Authr : Réseau des Femmes Leaders pour le Développement
Restrictions indicate that some countries harbor some of the poorest conditions of civic space, with countries closed to civil society participation, governments using repressive tactics to target civil society. Factors contributing to poor respect for fundamental rights include the entrenched authoritarianism of dominant party governments, armed conflict and weak rule of law. For most countries, restrictions on civic space and human rights violations continue because perpetrators ranging from government officials, armed groups, radical wings of ruling political parties and big business are not held accountable for their actions and often act with impunity. In some countries, the environment is hostile to civil society human rights defenders, who are always under attack.
Human rights defenders and journalists have been targeted by the state and armed groups.In most of these countries, demonstrators are killed as they call for democratic reforms, respect for workers’ rights and protest against austerity measures and state excesses.Human rights defenders and civil society representatives are subjected to threats, smear campaigns, judicial persecution and intimidation, and many are detained for their human rights activities.Representatives of civil society organizations have been abducted by state agents and have not been heard, with states remaining silent about their fate.
The attack on civil society’s fundamental freedoms of association, peaceful assembly and expression continues.These freedoms enable people to come together, debate, organize for collective action, scrutinize the actions of the powerful and express dissent.A key test of the health of any democracy should be the existence of space for civil society activists and human rights defenders to do their legitimate work.This means that most of us live in conditions where we are denied the right to organize towards a common goal and to participate in democratic dissent.
Governments continue to use restrictive legislation and policies to curb freedom of association by increasing the administrative burden on civil society, preventing some institutions from registering, while other organizations suffer the withdrawal of their registration certificates when they frequently intervene on issues deemed too sensitive.Terrorism laws have been used disproportionately to target freedom of association and expression, and pending legislation seeks to restrict funding and give the state absolute powers to control organizations.Civil society is not the only one under attack.Independent media are attacked alongside civil society for their role in asking tough questions of those who hold political and economic power, and in exposing corruption and bad governance. Journalists face pressure of all kinds, including threats, intimidation and physical assaults on them and their families.
Alongside the attacks, there is widespread concern about the bias of the public media, while the growing defamation tactic of “fake news” is spreading rapidly around the world. New laws are being passed to restrict online expression, and the repercussions can lead to widespread self-censorship.
The challenge for civil society is not only to document where restrictions occur, but also to work to reveal the underlying drivers and catalysts of restriction; to offer a narrative that speaks not only of restriction but also of riposte and expansion and the creation of meaningful spaces; and to build local-to-global citizen responses for advocacy and civic space. An opportunity is offered by the fact that civic space has become a major concern of many CSOs, donors and governments, and an emerging global community understands that without an activated civic space, development and human rights are not possible.
