ABSTRACT
The reinvention of civil society in the 1970s and 1980s has to be understood in the context of the process we call globalization. We tend to think of globalization in terms of the spread of multinational corporations or of global culture, but during this period the term ‘civil society’ was resurrected to mean a new form of non-party politics-the socalled new social movements, the dissidents in Eastern Europe, the new focus on single issues such as human rights, the environment or women. This new wave of activism developed new forms of organizing as a way of getting around the dominance and conservatism of political parties and of finding new avenues for political influence and social change. In effect, the political parties controlled access to the state, so the new activists sought to influence society directly through their own actions or they tried to influence political institutions at global and local levels. By linking up with similar groups and individuals across borders, by promoting global norms and rules, civil society actors, like multinational corporations or the stars of sports or popular music, became agents of globalization.
