AU Watch

CSOs

Exploring an African Civil Society
Development and Democracy in Malawi, 1994–2014
CLIVE GABAY

Summary

Are civil society organizations in Africa agents of democratization, legitimators of corrupt ruling elites, agents of imperial control, or all of these things and more? Based on nearly five years of engagements with civil society organizations in Malawi, including interviews and broader ethnographic methods, this book presents a contemporary account of civil society activism in a country which provides some intriguing contextual background to these questions.

The Handbook of Civil Society in Africa (Non-profit and Civil Society Studies)

Summary
This volume brings together the most up to date analyses of civil society in Africa from the best scholars and researchers working on the subject. Being the first of its kind, it casts a panoramic look at the African continent, drawing out persisting, if often under-communicated, variations in regional discourses

Good Governance and Civil Society Participation in Africa

Summary
The 10 chapters in this volume were selected from 24 papers presented at a regional conference on Promoting Good Governance and Wider Civil Society Participation in Eastern and Southern Africa.

The Two Faces of Civil Society: NGOs and Politics in Africa
By Stephen N. Ndegwa

Summary
This book examines how nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), as part of civil society, contribute to democratization in Africa and what conditions facilitate or inhibit their contributions. Although much has been written about how civil society organizations, including NGOs, have significantly altered state-society relations in Africa over the last decade, we understand little about how this process unfolds, its determinants, and its limits.