ABSTRACT
The idea of global civil society gained significant ground in the 1990s following the end of the Cold War. Advocates were encouraged by the strides in international human rights regimes and the foundation of an international criminal justice system in which human rights were invoked as transcending national sovereignty. Kenneth Roth, director of Human Rights Watch, proclaimed in 1999 that human rights had now trumped national sovereignty (Roth, 1999). However, since September 11 and the inauguration of the war on terrorism, global civil society advocates identify reversals in developments towards global civil society. In contrast to the global civil society literature, this chapter identifies problems with the concept of global civil society and its concept of the rights-holding subject. The chapter’s core argument is that global civil society advocacy projects a demoralised vision for humanity, which constrains human aspirations and inverts rights and freedoms. A profound scepticism of citizens as moral beings underlies the global governance sought by advocates of this model. First, the chapter analyses the demise of belief in humanity as progressive history-making subjects. Second, it analyses global civil society’s concept of rights. Third, it assesses the contemporary model of aid and development. It concludes that global civil society advocacy represents a retreat from universal rights and reinforces official donor government policies disciplining populations. However, the disciplining of populations is mystified under the contemporary therapeutic mechanisms of self-articulation.
