Collins Katebe :Civil Society Organisations in Zambia: Curse or Blessing

The concept of civil society is elusive, complex and contested. There are different meanings and interpretations and over time different schools of thought have influenced theoretical debates and empirical research on their role in development. It is for this reason that this essay attempts to discuss why to some, civil society is considered a new broader paradigm of development which has been born, while to others, it is considered a symptom of intellectual fashion that has come to afflict the development industry. It begins by defining the key concepts before giving a brief background to the resurgence of civil society in the contemporary world. It will then give a thorough analysis of the two different conception of civil society. It will then end with a conclusion. According to Van Rooy (1998:30), civil society is a population of groups formed for collective purposes primarily outside the state and the market place. The London School of Economics defines civil society as the arena of uncoerced action around shared interests, purposes and values. As for Mumba (2004) civil society is a collective term used to refer to an association of individuals who organize themselves outside the state and the market for the purpose of advancing common interests and facilitating collective action. From the above definitions, it can therefore be deduced that a central hypothesis of the civil society concept is that it is the force for societal resistance to state excesses and is, as a matter of fact, a centerpiece organizationally, materially and ideologically of the social movements and protests for reform and change towards a good society.
Though the concept of civil society is as old as civilization itself spanning through different epochs, it should be noted that, only recently has it come to acquire a certain prominence and come to be a buzzword within international development. Edwards (2004:2) says that only in the last ten years has the

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