POL354Y5 Lecture Notes - Mikhail Gorbachev, Public Knowledge, Communist Party Of The Soviet Union
Document Summary
Realm of organized social life that is voluntary, self-generating, (largely) self-supporting, autonomous from the state, & bound by a legal order or set of shared rules. Involves citizens acting collectively in public sphere to express interests, passions, & ideas, exchange information, achieve mutual goals, make demands on state, & hold state officials accountable. Restricts state power-- but legitimizes state authority when that authority is based on rule of law. Economic (productive & commercial associations & n etworks); Informational & educational (produce & disseminate public knowledge, ideas, news, information); Interest-based (advance or defend common interests of such members as workers, veterans, pensioners, professionals, etc); Developmental (combine individual resources to improve infrastructure, institutions, &quality of life of community); Issue-oriented (movements for environmental protection, women"s & minority rights, land reform, etc); Civic (nonpartisan improvement of polity through human rights monitoring, voter education & mobilization, anticorruption efforts, etc). 3. monopolize a functional or pol space in society, or claim to represent only legitimate path.
