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5 - Civil Society and the Contemporary Social Order

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 July 2009

By
Frédérique Chaumont-Chancelier
Edited by
Albert Breton ,
Gianluigi Galeotti ,
Pierre Salmon  and
Ronald Wintrobe
Frédérique Chaumont-Chancelier
Affiliation:
Centre d'Analyse Economique, Univerité d'Aix-Marselle III
Albert Breton
Affiliation:
University of Toronto
Gianluigi Galeotti
Affiliation:
Università degli Studi di Roma 'La Sapienza', Italy
Pierre Salmon
Affiliation:
Université de Bourgogne, France
Ronald Wintrobe
Affiliation:
University of Western Ontario
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Summary

In a totalitarian State or in a field already made into State monopoly, those dissatisfied with the institutions that they find can seek a remedy only by seeking to change the Government of the country. In a free society and a free field they have a different remedy; discontented individuals with new ideas can make a new institution to meet their needs. The field is open to experiment and success or failure; secession is the midwife of invention.

INTRODUCTION: REDISCOVERING CIVIL SOCIETY

One of the most fascinating social facts in France is probably the formidable explosion of civil actions. This civil activism has various appearances and goals; however, it seems that people not only increasingly engage in humanitarian causes, they also try to solve institutional problems that fall into the public domain such as pollution, violence, illiteracy, and social exclusion. On the other side, the citizens' desertion from the political arena and the growth of incivilities in schools or suburbs suggest that the French society does not display only such a beautiful side. The point of departure of this chapter is the idea that all those social facts could be linked to each other with the help of an appropriate explanatory framework.

The recognition of the modern growth of civil activism directed to the provision of collective goods has lead to various reactions. Most of them are unsatisfactory since they exclusively rely on preferences such as impulses of solidarity.

Type
Chapter
Information
Rational Foundations of Democratic Politics , pp. 68 - 90
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2003

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