exchange but also in introducing society at large to problems concerning environmental policy. Both were established by groups of intellectual volunteers, and depend mainly on foreign funds. These organizations are still small in number, but they are the closest groups in China to the concept of NGO as defined in chapter one of this book. They are antithetical to the social association-type NGOs, which are most common in China. Furthermore, informal activities and associations without permanent organizational form have begun to appear.11 As for interna tional NGOs, the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) and the Heifer Project International (HPI) have been active since the 1980s. It is estimated that there are several hundred international NGOs operating in China.12 NGO–STATE RELATIONS Regulations Concerning the Registration and Management of NGOs

During a 1998 organizational reform of government structures, a new Bureau of Administration of NGOs (minjian zuszhi guanli ju) was established within the Ministry of Ci vil Affairs, as an amalg amation of the Department of Administration of Social Associations and the Department of Administration of Non-Governmental and Non-Profit Institution Units (LZB 1998, pp. 64–65). In October of the same year two sets of administrative regulations, the Regulation on Registration and Management of SocialAssociations (a revision of the 1989 Regulation) and the Provisional Regulation on Registration and Management of Non-Governmental and Non-Profit Institution Units (a new regulation), were promulgated, as the beginnings of a system for the management of NGOs (GFZ and MMG 1999, pp. 1–7). Under this system, NGOs were classified into “social associations” and “non-governmental and non-profit institution units” (Table 12.1). First, a social association is defined as a non-profit social association, organized voluntarily by Chinese citiz ens, which car ries out acti vities according to its rules in order to realize its members’ will or wishes (GFZ and MMG 1999, pp. 12–15). The new regulations also stipulate that the following organizations are not required to be re gistered under the regulations: (1) people’s organizations (renmin tuanti) which participate in the Political Consultative Conference (the eight major organizations, namely the ACFTU, YCL, ACWF, China Association of Science and Technology, © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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TABLE 12.1 Categories of Organizations under the Regulations for Registration and Management of NGOs Organizations under the Regulations 1. Social associations (shehui tuanti) Associations (xiehui), societies of academics ( xuehui), alliances (lianhehui), research committees (yanjiuhui), foundations ( jijinhui), commissions ( cujinhui), Chambers of Commerce and Industry (shanghui), etc. 2. Non-governmental and non-profit institution units (minban fei-qiye zuzhi) Private kindergartens, schools, hospitals, r ehabilitation centres, libraries, museums, galleries, theatrical troupes, research institutes, science and technology museums, gymnasiums, sports organizations, vocational training centr es, employment of fices, homes for the aged, matrimonial agencies, community centres, law offices, etc. Organizations outside of the Regulations 1. People’s organizations (renmin tuanti) 2. Organizations authorized by the State Council 3. Public institution units (shiye danwei) 4. Enterprises (gongsu) 5. Subsidiary organizations of existing organizations (guakao zuzhi) 6. International NGOs Source: Compiled by the author based on the Regulation of Registration and Management of Social Associations and Provisional Regulation on Registration and Management of NonGovernmental and Non-Profit Institution Units.

All-China Federation of Repatriated Ov erseas Chinese, All-China Friendship Associations with Taiwanese Unions, All-China Association of Youth Organizations, and All-China Federation of Industry and Commerce); (2) organizations managed directly by the government; and (3) subsidiary organizations of existing organizations (guakao) (GFZ and MMG 1999, pp. 15–18). Non-governmental and non-profit institution units are defined as (1) private institutions whose main operating bodies are enterprise/institution units, social associations and other social bodies, and indi vidual citizens, (2) which do not use state-owned assets, (3) to engage in non-profit, social service activities. (1) and (2) define the non-governmental character of the institution units, and distinguish them from public service units of the state or other or ganizations, which conduct social public service acti vities utilizing state-owned assets.13 At the same time (3) def ines their notfor-profit nature, distinguishing them from non-go vernmental profit organizations. © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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Furthermore, the registration system for social associations and non-governmental and non-profit institution units is characterized by the following three features. First, they must be examined and screened by party and government bureaus which manage the areas of their activities, or examined by related organizations (competent authorities). For instance, the competent authority for the China F amily Planning Association is the Sta te Family Planning Committee of China, and that for the China En vironmental Protection Foundation is the State Environmental Protection Administration of China. Only after this e xamination can an application f or establishment and registration be f iled with the ci vil administration authority concerned (registration management or gan). (Social associations can acquire their corporate status through this process of r egistration.) The competent authority extends leadership to and supervises the personnel and financial affairs, party political activities, and other day-to-day activities of the NGOs, and on this basis the re gistration management organ can e xercise its administrative power concerning the registration and management of NGOs (GFZ and MMG 1999, pp. 22–25).14 As a result of this dual-line management system, there are cases in which the leaders of party and government agencies which manage social associations concurrently hold leading positions in these social associations, although this practice is prohibited (Xin and Zhang 1999, pp. 98–99). Along with the promulgation of the new regulations, the central party in 1998 issued a new notification confirming the banning of this practice (GFZ and MMG 1999, p. 41). Second, a clear line of demarcation is drawn between central and local jurisdiction. If the ar ea of activity of a social association is na tional, or covers two or more provinces, the central competent authority undertakes its examination; if it co vers a certain administrati ve area, a competent authority higher than the local government in the area undertakes the work. The division of authority between central and local jurisdiction concerning the registration by departments of civil affairs is essentially the same. This is called a hierarchical administrative management system (GFZ and MMG 1999, pp. 25–27). Third, the establishment of more than one organization of the same type in a single area is prohibited or r estricted. In particular, the establishment of similar social associations within one ar ea is prohibited. A social association can establish ad hoc committees, but not branches. On the other hand, the registration authority is required to be car eful not to permit the establishment and recognition of two or more non-governmental and nonprofit institution units which are similar in nature. Moreo ver, these © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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organizations, unlike social associa tions, are not allo wed to esta blish subsidiary organizations. These prohibitions and the restriction clauses reflect the cautious attitude of the party and the g overnment about the possible multiplication of NGOs (GFZ and MMG 1999, pp. 35–37, 46–48, 131–36).15 Strict Regulation of Anti-Governmental and Anti-Social Associations

Since the Tiananmen Incident of June 1989, the party and the government have strengthened their cautious stance towards anti-government and antisocial bodies and movements, and tightened their suppression. According to the Ministry of Civil Affairs, quite a number of social associations, which are increasing by 20,000–40,000 e very year, have incomplete internal organizational structures. Some of them ar e said to be allied with antigovernment and anti-social forces, and threaten the stability of social or der. It is also reported that in the past f ew years, in Beijing alone, more than 300 illegal social associations ha ve been suppressed (W u and Li 1998, p. 148). This situation is the background against which the registration and management of NGOs have been strengthened. The two sets of regulations concerning the registration and management of NGOs stipulate in explicit terms that no non-g overnmental organization may oppose the basic principles of the Constitution 16 (in particular, the leadership of the CCP); harm national unity and security or national interests, social interests, and the interests of other organizations and citizens; or carry out acts contrary to social and public morals (GFZ and MMG 1999, pp. 18, 113). The recent Falun Gong incident can be seen as an instance of lar ge-scale repression of an anti-g overnment and anti-social or ganization. State leaders were shocked on 25 April 1999, when more than 10,000 members of a folk Qi Gong group called Falun Gong quietly surrounded the Zhong nan hai section of Beijing, the site of the party headquarters and the Chinese Cabinet office, in protest against the attacks on the group by the party or gan paper and other media, which had continued in various parts of the country. In response to this, the party and the government decided on 22 July 1999 to suppress the group, condemning it as an illegal organization (feifa zuzhi) under the Regulation on Registration and Management of SocialAssociations. The government arrested its leaders and supporters, charging them with forming an anti-social cult group (xiejiao zuzhi), and unfolded a lar ge-scale campaign, enlisting various work units and mass media, calling upon members to leave the group. In October of the same year, a new law for the regulation of cult organizations was proclaimed, © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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which provided for strict punishment of criminal acts such as causing the deaths of others wilfully by utilizing superstitions and cultist deceit, as well as rape and fraud.17 Responses and Strategies of NGOs

Under the NGO management system which started in 1998, only two types of organizations — social associations and non-governmental and non-profit institution units — were given legal status. Not all groups which are regarded as constituting the NGO sector in China fall under these two categories. Table 12.2 shows the forms of registration for each of the four types of NGOs mentioned earlier. In addition to social associations and non-profit institution units, there are gongsu zuzhi (enterprises) and guakao zuzhi (subsidiaries of existing work units and other organizations). Of these, social associations and non-governmental and non-profit institution units are TABLE 12.2 Forms of Registration of NGOs in China Forms of Registration Social associations (shehui tuanti) Non-governmental and non-profit institution units (minban fei-qiye danwei) Enterprises (gongsu) Subsidiary organizations (guakao zuzhi) Others

Social Associations

Service Providers

Grass-roots NGOs

International NGOs








2


3



1





The registration of these organizations has just begun. Informal volunteer activities and bodies which do not have a permanent organization. 3 They include: (a) Establishing a project office in a local area; (b) Establishing a head office in Hong Kong, and sending activists to Mainland China from Hong Kong or Macao; (c) Co-operating with a government-related organization or a domestic NGO in carrying out projects; and (d) Entering Mainland China as specialists, teachers, businessmen, etc. (Huang 2000, p. 6). Source: Compiled by the author. Notes:

1 2

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designated for registration under the Regulation on Registration and Management of NGOs. However, the registration of non-governmental and non-profit institution units has just begun (Zhu 2000, pp. 342–43). In other words, the situation is that groups other than social association-type NGOs, which were formally registered as social associations, have acquired legality in some form or another, and are engaged in their activities outside of the framework of the existing management system for NGOs. In cases where NGOs that are not of the social association-type (service unit-type NGOs, grass-roots NGOs, and international NGOs) desire to acquire legality outside of the existing management system for NGOs,they invariably resort to registering themselves as gongsu (enterprises). In this case, registration applications must be f iled with the industrial and commercial management departments of either the central or local government. The matter of concern here is the extent to which they can be exempted from taxes. They tend to register with local-level industrial and commercial government authorities rather than with the central government authorities, because the management of the former is not as strict as what could be expected from the central authorities. However, some domestic NGOs which are not of the social associationtype (service unit-type NGOs and grass-roots NGOs) register as subsidiary organizations (guakao) of existing social associations or of neighbourhood committees, in addition to re gistering as gongsu (enterprises). The areas of activities of subsidiary organizations are confined in principle to activities of the social associations concerned, and they cannot be independent corporations. In actuality, however, they carry out activities as independent bodies. NGOs have responded in this manner because of the dual-line management system, that is, by competent authorities and by registration management organs, and because the establishment of similar organizations within a single area is restr icted. The existing management system is not suitable for the or ganization and activities of NGOs, which ought to be free associations. So long as the y maintain themselv es as per manent organizations, there is no room for NGOs in China to develop their activities as completely unof ficial voluntary organizations independent of a government authority.18 Therefore, if an NGO in China does not or cannot register itself under the e xisting registration system for NGOs, it must acquire government approval in some for m or another (a subsidiar y organization of an existing work unit is regarded as indirectly authorized by the government because of the legal status of the work unit).19 Meanwhile, this form of re gistration offers an advantage to NGOs, in that the process is simpler than going through formal registration procedures, © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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and that they can avoid interference by competent authorities. Furthermore, international NGOs, for which there is no formal registration system, apart from registering themselves as foreign-invested enterprises, can establish headquarters in Hong Kong, or can establish direct, co-operative relations with local governments (some of these NGOs ha ve project offices inside government offices), or enter China as indi viduals in their ca pacity as specialists, instructors, or businessmen. They enter Mainland China through a diversity of channels and routes in order to carry out practical activities. In this way they acquire their le gality in various forms as mentioned above. However, social association-type NGOs are the leading form. NGOs of this form, which appear as outgrowths of party- or government-related organs, are closely tied to competent authorities in all their activities, ranging from establishment to pr actical activities. Therefore, they are given easy access to the resources which in the past were monopolized by the state, and are co-operating with the government or doing work for it, fully utilizing these resources.20 Presenting a remarkable contrast to these or ganizations are grassroots NGOs founded by v oluntary intellectuals. In par ticular, the gr assroots NGOs, which are beginning to assert their presence in the area of environmental protection, are somewhat independent of the government organizationally and financially. However, since they do not ha ve a firm foundation for their activities within the government, they are compelled to seek support, depending on the situation, from administrative authorities, public opinion, the international community, or from persons with political influence. Given this situation, at present the number of grass-roots NGOs is extremely limited. In view of the severe state regulation of anti-government and anti-social organizations, NGOs in China are r estricted in political acti vities, irrespective of organizational type. In particular, they must take utmost care not to touch upon political taboos such as democratization, human rights problems, nationality questions, and relig ious problems. Therefore, they share the common concern of how to expand their areas of activities while wisely avoiding these political taboos. Recently, there have been demands for the relaxation of the tough and strict management system of NGOs among people involved with these organizations.21 Meanwhile, the Bureau of Administration of NGOs in the Ministry of Ci vil Affairs is no w formulating a registration and management system for international NGOs, in addition to supplementing the enforcement rules for social associations and non-governmental and non-profit institution units (Chen 2000, p. 101). Inasmuch as the management system for NGOs will have a decisive impact © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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on the relations of NGOs with the state in China, it is important to focus attention on the future reform of this system. CONCLUDING REMARKS

Along with the series of reforms carried out in China since 1978 aiming for a transition from a planned economy system to a mar ket one, socio-economic functions which had so far been monopolized by the state began gradually to be liberated. In order to address the various social issues which had emerged together with economic growth, the party and the government appear intent on relying on the energies of a variety of social associations, while maintaining faith in their own organizational strength. In this situation,NGOs with a variety of organizational forms are e xpanding their areas of acti vities. The groups considered to constitute the NGO sector in China are composed of theollowing f four types: (1) social association-type NGOs, (2) service unit-type NGOs, (3) grass-roots NGOs, and (4) international NGOs. With the exception of social association-type gr oups, NGOs in China cannot register themselves under the present manag ement system. Those which are not re gistered under the present system are required to be authorized by the government in one form or another. This is required in a political environment in which the party and the government find it necessary to strictly regulate anti-government and anti-social activities for the sak e of the major principle of maintaining a single-par ty dictatorship. The authorization of NGOs by the go vernment is the basis on w hich China’s domestic NGOs can acquire legal status. In other words, while always keeping a cautious eye on NGOs to ensure that they do not become a hotbed of anti-go vernment and anti-social activities, the state holds expectations that they will become a social sector which will play a role in realizing its ideal — “Small government, big society”. As a result of this contradictory policy, a situation has arisen in which the government, in the face of the emergence of a diverse number of NGOs, has been compelled to take the attitude of tacit approval — as long as they carry out their activities within the framework of the government’s management system — in spite of the fact that the government has at its disposal a system for regulating the registration of NGOs. However, it is a taboo for NGOs, and for all other or ganizations for that ma tter, to touch upon any of the problems which the government is sensitive about. Under this system and in this environment, social association-type NGOs, which appear as appendages to party- and government-related organs, are

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in an overwhelmingly leading position, while grass-roots NGOs, which have been established by volunteers and which draw a line of demarcation between themselves and party- and go vernment-related organs, are extremely limited in number. However, if China carries forward systemic reforms that curtail its state administration functions, there is a possibility that it will be compelled, sooner or later, to review the present management system of NGOs, which is predicated on the strengthening of the state administrative control. Notes 1

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Formally registered social associations are seen as NGOs and are discussed as such in Xin and Zhang (1996), Nagao et al. (1997), and Zhang (1998). Xin and Zhang discuss in relative detail the registration and management system of social associations, which be gan in 1989, and its actual conditions.White et al. (1996), who examine the possibility of a civil society in China, attach importance to the influence of economic reforms on society and the development process of social associations. Furthermore, Howell (1997), one of the author s of the previous book, discusses the relations to the state of various types of NGOs, including social associations, in projecting the future of NGOs in China. With regard to work units, this writer depended as reference material on the information supplied by Lu (1989),Yu (1991), Tan (1991), Li (1993, 1996), Li et al. (1994), Yang and Zhou (1999), and other sources. Furthermore, with regard to the actual conditions of social services given to employees of state-owned enterprises, refer to Kizaki (1988a, 1988b). Neighbourhood committees are residents’ organizations which were formally established in all cities in 1954, and were expected to play the role of supporting management services in urban communities for the end-receivers of these services (Otsuka 1999). The people’s communes were established in 1958, as social organizations engaged in administrative, productive as well as social service activities in agrarian communities. They were abolished in 1982 (Nakagane 1999). Reference information for mass organizations and their relations to the party was obtained from Tang (1997, pp. 91–105), Chi and Tian (1998, pp. 46, 86–97, 515–17), Wang et al. (1993, pp. 44–45), Xin and Zhang (1999, p. 87), and ZZDL (1991, pp. 153–54). As of 1965, there were nearly 100 national-level social associations and more than 6,000 at the local level (Wu and Chen 1996, p. 5).

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For instance, relief activities were carried out in the areas of flooding which simultaneously hit v arious parts of China in 1949–50. These activities were organized by the People’s Relief Society of China, China Red Cross Society, the ACFTU, the ACWF, and three student and youth organizations (Li and Jiang 1996,p. 91). Also, research and propaganda activities were carried out by the ACWF, including the rehabilitation of prostitutes and the prohibition of opium smoking (DZCB 1994, vol. 1, pp. 63–64, 76–80). Even in this situation a few organizations, including some involved in medical exchanges and the ACWF, managed to continue some personnel exchanges, and played a significant role in maintaining international relations between the Chinese Government and the United States, Japan, and other Western countries during the Cold War period (Xin and Zhang 1999, p. 88). At that time the ACWF, which was under the leadership of the CCP , participated in the organizing as a Chinese NGO (according to a report by Liu Bohong of theWomen’s Institute of theACWF at the International Conference on Non-Profit Sector and China’s Development in Beijing, 1999). Although the law was proclaimed, rules for enforcement were not framed. In connection with this, the China Charity Foundation called for concrete measures to ensure preferential tax treatment for contributions to public service projects (People’s Daily, 28 August 1999). The following descriptions of the actual conditions of NGOs are based, in addition to information obtained from publications and Internet websites, on the following sources: pamphlets and reports, presentations by participants distributed at the International Conference on Non-Profit Sector and China’s Development held in J uly 1999 and the Third International Seminar on NGO Co-operation in China, held in Beijing in October 2000, which I attended, and on my interviews of people involved in the conference during, before and after the conference while I was in Beijing. According to Zhao Xiumei (1999), the number of non-governmental environmental protection or ganizations in Beijing consists of the following: 100 or more formal social associations, fifteen students’ associations, and six grass-roots organizations classified as such in this chapter (of which three are informal organizations of volunteers). The directory of international NGOs by Chinabrief lists 120 organizations, which are belie ved to account for one-f ourth of the

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total number of international NGOs operating in China (Chinabrief 1999). The registration and management of public institution units are stipulated by the Provisional Regulation on Registration and Management of Public Institution Units, which was proclaimed simultaneously with these two laws (GFZ and MMG 1999, p. 196–200). Included in the competent authorities are related professional departments of the go vernment, party work departments of the par ty, and organizations authorized by the government (GFZ and MMG 1999, pp. 22, 119–20). Among the authorized or ganizations are public institution units of government-run research institutes and people’s and mass organizations (Wang and He 2000, p. 183). Furthermore, separate regulations are formulated for foundations and religious social associations as specially organized social associations. As for foundations, please refer to Wu and Chen (1996, pp. 122–24, 160 and Zhu (2000, p. 343); and as for religious social associations, to ZZWYZY and GZSZF (1995, pp. 222–24). Moreo ver, the dual-line management and hierarchical administrative management systems and the prohibition of the establishment of two or more similar organizations in the same area, which apply to social associations in general, are also applied to foundations and religious social associations. Referred to here are the four basic principles: the socialist path; the dictatorship of the proletariat; the leadership of the CCP; and MarxismLeninism and Mao Zedong’s Thought. As for this new law, please refer to Daily China News, dated 2 November 1999. The website called “Falun Gong Exposed” is link ed to People’s Daily (, 28 December 1999), where news items on Falun Gong can be reviewed. Ad hoc and small-scale volunteer activities and bodies are excluded. According to Professor Gao Bingzhong, at the Institute of Sociology and Anthropology, Beijing University, miao hui (local associations of ancestor worshippers), folk religions and small associations aimed at inheriting traditional local cultures, which ha ve re-emerged mainly in agrarian communities since the reform and opening, are regarded as not falling under the e xisting management system of NGOs. They are also regarded not only as having legitimacy, preserving as they do local social cultures, but also as having administrative and political legality in their o wn ways (Gao 1999). These associations are not included in any of the cate gories of NGOs discussed in this chapter .

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However, Professor Gao’s view is worthy of note in that, in discussing the relations of the state to NGOs in China, it critically analyses the present management system from the standpoint of the legality of non-governmental associations. This question is analysed in detail in Zhao Liqing (1998) with reference to the China F amily Planning Association and in Kang (1997) with reference to the China Youth Development Foundation. See, for instance, Yang (2000, pp. 380–84).

References

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This chapter is reproduced from The State and NGOs: Perspective from Asia , edited by Shinichi Shigetomi (Singapore: Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, 2002). This version was obtained electronically direct from the publisher on condition th at copyright is not infringed. No part of this publication may be reproduced, translated, stored in a retrieval system, or transmi tted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies and Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo.

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13 Hong Kong Uneasiness among Administrative Agents Yukari Sawada INTRODUCTION

In Hong Kong fei-zhengfu zuzhi, a direct Chinese translation of the English term “non-governmental organization” (NGO) is now used to denote NGOs, but this term did not establish itself f irmly until the 1990s. Of course this does not mean that NGOs did not e xist until then, because since before World War II many charities and social service organizations had engaged in helping the poor and in welf are programmes. But these or ganizations were customarily known not as NGOs, but as zhiyuan jigou (voluntary agencies). It is important to note that not all voluntary agencies fall into the typical NGO category. At the mention of NGOs people in Japan generally think of development-oriented NGOs. When we unconsciously think in this term, Christian missionary organizations with long histories, like the Young Men’s Christian Association (YMCA) and the Salv ation Army, are excluded because we tend to look upon them primarily as religious groups, not as development-oriented NGOs. But in Hong Kong these organizations form a nucleus that serves as a portal for the community receiving new immigrants from Mainland China, many of whom have low incomes, and they lead campaigns in temporary housing for livelihood improvement. Buddhist temples as well as ethnic Chinese organizations based on geo graphical and kinship ties ha ve also played a major role in helping the poor and in providing medical care and educational services. These services are not necessarily limited to adherents of Buddhism or members of re gional or clansmen gr oups, but are often available to the society as a whole. © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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Why are these old non-development organizations so influential as NGOs in Hong K ong? On the other hand , what opportunities remain for the development-oriented NGOs to be active in Hong Kong, which has already attained the level of developed country in terms of per capita GDP? While the government uses the term “par tnership” to descr ibe the relationship with NGOs in certain f ields,1 does this mean co-opera tion, or can it be dependency? Essential to answering these questions is an understanding of the historical background of political and economic changes, as well as the transformation of NGOs themselves. In the following section, I will determine the characteristics of Hong Kong’s current NGOs by giving an overview of the development process of NGOs, mainly the voluntary organizations, then classify them according to the definitions laid down in the introductory c hapter. The next section analyses the relationship between NGOs and the state from the perspective of the legal system. Specifically, the section will discuss the r egistration and tax systems. The section after that focuses on changes in the relationship between the government and voluntary organizations, and explores NGO self-reliance mainly in terms of financing. HISTORICAL DEVELOPMENT OF NGOs Pre-war Charity Activities (Hong Kong Cession to 1945)

In the process of its development as an entrepôt trading port, pre-war Hong Kong had a large influx of mainland Chinese workers who came to earn money, but the main focus of the administrative services provided by the colonial government was on the British residents. Social services for the Chinese were therefore customarily provided by private organizations, including those based on locality, kinship, and religion. Although these organizations engaged in a broad v ariety of activities, including legal advice, dispute settlement, emplo yment assistance, and educational and medical services, one of their most important acti vities was sending the deceased back to Mainland China and arranging for burial. Many of the Chinese who entered Hong Kong were young male labourers who left their families behind, so in the event of death, it was necessary for these organizations to claim the body in place of the f amily and send it back to the deceased person’s home, or place the body in a morgue, or bury it in a communal cemetery when the deceased could not be identified. The increasing demand for the repatriation of the deceased and for funerals according to Chinese custom catalyzed the 1870 founding of theTung Wah © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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Group of Hospitals, which was the first charity organization for Chinese in Hong Kong. Along with funerals and medical care, another origin of charity organizations for Chinese people was the libera tion and protection of individuals. Hong Kong was a relay point for not only goods, but also for human traffic. The Po Leung K uk, established in 1883, w as a Chinese organization meant to rescue and pr otect women and children who had been sold as human traffic and confined by either abduction or deception. Po Leung K uk also had a f acility that cared f or abandoned children. It cared for women with no relatives and abandoned children with no guardians until they became adults. Christian churches also played a significant role. Their services consisted mainly of helping the weak members of society,such as running orphanages and homes for the elderly, and protection of the disabled. Of course charity organizations operated by churches were also involved in missionary work, but their services were not limited to believers. Funds for church operations came exclusively from the overseas headquarters of each denomination. From Saving Refugees to the Golden Age (1945–67)2

From the end of World War II and into the 1950s huge numbers of immigrants entered Hong Kong. These new residents differed fundamentally from the pr e-war migrant workers from China in that the y were mostly refugees who had no hope of returning to the mainland. The material goods and helpers for settling these refugees in the new environment came from Chr istian volunteer organizations and Chinese organizations, including regional associations, clansmen associations, and neighbourhood associations. As the refug ees from China attracted the world’s attention, the Chr istian organizations grew into international aid organizations. Further, some of the organizations operating on the Chinese mainland relocated their of fices to Hong K ong when the comm unists assumed control in 1949. The activities of volunteer organizations in those days included not only distributing food and c lothing to incoming refugees, b ut also noticeable public health efforts, such as preventing communicable diseases. Beginning in 1949, Kaif ong welfare associations w ere formed in various districts, and refugees were provided with relief goods. The years immediately after 1949 also saw an expansion of volunteer organizations, which had since the pre-war years helped society’s weak: women, children, the elderly, the disabled, and those with criminal records. © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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Christian church-affiliated volunteer organizations at that time financed most of their activities with funds sent fr om their overseas headquarters, while Chinese organizations covered their expenses with local donations. And because numerous relief goods were being sent from abroad, the period from war’s end to the early 1960s was the time when volunteer organizations were flush with supplies. NGOs were better equipped with resources to cope with the rising demands from refugees than the government, and for that reason this period is called the “golden age of volunteer organizations” (Zhou 1984, p. 27). Rise of Community Activities (1968–83)

But in the latter half of the 1960s Hong Kong’s economic growth picked up speed, and along with this donations from abroad diminished. Because refugees were settling do wn within the local community , the focus of volunteer organizations’ activities shifted away from emergency relief work. This trend was set by two riots that occurred in 1966 and 1967, which prompted the Hong K ong Government to reorient its social polic y considerably and embar k on reinfor cing welfare to bring about social stability. Consequently, volunteer organizations’ activities to bring relief for the poor were no longer significant. In place of relief activities, community-related services became the new focus of volunteer organizations. In the 1970s the Hong Kong-born portion of the population was already greater than the first-generation immigrants in numerical terms. In those same years the Hong K ong Government responded to the expansion of residential districts and industrial areas by setting to work on urban redevelopment and developing new towns equipped with many public housing estates. This led volunteer organizations to switch their activities from emergency relief to counselling for domestic problems and other everyday support services for local communities. Also it is noteworthy to point out another consequence of urban redevelopment, that is, the frequent opposition movements by residents’ organizations against evictions. Students and v olunteer organization supporters linked up with campaigns by the citizens of af fected areas to form many “concerned groups”, providing guidance and support for protest campaigns. Student movements also flourished because economic expansion had increased the number of university students. A response to this situation was the appearance of ne w types of volunteer organizations, which, in addition to pro viding the usual social services, considered advocacy important. Many of them were Christian, while there © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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were also trade unions that advocated the rights of society’s weak members. Not a few such organizations carried out protest campaigns in partnership with residents’ organizations. Political Season and the Diversification of Activities (1984–97)

In 1984 Britain and China reached an accord on the Hong Kong issue, and preparations for the return of sovereignty were initiated. Two factors with great impact on v olunteer organizations at this time w ere: (1) increased political participation, including the introduction of direct elections; and (2) enhanced welfare for social stabilization. As negotiations over Hong Kong’s return of sovereignty to the People’s Republic of China (PRC) be gan, the colonial government set to work on fostering citizen autonomy and democratization, which it had shelved until then. In 1982 the go vernment established District Boar ds, and from tha t time assembly members were directly elected at the district level. In 1985 members of the Le gislative Council, which corresponds to a parliament, were for the first time chosen in elections, albeit par tially and indirectly. Beginning in 1991 direct Le gislative Council elections w ere partially introduced. This transformation of the political system increased the involvement of volunteer organizations in the f ield of politics. Because political acti vity had been severely restricted under the colonial system, Hong Kong lacked a reserve of statesmen. Leader s in Chinese society were all b ureaucrats and businessmen who were distant from the general populace. These circumstances meant that the people most closely positioned to popular political movements were tr ade union member s, lawyers, members of teachers’ organizations, and social workers. There were opportunities for them to be appointed as Legislative Council members by the governor, and they also participated in government advisory commissions. As the top-down democratization seen in the introduction of direct elections became full-fledged, v olunteer organizations produced many legislators and came to function as the n uclei of political parties. In the 1994 District Board elections forty-three social work ers ran for the 346 seats and twenty-six of those were elected , while in the 1991 Le gislative Council elections eight social workers ran and five were elected (Mo 1998, p. 1; Information Service Department 1996, p. 13). Because the social workers’ community activities gave them co-operative relationships with people living in places like public housing estates, which were major vote pools, their strength was evident in direct elections. © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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Factor (2), enhanced welfare, led to the expansion of social service volunteer organizations. The colony’s last governor, Christopher Patten (in office 1992–97), w as enthusiastic a bout beefing up the welf are budget. Although his main objective was for the action to let Britain make an elegant exit from the crown colony, other underlying reasons were (1) the advent of a new group of poor due to a shift in the industrial structure, and (2) the overall aging of Hong K ong society. Due to these factor s, volunteer organizations were b usy providing services for the elderly and support for low-income households in the second half of the 1980s and through the 1990s. Volunteer organizations working in fields other than welf are services, such as the en vironment, women’s issues, and human rights, started appearing during this per iod. These organizations tended to emphasiz e advocacy more than welfare organizations. Human rights issues especially occupied the citizens’ concern more as 1997 approached, and human rights organizations became quite active starting in the second half of the 1980s. This trend was accelerated by the 1989 Tiananmen Incident. Finally I should like to point to the revival of the international relief NGOs as a new trend in the 1980s.When Chinese refugees stopped coming to Hong Kong in the 1960s, the activities of international relief NGOs ebbed, but starting in the 1980s Hong K ong-based organizations such as Save the Children and Oxfam Hong Kong reorganized themselves. These organizations started to conduct a wide rang e of activities in Asia, from supporting the Vietnam boat people to aid f or East Timor and arranging development programmes in poor Chinese villages. Hong Kong, to them, is now seen as a place to raise funds for those activities. Current State of Hong Kong Volunteer Organizations (1997 to the Present)

Since 1997 new kinds of activities have appeared. First is employment support for the new poor in the r egion. The 1997 Asian currency crisis brought Hong K ong’s unemployment rate to o ver 6 per cent, the worst during the previous twenty years. In order to cope with this situation, the e xisting welfare organizations initiated retraining programmes and psychological care for the unemployed. Such help for the new poor was not aimed exclusively at families of the unemployed. Help for settling new immigrants from China (including illegal immigrants) expanded as the number of post-1997 immigrants gre w. Volunteer organizations set up programmes for English-language education © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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for children of new immigrants, entertainment at holiday camps and community centres, legal counselling for new immigrant families, and more. Second, it is worthwhile to mention support for development to help the poor in China. On the occasion of Hong Kong’s return to the PRC, not only inter national NGOs b ut also local v olunteer organizations commenced activities to support r ural villages in China’s northwest and southwest regions. What areas are NGOs currently putting the most effort into? I used the Hong K ong Freeway3 NGO Database to f ind organizations that seem to f it the definition given in the f irst chapter of this book. The result is seen in Table 13.1. Since the Fr eeway NGO Database was last updated at the beginning of 1998, the table shows information at that time. It is evident that social services account for over 50 per cent, or the overwhelming preponderance in Hong Kong. On the other hand there are few NGOs involved in political and social issues.

NGO-RELATED LEGAL SYSTEM

Hong Kong’s NGO-related la ws consist of ordinances for re gistration and taxation. Registration ordinances affecting NGOs that are non-profit private organizations are in nearly all cases either the Societies Ordinance, Section 151, or the Companies Or dinance, Section 32. 4 The Societies Ordinance covers a broader range of organizations compared to the latter. Societies Ordinance

The Societies Ordinance has a long history, dating back to 1887. From the outset, this ordinance’s purpose was to control the triads, and for that reason the definition of “society” w as purposely vague. Hence, any society “whatever its nature or object” is required to register with the Registrar of Societies within fourteen days of its formation. The Registrar of Societies is a post held concurrently by the Commissioner of Police, who screens applicants. If a society applies to the registrar but is denied registration, it becomes subject to control as an illegal organization, and its members could be fined or impr isoned. When refusing to r egister an or ganization, the registrar does not have to make that society’s name public, and the registrar is also not required to disclose the reason for efusal. r However, organizations whose purposes are confined to religion, charity, society, or entertainment may be exempted from the registration requirement by the registrar. Unlike © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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TABLE 13.1 Categorization of Hong Kong NGOs (Early 1998) Category I. Self-help/Charities/Social Services Social services General Community development Family and child care Rehabilitation The elderly Offenders and ex-offenders Children and youths Chronically ill persons Multi-disciplines Support services Disaster relief Kaifong welfare associations Regional associations Clansmen associations II. Society and Culture Political issues General Policy research Social issues General Housing Public utilities Cultural issues General Gay and lesbian Women’s issues Human rights Environment and nature General Environmental protection Wildlife and animal rights Total

No. of Organizations

%

672

88.9

382 26 9 44 63 50 5 61 11 57 56 6 77 117 90

50.5 3.4 1.2 5.8 8.3 6.6 0.7 8.1 1.5 7.5 7.4 0.8 10.2 15.5 11.9

84

11.1

4 1 3 12 8 4 0 43 2 0 26 15 25 10 10 5 756

0.5 1.1 0.4 1.6 1.1 0.5 0.0 5.7 0.3 0.0 3.4 2.0 3.3 1.3 1.3 0.7 100.0

Source: Hong K ong Freeway NGO Da tabase, . Accessed on 13 February 2000.

organizations denied r egistration, exempted organizations may legally operate without registering. Organizations officially permitted to register must submit their charters and have them accepted by the registrar. If these organizations gather dues or donations, or maintain funds under their organization names, they must © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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annually submit audited financial reports, information on their officers, the minutes of their annual meetings, and changes in their charters. Although this system allo ws the police to r igorously monitor pri vate organizations, implementation is in f act quite relaxed. Miners notes that over 90 per cent of the organizations applying in 1988 were either registered or exempted, and that most “normal” groups are registered without problems (Miners 1991, pp. 186, 194). As Davies points out, moreover, the effectiveness of this or dinance is questioned owing to its e xceedingly vague definition of a “society”. In 1988 it was found that most of the solicitors’ firms in Hong K ong were unregistered, which sparked public controversy because they were subject to the Societies Ordinance. And although the decision on e xempting an organization from the r egistration requirement is supposedl y at the discretion of the r egistrar, organizations subject to other ordinances are also exempted from registration under the Societies Ordinance. Hence corporations and labour unions na turally have no need to r egister once again as societies. This means that secret societies, whose control was the original purpose of the Societies Ordinance, are provided with a loophole (Davies 1990, p. 459). Companies Ordinance

The object of registering NGOs as corporations is likely to win social trust because the Companies Ordinance requires greater fiscal openness and puts up higher barriers to registration. Under this ordinance an organization first registers with the Companies Registry. Initial registration entails submitting the or ganization’s by-laws and a written pledge of compliance with the law, then paying a registration fee. Ordinary companies are billed HK$1,425 as a re gistration fee if they are locally incorporated subsidiaries, with the fee ranging to a maximum of HK$30,000, depending on how highly the company is capitalized. But because NGOs are categorized as “companies without stock capital”, they are exempted from the registration fee if they have fewer than twenty-five members. NGOs with over twenty-five but fewer than 100 members must pay a registration fee of HK$340, and those with 100 or more member s must pay HK$1,025.5 After registration is completed, registrants must each year submit an annual report, including an audited financial report, to the Companies Registry. The difference with the Societies Ordinance is that under Paragraph 290A of the Companies Ordinance, the Companies Registry commissioner © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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has the authority to deregister any company that has failed to submit its annual report for two consecutive years or more. Every year this authority is exercised, with 445,600 companies being reviewed in 1996 and 36,097 of them having their registrations revoked (Information Service Department 1996, p. 67), while in 1998 the commissioner deregistered 94,337 companies (Information Service Department 1998, p. 94). Another reason for registering as a corporation is that being a corporation allows a company to have assets. Further, because old kinds of organizations like provincial associations and Kaifong welfare associations are registered as societies, organizations want to distinguish themselv es from those societies by becoming corporations. The foregoing shows that NGOs see society registration, which is under police jurisdiction, as being more loosely controlled than under compan y registration. Although the Societies Ordinance has means for strict administration in the event of contingencies, it has otherwise been implemented so as to allow free activities. This is a characteristic of Hong K ong’s legal system itself. If one considers Hong Kong as a business centre, it is more important for political administration to ensure the transparency of company finances. Finally there is an ordinance for taxation that affects both societies and companies. Pursuant to the Inland Re venue Ordinance, Section 88, an y organization deemed to be “a c haritable organization or a trust ha ving a public character” can be e xempted from taxation. It is e vident from this condition that not all NGOs are tax-exempt. Even volunteer organizations or non-profit organizations cannot be e xempted if their purposes ar e not charitable. In fact, however, a wide variety of non-profit groups, including environmental organizations, women’s organizations, university student self-government associations, clansmen associations, and Amnesty’s education fund, are exempted just like orchestras and schools.6

GOVERNMENT–NGO RELATIONSHIP: DEPENDENCE ON GOVERNMENT FUNDING

The foregoing discussion shows that government regulation of NGOs evokes legal measures only in emer gency situations. Such being the case, wha t means of control are used in normal circumstances? The government’s most po werful tool for controlling NGOs is the provision of funds, because the Hong K ong Government is the lar gest sponsor for many volunteer organizations. In fiscal 1998 the government © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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FIGURE 13.1 Hong Kong: Volunteer Organizations’ Income Sources 100

Percentage

80

60

40

20

0 1966

1968

1970

1973

1979 1981 1982 Fiscal Year

Government subsidies

1983

Local donations

1984

1985

1986

Others

Source: Yuk (1991), p. 16, Table 1.2.

disbursed nearly HK$5.419 billion (about US$700 million) just in social welfare-related funds to v olunteer organizations, which corresponded to 71 per cent of the government’s welfare disbursements, excluding payments for social security schemes.7 Government statistics for the same year show that 26,000 v olunteer organization employees were hired with welf arerelated subsidies, accounting for 80 per cent of those hired in the social welfare field, including public employees. This government assistance for NGOs has been enhanced since the 1970s. Figure 13.1 sho ws that the per centage of go vernment assistance in the incomes of v olunteer organizations was between 20 and 30 per cent in FY1966, exceeded 50 per cent in 1979, and topped 70 per cent in 1986. However, income source data were unavailable for the years after 1986, so to estimate the influence of government subsidies I compared the projects getting government subsidies earmarked for volunteer organizations with the areas co vered by v olunteer organizations’ activities. Social Welfare Department statistics for FY1997 re vealed that “rehabilitation” got the biggest share (27.9 per cent) of subsidies for v olunteer organizations, © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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followed by “elderly/medical care” (27.6 per cent), “family/children” (18.3 per cent), and “youth” (17.8 per cent) (Chang 1998, p. 52). Operations listed as separate items in government statistics for FY1998 under “subsidies to volunteer organizations” are “rehabilitation”, “elderly/medical care”, “family problems”, and “children/child care”, thus revealing the same trend (Census and Statistics Department 1999, pp. 289–94). If we closely observe the activity areas of NGOs, we find that the largest number of v olunteer groups is classif ied under the cate gory of “rehabilitation”, followed by “children/young people”, “support services”, “the elderly”, and “family/child care”, as shown in Table 13.1. These are the only categories that have the participation of at least iffty organizations.8 This means that many volunteer organizations are involved in operations that receive subsidies from the government. This fact suggests that even in the 1990s government subsidies had considerable influence over the entry of volunteer organizations and on the development of activity spheres. Receiving these subsidies and grants from the government tends to transform volunteer organizations into the go vernment’s auxiliary organizations, and this tendency was abetted by a subvention system called the “standard cost system”, which was instituted in 1982. Government subsidies until that time had been in the form of lump-sum grants given under what might be called a “total subcontracting” system that disbursed fixed amounts of money without specifying any certain use. The reason that the g overnment at first adopted this method was that it enabled it to evade the direct responsibility for providing social services. The Hong Kong Government, being an administration alien to the majority of the residents, lacked both the experience and a philosophy for providing social services to the local Chinese. Furthermore, as Figure 13.1 illustrates, volunteer organizations in the f irst half of the 1970s still depended on overseas and local donations f or over half of their oper ating expenses. Therefore, the g overnment found little incenti ve to put r estrictions on the usage of its subsidies, since the NGOs had other more important sources of income. But beginning in the second half of the 1970s, the Hong K ong Government’s ample financial reserves led it to increase its subsidy budget, and it became “firmly committed to the future development of social welfare services and wanted to see a degree of accountability commensurate with its increasing financial commitments.” Volunteer organizations, meanwhile, had a growing sense of crisis over their dwindling overseas contributions. In order to cope with this situation, the go vernment decided to s witch

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volunteer organization subsidies from the lump-sum grants to the standard cost system (Working Group 1987, p. 4). Under this new system, funds were disbursed as subventions to cover the costs of appro ved projects according to a go vernment-formulated standard cost table that was based on the government sector. For that reason the personnel costs for volunteer organization staff engaged in subvented projects were also based on those of ci vil servants, which guaranteed volunteer organization staff the pay equivalent to the mid-point salaries of civil servants holding similar positions. If ci vil servants’ salaries were to be raised after the approval of NGO projects, the government would fill the gaps in personnel costs betw een them and the NGO staf f engaged in the subsidized operations immediately within the same fiscal year. On the other hand, if the volunteer organizations’ operating costs were below the standard costs, they had to return their surpluses to the government.9 Subsequently the standard cost method was revised to the model cost and modified standard cost systems. Although the lump-sum grants system still survives, and in 1991 the government launched the new method called the unit r ate subsidy system, the o verwhelming majority of v olunteer organizations’ programmes get funding under the modif ied standard cost and model cost systems. Further, as shown in Table 13.2, these two methods are the disbursement types closest to those of go vernment agencies. For that reason NGOs that run subsidized projects function as if they are agents of the go vernment. In other w ords, the go vernment and v olunteer organizations have come to maintain a rela tionship similar to tha t of shareholders and business managers, that is, principal–agent relations.

CONCLUSION: CURRENT PROBLEMS AND FUTURE OUTLOOK

As the growth of Hong Kong’s economy slowed in the 1990s, the government tried applying greater efficiency and the principle of competition to volunteer organizations in a bid to deal with the tendency of subventions to concentrate on large organizations and the system to lose flexibility. Social Welfare Department calculations show that in 1998 subventions were paid to 186 or ganizations, but that 65 per cent of the total amount w as concentrated in the top twenty organizations.10 At the same time, there were intensifying protests from volunteer organizations as well. Although they were given opportunities to make their views known to the decision-makers through the Social Welfare Advisory

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© 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

5% Subsidy

19

n.a.

Full flexibility over staffing

No definition of staffing level

259

1

No restriction of expenses incurred by the NGO

The level of financial Subsidizes 5% of support is determined by approved expenses. the level of output and a predetermined unit price. No claw back; no topping up.

Unit Rate Subsidy

Sources: Chang (1998), p. 72; and Social Welfare Department, . Accessed 27 February 2000.

1,434

27

Civil Service grades, salaries, grades, or requirements for appointment

Staffing flexibility Staffing flexibility in relation to the in relation to both grade of individual number and grade posts (subject to when total personal financial limitations) emoluments but not the number requirement is of staff below the mid-point of provision

889

No limitations on salaries, grades, or requirements for appointment

Staffing conditions

401

Full flexibility over staffing

Flexibility in staffing structure

Agreed staffing standard

Number of units

No definition of staffing level required

Basis of staffing

There are expenditure ceilings and detailed definitions of types of cost eligible for reimbursement. Thus deficits are not funded.

60

No restriction on expenses incurred by the NGO

Level of detailed expenditure restrictions

Modified Standard Cost

Repayment of actual costs so overpayments are clawed back.

Model Cost

Types of subvented services

The level of financial support is fixed at a predetermined price. No claw back; no topping up

Basis of financial support

Lump-Sum Grants

TABLE 13.2 Hong Kong Government Subsidy Disbursement Categories 258 YUKARI SAWADA

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Committee and the SocialWelfare Department, those occasions were merely one-way flows of information from the v olunteer organizations, and the reports they submitted to the government were not made public. Additionally, when direct elections wer e introduced into the Le gislative Council, the Committee’s authority declined. This opened the way for the staff of volunteer organizations to influence the go vernment directly by being elected as members of the Le gislature without g oing through the Committee. Owing to these cir cumstances, the government’s control of v olunteer groups through subventions has lost much of its effectiveness, and to cope with this, the go vernment in 1995 proposed the mark etization of social services with the intention of letting the market assess the quality of services provided by volunteer organizations. Already in 1999 the government began the experiment by introducing an open bidding system to let NGOs compete with private businesses in certain areas, such as meal services and nursing care for the elderly. Under this system the disbursement of subsidies takes the form of payments from the government to outside contractors, that is, NGOs. Thus, even if a v olunteer organization makes a successful bid, it must bid once again after the e xpiration of its contract. The subsidies are automatically cut off if the organization fails to win another contract. The government is also proposing that the guarantee of payment based upon the personal emoluments to the v olunteer organizations’ staff engaging in subvented projects should be left to the discretion of the volunteer organizations. These efforts got a further push after 1997 from the PRC’s attitude towards social welfare spending and theAsian currency crisis. Even before the Hong Kong’s return of sovereignty, the PRC Government was wary of the quickly expanding welfare budget under the last go vernor, Christopher Patten. Beijing was suspicious that the colonial government would force a fiscal deficit onto the post-1997 Special Administrative Region (SAR) Government. In fact, the president of the New China News Agency, who was the de facto Chinese ambassador, voiced concerns about increasing welfare expenses under the pretext of free competition. Further, the deterioration of the fiscal balance induced by the Asian currency crisis functioned as pressure to reduce social security assistance. These circumstances have caused uneasiness among the administrative agent-type volunteer organizations. Should this trend continue, there will be a decline in the strength of the present administrative agent-type NGOs, which emphasize social services, while the human rights NGOs with

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overseas funding sources and the environmental NGOs, which depend on local non-government donations, will carry on with their vigorous advocacy activities through the media.

Notes 1

2

3

4

5

6

7

Social Welfare Department, Subventions Branch, . Accessed on 12 February 2000. Subsections two through four are based on Zhou (1984, pp. 24–34) and Yuk (1991, pp. 23–29). Hong Kong Freeway was created by a non-profit organization, the Hong Kong Development and Strate gic Research Centre, in J uly 1996. Its purpose is to develop civil society through the free access to information. It is now independent from the Hong Kong Development and Strategic Research Centre. (. Accessed on 12 February 2000.) Companies Registry, Formation of New Companies. . Accessed on 13 February 2000. However, large organizations like the Hong K ong Red Cross are based on their o wn ordinances. Companies Registry, Major Fees under the Companies Or dinance. . Accessed on 13 February 2000. However, the Hong Kong Society of Community Organizations (SOCO), which empowers low-income citizens, and representati ve NGOs, like the environmental organization Friends of the Earth, were not included in the list of tax-e xempt charity or ganizations. (Inland Re venue Department, .) I have not yet investigated the reason for this. The largest fiscal expenditure of the Social Welfare Department is payments for social security schemes, such as cash benefits to the poor. But because NGO activities are mostly in the field of social services, this section calculates the percentages of subsidies to NGOs by using social welfare expenditures excluding payments for social security schemes as a parameter. Even when payments for social security schemes are included, subsidies to NGOs account for 21 per cent of total Social Welfare Department expenditures, exceeding the departmental expenses (Census and Statistics Department 1999, p. 295).

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9 10

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I have excluded clansmen associations, regional associations, and Kaifong welfare associations from the list. Although more than f ifty groups belong to this ca tegory, I found it impossible to classify them according to the area of activities since they provide multiple social services. The new system was instituted in 1982/83 (Working Group 1987, p. 5). According to an inter view by the author with June Sherr y, assistant director of the Social Welfare Department.

References

Census and Statistics Department, Hong Kong. Hong Kong Annual Digest of Statistics 1999 Edition. Hong Kong: Hong Kong Special Administrative Region Government, 1999. Chang Siu Kuen. “Progress or Retreat: A Review on the Proposed Ne w Subvention System”. MPA dissertation, University of Hong Kong, 1998. Davies, Stephen, with Elfed Roberts. Political Dictionary for Hong Kong. Hong Kong: Macmillan Publishers, 1990. Information Service Department, Hong Kong. Hong Kong 1996. Hong Kong: Government Printer, 1996. ———. Hong Kong 1998. Hong Kong: Government Printer, 1998. Miners, Norman. The Government and Politics of Hong Kong.5th ed. Hong Kong: Oxford University Press, 1991. Mo Banghao. “Zonglun Xianggang de shegong Canzheng ” [General comments on the political participation of Hong Kong social workers]. Shelian Jigan, no. 145 (Summer 1998). Working Group. Report of the Working Group on Social Welfare Subvention Administration. Hong K ong: Hong K ong Government, May 1987. Yuk Tak-fun, Alice. “Funding Social Welfare in Hong Kong in the 1990s”. MPA dissertation, University of Hong Kong, 1991. Zhou Yongxin. Xianggang Shehui Fuli Zhengce Pingxi [Analysis on the Hong Kong social welfare policy]. Hong Kong: Tiandi Tushu, 1984. English Websites Companies Registry, Major Fees under the Companies Ordinance. Hong Kong Freeway, About Hong Kong Freeway.

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Inland Revenue Department, List of Approved Charitable Institutions and Trusts of a Public Character Under Section 88 of the Inland Re venue Ordinance as at 31 May 1999. Social Welfare Department, Subventions Branch.

© 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

This chapter is reproduced from The State and NGOs: Perspective from Asia , edited by Shinichi Shigetomi (Singapore: Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, 2002). This version was obtained electronically direct from the publisher on condition th at copyright is not infringed. No part of this publication may be reproduced, translated, stored in a retrieval system, or transmi tted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies and Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo.

TAIWAN: FROM OPPRESSION TO INSTRUMENTS OF “TAIWANIZATION” 263

14 Taiwan From Subjects of Oppression to the Instruments of “Taiwanization” Tadayoshi Terao INTRODUCTION

In Taiwan the acti vities of pri vate social or ganizations were severely restricted until the mid-1980s. Since the government had neither the intention nor the administrative capacity to adequately improve social security and provide public services, there was a strong latent demand for social services by pri vate social organizations. However, their activities were far from vigorous, given the clear suppression by the government. With democratization in the mid-1980s as a turning point, however, the political environment surrounding private social organizations in Taiwan changed significantly. Their activities became more vigorous, and a number of new developments were observed. This chapter describes the strict restrictions placed on private social organizations before democratization in Taiwan, in order to shed light on why the government imposed such thorough curbs on these organizations and how the strict restr ictions were made possib le. This chapter also discusses the role played by private social organizations in the process of democratization from the mid-1980s, and at the same time examines what types of pri vate social or ganizations emerged around the time of democratization, and what sort of relationships they formed with the government.

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POLITICAL, HISTORICAL BACKGROUNDS AND DEVELOPMENTS IN SOCIAL MOVEMENTS1

In tracing the history of developments concerning non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and pr ivate social or ganizations in Taiwan, it is necessary to f ocus attention on the unor ganized social mo vements that preceded those developments. Further, it is essential to grasp the political background to this situation and later changes.

Total Control by the Transplanted Autocratic Regime (until the End of the 1970s)

Taiwan was under Japanese colonial rule from 1895 through 1945. In the aftermath of the civil war on Mainland China,Taiwan came under the control of the “transplanted” government, meaning the Nationalist Party (Kuomintang, or KMT), which came to Taiwan as one of the parties of the divided nation of China, having practically no foundation in Taiwan. Although the mainlanders who came in the wake of the KMT government’s move to Taiwan account for only a little over 10 per cent of the population, elite mainlanders dominated the central government-level politics and administrati ve organizations, the militar y, the big state-run enterprises, and mass media, until democratization started in the mid-1980s. Local Taiwanese, who make up over 80 per cent of the popula tion, were ruled by the mainlanders, deprived of political freedom, and denied the right to use their own language and cultural traditions. The concentration of power and the restrictions on the rights of the general public were justified by the fiction that the Republic of China (the KMT government) ruled over the whole of China, including the mainland, and by using the continuation of the civil war with the communist government on the mainland as a rationale. Using the impossibility of holding elections on the mainland as a pretext, members of the Legislative Yuan and the National Assembly kept their seats for long years without re-election, as permanent members, having been elected on the mainland long before. Many local Taiwanese kept away from politics. The “28 February incident” of 1947 is well kno wn as a massacre of local Taiwanese by the KMT government in response to a massive uprising against oppression by corrupt bureaucrats in the KMT government. It is estimated that the death toll from the incident e xceeded 20,000. Throughout the first half of the 1950s, the government cracked down on local intellectuals in the name of hunting for communists, under a period of oppression called the “White © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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Terror”, and it is belie ved that a signif icant number of intellectuals disappeared. In subsequent years the secret service agency that had been brought along by the KMT from the mainland engaged in constant surveillance of political activities and intimidation. The fear and abominable memories of these incidents implanted deep antipathy towards politics among the local Taiwanese. The government showed no tolerance whatsoever for organized resistance to its rule in any corner of Taiwan society. In particular, it took precautions against any organization other than the KMT forming political or social networks covering the whole of Taiwan. This stern attitude brought rigid constraints on the establishment and activities of private social organizations. Opposition political parties were prohibited. Neither political parties nor any other social or ganizations could be established or undertak e any activities without the permission of the go vernment. Whether political or not, organizations over which the KMT had no influence or control became subject to total oppression.2 Private social organizations, which were infiltrated by the state, failed to positively take up the interests of the social groups they represented, get them into the political arena, and try to realize gains for them. They were not allowed to serve as bases for v oluntary political mobiliza tion. Their leaderships were infiltrated and co-opted to become “demobilized”, while rank-and-file members came under strict surveillance.3 However, although most of the social organizations that were politically suppressed became, at least on the surface, affiliated with the KMT, the Nationalists could not completely infiltrate all the or ganizations of the local communities or of blood relationships (Tien 1989; Chen Ming-tung 1995). Taiwan’s unique political system also af fected its economic and social structures. Public enterprises and KMT-operated companies acquired monopolistic control over capital-intensive heavy industries and the mass media. Senior positions at the central government, the military, and public enterprises were filled mostly by mainlanders. As local Taiwanese had only limited opportunities for social self-actualization in the public sector, they focused their energies on gaining economic success as private businessmen. Some small business owners with astute entrepreneurial ability actually hit the jackpot (Sato 1996, pp. 101–13). The large gap between the mainlanders and the local Taiwanese began to narrow in the economic field. Throughout the period of high economic growth, the distribution of income generally improved. In the meantime the mainlanders still accounted for a high percentage of the intellectuals, professionals, engineers, and managers who emerged in tandem with the economic gr owth. Together with the ne wly © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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risen local Taiwanese businessmen, they began to form a middle class, and emerged as a new social class. Before democratization, however, they were unable to form organizations to assert their interests, and lacked opportunities for social self-actualization as a group.4 The KMT regime was an authoritarian government that tolerated no political challenges, using oppressive power to crush them, but it did not necessarily wield broad power in terms of administrative capacity. It was incapable of fully monitoring and managing individual areas of private-sector economic acti vities. Moreover, until recently the social security system was available only to a limited number of social groups. In particular, it was only recently that it put in place a social security mechanism for the poor and the socially weak, such as the indigenous people, the physically disabled, and the elder ly. It was only after the 1980s tha t the social insurance system be gan to e xpand. As for the medical insur ance system, the government failed to go beyond devising stopgap systems for some specific social groups just to fit the needs of the moment, and these systems generally favoured the public sector that was dominated by the mainlanders. It was only in 1995 that a national health insurance system was launched which covered all the Taiwanese people (Lin 1999, pp. 114–15). Transitional Period to Democratization (from the Late 1970s to 1987)

As the communist government in Mainland China joined and solidified its position in the international community from the early 1970s, the partystate system of the KMT was confronted with a crisis of its external legitimacy. As it lost its raison d’être as an anti-communist bastion,it faced rising criticism from the interna tional community, and particularly from the United States, which was its security lifeline, over its disregard for human rights and the dictatorial rule of the KMT. Domestically, as income increased along with the remarkable economic growth, latent demands for political freedom began to mount. Movements with strong political overtones, calling for example for the protection of human rights and democratization, began to surface in spite of the government’s oppression. Also, from the mid-1980s, “self-relief ” (tzuli-chiuchi) social protest movements were launched by the local community residents or social groups involved in a variety of social problems that directly affected their businesses or livelihoods, without turning to either administrative institutions or the court system. © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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These developments forced the KMT government to move towards democratization on its own initiative. On 28 September 1986 the Democratic Progress Party (DPP) was formed as an organization of non-KMT forces, becoming the first political organization other than the KMT to co ver the whole of Taiwan. The government had no choice b ut to acquiesce to its establishment. Martial law was lifted on 15 July 1987, thirty-eight years after its proclamation. With its r epeal, all kinds of suppressed, latent social dissatisfactions surfaced, and political street protests against the government became frequent. The print media were liberalized in January 1988, and the growing freedom of speech allowed vocal criticisms of the KMT government to rise. Self-relief movements began to take place frequently, all across Taiwan. The people dir ectly involved in these mo vements organized informal ad hoc bodies such as those called “self-relief associations” ( tzuchiuhui), relying mainly on relations based on local communities, asde facto activist organizations.5 Self-relief movements against pollution sometimes led to shutdowns of factories using physical force for long periods of time and to the destruction of equipment and facilities. In some cases these movements won large amounts of compensation (settlement money). In the mid-1980s, before the lifting of martial law, some self-relief movements caused social sensation by blocking projects to build large plants using foreign capital or by succeeding in forming le gal organizations to carry out movements at regional levels.6 It is important to note that the expanded freedom of speech and relaxation of the controls over media and news reporting helped self-relief movements across Taiwan to grow beyond localized, isolated phenomena to interest across Taiwan, and winning understanding and sympathy from the general public. It became possible, to a certain degree, for movements across the island to mutually influence and expand support for their activities even without the existence of legal movement network organizations. In previous years the open expression of dissatisfaction against the government had not been allowed, and had been suppressed through brute force. After the people w on political freedom and be gan to v oice their complaints publicly, the go vernment found itself inca pable of solving specific problems and settling disputes. In order to mitigate the public discontent with the administration, it was forced to carry out institutional reforms of the administrative organization (Wakabayashi 1992, p. 240). The string of changes and reforms in those years can be considered to have been brought about in the following way. Unorganized popular social © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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movements took advantage of the opening of political freedom created by the challenges to the dictatorship mounted by political movements of intellectuals and politicians not af filiated with the KMT, and the gr eater political freedom created by those social movements. This then helped their respective movements advance further (Wakabayashi 1992, pp. 213–29). The middle class, which was made up of newly risen intellectuals and professionals as well as corporate managers, welcomed the political freedom and democratization, and at least felt some sympathy towards the political challenge of opposition forces against the government (Chang 1993). Intellectuals and professionals became important driving forces for urban advocacy-type social mo vements, including consumer, environmental conservation, anti-nuclear, and women’s movements. Democratization and the Sharp Rise in Private Social Organizations (from 1988)

In January 1988 President Chiang Ching-kuo died, and was replaced by Vice President Lee Teng-hui, who became the first president born in Taiwan. Lee dismantled vested interests and tried to carry out a process of democratization from the top down. The series of reform measures implied the “Taiwanization” of politics. They were designed to break the KMT’ s single-party rule, called the Party-State system, to do away with the fiction that the Republic of China would someday rule over the whole of Mainland China, base the legitimacy of the government on support from the people of Taiwan, and let Taiwanese residents decide on the future of Taiwan. In May 1991 the “Provisional Amendments for the Period of Mobilization of the Suppression of Communist Rebellion” (known as the “temporary provisions”), which had been on the books since they were legislated in Mainland China in March 1948, were abolished. This signified a unilateral declaration of an end to the ci vil war on the par t of Taiwan. At the same time the suspension of the Constitution, which had been in effect under the pretext of the continuing ci vil war, was halted, and the institutional foundations of democratization were improved in subsequent years. Full elections for the Na tional Assembly took place in 1991, and for the Legislative Yuan in 1992, with the so-called “permanent” members retiring at last. In January 1989, before the above-mentioned reforms were made, the Civil Organization Law was completely revised. This law had served as the basis for the KMT’ s single-party rule, and the r evision legalized the existence of political opposition parties by confirming the present state of © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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affairs. The revision also substantiall y relaxed the requirements f or establishing social associations (with an institutional definition to be given later), and man y social associations were esta blished thereafter. Social movements that had started in various places as self-relief movements in protest of a variety of social problems began to be organized, at least partially. Other big changes included the establishment of social movement organizations in fields of activities, such as anti-n uclear power, that had not previously been permitted, and the estab lishment of Taiwan-wide networks of grass-roots movements. Before the political liberalization, social groups could only protest against the government indirectly, through support for opposition forces. After the liberalization, they created their o wn organizations and be gan to independently mobilize supporters and other movement resources to confront the government directly (Wakabayashi 1992, pp. 239–40). In the areas of anti-pollution and environmental conservation, the driving force began to shift from temporary organizations of immediate victims, such as self-relief associations, towards social movement organizations seeking to broaden social support and have their opinions reflected on government policies. These groups included the Pollution Prevention Association and the Environmental Protection Association. Some organizations shifted the priority of their activities from protests over industrial pollution and environmental destruction to the improvement of the living environment and the rebuilding of local communities. On the other hand, adv ocacy-type networked organizations emerged, such as the Taiwan Environmental Protection Union, which had been established in 1987 mainly to carry out anti-nuclear power activities, an area which had previously been a political taboo. Local activist groups were organized as branches of a Taiwan-wide network. Movements to rebuild local communities and create regional culture also became very active across Taiwan, involving local administrative authorities (Wakabayashi 1998; Chen Liang-chuan 1996). Strong movements emerged to revive cultures and traditions using such local languages as Hoklo (Minnan) and the Hakka dialect, both of which had long been banned under the KMT government’s kuo yu (“national language”, meaning Mandar in) policies. Many of these social associations are believed to have embodied long-suppressed identities of local Taiwanese, or Taiwan nationalism. Political movements were organized into opposition parties in order to establish a presence in parliament and local governments, after gaining a certain number of seats in national elections as well as winning victories in elections for the heads of some local governments. Meanwhile, social © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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movements, which also gained the ability to become organizational entities, became diversified and differentiated as they pursued their respective areas of activities; they transformed themselves into or ganizations aiming for the revival of local communities and ad vocacy-type organizations or networks. The relationship of collabor ation between political and social movements that emerged during the process of democratization came to an end, at least temporarily.

CURRENT STATUS OF SOCIAL ASSOCIATIONS AND FOUNDATIONS, AND GOVERNMENT MONITORING SYSTEMS Institutional Aspects and Overall Picture of Social Associations and Foundations

Institutionally speaking, some of Taiwan’s social associations and foundations can be considered to be equivalent to NGOs. Social associations are organizations based on the Civil Organization Law.7 Civil organizations is a broad cate gory that can include all non-governmental organizations. However, private profit-seeking companies in the pr ivate sector are not subject to supervision under the law. The Civil Organization Law classifies civil organizations into three cate gories: political organizations (political parties), professional organizations (labour unions, commerce and industry associations, agricultural co-operatives, fisheries co-operatives, etc.), and “social associations”. “Social associations” are defined as groups made up of individuals or organizations engaged in public-interest activities in areas such as culture, science, medical care, health, relig ion, philanthropy, friendship, physical education, and social services. It is likely that organizations equivalent to NGOs or non-profit organizations (NPOs) can be found among the “social associations” classified as associations with the main objectives of philanthropy and public-interest activities. (There are of course other social associations that can be considered equivalent to NGOs or NPOs.) Ci vil organizations are c lassified as people-based organizations, established by a group of thirty or more adults. Their main revenue sources are membership dues, as they are not permitted to raise public donations. Civil organizations are supervised by the central government’s Ministry of Interior and the divisions of local governments responsible for interior affairs. To establish a ci vil organization, an application is filed with the local government when the scope of activities is limited to a specific local

© 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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area, and with the central government’s Ministry of Interior when activities cover the w hole of Taiwan. The Ministry of Interior mak es a judgment based on the intended activities described in the organization’s application papers, and refers the matter to the relevant government institution that is to serve as the principal supervisory agency for the organization’s activities. Civil organizations come under the guidance and supervision of the Ministry of Interior for their general or ganizational management, and of r elevant supervisory agencies for specific projects and activities. Foundations are established as incorporated foundations under the Civil Code, and must have a certain amount of funding. They undertake varied activities, and range from government-instituted organizations that shoulder part of the administrative work, government-affiliated research institutions, and private-sector think tanks, to organizations that raise funds for political activities, philanthropic foundations operated by private enterprises, and social movement organizations. Reportedly, many paper foundations have been set up for tax evasion purposes. Unlike civil organizations, which are under the unified supervision by the Ministry of Interior, foundations are registered with and supervised by many ministries and agencies of the central government, depending on the pur pose of establishment. This makes it difficult to assess the foundations as a whole.8 In establishing organizations equivalent to NGOs or NPOs in Taiwan, the following methods of legal registration are available: (1) the organization reports to the Ministry of Interior and is registered with the ministry under the Civil Organization Law, without registering as a cor poration; (2) the organization becomes re gistered with the Ministr y of Interior as a ci vil organization, and then as a corporate juridical person under the Civil Code; and (3) the organization files an application with a government agency that is most suitable to its planned activities, and with the permission of the agency, is re gistered as an incor porated foundation under the ci vil law. Registrations as corporations are conducted at local courts. Civil organizations are not required to obtain corporate status. According to a survey by the Ministry of Inter ior, the number of ci vil organizations registered with the government rose from 2,560 in 1952 to 11,306 in 1987. 9 Detailed f igures for 1988 onward are a vailable. As for the category of “social associations”, the number of associations registered with the government increased 2.5-fold from 6,187 in 1988 to 15,328 in 1999 (Table 14.1). “Social associations” specializing in “social services and philanthropic activities” more than trebled from 1,458 in 1988 to 4,740 in 1999. The increase was not limited to ne wly established

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TABLE 14.1 Number of “Social Associations” by Type, 1988–99 Type of Organization Academic and cultural associations Medical and health associations Religious associations Athletic associations Social service and philanthropic associations International associations Economic affairs associations Family clan associations Home-town associations Alumni associations Other non-profit organizations Total

1988

1989

1990

1991

1992

1993

1994

1995

1999

776

800

892

979

1,114

1,217

1,335

1,459

2,111

172 85 653

189 96 693

191 120 745

194 134 748

232 192 848

254 226 916

296 262 1,016

330 318 1,124

464 529 1,713

1,458

1,626

1,755 1,905

2,201

2,589

2,947

3,309

4,740

810

1,046

1,076 1,171

1,250

1,335

1,413

1,523

1,943

602

709

638

685

848

936

1,046

1,155

1,574

560

566

566

572

602

594

618

663

764

700 299

643 309

653 299

659 319

522 325

672 339

683 364

694 398

709 607

72 6,187

42 6,719

54 35 9,132 10,015

62 11,035

174 15,328

33 26 44 6,968 7,392 8,178

Notes: 1. The number of organizations is as at the end of each year. Detailed survey results have not been released for 1996–98. 2. Economic affairs associations are organizations set up to work for the development of varied economic activities and related research. 3. “Cross-strait exchange associations”, a category created in 1999, is included in “Other nonprofit organizations”. Source: Statistics Division, Ministry of Interior, Taiwan, Civic Organization Statistics, various years.

associations, but included existing unregistered associations that chose to become registered during the survey years. Not all of these “social associations” can be categorized as NGOs or NPOs, while some foundations and many small-scale unregistered organizations not covered by the survey should be regarded as NGOs or NPOs. According to a survey by the private Himalaya Foundation, at least 1,649 foundations were in operation in 1999 (Himalaya Foundation 1999). The distinction between “social associations” and foundations merely reflects a difference in the w ay of r egistering with the go vernment, and does not necessarily mirror differences in actual activities. © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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TABLE 14.2 Philanthropic and Public-Interest Activities by “Social Associations”, 1990–99 Number of Activities Carried Out Type of Organization

1990

Academic and cultural associations 363 Medical and health associations 39 Religious associations 306 Athletic associations 512 Social service and philanthropic associations 5,835 International associations 4,833 Economic affairs associations 24 Family clan associations 81 Home-town associations 41 Alumni associations 5 Other non-profit organizations 10 Total 12,049

Ratio (%) of All Activities

Average Mobilization

1995

1999

1990

1995

1999

1990

1995

1999

1,043

3,687

7.1

4.4

14.6

162

230

242

173 1,884 1,314

1,366 4,945 3,217

6.2 9.3 3.4

4.4 10.7 3.5

32.5 34.3 7.9

93 61 147

503 284 127

586 240 1,530

15,508

26,065

26.6

16.8

26.6

44

216

199

9,665

14,509

23.9

21.3

31.3

59

134

149

863

2,294

1.8

6.4

15.7

76

194

303

256

909

8.8

7.9

28.1

26

61

48

409 209

1,133 410

4.1 1.2

10.0 5.3

19.0 9.2

50 20

90 129

50 86

26 31,354

98 58,666

14.1 17.2

2.7 12.7

8.9 22.7

96 59

29 189

49 273

Notes: 1. “Number of activities carried out” was based on the survey of all organizations for 1990, and estimated by the author on the basis of the results of sample surveys for 1995 and 1999. 2. “Ratio (%) of all acti vities” is the ra tio of activities carried out by or ganizations in each category to total activities carried out by type of organizations. 3. “Average mobilization” is the average number of individuals involved in each activity. 4. Since categories of activities became more finely subdivided in later years, categories for 1995 and 1999 were tallied to match the “social philanthropic activities/public-interest activities” of 1990. As the subdivision of the categories of activities broadened the scope of activities in surveys in later years, it is possible that the total number of activities in the preceding year may have been underestimated. 5. See also notes on Table 14.1. Source: Statistics Division, Ministry of Interior, Taiwan, Civic Organization Statistics, various years.

Next, let us examine the trends in the activities of “social associations”, particularly philanthropic and pub lic-interest activities (Table 14.2). For all the “social associations” and for social service and philanthropic associations alone, the amount of philanthropic and public-interest activities increased remarkably, much faster than the pace of the increase in the number © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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of related organizations shown in Table 14.1. The ratio of philanthr opic and public-interest activities to all activities undertaken by “social associations” rose in 1999 for “social associations” as a whole. Particularly noteworthy is the conspicuous rise in the ratio seen among “social associations” other than social service and philanthropic associations, such as academic and cultural associations, medical and health associations, religious associations, and family clan associations. The average number of people mobilized per activity also increased generally in 1999, even excluding the unusually high figure shown by athletic associations. The number for 1999 is assumed to have included relief activities in the aftermath of the major earthquake that jolted the central part of Taiwan on 21 September. These figures generally indicate that philanthropic and publicinterest activities have become major activities of “social associations”. Actual Government Supervision of Social Associations

In the past the government’s supervision of civil organizations was based on the Civil Organization Law, which was legislated on the mainland in 1942. It required that ci vil organizations be established to operate in the equivalent of an area of administration (Article 7), and did not allow the establishment of two or more organizations of the same nature or conducting the same activities in a single administrative area (Article 8). Because of these provisions, in cases where an or ganization affiliated with the KMT existed in an area, it was almost impossible to lawfully create an organization opposing or competing with it within the same area.These provisions were applied to all pr ivate-sector organizations other than pr ofit-seeking enterprises. Civil organizations responded to the article requiring the area of an or ganization’s activities to match an administr ative area, as if in correspondence to the hierarchy of administrative areas, by forming affiliations between main and subsidiary or ganizations, with na tional organizations and their subor dinate bodies inte grated for each sector of activities. In dealing with particularly important social groups, the KMT took the initiative in establishing or ganizations and placing them under its control. The KMT also infiltrated existing organizations using party organs. In order to prevent the establishment of any organization capable of posing a potential threat to the KMT regime, it manoeuvred to create patronized organizations first in all prospective areas of activities, making good use of the provisions of Article 8 (Wakabayashi 1992, p. 224). A typical example of such manoeuvres can be found with labour unions. It also promoted the © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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activities of or ganizations established in a top-do wn way in order to politically mobilize people under its influence, such as theAnti-Communist National Salvation Youth Corps (Tien 1989). In the spring of 1956 a general inspection of social associations was carried out, with all associations required to present reports on financial matters, activities, lists of members, and personal history of full-time members to pass a government screening. Social associations that refused the inspection were banned from carrying out activities, and their assets w ere confiscated (Wakabayashi 1992, pp. 113–14). Since it w as extremely difficult, before democratization, to la wfully establish civil organizations without coming under the influence of the KMT , some organizations active in social movements since the early 1980s were founded as foundations (incorporated foundations), for example, the Consumers’ Foundation, Chinese Taiwan (CFCT), established in 1980 (Huang 1989, pp. 56–57). In January 1989 the Civil Organization Law was thoroughly revised to permit, for the f irst time, two or more civil organizations to exist in the same area and in the same f ield of activities. The revision repealed most provisions for administrative penalties, and weakened the administrative authority of supervision. Supervision by the Ministry of Interior was scaled down to limited areas in ensuring the healthy management of civil organizations, such as guidance about articles of organization, elections of executives, and asset management, and working conditions for full-time staff. The specific activities of individual organizations were made subject to supervision by the respective relevant ministries and agencies. After the full revision of the Civil Organization Law, regulatory controls involved in administering the law were substantially weakened, the Ministry of Interior’s strict controls were abolished, and the ministr y’s overall supervision was changed to cover only those organizations that threatened to go against the public interest. Thus, it can be said that an institutional change took place, away from the system of administrative permission for the establishment of organizations, to a system of a pproving the esta blishment of all organizations in principle and requiring only registration.10

CURRENT STATUS OF ACTIVITIES: PHILANTHROPY, MUTUAL AID, AND LOCAL COMMUNITY RENAISSANCE MOVEMENTS

Since before democratization, philanthropic organizations and v arious traditional mutual-aid or ganizations had e xisted to supplement the © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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inadequacy of the social security provided by the government, in addition to organizations that undertook social mo vements as described earlier . However, the acti vities of these or ganizations could not e vade the government’s strict control over social organizations, and due to a variety of constraints, their acti vities became distor ted. After democratization, philanthropic organizations became increasingly acti ve. The activities of religious organizations became particularly conspicuous. However, mutualaid organizations, or at least those that were formally organized, all but lost their function of providing mutual assistance. The following subsections describe mutual-aid and philanthropic activities carried out by or ganizations that can be seen as “social associations” or foundations. The role played by social mo vement organizations in the process of democratization has already been discussed earlier in the chapter . After democratization, some social mo vement organizations transformed themselves into advocacy-type organizations or became more network-oriented. In addition, local community renaissance movements will be introduced as a specific post-democratization development of social movements. Traditional Mutual-Aid Organizations: Family Clan Associations

Given the considerable deficiency of social security and welfare provided by the government, groups of socially weak individuals, such as the elderly and the physically disabled, as well as the destitute, had no choice but to depend on family members, relatives, local communities, or philanthropic organizations. However, even urgent calls for the pro vision of welf are services to the physically disabled were made impossible by the controls on the formation of organizations, freedom of speech, and assembly under the Civil Organization Law. A nationwide organization of mo vements working for the interests of the physically disabled was not established until 1989 (Tsao 1995, pp. 269–71). Mutual-aid organizations are not typically re garded as NGOs. However, in pre-democr atization Taiwan, with its strict controls on organizational activities, mutual-aid acti vities were important in covering the deficiency of administrative services. Generally speaking, it is not easy to grasp the overall picture of informal mutual-aid organizations. This subsection will examine family clan associations,11 which are formal and lar ge-scale mutual-aid or ganizations based on kinship. They are closed membership-based associa tions of people having the same family names, created for mutual aid in such matters © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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as celebrations or condolences, scholarships for children, relief, commendations, member welfare, and friendship. Even non-political mutual-aid organizations such as the f amily clan associa tions were regulated by the Civil Organization Law, and subject to the rule of only one organization with a certain purpose of activities per administrative area. This meant that only one family clan association was allowed to be established in each administrative area (a county or city) for one family name, regardless of the size of a population with that name. Family clan associations with common family names, therefore, gained huge memberships, so huge that it became impossible to trace lineages in a meaningful w ay; this made it dif ficult for them to perform their function as a mutual-aid or ganization. 12 Also, some f amily clan associations, taking advantage of their huge membership bases, mobilized relatives to stand for local elections (Horie 1988). The example of family clan associations clearly shows that even the activities of tradition-based mutual-aid organizations, or at least those that came into the open as f ormal organizations, were considerably distorted, largely because of the effects of the controls on organizations imposed by the KMT government. Philanthropic Activities by Religious Organizations13

Before democratization, it was difficult to undertake organized activities even for philanthropic purposes, with the exception perhaps of some religious organizations and other groups such as the Lions Club and Rotary Club. Since democratiza tion, a v ariety of or ganizations have become engaged in philanthropic projects, with religious organizations particularly increasing their influence (Lo 1995, pp. 381–82). In Taiwan, Buddhism and Taoism remained more or less undifferentiated until recent years, and the role of community-based economic mutual aid was traditionally reserved for indigenous religion. Indigenous religious belief has a strong tendency to seek worldly material benefits rather than spiritual relief or happiness in the afterlife. This indigenous religion-based mutual aid was supported by the attempt of local people of influence to win the legitimacy of their rule over communities by demonstrating benevolence through social projects and philanthropic activities. Mausoleums served as the centres of such activities. The mausoleums vary in size. Relatively small ones are closely identified with local communities, and are regarded as both places of worship and at the same time hubs of economic and social activities. They also served as © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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places which accepted the socially weak, such as the physically disabled and the elderly, who could not find jobs, supporting them.14 However, Japan’s colonial rule and the KMT’s rigid control threatened to destroy the function of mausoleums in local communities. In particular, the Buddhist Association of the Republic of China, which crossed the strait from the mainland in the footsteps of the KMT , imposed strict relig ious precepts and ascetic practices which did not exist in Taiwan’s indigenous beliefs, and pursued the unification of temples and mausoleums. However, it never succeeded in completely integrating the foundation of indigenous beliefs. With the weak ening of go vernment controls, religious or ganizations became more di versified in their acti vities. The number of religious associations registered with the government rose sharply from 85 in 1988 to 529 in 1999 (Table 14.1). According to a survey by the Ministry of Interior, as of 1995 there were some 17,000 temples, mausoleums, and churches in Taiwan. Of the total, 70 per cent were Taoist mausoleums and 15 per cent Buddhist temples. After democratization, these temples and mausoleums began to diversify their functions, from being places to respond to people’s wishes for wor ldly gains through the g ood offices of v arious gods, to becoming centres of community culture and welfare. Many famous temples and mausoleums have become actively involved in independent philanthropic and other public-purpose activities (Kamizuru 1998, pp. 71–72, 75–76). As religious associations diversified and new religions flourished, many have begun stressing on philanthropic activities as they compete with rival groups to demonstrate their uniqueness. Religious associations have emerged featuring a variety of philanthropic activities. One good example is the Buddhist Compassion Relief Tzu Chi Foundation (Tzu Chi Hui), w hich was established by Master Cheng Yen and others in the easter n county of Hualien in 1966, and which was authorized as an incorporated foundation in 1980. It began by offering relief to the poor, and gradually expanded the scope of its activities. After constructing a large hospital in Hualien County in 1986, after seven years of work, it also established a junior college for nurses and a medical school.Tzu Chi Hui also became a pioneer in the area of bone marrow banks, performing a pivotal role in running the network for organ transplants. The most obvious characteristic of the foundation is its ability to mobilize a great number of volunteers and its impeccable record of achievements in disaster relief acti vities within Taiwan, as well as international assistance to and disaster relief in developing countries (Tzu Chi Foundation 1999). © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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When the major earthquake hit central Taiwan on 21 September 1999, many private volunteer organizations undertook relief activities. Tzu Chi Hui outperformed all the other s in terms of its mobilization ability . Immediately after the temblor, it very rapidly and systematically mobilized massive resources for relief activities. Displaying powerful financial mobilization power as well, it constructed temporary housing of its own for earthquake victims and co-operated in rebuilding damaged schools.

From Social Movements to Local Communities: Efforts for Community Renaissance

The experiences of self-relief mo vements across Taiwan, which were common in the second half of the 1980s, convinced many activists that the root cause of the worsening destruction of the basis of life in local communities, including environmental problems, lay in the collapse of local communities after long years of political oppression.This recognition helped raise the awareness and consciousness among local Taiwanese people that had long been suppr essed by the KMT government. They began to carry out various community-based movements, including the preservation of the old rows of houses and aged structures, the revival of folk culture, and investigations into local history. With offices for local culture and history established across Taiwan, active efforts were put into the revival of local communities through investigations into local history, traditional culture, and historical heritage. The organizations undertaking these activities then began to have their opinions reflected on urban planning, in co-operation with local governments. In response to these bottom-up movements involving private organizations and local governments, the Council for Cultural Affairs, the Executive Yuan (the central go vernment) came up with the Community Renaissance policy to support local movements (Chen Liang-chuan 1996). The Community Renaissance scheme is different from former community development plans in that it assumes the participation by local residents, residents’ organizations, and activist organizations from the planning stage. It also seeks, as its principal objective, the modern revival of traditional cultures in various parts of Taiwan, which had previously been the target of government oppression, in addition to material inputs such as infrastructure construction and improvements of health conditions.A leading advocate of the Community Renaissance, cultural anthropologist Chen Chi-nan, believes that the reconstruction of local communities will be essential to the © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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completion of democratization. His reasoning is that even if democratization proceeds in form, it will not be possible to elect a fair government unless the very foundation of society is democratized. In order to realize this, autonomous local communities need to be constructed in a bottom-up manner (Wakabayashi 1997, pp. 154–55). Specific activities that are under way in various places with administrative guidance and financial support include so-called regional development projects, such as the development of special products and the promotion of tourism through the reappraisal and preservation of local historical heritage, town- and village-building efforts, and the revival of mausoleums as axes of history, traditional culture, and exchanges in local communities. 15 For example, in the Baimi community of Su-ao Village, Ilan County, a protest movement against particles emitted from a local cement plant led to the creation of a local restoration fund with money collected from the cement plant operator after a self-relief struggle. Using this restoration fund, the one-shot protest movement has now been transformed into one to revive wooden sandals, which used to be the community’ s main b usiness, as traditional handicraft in an ef fort to re vitalize the local community (Wakabayashi 1998, pp. iii–iv). Some social movement organizations, which happened to contribute to democratization, as well as people who led those movements, later found new fields of activities within advocacy groups in areas such as environmental conservation, consumer protection, and women’s issues. But these advocacy-type movements failed to grow into forces with a significant social impact, with the exception of the anti-nuclear power movement and a few others. Moreo ver, at least up until May 2000, under the KMT government, advocacy-type groups were not able to join the government or to use their influence to pressure the government into changing its policies. Taiwan has yet to witness the emergence of advocacy-type social movements with sufficient influence to support the full engagement of NGOs in policymaking and policy implementation. Advocacy-type social movements have so far failed to become a major presence, perhaps because the opening of political channels through democratization increased the likelihood that social discontent, which is the fuel for activist movements, would be at least partially solved through the administration or politicians. It is also possible that the enormous interest in elections since democratization has helped raise people’s awareness of political participation, and led to a decline of their interest in social movements as alternative channels.

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CONCLUSION: RELATIONSHIPS WITH GOVERNMENT

After the end of World War II, the history of social associations in Taiwan was for the most part a histor y of the relentless oppression of people’ s political activities, at least up until the period of political liberalization that arrived around the time of the lifting of martial law in 1987. In fact, the KMT government uniformly treated pri vate social or ganizations, professional organizations, and political organizations as civil organizations as it tried to impose its own single-party rule in the political arena into any social sectors in Taiwan. Social associations were suppressed using dictatorial political power. Social movements which arose to counter threats to people’s everyday living were oppressed just like movements clamoring for political freedom. Under this political oppression, the majority of local Taiwanese focused on economic activities, and the distribution of income improved in line with the high gro wth of the Taiwanese economy as a whole. Since the government was not eager to provide social services, there was a strong latent demand for welfare activities and philanthropic projects. However, even mutual-aid and philanthropic organizations were subject to government controls over organized activities, and this constr ained their acti vities considerably. Private social or ganizations were caught in a dilemma of whether to let themselv es be placed under the wings of the KMT , or to limit the scope of their activities to informal operations. From the latter half of the 1980s, anti-KMT political movements co-operated with social movements to promote political liberalization and democratization, leading eventually to the lifting of government controls over organizations. Many social associations were established, and their activities became diversified. One can find at least the following three trends or groups. The first consists of organizations undertaking social welfare activities and philanthropic projects to make up for the inadequacy of administrative services. With the liberalization that accompanied democratization, their activities expanded rapidly in response to the latent demand for social services. In particular large-size organizations with a strong religious tinge appeared on the scene. Since democratization, the government has tried to increase the public provision of social welfare services, but without much success so far. It has made some a ttempts to incorporate the activities of private organizations in this area, but co-operative relationships are still far from fully developed.

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It appears that social movements have branched off onto two paths. In the process of democratization, some were organized into activist groups, network-type organizations, or advocacy groups that presented alternatives to the government’s development and social policies (Ku 1999, pp. 131–32). Even after democratization, many of the advocacy-type activist groups seem to have maintained their distance from the government, at least under the KMT administration that came to an end in May 2000. Their focus is on specific actions centring on opposition movements against government projects, as well as public relations activities to raise public awareness, and they are far from active in making comprehensive policy proposals to the government. The government, for its par t, has not tried to incorporate advocacy-type organizations into the process of policy-making. However, some local governments have begun to seek co-operation with social movement-type NGOs in areas such as environmental conservation. With the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) coming to power in 2000, there is a possibility that the situation may change quite significantly. Another development regarding social movements is that some local groups have converted themselves into organizations aiming for the revival of local communities through the r eappraisal of local traditional culture. These movements are seeking to develop co-operative relations with the government sector. Movements for the revival of local communities, as exemplified by the Community Renaissance, have been on co-operative terms with the government since the mid-1990s. In the background of this co-operation was the rising trend towards “Taiwanization”. While political and social movements seeking political liberalization turned their attention to Taiwan nationalism as the centripetal force, the KMT government also began to seek its legitimacy in support from the Taiwanese people, after breaking with the fiction that it was the legitimate ruler of the whole of China. The change of government in 2000, the first such change in Taiwan, made the Taiwanization of the go vernment definitive, with Chen Shui-bien of the DPP assuming the presidenc y. However, Taiwan is still searching for a new identity that will lead it to a reconciliation of ethnicity, lest Taiwanese nationalism should turn into an exclusive nationalism of the majority of Hoklo (Min-nan) residents. Against this background, some social movements are working towards the renewal of local communities, by rebuilding culture as a new identity for Taiwan.

Notes 1

The description of Taiwan’s politics and history is lar gely derived from Wakabayashi (1992). Other r eferences include Tien (1989)

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2

3

4

5

6

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10

and Chen Ming-tung (1995). The division of per iods follows that of Hsiao (1996), regarding the lifting of martial law in 1987 as the major turning point. By dividing society into sectors, the KMT government gave exclusive rights of representation to a single organization in each sector, in exchange for acceptance of its control. These characteristics seem to come under the interest representation system of state corporatism, a subordinate type of corporatism. See Wakabayashi (1992), Chen Ming-tung (1995), Tien (1989), etc. “State corporatism in Taiwan existed only in structure, not in practice.” (Wakabayashi 1992, p. 116) “However, social class by itself does not act. Social class acts in the name of political parties and social organizations.” (Chang 1993, p. 126) Research, Development and Evaluation Commission, Executive Yuan, project leader: Chang Mau-kuei (1992, pp. 89–91, 135–37). According to Chang and others, about 75 per cent of anti-pollution and antidevelopment self-relief movements were conducted collectively, relying on co-operation among local communities or relatives. The key players in these movements were local residents living near the sources of pollution, and farmers and fishermen who suffered economic damage. Many of the movements first turned to local governments for resolutions. After discovering that the local governments had no capacity to resolve their problems or mediate disputes, they were compelled to resort to self-relief actions. They gave little thought to taking their complaints to court (T erao 1993, pp. 160–62, 177–82). Hereafter, social associations as an institutional category under the Civil Organization Law are used in quotation marks. See pp. 316–17 of Feng (1999), which explains the registration system and preferential tax treatment in detail. Ho wever, it does not mak e a distinction between social associa tions (civil organizations) and foundations, calling them all NPOs. This leaves some confusion, particularly in its explanation about institutions. See Tien (1989). The number is for the total ci vil organizations. The number for “social associations” among them is not known. According to Feng (1999), only 2–3 per cent of applications for the establishment of foundations filed with government ministries were rejected. The reasons cited for disappro val included inconsistenc y between the purpose of establishment and activities, the advocacy of Taiwanese independence, criminal and bankruptcy records of founders, and unrealistic plans for asset acquisitions (p. 329).

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On family clan associations in Taiwan, see Horie (1988). The feature of the unity of (Han) Chinese society is that bonds are freely selected to suit the people’s own circumstances to build the necessary networks. According to a survey on Chinese society in the Philippines, home-town associations tend to be subdivided into smaller groups when there are many people from one home town, and tend to be integrated into higher associations in the opposite case. That is to say, ancestry-based community groups expand or shrink in size as the occasion demands, in order to maintain an appropriate size for an interest group (Wang 1986, p. 164). Unlike other Chinese or ganizations, family clan associations in Taiwan were prohibited from expanding or shrinking in response to needs. The author owes the following descriptions of religious organizations to Kimimasa Matsukane. However, the author is solely responsible for any errors in those descriptions. Mausoleums served as places of exchange for people in local communities and at the same time as mediums of exchange between local communities, through inter-mausoleum relationships (Mio 1995). Wakabayashi (1997) included a con versation between Chen Chi-nan, an advocate of the revival of communities, and a chief representative of a community organization in Taichung County (pp. 178–80).While Chen emphasized the role played by mausoleums, the chief representative highlighted the role of social associations rather than local communities. Asserting that all mausoleums are controlled by local factions or mobsters, the chief representative said he would like to avoid being involved in mausoleums. In rebuttal, Chen argued that mausoleums are the only things left to carry on the tradition of local communities in Taiwan as str uctures or as junctures of cultural acti vities, and that mausoleums cannot be ignored in the revival of local communities.

References

Chang Mau-kuei. “Middle class and social and political movements in Taiwan: Questions and some preliminary observations”. In Discovery of Middle Classes in East Asia, edited by Michael Hsiao Hsin-huang, pp. 121–76. Taipei: Institute of Ethnology, Academia Sinica, 1993. Chen Liang-chuan. “Taiwan no Kank yo Mondai to ‘Shaku’ Zukuri” [Environmental problems and ‘community’ renaissance in Taiwan]. Sekai, December 1996, pp. 126–29.

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Chen Ming-tung. Paichi chengchih yu Taiwan chengchih pienchien [Faction politics and political c hange in Taiwan]. Taipei: Yuehtan Chupanshe, 1995. Feng Yen, Joyce (with Michael Wei Mou). “Taiwan”. In Philanthropy Law in Asia, edited by Thomas Silk, pp. 315–30. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass Publishers, 1999. Fuchao Tzu Chi Chic hinhui (Tzu Chi F oundation). Fuchiao Tzu Chi Chichinhui chienchieh [Introduction of Buddhist Tzu Chi Foundation]. Hualien: Tzu Chi Foundation, 1999. Horie, Shun’ichi. “Shitashii tanin to mishiranu shinzoku: Taiwan Kanzoku ni okeru futatsu no giseiteki shinzoku” [Familiar unrelated and unfamiliar relatives: Two types of f ictitious family of Han in Taiwan]. Bunka Jinruigaku 5 [Cultural Anthropology 5] 4, no. 1 (1988): 50–63. Hsiao Hsin-huang, Michael. “The new reformism: The private philanthropy in Taiwan in the 1980s”. In Philanthropy and the Dynamics of Change in East and Southeast Asia, Occasional Papers of the East Asian Institute, edited by Barnett F. Baron, pp. 113–26. New York: Columbia University, 1991. ——— . “Toyuanhua kuochengchung shehui yu kuochia kuanhsi ti chungtsu” [Society-state relationship during the process of pluralization]. In Taiwan ti kuochia yu shehui [State and society in Taiwan], edited by Hsu Chengkuang and Hsiao Hsin-huang, pp. 355–77. Taipei: Tungta Tushu, 1996. Hsimalaya Yanchiu Kaifa Chichinhui (Tsaituan f aren) [Himalaya Foundation]. Taiwan 300 chia chuyao chichinhui minglu [Directory of 300 major founda tions in Taiwan]. Taipei: Tsaituan faren Hsimalaya Yanchiu Kaifa Chichinhui, 1999. Hsingchengyuan Yanchiu Fachan Kaohe Weiyuanhui [Research, Development and Evaluation Commission, Executive Yuan]. Mingkuo chishi nientai Taiwan tichu “Tzuli Chiuchi” shihchien chih yanchiu [Studies on “self-relief” incidents in Taiwan during 1980s]. Taipei: Hsingchengyuan Yanchiu Fachan Kaohe Weiyuanhui, 1992. Huang Jung-tsun. “Taiwan tichu huanpao yu hsiaof eiche paohu yuntung: Tese yu hutung” [Environmental protection movements and consumers’ movements in Taiwan: Characteristics and alignments]. In Taiwan hsinhsing shehui yuntung [New social movements in Taiwan], edited by Hsu Cheng-kuang and SungWen-li, pp. 55–78. Taipei: Chuliu Tushu, 1989. Kamizuru, Hisahiko. “Shukyo” [Religions]. In Motto Shiritai Taiwan [Getting closer under standing on Taiwan], edited b y Masahiro Wakabayashi, pp. 69–85. 2nd ed. Tokyo: Kobundo, 1998.

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Ku Chung-Hwa. “Kungmin chiehshu ti chiehkou pienchien: Yi Taiwan feiyingli tsuchih ti fachan weili” [The structural transformation of civic associations and the development of NPOs in Taiwan]. Taiwan shehui yenchiu chikan [Taiwan: A Radical Quarterly in Social Studies], no. 36 (1999), pp. 123–45. Lin Chen-wei. “Mouhitotsu no ‘Sekai’?: Higashi Ajia to Taiwan no Fukushikokka” [Another ‘wor ld’?: Welfare states in East Asia and Taiwan]. Nihon Taiwan Gakkaiho, no. 1 (1999), pp. 108–26. Lo Hsiu-Hua. “Pinghsi Taiwan tichu minchien shehui kungtso huanching” [Analysis of conditions on pr ivate sector social w orks in Taiwan]. In Taiwan ti shehui fuli: Minchien kuantien [Social welfare in Taiwan: From private sector viewpoint], pp. 365–89. Taipei: Wunan Tushuchupan, 1995. Mio, Yuko. “Byo: Shinko to kouryu no center” [Miao: Centres of religion and exchange]. In Ajia Dokuhon: Taiwan [Readings on Asia: Taiwan], edited by Seiji Kasahara and Hirok o Ueno, pp. 228–35. Tokyo: Kawadeshobo Shinsha, 1995. Numazaki, Ichiro. “ The Laoban-led development of business enterprises in Taiwan: An analysis of the Chinese entrepreneurship”. The Developing Economies 35, no. 4 (1997): 440–57. ——— . “Ethnicity to Shakai Kaiso” [Ethnicity and social stratum]. In Motto Shiritai Taiwan [Getting c loser understanding on Taiwan], edited by Masahiro Wakabayashi, pp. 46–68. 2nd ed. Tokyo: Kobundo, 1998. Sato, Yukihito. “Taiwan no keizai hatten ni okeru Seifu to minkan kigyo: Sangyo no sentaku to seika” [State and business in economic development of Taiwan: Selection of industries and its outcomes]. InKankoku Taiwan no Hatten Mechanism [Mechanisms of development in South Korea and Taiwan], edited by Tamio Hattori and Yukihito Sato, pp. 87–118. Tokyo: Ajia Keizai Kenkyujo [Institute of Developing Economies], 1996. Terao, Tadayoshi. “Taiwan: Sangyo kougai no seijikeizaigaku” [Taiwan: Political economy of industrial pollution]. InKaihatsu to Kankyo: Higashi Ajia no Keiken [Development and environment: The experiences of East Asia], edited by Reeitsu Kojima and Shigeaki Fujisaki, pp. 139–99. Tokyo: Ajia Keizai Kenkyujo [Institute of Developing Economies], 1993. Tien Hung-mao. The Great Transition: Political and Social Change in the Republic of China. Stanford: Hoover Institution Press, 1989. Tsao Ai-lan. “Fuli hsaiofeiche yuntung chih hsingchi yu shehui fuli fachang” [Origins of welfare consumer movements and development of social welfare]. In Taiwan ti shehui fuli: Minchien kuantien [Social welfare in Taiwan: From pri vate sector vie wpoint], pp. 261–77. Taipei: Wunan Tushuchupan, 1995. © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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Wakabayashi, Masahiro. Taiwan: Bunretsukokka to Minshuka [Taiwan: Democratization in a divided country]. Tokyo: University of Tokyo Press, 1992. ——— . Taiwan no Taiwango-jin Chugokugo-jin, Nihongo-jin: Taiwan-jin no Yume to Genjitsu [Taiwanese speakers, Mandarin speakers, and Japanese speakers in Taiwan: Their dreams and realities]. Tokyo: Asahi Shinbunsha, 1997. ——— . “Watashi no Motto Shiritai Taiwan: Maegaki ni Kaete” [My own “Getting closer understanding on Taiwan”: In place of the preface]. In Motto Shiritai Taiwan [Getting closer understanding on Taiwan], edited by Masahiro Wakabayashi, pp. i–viii. 2nd ed. Tokyo: Kobundo, 1998. Wang Sung-hsing. “Kan minzoku no shakai soshiki” [Social organizations of Han]. In Nippon Mizoku Shakai no Keisei to Hatten: Ie, Mura, Uji no Genryu wo Saguru [Formation and development of folk societies in Japan: Exploration for origins of Ie, Mura, and Uji], edited by Takuji Takemura, pp. 147–67. Tokyo: Yamakawa Shuppansha, 1986.

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This chapter is reproduced from The State and NGOs: Perspective from Asia , edited by Shinichi Shigetomi (Singapore: Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, 2002). This version was obtained electronically direct from the publisher on condition th at copyright is not infringed. No part of this publication may be reproduced, translated, stored in a retrieval system, or transmi tted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies and Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo.

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15 South Korea Advocacy for Democratization Noriyo Isozaki INTRODUCTION

As is frequently reported in the media, South Korean non-governmental organizations (NGOs) are active in advocacy activities; they make policy proposals and critique and monitor government activities on political issues. They exert such a lar ge influence in the country that the y are sometimes called the fifth power in South K orea. For the general elections in April 2000, more than 500 NGOs got together in a Citizens’ Alliance. This alliance led an effective nationwide movement for a fair and just election, and successfully ousted 70 per cent of the candidates it placed on its blacklist. However, it is only in the past ten y ears or so that NGOs have made their presence felt.1 Why have they grown so rapidly? The quantitative expansion can be explained by the democratization and resurrection of civil society. As a divided country on the forefront of the Cold War, South Korea for many decades was characterized by strong state control over society. Particularly after Park Chung-hee seized power through a coup d’état in 1961, the state controlled resources and their distribution in all spheres, including politics, economics, and social welfare, and autonomous activities by non-governmental groups, as well as the sphere in which they could conduct acti vities, were strictly regulated. However, this system of control began to change following the Declaration for Democratization issued by the authoritarian “soft-liners” in 1987. Numerous NGOs sprang up as state control w aned. This is how the proliferation of NGOs is often explained. But it is not just the n umerical growth that attracts our attention. Why are South Korean NGOs engaged mainly in advocacy activities? How can © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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we account for NGOs’ role in society and their influence regarded as the fifth power? To put it in another way, what activities did they play and what functions did they carry out in the process of democratization, that is, the democratic transition from authoritarian rule and democratic consolidation,2 of South Korea? To answer these questions, it is not suf ficient merely to focus on NGO activities in the 1990s.We must examine: (1) under the authoritarian regime, how NGO activities were once regulated by state control and state–NGO relationships; and (2) within the process of democratic transition and consolidation, what NGOs pursued as their goals, and how the state–NGO relationship and the contents of NGO activities changed. In the following sections, therefore, we will start by examining the state–NGO relationship under each of the successive periods and then, on this basis, discuss the NGO situation and orientation in the 1990s, in the light of the regime change. However, since the civic groups active under the author itarian regime do not exactly fit into the category of NGOs as defined in this book, we will call them “social groups”, the term generally used in South Korea at that time. HISTORICAL EVOLUTION OF THE STATE–NGO RELATIONSHIP3 Rhee Syngman Period (1948–60)

This was the period when the framework of divided statehood at the front line of the Cold War was imposed and became entrenched. The skeleton of the legal systems used in later periods was created at that time. It can well be defined as the preliminary stage of the authoritarian regime. After Korea was liberated from Japanese colonial rule in 1945, numerous social groups cropped up. However, the ones that were able to survive the period from the establishment of the Republic of Korea through the Korean War were mostly those c losely linked with the pr esident and the r uling party (Kim Kw ang-sik 1999, pp. 32–33). There were fe w autonomous groups. Moreover, the resour ces available to private social gr oups were strictly restricted during the period of post-war rehabilitation. The solicitation of donations was prohibited in principle by the Prohibition Law against Collection of Contributions. Social groups thus were unable to obtain funds 4 for their activities except through the collection of membership dues. Most social groups operating in that period provided social services with funds from overseas donors (Lee 1995, p. 162). During this time the government created an institutional framework to place civic social groups under its control. The Civil Code of 1958 laid

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down the institutional basis for non-profit corporations. The code said that “an association or foundation not engaged for profit or gain may become a legal person subject to the permission of the relevant ministries” (Article 32). Permission depended largely on the discretion of the administrative agencies in charge. On the other hand, the Inheritance Tax Law, Tax Exemption and Reduction Law, and the Cor porate Tax Law defined “public benef it associations”, and provided tax privileges for them. But (1) it was up to the administrative agencies to decide whether the activities of a given association were for the public benefit or not, and (2) tax privileges did not depend on whether the association was incorporated or not (Kim Jin-su 1996, pp. 14–18). Accordingly, even associations that did not satisfy the requirements of legal persons enjoyed tax privileges if government agencies so decided. These systems, which allowed the government to intervene arbitrarily in the affairs of social groups at each procedure, served as regulatory instruments for the authoritarian regime. Park Chung-hee Period (1961–79): Monolithic Systematization of Society by the State

Park Chung-hee seized power through a military coup in May 1961, and ruled the country as president even after powers were transferred to a civil administration. In the name of national security , his r egime restricted people’s political right of freedom and participation. In the economic sphere the state placed all material and human resources under its control, by means of the nationalization of banks and the re gulation of labour. It promoted state-led industrialization under the national plan, and set out to undertake social services using its powers of resource distribution. A series of special laws were introduced to organize and foster state-oriented social movements through which state-controlled resources were distributed.5 Organizations established under the special laws were given financial assistance for their government-registered activities, and enjoyed tax benefits and other privileges. These groups were generally termed kwanbyeon danche (government-related organizations). The long-term top-down flows of benefits produced corrupt and collusive ties between the government and its beneficiaries. This facilitated the maintenance of po wer by the elite groups. In the meantime private social groups were only able to survive in some niches of society, a society almost completely organized by the kwanbyeon danche. But the government wanted to control even these niche groups. The Law Regarding Registration of Social Organizations was drastically revised in 1963, in an attempt to maintain social order after transferring power to civil © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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administration. Under this law, every social group was required to register its title, articles of association, regulations, location, names and addresses of representatives and other officers, date of founding, and number of members with the supervisory agency within ten days after its founding. Until its abolition in 1994, this system enabled the central government to control all social groups in a unified way. But registration was only a means for control; re gistered groups were not rewarded with any assistance for their acti vities. Moreover, given that the penalty for failing to register was a relatively small fine, it is questionable whether the government was able to control and monitor social groups using it. Under the Park government, which sought to monopolize development and social services through the unified management of resources, there was indeed little space in which autonomous social groups could operate.6 Chun Doo-hwan Period (1980–87): Restoration of Authoritarian Regime and the Activation of Democratic Groups Resisting the State

The Chun Doo-hwan government came into being as the result of military intervention during the democratization movement that sprang up following the assassination of Park Chung-hee. It was in this period that public criticism gradually gained ground against the type of regime in which major government posts were occupied by ex-military men and basic human rights and people’s political participation were suppressed in the name of national security and development (Isozaki 1998, pp. 267–74) partly because economic growth had signif icantly transformed South K orea’s social structure, with the middle class growing rapidly. Also, as industrialization proceeded rapidly, new issues surfaced, such as the environment, consumer protection, and problems related to women’s participation in social activities. This led to the emer gence and g rowth of social g roups concerned with these issues. In the face of this situation, the government organized semigovernmental organizations to provide help to these social groups, with a view to placing the organizations under the government umbrella.7 However, many of them chose to stay independent from the state and intensified their activities. The orientation of social groups towards autonomous activities led to demands for the democratization of the regime that was repressing them. Not only did they call for the right of autonomous activities, they also integrated their respective goals of group action into an overall goal: overthrow of the undemocratic political regime. Social groups working in a broad range of areas, such as culture, media, women, environment, © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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farming, labour, and youth, organized themselves into coalitions in eac h area and demanded democratization. Environmental groups, for instance, found the cause for environmental disruption in “the monopoly chaebol (business conglomerate) groups that pursued profit alone and the military regime and the United States that protected them”.8 With this recognition, they regarded themselves as an inte gral part of the lar ger movement to transform the ruling regime. Groups promoting the w omen’s movement asserted that the social contradictions in which women were oppressed resulted from “the division of the nation by external forces and the violation of human rights and imposition of people-oppressing economic policies by the military dictatorship”.9 They shared as their inte grated goal women’s liberation, the democr atization and the autonomization of society . They understood that their particular problems all originated in the unitary state control of politics, the economy, and society. These groups neglected their legal obligation of registration. However, the government did not repress them because the y were not registered. The government wanted registration only of those groups that it could control. As for “anti-government” groups that did not fall into this category, the government policy was to repress them in reference to their contents of activities on grounds of public order, invoking against them the National Security Law and the laws regarding assembly and demonstration. Roh Tae-woo Period (1988–92): Regime Change and the Emergence of Citizens’ Movements

The national movement for democratization reached a climax in 1987, and succeeded in wresting a declaration of democratization from the authoritarian regime. This ushered in a process of democra tic transition. However, problems remained. Outstanding among them were those caused by development from above, such as issues of government–business collusion, concentration of economic powers in the hands of the chaebol (South Korea’s huge f amily-owned and f amily-managed business conglomerates), and environmental destruction. Roh Tae-woo, who won the 1987 presidential election as the ruling party’s candidate, was a former general and his g overnment had continuity with his predecessor . Some extremist movements also emerged, demanding a radical change of regime. The South Korean society was plagued by uncertainties and volatilities which necessarily accompany transition. In this situation, new groups came into being seeking to resolve problems in new ways corresponding to a regime change. Calling themselves citizens’ movements, they: (1) shifted the movement goal from illegal transformation © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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to reform through democratic procedures and dialogue; (2) set the public good as the goal of their movements; and (3) declared that they would work on issues of everyday life, such as fair distribution, land, housing, education, and the environment. Acting as voices for citizens w ho wanted to straighten out various socio-economic problems that were plaguing them, these groups began to advocate policy alternatives. As the political par ty channels for carrying demands from civil society into the political realm were not fully functional, these groups began to play an increasingly important role and grew rapidly in the 1990s. With the advent and growth of citizens’ movements, the term “NGO” came into wide circulation. Citizens’ movement groups then came to be seen as NGOs. They grew into comprehensive NGOs that dealt with a broad range of social problems, acting as channels through which demands from civil society were brought into the arena of politics.10 Under this new situation, some of the movement groups that had been organized in the 1980s c hanged their policies. Some en vironmental and women’s movements, which had or iginally identified with re gimetransforming movements, changed their stances and began to set concrete goals for reform. They became issue-based en vironmental and women’s NGOs, devoted to the resolution of their respective specific issues.11 NGO activities blossomed. These groups conducted advocacy activities from outside the constitutionalized political system, in order to rectify the various defects of the state-led systems of development, distribution, and social control through constitutional measures and ne w legislation. They were organized mainly by white-collar workers, while their policies were formulated by reform-oriented professors, lawyers, and foreign-educated middle class intellectuals. The legwork was done by young people from the student movement in the 1980s.

CURRENT STATUS OF THE STATE–NGO RELATIONSHIP NGOs in the 1990s

As stated earlier, in the transitional period the mode of existence of NGOs was largely determined by the authoritarian ruling structure and the mode of transition. Let us now examine the characteristics that NGOs acquired in the stage of democratic consolidation. Democratic reforms were acceler ated under the Kim Young-sam administration (1993–97), the first civilian government in thirty years, and the Kim Dae-jung government (1998–) that was inaugurated through electoral change. In this process the NGO–state relationship underwent rapid change. The following factors defined the change in the relationship. © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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First, serious socio-economic problems that were crying for solution had been carried over from the previous period, while the changes in the political system which were required to solve these problems were slow to come. As mentioned earlier, one of the most serious issues of public concern was the economic injustice resulting from the state-led and chaebol-centred development pattern entr enched over the preceding decades. While the rectification of such injustices needed to be carried out through legislation, the system of parliamentary politics, which was vested with legislative powers, remained dysfunctional. New political forces that were pressing for solutions were not able to enter into the arena of party politics.12 Under these circumstances, it was NGOs that took the role of placing pressure on political decision-making processes from outside the institutionalized political system in order to resolve the critical socio-economic problems. Secondly, beginning in the Kim Young-sam period, the presidential office and the parliament became involved in a twisted relationship. Under the authoritarian regime, Kim Young-sam had stood on the side of democr atic forces, acting as an opposition leader . However, he and his party joined the ruling party in 1990, and Kim himself, running as the r uling party’s presidential candidate, was elected. However, his position within the r uling party was weak, as a lar ge number of members had come from Chun Doo-hwan’s party. For this reason, Kim often bypassed the National Assembly and parties and sought support directly from the people in order to implement “policies demanded by the people”. In this process NGOs began to carry great weight as partner s of the go vernment in pr omoting reform policies. This relationship was continued to the Kim Dae-jung government. The opposition party (the ruling party of the previous government) has great strength in the National Assembly, and the coalition partner of Kim Dae-jung’ s party is the very conservative political force that or iginated in Park Chung-hee’s party. Under these cir cumstances, Kim Dae-jung de veloped a pr esidential officecentred political style, claiming that his is a “people’s government”, exercising its power with NGOs as partners. In this setting NGO–state relationship and NGO activities developed the following characteristics. First, the NGOs adopted the strategy of putting pressure on the government, with the backing of public opinion, to resolv e socio-economic issues. They mobilized the media on specific issues, prepared alternative plans, and pressed the government to adopt them. The media also took an interest in, and actively reported on, these moves by NGOs. NGOs emerged as a visible political power. On important issues, they formed coalitions to maximize their power. However, this approach of attempting to achieve reform in partnership with the presidential office generated a new problem — NGOs became too © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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close to the government. Criticism was increasingly directed against large NGOs which, critics said, were “managed without the presence of citizens”. We will retur n to this topic later . Generally speaking, NGOs had to ask themselves the question of what their correct relationship with the state and their role in civil society ought to be. In the meantime, tiny grass-roots-oriented NGOs working with local communities began to proliferate, expanding the margins of the NGO world. NGO Surveys

Are the above characteristics of NGOs confirmed by survey data? Let us look at the Directory of Korean NGOs 1997 (Hanguk minkandanche chongnam 1997) published in December 1996 and the 2000 Directory of Korean NGOs (2000 Hanguk minkandanche chongnam) published in October 1999.13 Though not all the groups listed are NGOs, some trends can be shown by analysing the directories. The first directory, which is based on a 1996 survey, lists 9,468 groups, with 3,899 entered as head of fices and 5,569 as branc hes. Removing academic societies and overseas organizations from the head offices, 2,914 groups fall under the purview of our analysis (T able 15.1). They are broken down by founding purpose into 1,066 (36.6 per cent) working for the public good, 643 (22 per cent) for the mutual benefit of their members, and 1,205 (41.4 per cent) with unclassifiable purposes. The activity areas for groups in the first category are divided into “citizens, women, and youth” (approximately 100 per cent), “human rights, farmers, fishing people, urban poor, and the environment” (over 80 per cent). Of the groups involved in health and medical care, all were organizations of professionals working for the mutual benefit of their members, and roughly half of the groups in welf are were difficult to classify. These figures show that in terms of numbers, NGOs are concentrated in activity areas involving citizens, women, youth, human rights, farmers, fishermen, the environment, and welfare. Of all the head of fices, 56 per cent w ere established in or after 1987, with more than 80 per cent of the head offices of youth, environmental, and human rights groups being set up in the same period. The number of NGOs apparently began to increase after the change of regime.14 Of the head offices, 69 per cent are located in Seoul, indicating that NGOs tend to be centralized. Ho wever, youth, peasant, welfare, and environmental groups are more decentralized. As for the contents of activities, mass education predominates in the programmes of the groups concerned with the poor, youth, women, the environment, and welfare, while groups concerned with the environment, citizens, and daily living matters place their emphasis on public © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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TABLE 15.1 Social Groups by Activity, 1996 Category

Subcategory

Politics

National reunification Politics, administration, laws Citizens Labour Farmers and fishermen Urban poor Women Youth Health and medical care Welfare Voluntary services Daily living, consumers Human rights Environment Education Media/publications Culture and arts Sports, leisure Religion Academic fields Economy International Fellowship, hobbies

Society

Society

Education and culture

Religion Academic fields Economy International Others Total

Number of Groups 107 17 212 129 40 25 136 75 104 316 44 58 52 123 83 63 305 82 313 47 499 50 34 2,914

Subtotal

Share (%)

124

4.3

617

21.2

697

23.9

533

18.3

313 47 499 50 34

10.7 1.6 17.1 1.7 1.2

2,914

100.0

Source: Compiled by the author from Citizen Times (1996).

campaigns. They make policy proposals using research, and offer counselling services on women’s affairs and welfare. The 1999 survey listed more than 20,000 groups, including 6,159 head offices, a signal increase from three years before. Excluding academic and international groups, there w ere 4,023 head of fices (Table 15.2), with 54.6 per cent of them located in Seoul.Though the share of the Seoul-based groups fell, the rate of centralization was still high. Groups concerned with local autonomy, the en vironment, civil society, labour, farmers, and fishermen were relatively evenly dispersed throughout the country. Groups concerned with local autonomy and the environment were smaller in terms © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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TABLE 15.2 Social Groups by Activity, 1999 Category

Subcategory

Civil society

Civil society in general Women Youth and students Laws, administration, politics Human rights Peace and reunification Consumers Local autonomy, urban poor Social welfare Health and medical care Volunteer activities, relief Environment Culture and arts Media/publications Sports, leisure Education Academy Religion Labour Farmers and fishermen Economy International Fellowship, hobbies

Local autonomy Social services

Environment Culture

Education and academy Religion Labour, farmers, fishermen Economy International Others Total

Number of Groups

Subtotal

Share (%)

317 265 77 34 75 115 130 222 493 121 129 287 399 146 89 146 89 107 143 74 501 44 20

1,013

25.2

222 743

5.5 18.5

287 634

7.1 15.8

235

5.8

107 217

2.7 5.4

501 44 20

12.5 1.1 0.5

4,023

4,023

100.0

Sources: Cho Hee-yeon (1999, p. 20); Citizens’Movement Communication Center (1999).

of membership and budgets than others. Comparing the subcategories in Table 15.1 and Table 15.2,15 we notice that the number of groups concerned with civil society, women, the environment, and voluntary services, which are classifiable as NGOs, increased compared to three y ears earlier. The rapid increase in the number of groups concerned with local autonomy and the poor was obviously a reflection of the progress of decentralization since the middle of the 1990s as seen in the introduction of local government systems, under which local assembly elections were held. Table 15.3 shows in chronological order the dates of founding of the social groups listed in the 2000 Directory of Korean NGOs by category. It © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

© 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

6.6 13.0 80.4

0 2.1 98.0

5.7 14.1 80.2 0.4 3.5 96.1

Environment 7.8 18.1 74.1

Culture 4.3 11.5 84.1

5.2 30.9 63.9

7.7 20.3 72.1

5.4 30.8 63.6

Labour, Education/ Farmers, Academy Religion Fishermen Economy

Source: Compiled from The Korean NGO Weekly–Citizen Times (Siminui Sinmun), 18 October 1999, p. 5

1950s and earlier 1960s–1970s 1980s–1990s

Period

Civil Local Social Society Autonomy Services

Category

7.2 42.8 50.0

International

TABLE 15.3 Distribution of Existing Non-profit Social Groups by Date of Founding and Category, 1999 (In percentages)

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indicates that there was a rush of establishment of social groups in and after the 1980s. These data confirm the characteristics of NGOs as discussed in the earlier section. Legal Systems Related to NGOs

NGOs have been working to carry out institutional reforms in order to consolidate democracy; the legal systems related to NGOs have also undergone changes under this climate. In the following section, we will examine how the systems have been modified. The issues that the NGOs wanted the government to address were as follows: (1) changing or abolishing the NGO regulating systems created under the authoritarian regime, which obstructed the autonomous activities of NGOs; (2) changing or abolishing systems that provided benefits and privileges exclusively to government-related organizations;16 and (3) introducing new systems to facilitate NGO activities. With regard to issue (1), the la w concerning re gistration of social organizations became an object of public censure. Most NGOs which were active in the 1990s remained unregistered because they were critical of this law itself.17 The government, in the meantime, be gan to treat these unregistered NGOs as partners. This made the regulatory law meaningless. It was finally abolished in 1997, as a means to “ensure that social groups have more autonomy in their activities”. The law prohibiting the collection of contributions was also criticized, and was revised in 1995 into the Law to Regulate Collection of Contrib utions. The revised law, however, still limits the collection of donations through strict contribution collection procedures and regulations on the uses of collected funds. NGOs are strongly demanding that the law be simply abolished. As to issue (2), special laws that created the legal grounds for governmentrelated organizations became an issue of controversy. Criticism rose against the system that imparted various privileges to government-related organizations out of political consideration. NGOs demanded that the special laws be abolished and that the government-related organizations be turned into ordinary organizations. But strong resistance was raised, as this measure would have deprived them of their privileges. The laws are still in place. Instead of implementing any fundamental solution, the government tried to strengthen its partnership with NGOs by proposing a compromise plan. In March 1999 the Ministry of Government Administration of the Kim Dae-jung government announced tha t the official subsidies, which hitherto had been distributed solely to government-related organizations, would be provided to other groups as well. In accor dance with this polic y, the ministry recruited © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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public service corporations as recipients for official subsidies. However, in the process of screening it w as revealed that government-related organizations were still being preferentially treated. Some subsidies were also being inappropriately granted, as the government lacked adequate knowledge about the recipients.18 The issue became controversial. As a result, the focus shifted to issue (3), namely the introduction of a new system. Finally, a law to support non-profit civic organizations was enacted and enforced in Jan uary 2000. This law specifies the contents of support to non-profit organizations and r equires that applicant g roups register with government agencies. The reaction of NGOs to this la w will be explained later. The law defines non-profit civic organizations as groups that satisfy the following requirements: (1) their beneficiaries are multiple and unspecified persons; (2) benefits are not divided among their members; (3) they do not support a specific political party or parties or religion; (4) they have 100 or more constant members; (5) they have a record of public service activities of more than one year; and (6) if they are not incorporated, they have a representative or manager. The law also provides (1) that non-profit groups hoping to get government support should apply for registration with the relevant administrative agencies; (2) applications for registration be accepted if the applying groups satisfy the requirements as non-profit organizations; (3) that the registered groups can apply for governmental public activity promotion subsidies; and (4) that these groups be accorded preferential tax treatment and the use of postal services at special low fees. Relatively severe penalties can be meted out to groups that receive subsidies after registering using false information. Under this law, preferential trea tment is accorded to NGOs pro vided that they satisfy certain minimum requirements.This signifies a fairly large institutional change. Present Status of the State–NGO Relationship and Its Future

How, then, is the actual relationship between the state and NGOs changing in the wake of the above institutional changes? As was mentioned earlier, South Korean NGOs are conducting vigorous advocacy activities. The main features of their advocacy work are as follows: (1) they raise issues through the media, rally public opinion around themselves, and bring pressure to bear on the government to change its policies; (2) while criticizing existing policies, they propose alternative policies; and (3) they hold policy consultations, and otherwise participate in policy discussions, with the go vernment. The most typical example of © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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this type of activity was the successful campaign launched in 1989 by the Citizens’ Coalition for Economic Justice (CCEJ) (see note 10) for the introduction of the “financial real-name system, which required the use of a ‘real-name’ to open a bank account, a measure taken to prevent the concealing of wealth and tax evasion”. CCEJ raised public awareness on the matter through various campaigns, proposed a new system, and lobbied the government to adopt it. The Kim Young-sam government, when it came to power in 1993, decided to adopt the highly popular CCEJ proposal and enforced it in a surprise move, bypassing the conservative parliament. The decision was sent into force as an extraordinary presidential decree (Park and Yoon 1997, p. 145). Since that time the social influence of NGOs has risen and their role in policy-making increased. Under their influence, a series of laws pressed by women’s groups w as enforced, including a special la w against se xual violence and a law for the prevention of domestic violence. Similar ly, in June 2000 the Dong River Dam project in Kangwon Province, once approved by the Ministry of Construction andTransportation, was cancelled when environmental NGOs effectively opposed it with the co-operation of the Ministry of Environment. In pace with this, the Presidential Of fice began to appoint a number of NGO leaders to be of ficials. A professor who headed CCEJ’ s policy advocacy group was appointed chief secretary of the presidential secretariat. Following this, NGO intellectuals were brought into the government one after another, as presidential aides. They joined go vernment offices as individuals after quitting their NGO posts. Nevertheless, their personal participation in government offices affected the positions of the NGOs they had belonged to. Critics say that their participation in the government is prejudicial to the autonomy of NGOs.The negative side of this phenomenon came to the fore par ticularly towards the end of the Kim Young-sam government, and stimulated self-reflection among the NGOs about their roles.19 For years, many NGOs had been calling for the right to conduct autonomous activities, criticizing and monitoring government action. They have reason to be wary of government control and intervention. Many NGOs found the go vernment’s offer of financial support highly controversial. In 1999 the government began to provide subsidies to NGOs on the basis of open in vitation. The pros and cons of acce pting aid were debated among NGOs.20 Critics argued that: (1) the administration’s financial support, coupled with the continued regulation of autonomous finances through the Prohibition Law against Collection of Contributions was another form of government control over NGOs; and (2) the government, if it really wanted to support autonomous NGOs, should do so by indirect means such © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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as tax pri vileges, and by abolishing the prohibition la w. Proponents responded that: (1) it was legitimate for NGOs to use tax revenue to finance activities for the public good; and (2) there would be no problem as long as the subsidized NGOs safeguarded their autonomy and kept their finances transparent. In fact, when applicants were invited, many NGOs that had been critical of government policies sent in applications. NGOs continue to suffer from financial difficulties despite their increasing social influence. Some applied for official subsidies because of financial tightness. As shown in this process, at the time of the institutional reform to consolidate democracy, the debate o ver government subsidies re volved around maintaining a balance between two factors — government control and the autonomy of NGOs. The law to support non-profit organizations that finally went into force reflects a compromise between the two conflicting factors. It combines direct and indirect support. It requires that social groups wishing to obtain direct support be registered with the government. However, it was pointed out right from the be ginning of the debate that the law could become a means of government control over NGOs, depending on its implementation. Critics on the other side point to the absence of mechanisms to monitor the utilization and ef ficacy of the subsidies. The law’s implementation process will require further observation. In any case, at present NGOs are anxious to engage in policy-making and to improve the legal institutions by intervening in the political process from outside the institutionalized political system in order to resolve the socio-economic problems carried over from the authoritarian regimes. The government, for its part, wishes to utilize the influence of NGOs for its own purposes. Generally speaking, the state–NGO relationship has been reshaped from the erstwhile pattern of “regulation and resistance” into “collaboration in areas of shared aims”. But what shape this new relationship will eventually take is still an open question. Remnants of old institutions from the previous regime remain while groups adhering to vested interests are firmly rooted in society. There may be more twists and turns before a stable relationship is established between the state and NGOs. CONCLUSION

As seen above, the areas of activities and functions of South Korean NGOs have been largely determined by the mode of rule of the government. Under the authoritarian regimes, the state unitarily managed all resources and controlled political, economic, and social activities. While regulating social groups using various legal measures, the state itself organized social movements © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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to provide social services. Under these circumstances, NGOs had an extremely narrow space of activities. Nor was any clear social demand voiced for their services. However, as the regime’s rule grew longer, criticism grew. Critics denounced it for repressing basic human rights under the pretext of economic development and national security. In this pr ocess they exposed a pa ttern of resource distribution for development from above, which catered to the needs of the chaebol. Also criticized w as the unf air distribution of resources thr ough government-related organizations. Critics pointed out that it was merely being used as an instrument for the preservation of the regime. In the second half of the 1980s, all these problems came together to generate popular demand for democratization. At that time social gr oups tackling women’s problems, the environment, and other specific issues all identified with the regimetransforming movement. Because the state totally controlled political, economic, and social affairs, they argued, everything boiled down to changing the mode of being of the state, or more specifically, to changing the regime. Once the government began to introduce a democratic institution in the 1990s, NGOs began, understandably, to switch their goal from drastic change of regime to incremental reforms through democratic procedures and discussion. In this change of policy, NGOs wanted to get laws enacted in order to resolve socio-economic problems such as the concentration of power in the hands of the chaebol and the unfair distribution of resources. Structural socio-economic ills, they thought, needed to be rectified through the coercive power of laws. Institutions that supported the authoritarian regime simply needed to be abolished. This was only f easible through legal measures under democracy. Laws were also needed to rectify unfair practices that solely benefited groups with a stake in the existing system. Though this was the NGOs’understanding, political parties were unable to gather together diverse societal demands and interests, and the legislature was far from acting in response to demands from society. Given this situation, NGOs opted for the path of cr eating public opinion in their favour, with the help of the mass media. With the backing of media support, they hoped to bring pressure to bear on the g overnment. This was how advocacy-centred general-issue NGOs emerged and became dominant in South Korea. In this sense, the mode of democratic transition defined the characteristics of NGOs in South Korea. Since the Kim Young-sam period, the presidents ha ve consistently been trying to turn NGOs into partners to facilitate their quests for popular support in continuation of the democratic reform. NGOs, for their part, while maintaining a vigilant eye on the government, have showed a readiness to co-operate with the government for the sake of participation in the © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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policy-making processes. Their influence expanded in this process. 21 But this same process became problematic in that it brought NGOs too close to the powers that be, hindering their autonomy. NGOs are now groping for a role in society and proper attitudes to take in relating to the state. Even after the change of regime, NGOs in South Korea have continued to engage mainly in policy advocacy work directed towards the central government. This is because: (1) party politics are still dysfunctional; (2) the central government has vast powers; and (3) the pattern of NGO behaviour shaped in response to strong government control still persists through inertia. However, the highly centralized mode of the sta te is now changing. NGOs are be ginning to w ork energetically on the par liament and political parties in their advocacy work. Also, as shown by the data we examined, NGO activities are being decentralized, from Seoul towards local communities. We need to look carefully at whether the action pa tterns, action areas, and functions of NGOs are changing as well. While much has been said about the tremendous influence that NGOs wield, it should be pointed out that as entities they are not adequately equipped to substantiate this influence. They are still far from the ideal situation they envision — where numerous citizens participate in their activities on a constant basis, paying membership dues that will give them a solid financial base. Though they are often called the fifth power, they are relying on unstable and volatile public opinion to exercise this power. The NGOs themselves are still unstable entities. While NGOs grope for a solid activity basis 22 as the state modifies its mode of governance, the state–NGO relationship is in a process of dynamic change. True, NGOs have come to exert great influence. But it remains to be seen how they will reconceptualize their relationship with the state and what role they will play in society in the future. Notes 1

2

3

4

The term “NGO” came into general use only in the middle of the 1990s. Formerly they were called “social groups” or “citizens’ groups”. On the concepts of democratic transition and consolidation, see Diamond and Shin (1999) and Diamond and Kim (2000). We should have examined social groups set up during the aJpanese colonial period (for example, the Young Men’s Christian Association [YMCA], set up in 1903) in terms of their experiences under Japanese rule and their influence on later activities, but could not do so due to space limitations. This law prohibits soliciting donations “except in special cases approved by the Minister of Home Affairs”. This system effectively worked to

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6

7

8

9

10

11

305

undercut the flow of funds to autonomous social organizations. Details of the changes of related laws are from History of the Enactment, Amendments and Repeals of Statutes. Various organizations were spawned by special laws sponsored by the government. The archetypal movement created in this manner was Semaeul Undong (New Village Movement). It was a rural community modernization movement, established in the 1970s, with the Ministr y of Home Affairs taking the lead. Headquartered in Seoul, the movement was promoted in localities by the local administrative agencies’ Semaeul sections. Local administrative agencies appointed village-level Semaeul movement leaders. Village communities were organized around these leaders to conduct various government-subsidized local projects such as agricultural road construction, housing, water and sewage system building, and the introduction of new breeds of rice (Ministry of Home Affairs 1984). The space for autonomous activities by social groups was made even narrower under theYusin regime (1972–79), which imparted strengthened powers to the president. Religious groups, which had a relatively larger social space than others at that time, came to the fore in promoting democratization, with an emphasis on human rights. Responses were made in the areas of women, consumers, and the environment (Lee 1995, p. 163). These responses laid the basis for the quick decisions for co-operation with social groups that came soon after the change of regime. The founding declaration of the K orean Anti-Pollution Movement Association (KAPMA), a coalition of environmental groups founded in the middle of the 1980s. This declaration typifies the perception shared by environmental groups in the 1980s. The founding statement of the K orea Women’s Associations United (KWAU), which w as founded by w omen’s groups that had acti vely participated in the democratization movement of the 1980s. The pioneering organization symbolic of this new trend was the Citizens’ Coalition for Economic Justice (CCEJ). It was inaugurated in 1989, with 500 members, for the fair distribution of economic gains and the elimination of corr uption. It gr ew rapidly, reaching 25,000 members and forty-three branches by 1997. In this period it enlarged the scope of its activities to all problems related to citizens’ everyday lives. For instance, KAPMA, which had aimed to achieve a regime transformation, was reorganized into the Korean Federation for Environmental Movement (KFEM) with a newly defined goal. KFEM stated its goal as follows: “eradicating all environmental disruptions and pollution in everyday life and turning our own living space into a healthy space by developing new

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12

13

14

15

16

17

18

NORIYO ISOZAKI

environment awareness and practices”. KWAU also stated that it w ould work for the esta blishment of a system to guar antee women’s rights. It began to tackle the task of amending existing laws and making new laws related to women. These two organizations are coalitions of groups working all over the country (Yu 1999, pp. 12–17). After the Declaration on Democratization was issued, political parties were reorganized centred on specific politicians, each representing the interests of his region’s constituency. This served to politicize regional sentiments. This political practice, in which electoral and party politics revolved around regional antagonisms, lasted even into the 1990s. The former was produced and published by the newspaper organization that publishes The Korean NGO Weekly – Citiz ens Times (Siminui Sinmun), and the latter by the Citizens’ Movement Communication Center (CMCC), a research gr oup from The Korean NGO Weekly. The surveys covered all non-profit groups in various areas, including government-related groups. The analysis of the data contained in the 1997 directory is from reports of The Korean NGO Weekly – Citizens Times, 2, 9, and 16 December 1996 and that of the data in the 2000 directory is from the same weekly newspaper, 18 October 1999 and Cho Hee-yeon (1999). Tsujinaka Lee, and Yeon (1998) says that the number of non-profit groups trebled, most of them NGOs, from 1991 through 1996. The two directories categorized religious groups differently. The 1997 edition classified as religious groups all groups which were religious even when they were conducting activities in areas other than religion, but the 2000 edition categorized them basically in accordance with the non-religious activities they were conducting. The New Village Movement (Semaeul Undong), the Right Lif e Movement Council, and the Korean Federation of Freedom, all of which received large government subsidies, w ere known as the three major government-related organizations. The data of major non-registered organizations (compiled by the First Minister of State f or Political Affairs’ Office) enumerated 115 groups identified by the government as of April 1993. This list includes CCEJ, KFEM, KWAU, YMCA, and most of the ci vic groups that have broad social influence (Ahn 1995, pp.128–29). Groups eligible for public subsidies are defined as private ones having formal organizational forms and engaged in non-profit activities (with 100 or more member s, with an acti vity record of one year or long er, registered or not registered). A total of 316 groups applied for subsidies

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19

20

21

22

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to undertake 344 national projects. Of these, 159 groups were subsidized, for 219 projects. More than 40 per cent of the subsidies went to the three major government-related organizations. The final period of Pr esident Kim Young-sam’s rule lacked the initial steam of reform. Scandals involving politician–business collusion also surfaced. CCEJ, which was known to be very close to the government, was suspected of holding back from thorough investigation into corruption cases; this invited popular distrust. This case gave NGOs an opportunity to review their relationships with the government and with the people. As a mo ve to clear the air , the P eople’s Solidarity for Participatory Democracy (PSPD) w as founded in 1994. Through its down-to-earth activities and achievements, this group became one of the leading NGOs by the end of the 1990s. On the controversy over government subsidies, see Chamyeosahoe [Participatory Society], June 1999 (pp. 28–29) and September 1999 (pp. 34–35); Kim Kwang-sik (1999, pp. 112–14); and Yu (1999, pp. 24–26). However, stable channels for political participation and po wers given to NGOs are still to be established. Im Seung-bin (1998, pp. 104–6) analyses the actual state of NGO participation in government committees. The Internet is being ef fectively used to consolidate the basis for movements. CMCC’s website allows free access to an NGO da tabase, and contains links to the various groups. On this website, information about NGOs is disclosed, and citizens can directly access it. This service is influencing NGOs’ forms and the contents of their activities.

References

Ahn Byung-joon, ed. Kukka, simin sahoe, jeoengchi minjuhwa [The state, civil society, and political democratization]. Seoul: Hanul, 1995. Cho Dae-yop. Hangukui siminundong – Jeohanggwa chamyeoui donghak [Social movements in Korea: The politics of protest and participation]. Seoul: Nanam, 1999. Cho Hee-yeon. “Tonggyero bon hanguk simindanche hyeonjuso” [The present state of Korean NGOs judged by the statistical data]. Chamyeosahoe [Participatory Society], December 1999, pp. 20–21. Choi Jang-jip. “Hangukui minjuhwa, siminsahoe, siminundong” [Democratization, civil society, and citizens’movement in South Korea]. Jeongchibipyeong [Political Review], Spring 2000, pp. 158–84. Choi Jang-jip and Lim Hyun-chin, eds. Siminsahoeui dojeon — Hanguk minjuhwawa kukka jabon nodong [The challenge from civil society: © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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State, capital, and labour in the democratization of South Korea]. Seoul: Sahoebipyeongsa, 1993. ——— . Hanguksahoewa minjujuui — Hangukminjuhwa 10nyeonui pyeonggawa panseong [Korean society and democracy: Assessments and prospects of ten years of democratization in Korea]. Seoul: Nanam, 1997. Citizen Times. Directory of K orean NGOs 1997 (in K orean). Seoul: Siminuisinmunsa [Citizen Times], 1996. Citizens’ Movement Communication Center. 2000 Directory of Korean NGOs (in Korean). Seoul: Siminundong-jeongbosenteo [Citizens’ Movement Communication Center], 1999. Dalton, Bronwen and James Cotton. “New Social Movements and the Changing Nature of Political Opposition in South Korea”. In Political Oppositions in Industrialising Asia, edited by Garry Rodan, pp. 282–99. London and New York: Routledge, 1996. Diamond, Larry and Kim Byung-Kook, eds. Consolidating Democracy in South Korea. Boulder: Lynne Rienner Publishers, 2000. Diamond, Larry and Doh Chull Shin, eds.Institutional Reform and Democratic Consolidation in Korea. Stanford: Hoover Institution Press, 1999. Eder, Norman. Poisoned Prosperity: Development, Modernization, and the Environment in South Korea. New York: M.E. Sharpe, Inc., 1996. Han Sang-Jin. “The Public Sphere and Democracy in Korea — A Debate on Civil Society”. Korean Journal 37, no. 4 (Winter 1997): 78–97. Im Seung-bin. Haengjeonggwa NGOganui neteuwokeu guchuke kwanhan yeongu [A study on networking public administration and NGOs]. Seoul: Hangukhaenjeongyeonguwon [Korea Institute of Public Administration], 1998. Institute for Participatory Society. Hanguksiminundong, 21segi daeaneul chaja [Korean social movements — In search of the alternatives for 21 century]. Seoul: Chamyeosahoeyeonguso [Institute for Participatory Society], 1999. ——— . Siminsahoeui seongjanggwa siminsahoe undong[The development of civil society and the movements of civil society]. Seoul: Chamyeosahoeyeonguso [Institute for Participatory Society], 2000. Isozaki, Noriyo. “Kaiha tsunniyoru Aidentitito kachikanno henyou — Kankokuno Uekarano kaihatsutno shintento syakai ishikino henka” [The transformation of the identity and sense of values according to the development: Progress of the “Development from above” and the change of social attitude in South Korea]. In Iwanami Kouza Kaihatsuto Bunka 4; Kaihatusuto Minzoku Mondai [Iwanami lectures: Development and culture 4], edited by Kawada Junzo et al., pp. 257–82. Tokyo: Iwanamishoten, 1998. © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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Isozaki, Noriyo. “Kankoku — Adobokasi chusinno minsyuka dantai” [Korea — Advocacy group for democratization]. In Ajiano kokkato NGO [State and NGO in Asia], edited b y Shinichi Shigetomi, pp. 354–79. Tokyo: Akashisyoten, 2001. Ju Seong-su and Jeong-il Nam. Jeongbuwa je3sekta pateuneosip [Government–third sector partnership]. Seoul: Hanyangdaehakkyo chulpanbu [Hanyang University Press], 1999. Kim Kwang-sik. Hanguk NGO [NGO in South Korea]. Seoul: Dongmyeongsa, 1999. Kim Jin-su. Gongikbeobine taehan kwasejedoui kaeseonpanghyang [A course for reforming the taxation system on public benefit corporations]. Seoul: Korea Institute of Public Finance, 1996. Kim Nyeong. Hangukjeongchiwa Kyohoe — Kukka Kalteung [Korean politics and church-state conflicts]. Seoul: Sonamu, 1996. Kim Sun-hyuk. “Civil Society in South Korea: From Grand Democracy Movements to Petty Interest Groups?” Journal of Northeast Asian Studies 15, no. 2 (Summer 1996a): 81–97. ——— . “From Resistance to Representation: Civil Society in South Korean Democratization”. Ph.D. dissertation, Stanford University, 1996b. Kim Yeong-ne. Hangukiikjipdankwa minjujeongpaljeon [Interest groups and development of democracy in South Korea]. Seoul: Daewangsa, 1990. ——— , ed. Iikjpdanjeongchiwa iikkalteung [Interest group politics and interest conflicts]. Seoul: Hanul, 1997. Korean Legislation Research Institute. History of the Enactment, Amendments and Repeals of Statutes (in Korean). 32 vols. Seoul: Hanguk beopje yeonguwon [Korean Legislation Research Institute]. Ku Do-wan. Hanguk hwangyeong undongui sahoehak — J eonguiropko jisokkaneunghan sahoereol wihayeo [Sociology of en vironmental movement in South Korea — For the just and sustainable society]. Seoul: Munhakkwajiseongsa, 1996. Lee Hye-Kyung. “NGOs in Korea”. In Emerging Civil Society in the Asia Pacific Community, edited by Tadashi Yamamoto, pp. 161–64. Tokyo: Japan Center for International Exchange, 1995. Ministry of Home Affairs, Republic of Korea. Semaeul Undong [New Village Movement]. Seoul: Naemubu [Ministry of Home Affairs], 1984. Park Gil-sung and Yoon Sang-u. “Minjuhw awa sahoejedoui gaehyeok” [Democratization and the reform of social institution]. In Hanguksahoewa minjujuui — Hangukminjuhwa 10nyeonui pyeonggawa panseong [Korean society and democrac y: Assessments and pr ospects of ten years of democratization in Korea], edited by Choi Jang-jip and Lim Hyun-chin, pp. 137–73. Seoul: Nanam, 1997. © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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Seong Kyoung-Ryung. “Civil Society and Democratic Consolida tion in South K orea: Great Achievement and Remaining Problems”. In Consolidating Democracy in South Korea, edited by Larry Diamond and Kim Byung-Kook, pp. 87–109. Boulder: Lynne Rienner Publishers, 2000. Sohn Hak-Kyu. “Political Opposition and the Yushin Regime: Radicalisation in South Korea, 1972–79”. Ph.D. dissertation, University of Oxford, 1988. Tarrow, Sidney. Power in Movement: Social Movements and Contentious Politics. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998. Tsujinaka, Yutaka, Lee Chung-Hee, andYeom Jaeho. “Nikkan Rieki Dantai no Hikaku Bunseki: 1987nen Minsyuka igono Kankoku Dantai Joukyo to Seiji Taisei” [A comparative analysis of South Korean and Japanese interest associations: Korean civil society and its political regime since 1987]. Leviathan 23 (Spring 1998): pp.18–49. Yu Pal-mu. “Siminundongdanche(NGO)ui yeoksawa sahoejeok yeokhwal” [The history and social role of the citiz ens’ movement organization (NGO)]. Hankukui biyeongniyeongeyokkwa sahoepaljeon semina palpyomun [Paper for the seminar on Non-Profit Sector and Social Development in South Korea], 1999, Institute of East and West Studies at Yonsei University, Seoul. Yun Sang-cheol. 1980nyeonde hangukui minjuhwaihaengkwajeong [Process of democratic transition in 1980s South Korea]. Seoul: Seoul University Press, 1997. Related Websites Citizens’ Coalition for Economic Justice, Citizens’ Movement Communication Center, Korean Federation for Environmental Movement, Korea Women’s Associations United, People’s Solidarity for Participatory Democracy,

© 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

This chapter is reproduced from The State and NGOs: Perspective from Asia , edited by Shinichi Shigetomi (Singapore: Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, 2002). This version was obtained electronically direct from the publisher on condition th at copyright is not infringed. No part of this publication may be reproduced, translated, stored in a retrieval system, or transmi tted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies and Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo.

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16 Japan From Activist Groups to Management Organizations Katsuya Mochizuki INTRODUCTION

In the 1990s non-go vernmental organizations (NGOs) in Japan and the environment surrounding them underwent signif icant change. This happened because the diversification and segmentation of people’s needs encouraged the emergence of new entities to suppl y the necessary social services. In Japanese society in the past, most social services were provided through the bureaucracy of the centr al and local g overnments. However, the increase in the number of bureaucrats, or public servants, did not necessarily bring improved social services. On the contrary, the expansion of the bureaucracy brought with it various harmful effects. Consequently, people in search of more efficient social services turned to non-governmental entities. There is still a strong sentiment among the Japanese that it is a duty of the government to provide social services of a highly public nature. People requiring such services tend to object as taxpayers, file petitions, or start campaigns. Very few of them, ho wever, voluntarily develop activities or organizations to undertak e such social services. On the other hand, administrative authorities exercise powers over the provision of various social services, while controlling the entry in this area of private enterprises and other profit-seeking corporations. The government, on the contrary , established huge numbers of public-service corporations (koh’eki hohjin), often referred to as extra-governmental bodies (gaikaku dantai) under their regulations. Within their authority a myr iad of governmental permissions and approvals have been granted. Furthermore, they tried to create a nonprofit sector through administrative guidance. On this score, it is quite

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interesting to note that administrative authorities have launched public-service projects by soliciting capital subscriptions from private companies, and called the undertakings “third-sector” projects. Actually, the prevalent belief in Japan has been that the management of the socio-economic system is the responsibility of the government (the first sector) and private enterprises (the second sector). It was not until very recently that the non-profit sector (the third sector) gained recognition as an entity capable of making up for the insufficiencies of the first and second sectors. Particularly since the 1980s, the importance of organized citizens’ activities in supplementing the failure of government and failure of the market came to be widely recognized amid the expanding and diversifying needs for public services. Then, in the 1990s discussions began on the issue of institutional foundations for citizens’ activities. Thus, efforts from both the public and private sectors bore fruit at the end of 1998, in the form of the Law to Promote Specif ied Non-profit Activities (commonly kno wn as the NPO Law). CONCEPTS OF CITIZENS’ ACTIVITIES ORGANIZATIONS Economic Planning Agency’s Survey on Citizens’ Activities Organizations

The Basic Survey on Citizens’ Activities Organizations,1 conducted by the Economic Planning Agency (EPA), mentioned that there was no established definition of a citizens’ activities organization. The survey defined it as “an organization that undertakes social activities on a continual and voluntary basis, but not for profit, and yet is not a public-service corporation (an incorporated foundation or a corporate juridical person)”. An entity that undertakes social activities on a continual and voluntary basis, as described abo ve, means nothing b ut a cor porate body. In combination with the definition as being not for profit and not a publicservice corporation, the EPA’s definition can be interpreted as being nearly synonymous with non-profit corporation, or non-profit organization (NPO). The EPA’s definition seems to be roughly on a par with that of NPOs in wide use recently. In this conte xt it “is gi ven in a manner that denies or excludes something” (Yamauchi 1999, p. 24). At the time of the survey (the end of September 1996), there were a total of 85,786 citizens’ activities organizations on a list prepar ed by prefectural governments and other parties concerned at the request of the EPA. Of these

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96 per cent were private voluntary organizations. This also well represents the status of non-profit organizations before the enactment of the NPO Law.2 NIRA’s Research on Improvement of Infrastructure for Citizens’ Public-Interest Activities

The term “citizens’ public-interest activities”, as used in a research by the National Institute for Research Advancement (NIRA), is def ined as being “part of non-profit activities by the private sector, and among other things being independent public-interest activities participated in and supported by citizens, of their own free will” (NIRA 1994, p. 1). 3 These activities can be described as a social phenomenon that has emer ged extensively since the latter half of the 1980s. Focusing on the sphere of citizens’ activities in the private non-profit sector (the third sector), between the administrative sector (the first sector) and the private profit-making sector (the second sector), the portion of these citizens’ activities with a particularly strong nature of public interests are deemed citizens’ publicinterest activities, and groups that undertake these activities on a continual basis are called citizens’ public-interest activities organizations. However, recognizing that “judgements about whether certain activities are in the public interest or not may vary depending on the position of those making the judgement, or on a specific period of time, and therefore cannot be determined by any single benchmark” (NIRA 1994, p. 2), 4 the NIRA’s survey covered a broad range of citizens’activities organizations in general and used the term to descr ibe the activities of these or ganizations in the survey report. HISTORY OF CITIZENS’ ORGANIZATIONS The Early Years

According to the Basic Survey on Citizens’ Activities Organizations cited in the previous section, organizations that launched their activities in 1986 or later accounted for the largest percentage (44 per cent) of the total covered by the survey. Going back to the earlier years, 24 per cent began their activities in 1976–85 and 13 per cent in 1966–75. Looking at the start-up period b y field, quite a lot of the or ganizations that were established early began their activities in the field of education, culture, and sports. On the other hand, more than half of those in the fields

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of social welfare and international exchanges and co-operation were started in 1986 or later. Those in the categories of social welfare and international exchanges and co-operation contrasted sharply in terms of their organizational structures. The social welfare organizations engaged in such activities as welfare services for the elderly and the disabled made up the largest group in number, accounting for 37 per cent of those covered by the survey. A majority of them, however, had tenuous financial bases and also lack ed the sufficient conditions for established organizations in terms of of fice space, secretaria t staff, and membership. In contrast, many of those in the field of international exchanges and co-operation were well-tailored organizations, though their number w as still small, at only 5 per cent of the total. The number of social w elfare organizations grew conspicuously in the 1980s. Participatory groups providing home-based welfare services and citizens’ groups implementing services/projects such as small-scale workshops emerged from around 1980. They aimed at making up for the quantitative shortage and uniform standardization of public services, and have played a considerable role since then (Suwa 1999, p. 125).5 There were no particular incidents or legal changes that triggered the increase in these organizations, such as the introduction of the nursing care insurance system and a re vision in the Social Welfare Services La w. Rather, the increase was fuelled by growing social needs, and this may well explain the inadequate organization of these social welfare groups. Meanwhile, two trends account for the increase in international exchanges and co-operation organizations. In the area of international exchanges, as more individuals travelled overseas from the 1970s onward, and as government-initiated international exchanges became more developed, both individuals and organizations gradually began to broaden the scope of their activities. As for international co-operation, after people’s movements that had been active in the 1950s and the 1960s changed in response to international movements in the 1970s, a f irst wave of or ganizational launchings came around 1980. The areas of interna tional exchanges and international co-operation were actually linked, but developments in the latter offer an easier explanation for the organizing of citizens’ groups in relation to social and economic developments. Organizational Picture of International Co-operation Activities

The reason why we have chosen to focus on citizens’ organizations in the field of international co-operation is that there is a body with the mission to © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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promote networking among or ganizations in this cate gory: the Japanese NGO Center for International Cooperation (JANIC). The NGO Directory6 which the centre has been publishing regularly since its inception in 1987 makes it easy to follow the activities of major organizations in this field. Among Japanese citizens’ groups (NGOs) engaged in international co-operation listed in the NGO Directory, many which focus on international co-operation as their core activities were established in the 1960s.The Japan Overseas Christian Medical Cooperative Service (JOCS), one of the earliest establishments, was founded in 1960, and has remained active until today, after obtaining corporate status as a corporate juridical person.7 It is worth noting that not only JOCS, but also all of the major organizations established in the 1960s, obtained corporate status soon after their establishment.8 The 1970s were epoch-making in terms of the establishment of new organizations. First of all, Amnesty International, a renowned international human rights organization, set up a Ja pan Section in 1970. In 1972 the Help Bangladesh Committee (currently Shapla Neer-Citizens’ Committee in Japan for Overseas Support) was launched, at the initiative of volunteers who had gone to Bangladesh in 1971 immediately after the country’ s independence. It was the pioneer of citiz ens’ organizations supporting developing countries that had fallen into social and economic difficulties. An important benchmark came in 1979, when the problem of Indochinese refugees came to the fore. After that citizens’ organizations aimed at activist international co-operation came into being one after another, including the Association of Aid for Refugees (currently Association for Aid and Relief, Japan [AAR]), Sotoshu Council of Relief for Refug ees in Southeast Asia (currently the Shanti Volunteer Association [SVA]), and the J apan International Volunteer Center (JVC). With so man y new organizations created into the first half of the 1980s, this period became symbolized as “an era of quantitative expansion” (Association for Promotion of International Cooperation 1991, p. 28). The period from the latter half of the 1980s to the early 1990s turned out to be one of “qualitati ve transformation” for citizens’ organizations (Association for Promotion of International Cooperation 1991, pp. 32–34).9 The support phase shifted from emer gency relief to r econstruction and development, and people in developing countries began to have their own organizations. As a result, acti vist support organizations faced a turning point in their activities. On the domestic front, meanwhile , organizations emerged mainly engaged in areas of indirect co-opera tion (without field operations), such as development co-operation and the provision of information. The establishment of networking organizations such as JANIC © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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helped spread activities to local areas of the country, and also the number of advocacy-type organizations increased. There was a remarkable rise in the establishment of new organizations, demonstrating a type of NGO boom, as public interest in their activities increased in part due to expanded government subsidies, such as the creation of the subsidy system for NGO projects in 1989 and of the international volunteer postal savings system in 1991. This was also driven by the 1992 United Nations’ Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED, generally called the Earth Summit) where NGOs were allowed to officially participate. While the number of new establishments began to fall in 1993, organizations established in the 1990s no w account for o ver half of the total number of groups (JANIC 1998, p. 3).10

DISTANCE BETWEEN CITIZENS’ ACTIVITIES AND THE ADMINISTRATIVE AUTHORITIES Communities and Local Governments

Citizens’ activities in the post-war period increased from around the 1950s, but their basic nature was little different from those of the pre-war period. For example, autonomous organizations of local residents, such as township associations (choh’nai-kai) and community councils ( jichi-kai), emerged in every part of the country, incorporating a large majority of people living in local communities. After World War II, these or ganizations had been abolished under orders from G.H.Q. (General Headquarters of the Allied Powers). However, they soon re-emerged and performed the same functions they had in the pre-war period, complementing clerical work and services provided by local government authorities and, in some cases, carrying out those tasks on their behalf. The consciousness of the people had not changed either. They still placed the primary social responsibility on the local g overnment. Township associations, which should ha ve acted as cor e organs for autonomous activities by the people, merely functioned to complement tasks at the margins of the local g overnment, or ser ve as pressur e groups, relaying the people’s demands to the government. This was primarily because of the deep-rooted perception among the people that the government should be the primary entity providing public services. It can be said that the Japanese people, whether they live in urban areas or rural districts, have maintained a common pattern of behaviour where they first go to the local government to solve problems that arise in their communities. This is not to sa y that © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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there have never been opportunities for citizens’ activities in local communities. For example, within the township associations, voluntary actions emerged in areas such as community w elfare and comm unitybuilding. Some of these actions were initiated by divisions or committees of township associations, while others were started by voluntary circles and developed into types of voluntary associations.11 These not only helped transform the innate characteristics of township associations, but also spawned a spirit of voluntarism among the people and provided a foundation for the further development of citizens’ activities. Another item that merits attention is that these developments also influenced the relationship between the people and the administrati ve authority. Until then, the relationship had been a rather centralized, single-channel one. If a matter was deemed to be something that should be handled by a township association, communication on the matter was conducted only through the low-end, smallest unit of the or ganization or through a federation of associations. However, the crea tion of committees undertaking v oluntary actions or independent circles within township associations opened the way for the people to have alternative channels of communication with the local government. The conventional channel for demands and requests from the people and instructions (and orders) from the local government was asymmetric in terms of the volume of information. As plural channels of communication were secured, the time lag was reduced, and both the people and the administrative authority began to develop an awareness of information sharing. Citizens’ Activities and Laws Regulating Organizations

Consumer movements, citizens’ movements, and other activist bodies with the main objectives of making demands to or criticisms of the government were extremely unstable as or ganizations. However, organizations with the function of complementing the services of the government were generally stable, and were accorded cordial consideration and special arrangements for their activities. Typical examples of such or ganizations were administration-complementing-type public service corporations (Endo et al. 1999, p. 64), which the state or local governments took over partially or helped with their administrative and clerical work.12 They exist in a wide range of fields, as corporate juridical persons or incorporated foundations under Article 34 of the Civil Code. There are three qualifications for an or ganization to be established as a public service corporation under the Civil Code. It must: (1) provide © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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services for the public good; (2) not provide services for profit; and (3) obtain authorization from the competent authorities. Under these qualifications, non-profit corporations with the purpose of doing good for the general public should not have any problem being fully qualified to receive favourable treatment as public service corporations at the initiative of the private sector. However, the third qualification places judgments on the public nature of a corporation’s activities in the hands of the competent authorities,13 and even after establishment, the activities of the organization would be subject to the supervision and guidance of the competent authorities.14 Many citizens’ organizations felt it unacceptable to oper ate under the influence of the competent authorities. This is probably the reason why 96 per cent of citiz ens’ organizations remained voluntary organizations at the time of the EPA’s Basic Survey on Citizens’ Activities Organizations. As mentioned earlier, some organizations that launched international co-operation activities in the 1960s obtained corporate status. In addition to the troublesome procedures and the dif ficulty in obtaining permission for establishment, ho wever, many citizens’ organizations loathed being subjected to the super vision and direction of the administrative authorities. Among citizen activists, there still remains a tendency to be too proud to accept various government subsidies or other public support. This was one of the r easons why the distance betw een citizens’ activities and the government did not narrow easily. Having said this, though, citizens’ organizations came to face a variety of managerial dif ficulties as their or ganizations and the scale of their operations expanded. The most serious among them w ere financial problems. Membership dues and donations could finance only so many activities, and they had to secure sources of stable and sufficient revenues in order to sustain their operations.Also, with the expansion of the scope of activities came specialization, and the recruitment and retention of able staff sometimes determined the fate of organizations. From the standpoint of securing funding and personnel, citiz ens’ organizations began giving serious consideration to obtaining corporate status,an issue largely belittled up until that time. They came to realize that corporate status means a lot, not only for soliciting support from the private sector, but also in terms of securing the support and co-operation of the administrative authorities. Social Recognition of Citizens’ Activities

Even into the 1980s, there was no fundamental change in the social perception that the provision of public services was primarily the © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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responsibility of the administrative authorities. A review of that perception was initiated at the level of the central government, as part of the administrative reform. At the local administrati ve level, however, local government authorities became involved more deeply in public services, and third sector15 projects flourished under the banner of taking advantage of private-sector vitality. In these pr ojects the go vernment authorities counted on the financial resources and expertise of private enterprises. Citizens’ activities were not yet on their horizons. On the part of citizens’ activities, meanwhile, there was a succession of trials and er rors. There was a g radual rise in public interest re garding international NGOs with track records of achievements. One good example was the expansion of projects in Japan by the Plan International, which carries out an international f oster-parent programme. On the other hand, while the number of citizens’ organizations in Japan increased, they failed to grow beyond volunteer activities by interested people. Typical of these were organizations for international co-operation. Counting only those listed in theNGO Directory, their number had reached nearly 200 by the late 1980s. But most were private groups, neither controlled nor protected by law, and dependent on membership dues and private charity organizations for funding. The social basis for citizens’ organizations was still precarious, and there was no noticeable change in the way the administrative authorities perceived them. A series of international conferences sponsored by the United Nations (UN)16 in the 1990s provided an important opportunity for both citizens’ organizations and the government to recognize that the status of NGOs in the international community had changed significantly. One of the changes on the part of citizens’ organizations, previously termed the “qualitati ve transformation”, was the acceptance of hitherto neglected advocacy as part of NGO activities. In a particularly remarkable development in the environmental arena, a common agenda 17 was established between international co-operation activities and domestic activities, providing a common base of opera tions for citizens’ organizations involved in these respective fields. The administrative authorities, for their part, positi vely disclosed information about the above-mentioned series of international conferences, and began to take specific measures to support the operations of citizens’ organizations, including financial support.18 Expectations towards Citizens’ Activities and the NPO Law

While the stance of the administrative authorities towards citizens’ activities were influenced by the political situation and the international environment, © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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the attitude of the general public was swayed, to a large extent, by mass media coverage. On this score, the “volunteer boom” (Yamauchi 1999, p. 14)19 brought about by the two major incidents in 1995 — the Great Hanshin Earthquake and the serious oil spill caused by the Russian tanker Nakhodka, which ran aground in the Sea of Japan — had a major impact in enhancing the recognition of citizens’ activities. The Japanese media gave wide coverage to residents in the afflicted areas, and to the activities of people who gathered there to provide relief, raising an important awareness about citizens’ activities. The impact of this was so large that its effects spread to developments concerning the corporate status of citizens’ organizations. The Great Hanshin Earthquake proved to be a key factor in prompting the government to hasten its consideration, launched in 1994, of giving corporate status for private NPOs and to grant preferential tax treatment for them. In February of that year, a liaison confer ence of ministr ies and ag encies on the issue of volunteers was launched by eighteen ministries and a gencies. This conference, as well as the three ruling coalition parties (the Liberal Democratic Party, the Japan Socialist Party, and the Sakigake), decided to go ahead with work to formulate their respective bills. Public debate on the so-called NPO-related laws became active amid rising expectations towards citizens’ activities, but discussions on the fundamental nature of the proposed law dragged on because of the divergent views and positions involved.20 Draft proposals were presented by citizens’ groups, including Cs (Coalition for Legislation to Support Citizens’ Organizations), a group f ormed to promote NPO-related le gislation. However, the r econciliation of opinions within the go vernment proved difficult, and it was not until the end of 1996 that the three r uling parties hammered out the Bill to Pr omote Citizens’ Activities for submission to the House of Re presentatives. After being dropped twice in the ordinary session of the Diet, and with its name amended to the Bill to Promote Specified Non-profit Activities, the bill was finally passed, unanimously, by the House of Representatives plenary session on 19 March 1998. Under the Law to Promote Specified Non-profit Activities, (commonly known as the NPO Law), which took effect on 1 December 1998, despite a slow start of applications for certification, a total of 287 organizations across Japan were certified as NPOs as of 25 June 1999, some six months after the law came into effect.21 As organizations born out of citizens’ activities to help others become NPOs, and as the social infrastructure necessary for citizens’ activities is impr oved across the countr y, 22 including the establishment of NPO support centres by local governments, the number of applications for certification is expected to increase further in the coming © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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years. Meanwhile, citizens’ organizations, for their part, for med a liaison group on NPO/NGO tax and corporate status system reform on 8 June 1999, and submitted requests for preferential tax treatment to the government. On 15 October they issued a “proposal on preferential taxation for corporations car rying out specif ied non-profit activities”, urging all parties concerned for understanding and co-operation.23

CONCLUSION

In Japan, where the big government became a fixture after the period of post-war reconstruction, people placed the primary responsibility of providing public services on the administrative authorities, while governments at various levels maintained a deep-seated attitude to meet social needs only in accordance with their own views of the public interest. The basic line of thinking was for the administrative authorities to cover social needs as they saw fit, while letting extra-governmental organizations and various other public service organizations take care of what fell outside of their own turf. People’s organizations, such as township associations and community councils, were expected to handle community-specific problems or needs that were not covered by the administrative authorities, and occasionally to co-operate with the lowest end of administrative organizations. Under these cir cumstances, citizens’ organizations that rose in the form of activist groups were limited to making various demands or voicing opposing views. Therefore, their main activities did not go beyond petitioning the administrative authorities or opposing specific administrative policies. The major change came in the 1990s.The administrative authorities were no longer able to respond to the diversified and segmented needs of the people, who in turn harboured pent-up frustration over governmental inefficiency. Boosted by the impact of NGO and v olunteer activities in such areas as international co-operation and disaster relief, there was a rise in voices demanding an adequate legal arrangement for promoting citizens’ activities, leading to the enactment of the Law to Promote Specified Non-profit Activities, the NPO Law. The NPOs that ha ve now emerged are no longer gr oups that never go beyond presenting demands to the administrative authorities, but rather are organizations that try to meet citiz ens’ demands that ha ve been left unattended or passed over unnoticed by the administrative authorities. The people who undertake such activities are now required to be competent as © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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managers, and not simply as activists. The enactment of the NPO Law was a reflection of this change in the relationship between the state and citizens; the law in turn should provide institutional support for the change, giving it further momentum. In what areas will citizens’ activities, NGOs, and particularly NPOs move into in the future? The answer to this question ma y be found in the NPO Law, which lists twelve areas of specified non-profit activities, including the promotion of health, medical, and welfare services, social education, and community-building.24 Response to needs in these areas has been a longstanding problem for the administrative authorities. Strong social needs in each of these areas will likely lead to the establishment of a large number of new NPOs. Citizens are moving ahead to autonomously organize activities to satisfy their own demands left unattended by the government. The most important area among these will be the promotion of health, medical, and welfare services. Already at the time of the EPA’s 1996 basic survey, as mentioned ear lier, the number of social welf are organizations accounted for more than one-third of the total. In a survey on actual conditions of citizens’ public service organizations, also conducted by the EPA, before the basic survey, welfare services for the elderly and those for the disabled occupied the first and second biggest areas of activities, with the share of 16.4 per cent and 15.7 per cent, respectively (STB Research Institute 1996, p. 9). If these organizations are characterized as enterprisetype citizens’ activities, they are taking up the function of complementing and replacing public services that the governments are supposed to promote for the general public, but at the same time are trying to respond to needs close to home, and to matters of concern to a small number of residents. The future direction for citizens’ activities becomes clearer when it is pointed out that the second biggest area of activities is community-building (8.2 per cent). This is not limited to projects such as the preservation of old buildings or urban planning, but also includes safety measures and other activities that may be called regional community-related activities, which are considered to be operations much closer to local residents and participatory. However, it is also tr ue that these needs of the people ha ve long been neglected by the administrative authorities. Needless to say, citizens’ activities undertaken in response to the needs of the people do not exist in complete isolation from the activities of the government. Close links between them become obvious if we look at the directions taken by both citizens’ activities and the administrative authorities concerning the introduction of the nursing care insurance system. If there is one big difference to be noted from the previous pattern © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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of activities, it is that those engaged in citizens’ activities have little or no recognition that their activities are meant to substitute for public services that should actually be provided by administrative authorities. On the contrary, the government finds it necessary to prepare policy initiatives on the assumption of the pr esence of citizens’ organizations and NPO corporations in the tar geted areas. This became all the more e vident in developments surrounding nursing care service. NIRA’s Research and Stud y on the Impr ovement of Infrastructure for Citizens’ Public-Interest Activities, conducted in the first half of the 1990s, pointed to the following problems to be tackled by citizens’ organizations and the g overnment. It noted that citiz ens’ organizations needed to: (1) establish themselves as or ganizational entities; (2) strengthen co-operation among themselves through networking; (3) create a variety of groups to support their activities; and (4) register as voluntary organizations or non-profit corporations and disclose the contents of their activities. The points cited in (2), (3), and (4) have been accomplished since the mid-1990s, as co vered by this chapter . But a genda (1), and especially financial and organizational administration matters, will certainly continue to be an issue amid the trend of man y organizations moving towards NPO status. With regard to the government sector, the NIRA enumerated, along with agendas for the state and local governments, what it called agendas concerning relationships with citizens’ organizations. It stated that local governments should: (1) review various funds and other subsidies; (2) review existing organizations and ways of managing facilities; (3) enhance their ability to deal with citizens through personnel exchanges with citizens’ organizations; and (4) make the establishment of local corporations under the Civil Code more flexible and reform the tax system for donations. According to the NIRA, the state needed to: (1) review the framework and criteria of authorization for public service corporations; (2) create a new system for non-prof it organizations; (3) refor m the tax system for donations; and (4) give more leeway to citizens in the management and activities of public ser vice organizations. The points cited by the NIRA were the very issues that were discussed by both the citizens’organizations and the government in the process of le gislating the NPO Law. Speaking in very rough terms, these issues can be narrowed down to the problem of how to redirect the flow of resources (financial and human resources) from public service cor porations and related or ganizations to citizens’ activities and NGOs/NPOs. Thus, citizens’ activities and NGOs/NPOs face the challenge of standing on their own feet, as self-managing © 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

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organizations. For the administrative authorities, the challenge is ho w to prepare systems to support the independence of these organizations. The NPO Law has brought the relationship between citizens’ activities and NGOs/NPOs, on the one hand, and the administrative authorities, on the other, to a ne w stage. The current system is f ar from sufficient for revitalizing citizens’ activities. If the administrative authorities stick to the current status quo, of certifying or ganizations solely according to public interest criteria of their own, and limit their guidance and supervision to organizations specified in this way, it may be a long time befor e the time comes when both sides can really collaborate. However, the real needs of society already transcend the scope that can be satisfied by the administrative authorities and their affiliated extra-governmental organizations (gaikaku dantai). In addition to the obvious example of nursing care service, the emergence of new entities to supply public services has become essential. In anticipation of future needs, citizens’organizations are being called upon to enhance their or ganizational preparedness, and the administra tive authorities to improve the institutional framework in order to allow better collaboration with citizens’ organizations. Notes 1

2

3

4

The survey was commissioned by the Economic PlanningAgency (EPA) in fiscal 1996, with questionnaires mailed to a total of 9,826 organizations between November and December 1996.The data from the survey quoted in this chapter are all based on Social Policy Bureau (1997), unless there are special explanations. The name initially given to the Bill to Promote Specified Non-profit Activities was the Bill to Promote Citizens’ Activities, but it was changed in the course of deliberations within the Diet (parliament). This research was conducted as a commissioned survey from 1993 to 1994. In addition to collecting lists of citizens’ organizations and other documents and materials, detailed hearings were conducted with thirty-four organizations. The thirty-four organizations subject to the hearings are classified into four categories, by type of organization. (a) Circle type: Organizations that meet ir regularly and do not ha ve written rules. Participants can enter or leave freely. (b) Voluntary bodies (type A): Organizations that have written rules of association and clear purposes of activities, and conduct activities

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regularly in line with the stated purposes. They do not have full-time staff but some members provide secretariat services. (c) Voluntary bodies (type B): Or ganizations that have written rules of association and clear purposes of activities, and conduct activities regularly in line with the stated purposes. They have a secretariat with full-time staff. (d) Corporation type: Corporate juridical persons or incorporated foundations sanctioned by the central or local governments, or social welfare corporations authorized under the Social Welfare Services Law. 5

6

7

8

9

According to Suwa (1999), however, citizens’ organizations were recognized as service-providing entities by the Health andWelfare Ministry only in the 1990s (and on a full-fledged basis in the latter half of the 1990s). The 1998 edition (JANIC 1998), which covers a total of 368 organizations, lists the mode of organization and results of activities for 217 groups, gathered from data collected by a questionnaire survey. The NGO Directory ’96, which was published in Mar ch 1996, before the EPA’s Basic Survey on Citizens’Activities Organizations, covered a total of 373 organizations. This figure can be considered large, even against the 5 per cent share taken up by organizations in the field of international exchanges and co-operation under the above basic survey. JOCS has been sending doctors, nurses, and public health nurses, as well as supporting trainees in the medical field, in three Asian countries (Nepal, Bangladesh, and Cambodia). Regarding its activities in Cambodia, see Amakawa (1997). The years of establishment and acquisition of corporate status for major organizations in the 1960s are as follo ws: OISCA (Or ganization for Industrial, Spiritual and Cultural Advancement International) (cur rently OISCA International), established in 1961, became an incorporated foundation in May 1969; Ja panese Organization for International Cooperation in Family Planning (JOICFP), established in 1968, incorporated foundation in 1968; K eiyo Education and Culture Center , preparatory committee for establishment in 1962, incorporated foundation in 1965. The following four points have been cited as the background for the “qualitative transformation”: (a) Greater attention was being paid to the structural aspects of the North–South problem in order to solve global issues. (b) In the cour se of debates on increasing of ficial development assistance (ODA), the Fourth Medium-Term Target called for closer

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collaboration with NGOs and established the Subsidy System for NGO Projects as well as the Grassroots Grant Aid System. (c) In the wake of the maturing of NGOs in Asia and changes in the activities of NGOs in Europe and Nor th America, there w as a change of attitude in Japan from doing-a-favour assistance to working with groups as equal partners. (d) There was a sharp rise in illegally employed foreign residents, which created a structural problem closer to home. 10

The number of organizations by period of establishment was as follows (figures in parentheses show the percentage share in the total number of organizations at the time of the survey): Up to the first half of the 1960s: 9 (2.4 per cent); The latter half of the 1960s to the first half of the 1970s: 15 (4.1 per cent); The latter half of the 1970s to the first half of the 1980s: 68 (18.5 per cent); The latter half of the 1980s and later: 276 (75.1 per cent). Source: JANIC (1998), Table 1–1.

11

12

13

14

15

For examples of voluntary actions and voluntary associations within township associations, see K urasawa and Akimoto (1990). In particular , chapter 9, “Voluntary Associations and Acculturation of Township Associations”, offers detailed accounts. They are accorded a variety of preferential treatments as public service corporations undertaking activities of a highly public nature, along with tenkei-gata koh’eki hohjin (typical public service corporations) for educational and charity activities andtokubetsu-hoh-gata koh’eki hohjin” (special law-type public service corporations) such as legally incorporated educational institutions, religious corporations, and social welfare corporations. Interesting discussions about the roles of public interest and the government sector can be found in Yamamoto et al. (1998). For arguments concerning the general judgment of what constitutes the public interest, see chapter 1 of Yamamoto et al. (1998), “Kou = Kan Shakai no Magarikado: ‘Koh’eki’ kara mita Shibiru Sosa’iti” [The ‘public = government’ society at a crossroads: Civil society in the light of ‘public interest’]. On problems concerning the competent authorities, see Hayashi and Iriyama (1997, pp. 197–203). It has often been said that this term is being misused in Japan. Japanese society as a whole has not fully recognized the true meaning of the third sector, as referred to earlier. In this sense the following view is relevant: “Throughout the 1980s, Japanese society was gradually permeated by

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17

18

19

20

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a perception of ‘NPOs’ as private nonprofit institutions which were third parties, undertaking public services that could not be done by either the administrative authorities or private companies” (Matsubara 1999, p. 53). In the early 1990s a series of international conferences were held, including the UN Conference on Environment and Development in Rio de Janeiro (1992), the UN Conference on Population and Development in Cairo (1993), the UN Social Development Summit in Copenhagen (1994), and the UN Conference on Women in Beijing (1995). Ne w organizations were established to take part in the NGO forums and other meetings held in parallel with these conferences. Agenda 21, one of the products of the UN Conference on Environment and Development (Earth Summit), presented specific policy agendas each country was supposed to tackle, and required individual participating countries to submit an action programme to tackle these agendas. In the course of formulating its action programme, the Japanese Government made the draft programme public, and solicited comments from citizens’ organizations and the general public. After the UN Conference on Environment and Development (Earth Summit), the Environment Agency established the Japan Fund for Global Environment as a mechanism for providing financial support to citizens’ organizations. In order to support their routine activities, it also created the Global Environment Partnership Plaza in centr al Tokyo, for citizens’ activities. According to a survey on the frequency of the use of terminology in the Nihon Keizai Shimbun newspaper, contained in Yamauchi (1999), the frequency of the use of the term “volunteer” soared from 549 times in 1994 to 1,037 in 1995. Though a similar change was seen for the term “NGO”, the increase was much more moderate, from thirty-seven times in 1991 to 186 in 1992. The points of discussion on the legislation included: (a) Whether to revise the Civil Code or make a separate law; (b) Whether the legislation should be proposed by parliamentarians or by the government; (c) Whether corporate status and preferential tax treatment should be a package or considered separately; and (d) The definition of organizations for corporate status. (Based on a lecture by Akira Matsubara at the Institute of Developing Economies, on 22 May 1999, and others.)

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328 21

22

23

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Yomiuri Shimbun (2 July 1999), “287 Organizations Obtain Corporate Status under NPO La w, Steady Progress in Six Months after La w Enforcement”. As of 10 Febr uary 2000, the cumulati ve total of applications received stood at 1,958 organizations. Of these, 1,421 were certified, and five not certified (Economic Planning Agency homepage at ). On local governments’ efforts to support NPOs, see Kato (1999) and Nobuo Yoshida (1999). The full text of the proposal is listed on the homepage of the Japan NPO Center (at ). The areas of activities in the attached list of the Law to Promote Specified Non-profit Activities are as follows: • • • • • • • • • • • •

Activities for the promotion of health, medical, and welfare services Activities for the promotion of social education Activities for the promotion of community-building Activities for the promotion of culture, arts, or sports Activities to preserve the natural environment Disaster relief activities Regional security activities Activities for the protection of human rights or promotion of peace Activities for international co-operation Activities for building a gender-equal participatory society Activities for promoting the sound rearing of children Activities to operate organizations undertaking one or more of the above-described activities or provide communication, advice, or assistance concerning such activities.

References

Amakawa, Naoko. “Kanbojia ni okeru NGO Katsudo no Genjoh to Mondaiten” [Current conditions and problems of NGO activities in Cambodia]. In NGO no Genzai: Kokusai-Kyoryoku-Katsudoh no Genjoh to Mondaiten [NGOs today: Current conditions and problems in international co-operation acti vities], edited by Mikimasa Yoshida. Tokyo: Institute of Developing Economies, 1997. Association for Promotion of International Cooperation. Waga-Kuni ni okeru NGO-Katsudoh no Hatten ni shisuru tame no Chohsa-Kenkyu: Nan-Boku NGO kan no Atarashi’i Kaihatsu-Kyoryoku no Arikata wo saguru Chohsa [Research and study to contribute to the development of

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NGO activities in Japan: Research to search for new ways of development co-operation between North–South NGOs]. Tokyo: Association for Promotion of International Cooperation, 1991. Endo, Hiroshi et al., eds. Minpoh (1) Sohsoku [Civil Code 1: General Provisions]. 4th ed. Tokyo: Yuhikaku, 1999. Hayashi, Chikio and Akira Iriyama. Koh’eki-Houjin no Jitsuzo: Toukei kara mita Zaidan Shadan [The real image of public service corporations: A statistical view of incorporated foundations and corporate juridical persons]. Tokyo: Diamond Co., 1997. Japanese NGO Center for International Cooperation (JANIC). NGO Dairekutorii ’98: Kokusai-Kyoryoku ni tazusawaru Nihon no ShiminSoshiki Yoran [NGO Director y ’98: Outline of Ja panese citizens’ organizations engaged in international co-operation]. Tokyo, 1998. Kato, Tetsuo. “NPO to Jichitai no Atarashi’i Ugoki” [NPOs and new moves at local governments]. In Nihon no NPO 2000 [NPOs in Japan 2000], edited by Yoichi Nakamura et al. Tokyo: Nihon Hyoronsha, 1999. Kurasawa, Susumu and Ritsuro Akimoto, eds. Chonaikai to Chiiki-Shudan [Township associations and community groups]. K yoto: Minerva Shobo, 1990. Matsubara, Akira. “NPO Hoh ni itaru Haik ei to Rippoh-Katei” [The background of the NPO Law and process of legislation]. In Nihon no NPO 2000 [NPOs in Japan 2000], edited b y Yoichi Nakamura et al. Tokyo: Nihon Hyoronsha, 1999. National Institute for Researc h Advancement (NIRA). Shimin-Koh’ekiKatsudoh Kiban-Seibi ni Kansuru Chohsa-Kenkyu [Research and study on the improvement of infrastructure for citizens’ public-interest activities]. Tokyo: National Institute for Research Advancement, 1994. Social Policy Bureau, Economic Planning Agency, Japan. Shimin Katsudoh Repohto: Shimin-Katsudoh-Dantai Kihon-Chohsa Houkokusho [Report on citizens’ activities: Report on Basic Surv ey on Citizens’ Activities Organizations]. Tokyo: Ministry of Finance Printing Bureau, 1997. Sumitomo Trust Bank (STB) Research Institute. Heisei 7-nendo Keizai-Kikakucho itaku, “Shimin-Koh’eki-Dantai no Jittai-Ha’aku Chohsa ”, Kekka Houkokusho [Fiscal 1995 r eport on the outcome of “Surv ey on Actual Conditions of Citizens’ Public Service Organizations”, commissioned by the Economic Planning Agency]. Tokyo, 1996. Suwa, Toru. “Shakai-Fukushi-Seido to NPO” [Social w elfare system and NPOs]. In Nihon no NPO 2000 [NPOs in Japan 2000], edited by Yoichi Nakamura et al. Tokyo: Nihon Hyoronsha, 1999.

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Yamamoto, Tadashi et al. Kan kara Min he no P awah-Shifuto: Dare no tame no Koh’eki ka [The power shift from “public” to “private”: In whose “public interest”?]. Tokyo: TBS Britanica, 1998. Yamauchi, Naoto. NPO Nyuhmon [A guide to NPOs].Tokyo: Nihon Keizai Shimbunsha, 1999. Yoshida, Mikimasa, ed. NGO no Genzai: Kokusai-Kyoryoku-Katsudoh no Genjoh to Mondaiten [NGOs today: Current conditions and problems in international co-operation acti vities]. Tokyo: Institute of De veloping Economies, 1997. Yoshida, Nobuo. “Gyousei (Seifu, Chiho-Jichitai) to NPO no Kankei: Shien kara Kyoudou he” [The relationship between administrative authorities (state government and local governments) and NPOs: From support to collaboration]. In Nihon no NPO 2000 [NPOs in Japan 2000], edited by Yoichi Nakamura et al. Tokyo: Nihon Hyoronsha, 1999.

© 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

This chapter is reproduced from The State and NGOs: Perspective from Asia , edited by Shinichi Shigetomi (Singapore: Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, 2002). This version was obtained electronically direct from the publisher on condition th at copyright is not infringed. No part of this publication may be reproduced, translated, stored in a retrieval system, or transmi tted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies and Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo.

Index

A Amnesty International, 316 Asian countries NGOs, manifestations, 22–29 Asian Development Bank, 44 B Bangladesh, 34–52 Bangladesh Aid Consortium, 42 Bangladesh Rural Development Board, 44 economy, underdeveloped, 34–36 foreign governments, role of, 43 Grameen Bank, 37–39, 43–44, 194 international aid agencies, role of, 42–43 micro-credit policies, 37–39, 44–45, 47–52, 194 NGOs Association for Development Agencies in Bangladesh (ADAB), 45, 47, 50 Bangladesh Rural Advancement Committee (BRAC), 34, 36–41, 44–45, 47–52 establishment, clash with, 50–51 expansion, 22–23, 34 foreign, 42 foreign funding, 39–43, 45–47 Gono Shahajo Shangstha (GSS), 46 NGO Bureau, 45–47 poverty alleviation projects, 36–42 regulation, 45–47 staff employment, 47–49 state, co-operation with, 44–45 successes and failures, 47–51 official development assistance (ODA), 35, 42–43 state, weak, 34–36

state–NGO relations, 43–45 co-operation, 44–45 Vulnerable Group Development (VGD), 44–45, 49, 52 C Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA), 44, 101 China, 222–37 Chinese Communist Party (CCP), 223–24, 228, 232 NGOs emergence, 25, 223–29 registration, 229–35 regulation, 229–36 types, 228 people’s organizations All-China Federation of Trade Unions (ACFTU), 225, 229 All-China Women’s Federation (ACWF), 225, 229 Young Communist League (YCL), 225, 229 social associations, 222–29 state–NGO relations, 229–36 Consumers International Regional Office for Asia and the P acific (CIROA), 186 E economic space definition, 9 NGOs, development of, 9–12, 14–15 H Heifer Project International (HPI), 229 Hong Kong, 245–60 NGOs, activities, 250–51

332

INDEX

categories, 252 development, 29, 246–51 funding, 254–57 registration, 251–54 regulation, 251–54 taxation, 254 Special Administrative Region (SAR), 259 state–NGO relations, 254–57 government subsidy, 254–58 volunteer organizations activities, 246–51 definition, 245 funding, 254–57 NGOs, distinction from, 245 I India, 57–70 Foreign Contribution Regulation Act (FCRA), 66 NGOs activities, 60–61 foreign funding, 62–63, 66 government funding, 62–64 Kerala Shastra Sahitya Parishad (KSS), 69 manifestation, 24 post-independence activities, 59–60 registration, 64–66 regulation, 64–67 Social Action Groups (SAGs), 59 state co-option, 67–68 Voluntary Action Network India (VANI), 65–66, 68–69 Societies Registration Act (SRA), 64, 66 state–NGO relations, 68–69 voluntarism, 58–59 voluntary organizations (VOs), see NGOs Indonesia, 161–74 Dili massacre, 164–65 Lembaga Pengembangan Swadaya Masyarakat (LPSM), 161 Lembaga Swadaya Masyarakat (LSM), 161–62 NGOs activities, 165–67

© 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

development, 24–25, 162–69 foreign funding, 163, 166, 169 Indonesian Legal Aid Association (YLBHI), 168 Indonesian Planned Parenthood Association (PKBI), 163 Institute for Social and Economic Research, Education and Information (LP3ES), 168 International NGO Forum on Indonesian Development (INFID), 168 Legal Aid Institute (LBH), 168 registration, 169–70 regulation, 169–72 types, 167–69 official development assistance (ODA), 172 Ombo Dam issue, 164 state–NGO relations, 170–74 J Japan, 311–24 citizens’ activities organizations activities, 317–21 Association of Aid for Refugees (Association for Aid and Relief, Japan) (AAR), 315 definition, 312 Help Bangladesh Committee (Shapla Neer-Citizens’ Committee in Japan for Overseas Support), 315 history, 313–16 international co-operation, 314–16 Japan International Volunteer Center (JVC), 315 Japan Overseas Christian Medical Co-operative Service (JOCS), 315 Japanese NGO Center for International Co-operation (JANIC), 315 manifestation, 28 regulation, 317–21 social recognition, 318–19 Sotoshu Council of Relief for

INDEX 333 Refugees in Southeast Asia (Shanti Volunteer Association (SVA), 315 state, relations with, 316–21 community–state relations, 316–17 Economic Planning Agency (EPA), 312, 318, 322 Law to Promote Specified Non-profit Activities (NPO Law), 18, 312–13, 320–24 National Institute for Research Advancement (NIRA), 313, 323 NGOs, see citizens’ activities organizations M Malaysia, 178–97 bumiputra policy, 188–91 Internal Security Act (ISA), 193 National Development Policy (NDP), 181 National Economic Consultative Council (NECC), 194 New Economic Policy (NEP), 180 NGOs activities, 182 Aliran Kesedaran Negara (Aliran), 181 All-Women’s Action Society of Malaysia (AWAM), 181 Amanah Ikhtiar Malaysia (AIM), 194–95 Angkatan Belia Islam Malaysia (ABIM), 184, 191, 193, 196 characteristics, 178–79, 183–84 consumer organizations, 189–91 Consumers’ Association of Penang (CAP), 181, 183, 189 development, 27, 179–84 Environmental Protection Society Malaysia (EPSM), 181, 194 Federation of Malaysian Consumers Association (FOMCA), 181, 189, 194 funding, 184 Pertubuhan Jamaah Islah Malaysia (JIM), 184, 196

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registration, 185–86 regulation, 184–87 Sahabat Alam Malaysia (SAM), 181 political organizations Barisan National (BN), 181 Democratic Action Party (DAP), 190, 193 Gerakan, 190 Malaysian Chinese Association (MCA), 190 Parti Islam Se-Malaysia (PAS), 180, 193, 195 Parti Keadilan Nasional (Keadilan), 193, 196 United Malays National Organization (UMNO), 181, 188, 191, 193 Registrar of Companies (ROC), 185–86 Registrar of Society (ROS), 185 Socio-economic and Environmental Research Institute (SERI), 195 state–NGO relations, 187–95 advocacy-oriented, 192–93 co-operation, 194–95 N newly industrialized economies (NIEs), 203 non-governmental organizations (NGOs), see also entries under respective countries activities, 1–2, 14–15 advocacy actions, 15–22 definition, 6–7 economic space, 9–12, 14–15 manifestations, 9–15 Asian countries, 22–29 Bangladesh, 22–23 China, 25 Hong Kong, 29 India, 24 Indonesia, 24–25 Japan, 28 Malaysia, 27 Pakistan, 25 Philippines, 23 Singapore, 27–28 South Korea, 26–27

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INDEX

Sri Lanka, 28–29 Taiwan, 26 Thailand, 23–24 Vietnam, 25–26 political space, 12–15 state, relationship with, 1–6 see also state–NGO relations under respective countries non-profit organizations (NPOs), 3, 6–7, 11, 21, 28, 222, 270–71, 312, 320–24 NGOs, distinction from, 7 O Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), 203 Overseas Economic Co-operation Fund, 43 Oxfam, 39, 42, 209 P Pakistan, 94–107 community-based organizations (CBOs), 98, 100–1 NGOs activities, 96–101, 105–7 Aga Khan Rural Support Programme (AKRSP), 98, 100, 106 All Pakistan Women’s Association (APWA), 100 development, 25, 96–98 Family Planning Association of Pakistan (FPAP), 100 foreign funding, 97, 104 government-organized (GONGO), 100 National Rural Support Programme (NRSP), 100 NGO Resource Centre, 99, 101–2 Orangi Pilot Project (OPP), 98, 106 registration, 101–3 regulation, 101–3 Social Action Plan (SAP), 103–4 society, 95–96 state–NGO relations, 103–5 Philippines, 110–21 Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR), 116 Department of Agrarian Reform (DAR), 113

© 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

Department of Environment and National Resources (DENR), 117 Ministry of Human Settlement (MHS), 112 National Democratic Front (NDF), 114 NGOs Association of Foundations (AoF), 113 backers, 113–114 Caucus of Development NGO Networks (CODE-NGO), 120 development, 23, 111–14 foreign funding, 112–14 National Movement for Free Elections (NAMFREL), 111 Philippine Business for Social Progress (PBSP), 113 Philippine Rural Reconstruction Movement (PRRM), 111, 113 registration, 115–16 regulation, 114–16 Task Force Detainees of the Philippines (TFDP), 112–13 official development assistance (ODA), 114, 116–18 people’s organizations (POs), 112–13, 115, 117–18, 120 Philippine Council for NGO Certification (PCNC), 116 Philippine Council for Sustainable Development (PCSD), 117 Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), 115–16 state–NGO relations, 116–19 political space definition, 9 NGOs, development of, 12–15 S Salvation Army, 245 Singapore, 200–17 Institution of Public Character (IPC), 210–11 National Council of Social Service (NCSS), 211 NGOs activities, 201

INDEX 335 Association of Muslim Professionals (AMP), 212–13 Association of Women for Action and Research (AWARE), 207, 210, 214–15 Chinese Development Assistance Council (CDAC) development, 27–28, 201–8 Eurasian Association Singapore (EAS), 212 Mendaki, 212 Nature Society of Singapore (NSS), 206–7, 214–15 registration, 208–9 regulation, 208–10 Roundtable, 207, 209, 214–15 Singapore Indian Development Association (SINDA), 212 Singapore Institute of International Affairs (SIIA), 207 taxation, 210 Nominated Members of Parliament (NMP), 214–15 People’s Action Party (PAP), 200, 202, 205–6 Singapore Environment Council (SEC), 211 state–NGO relations, 210–16 changing relations, 214–16 financial inducement, 212–13 government umbrella groups, 210–11 legal controls, 213 political co-option, 214 quasi-NGOs, 211–12 soft control, 213–14 South Korea, 288–305 Citizens’ Coalition for Economic Justice (CCEJ), 301 NGOs activities, 295–99 categories, 295–99 government subsidy, 302 manifestation, 26–27 regulation, 299–301 surveys, 295–99 social groups, 289, see NGOs state–NGO relations, 289–303

© 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

Chun Doo-hwan period (1980–87), 291–92 current status, 293–303 historical evolution, 289–93 Park Chung-hee period (1961–79), 290–91 Rhee Syngman period (1948–60), 289–90 Roh Tae-woo period (1988–92), 292–93 Sri Lanka, 72–90 community-based organizations (CBOs), 73, 77–79, 83–84, 88–89 distinction from NGOs, 73 Gramodaya Mandalaya associations, 77–78 NGOs activities, 80–82 development, 28–29, 73–84 foreign funding, 85 registration, 84–86 regulation, 84–87 Sarvodaya, 78, 87, 89 political organizations Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), 87–89 Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP), 75 United National Party (UNP), 75 state–NGO relations, 87–90 Voluntary Social Service Organizations Act (VSSOA), 85–87 state, definition, 8 state–NGO relations, categories, 4 see also entries under respective countries T Taiwan, 263–82 NGOs activities, 275–80 civil organizations, definition, 270 development, 26, 264–70 family clan associations, 276–77 foundations, definition, 271 mutual-aid organizations, 276–77 registration, 271 regulation, 270–75

336

INDEX

religious organizations, 277–79 social associations activities, 273 definition, 270 government supervision, 274–75 types, 272 social movement organizations, 279–80 political background, 264–70 political organizations Democratic Progress Party (DPP), 267, 282 Nationalist Party (KMT), 264–69, 274–75, 277–82 state–NGOs relations, 281–82 Thailand, 125–42 Department of Public Welfare (DOPW), 133 Ministry of Science, Technology and Environment (MOSTE), 138–39 National Economic and Social Development Board (NESDB), 135, 139 NGOs activities, 126–30 development, 23–24, 126–29 foreign funding, 129, 132 NGO Co-ordinating Committee on Development (NGO-COD), 129, 132, 135 NGO Co-ordinating Committee on Rural Development (NGOCORD), 135, 137 registration, 130–31 regulation, 129–32 Thailand Rural Reconstruction Movement (TRRM), 126, 134–35 Union for Civil Liberty (UCL), 127, 129 Office of the National Cultur e Commission (ONCC), 131–32 state–NGO relations, 133–39, 141 collaboration, 133 confrontation, 135–36 critical exchanges, 135 erosion, 138–39

© 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

parallelism, 134–35 participation, 137–39 U United Nations, 83, 320 Children’s Fund (UNICEF), 39, 152 Comprehensive Development Framework (CDF), 152 Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED), 317 Development Programme (UNDP), 43, 149 organizations, 149, 152 Social Development Summit, 43 United States Agency for International Development (USAID), 101 V Vietnam, 145–59 American NGOs, 146 commune development, 152–53 governmental organizations (GOs), 147–49 international NGOs commune development activities, 153–54 development fund and technologies, provision, 156–59 expansion, 154–56 history, 145–47 local partners, 149–50 position, 148 VWU, relationship with, 152 local NGOs classification, 148 People’s Aid Co-ordinating Committee (PACCOM), 147, 149–50 Vietnam Union of Friendship Organization (VUFO), 149–50, 152, 157 Vietnam Women’s Union (VWU), 150–55, 159 NGOs definition, 147–49 foreign, see international NGOs local, see local NGOs

INDEX 337 manifestation, 25–26 regulation, 149–51 official development assistance (ODA), 159 state–NGO relations, 154–59 VAC System, 153 W World Bank, 42–44 World Food Programme (WFP), 44–45

© 2002 Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Tokyo

World Health Organization (WHO), 152, 154 World Wildlife Fund (WWF), 229 Y Young Men’s Christian Association (YMCA), 180, 245 Young Women’s Christian Association (YWCA), 180