Civil Society, Headlines, Latin America & the Caribbean

MEXICO: X-Ray of Civil Society

Emilio Godoy

MEXICO CITY, Jul 10 2009 (IPS) - What kinds of work do Mexico’s civil society organisations do? How are they structured? Where do they obtain their financing? These are some of the questions that a new edition of the CIVICUS Civil Society Index (CSI) will attempt to answer.

“The Index seeks to learn about the state of civil society in the countries where it is conducted; it’s like taking an X-ray of civil society in Mexico,” the Mexican Centre for Philanthropy’s (CEMEFI) coordinator of research and public policy, Lorena Cortés, told IPS.

The Index consists of indicators based on surveys of civil society organisations, external stakeholders like government, donors and academics, and the public at large.

In addition, focus groups of 20 people will meet in different regions around the country to discuss how non-governmental organisations (NGOs) work, and case studies will be carried out on every aspect covered by the assessment.

The CIVICUS CSI programme launched its first Global Survey of the State of Civil Society in 2000, offering a profile of NGOs in 44 countries around the world.

The project is coordinated by CIVICUS – the World Alliance for Citizen Participation – and conducted by local NGOs.

The Johannesburg, South Africa-based CIVICUS, an international alliance of civil society organisations, trade unions, faith-based networks, professional associations, philanthropic foundations, donors and other bodies, was founded in 1993.

“CIVICUS has worked for over a decade to strengthen citizen action and civil society throughout the world, especially in areas where participatory democracy and citizens’ freedom of association are threatened. CIVICUS has a vision of a global community of active, engaged citizens committed to the creation of a more just and equitable world,” its web site says.

There are 9,000 officially registered civil society organisations in Mexico, although the number could be higher as registration is voluntary. They work in a broad range of areas, from care for the elderly and the fight against poverty to education, health and the promotion of human rights.

According to CEMEFI statistics, there are around 15,000 social associations in Mexico providing services to third parties, most of which are involved in the areas of health and social work.

In terms of their number, Mexico lags behind countries like Argentina, Chile or the United States, which have 105,000, 300,000 and two million civil society organisations, respectively.

The CSI, which now provides a detailed description of the current state of civic activism in 56 countries, measures several core dimensions: civic engagement, level of organisation, practical expression of values, and perceived impact on social and political decision-making.

Mexico took part in the CSI pilot project in 2000. The results highlighted NGOs’ difficulties in obtaining sources of funding and in cooperating among themselves, and their shortcomings in terms of internal democracy, accountability and financial transparency. The CSI also documented their positive public image, but found they had a low impact on policy-making.

The local NGO Iniciativa Ciudadana para la Promoción de la Cultura del Diálogo (ICPCD – Citizen Initiative for the Promotion of a Culture of Dialogue) and CEMEFI have established a partnership to carry out the current CSI, which is to take a year and will cost around 200,000 dollars supplied mainly by the British government.

Azyadeth Adame, ICPCD coordinator of democratic governance issues, told IPS that “in this country there are no studies on organisations of the kind covered by the CIVICUS CSI, so we hope this will provide a better understanding of civil society.”

María Verduzco, an expert with the NGO Alternativas y Capacidades, which took part in the pilot project in 2000, defined civil society in Mexico as “diverse, heterogeneous and focused on a wide variety of interests and issues.

“The organisations are seeking to influence public policies, but they have major structural limitations and problems securing funds. Furthermore, there is a lack of understanding of what they do, and they do not have a good public image, because of their political activism,” Verduzco told IPS.

In the 2008 National Survey on Philanthropy and Civil Society conducted by the Autonomous Technological Institute of Mexico (ITAM), seven out of 10 respondents expressed some degree of confidence in the country’s NGOs.

But the survey, which touched on questions like donations, volunteer work and the social capital of NGOs, found a low level of public involvement with organised civil society.

“Civil society is still in its early stages of development. There are very few NGOs, taking into account the size of the country,” said José Piña, head of the Fundación Nuevo Milenio (New Millennium Foundation), which is devoted to promoting civic culture.

“I attribute this to the fact that they have basically emerged to meet specific needs that the government is unable to fulfil,” he told IPS.

A 2004 federal law to foment activities carried out by civil society organisations established mechanisms to help them gain access to government funds.

But according to Piña, NGOS are unfamiliar with these mechanisms. “In practice, there is no real policy to develop the potential of civil society,” he said.

In 2007, the Mexican government provided NGOs with 142 million dollars in financing, representing eight percent of their total funding, 85 percent of which came from the provision of services and advice and sales of products, and only seven percent from donations.

There are only 125 donor foundations in Mexico, mainly business foundations, while the rest are family or independent foundations.

The CIVICUS CSI is intended to “build a minimum common agenda to present to the government, so that it is more than a mere research study” and “equip NGOs to become valid interlocutors with the government, and help the government to understand their dynamics,” said CEFEMA’s Cortés, a political scientist with the Centro de Investigación y Docencia Económicas (CIDE – Centre for Economic Teaching and Research).

“Thanks to the Index, we’ll see if there are advantages to society organising itself. NGOs are co-responsible for the world in which we live, but we are unaware of the enormous strength that we could have if more of us got organised,” said the ICPCD’s Adame.