Page 109 - The ISA Handbook in Contemporary Sociology

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80 THE ISA HANDBOOK IN CONTEMPORARY SOCIOLOGY

Large state firms, which had been the uncon- corruption and the lack of transparency
tested market pillars and a source of national while calling for the accountability of public
pride for so many Third World countries, agencies.
became, almost from one day to the next, the Other important changes in the official dis-
scapegoats for economic backwardness. course have taken place, suggesting that the
Opposition protests notwithstanding, the interaction between state and society requires
vanishing developmental state, both as an new ideological justifications. Conventional
economic model and as the official ideology, ways to perform authority roles came under
was surprisingly fast. critical scrutiny, and everywhere patterns of
In the Brazilian case, there are occasional behavior typical of the market became the
nostalgic claims for rescuing national devel- benchmark of government officers. Under the
opment projects under the aegis of the state, ‘new public management’ ideology, bureau-
particularly among old elites, be they repre- crats are expected to orient their behavior to
sentatives of the business sector or union market efficiency criteria (Barzelay, 2001;
leaders. It is also true that in appealing to the Lane, 2000; McLaughlin et al., 2002; Pollitt
masses, party leaders still resort to a dis- and Bouckaert, 2000). To solve fiscal prob-
course that puts emphasis on state develop- lems, the public sector is expected to seek
mentalism. However, the actual economic inspiration in the market. Welfare reforms
recipes enforced are far from the formulas of everywhere recast the protective function of
state-based capitalism prevailing in the past. governments in new moulds, so as to bring it
It is not that the state has ceased to be a rele- closer to sound contractual practices. In such
vant actor for the market to operate. a context, civil society actors enter the scene
However, it is impossible to deny that the as alternatives either to collaborate with the
role of authority has changed significantly state or to become its surrogate for carrying
and that the ideological justifications for out social functions.
state protectionism are no longer part of the While deeply aware that there have always
official discourse. Even if it is true that in the been multiple forms of civil society organiza-
last few years we observe a clear resurgence tions in action, I focus here on Non-
of state-centered discourses in several Latin Governmental Organizations as expressive of
America countries, we are not back to the old new formulas for social organization. While
days of uncontested state-championed capi- the definition of NGOs is the subject of con-
talism. Now, state authorities appeal to the troversy, some consensus exists that they are
new civil society associations to legitimize non-profit oriented, have a formal structure,
themselves. The official discourse is full of are autonomous in relation to governments,
exhortations to public/private partnership, and are non-representative (Baccaro, 2002;
and appeals to civic solidarity. Landim, 2002; Salamon, 1999).
To the demise of state capitalism corre- The evidence I use in the following text
sponds the ascension of an ideology of slim comes from a research entitled ‘Market,
government, an exhortation of the Third State and Society in the Implementation of
Sector, and pleas for devolution of compe- Social Policies’ that I am conducting in col-
tence to civil society. Furthermore, in Brazil laboration with Brazilian colleagues. My
and elsewhere, governments have discovered comments are based upon preliminary results
that partnership with NGOs can be an attrac- of a survey, aimed at identifying basic char-
tive alternative to gain flexibility and/or to acteristics of NGOs active in Brazil. As
avoid bureaucratic controls. In the Brazilian emphasized above, I am convinced that there
case, there have been frequent press reports have been significant changes in the way
on the use of NGOs for state patronage and we conceive of societal arrangements today,
nepotism. Although critics like to use this in changes that need clarification, and that call
order to condemn NGOs as such, there are for research into areas thus far not suffi-
also NGOs aimed precisely at fighting ciently covered. Along these lines, I take