“Highlight the roles and functions of civil society in a democratic system.” (2021)
Civil society covers voluntary associations, movements, trade unions, professional bodies and the media: everything organised between family, market and state. Alexis de Tocqueville saw associations as the safeguard of American democracy. Larry Diamond (“Rethinking Civil Society”, 1994) set out their democratic functions in detail. These can be grouped as follows.
Functions, with Indian illustrations
| Function | What it does | Indian illustration |
|---|---|---|
| Checking state power | Exposes abuse and defends liberties | People’s Union for Civil Liberties, founded in 1976 during the Emergency; litigation on custodial violence and surveillance |
| Voicing interests | Raises demands that parties ignore | Narmada Bachao Andolan for adivasis displaced by dams |
| Policy input | Brings expertise and field evidence into law-making | The Right to Food Campaign and members of the National Advisory Council shaped the National Food Security Act, 2013 |
| Information and civic education | Produces independent public knowledge | Pratham’s ASER surveys of children’s learning, since 2005 |
| Electoral integrity | Monitors candidates and party funding | Association for Democratic Reforms: disclosure of candidates’ records (2002); electoral bonds verdict (2024) |
| Leadership recruitment | Trains new political leaders | Student leaders of the JP movement; India Against Corruption, which gave rise to a new party in 2012 |
| Service delivery and inclusion | Reaches groups the state misses | Women’s self-help groups; disability-rights and HIV/AIDS networks |
Theoretical readings of these roles
- Functionalist and pluralist view: Gabriel Almond and Sidney Verba (The Civic Culture, 1963) linked stable democracy to a participant political culture that associations nourish. Civil society combines interests and keeps the political system in balance.
- Robert D. Putnam: associations build social capital, the trust and norms of give-and-take that make institutions work.
- Jürgen Habermas (The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere, 1962): civil society sustains a public sphere where citizens debate public affairs as equals. That debate gives laws their legitimacy, beyond the fact that they were passed by elected majorities.
- Antonio Gramsci: civil society is also where ruling groups win consent, through schools, churches and the press. It can sustain hegemony as easily as it challenges it.
- Partha Chatterjee: in India these rights-based functions belong mostly to urban, middle-class civil society. The poor act through political society.
Conclusion
In a democracy, civil society does three linked jobs: it restrains power, represents those left out, and renews public life. These roles work best when civil society is independent of both state and donors and democratic in its own functioning. Otherwise the same space can serve narrow or majoritarian interests.