Environmental NGOs

One of the examples often given in the literature for a global civil society is the environmental movement, specifically international, national and local environmental NGOs. Lin Gan109

107

Lipschutz, p. 2.

argues that aside from the liberalization and the integration of the global markets, and their effects on people, the democratization of political systems in Asia has equally contributed to the growth of civil society, particularly of environmental NGOs.

108

Lipschutz, p. 57.

109

Lin Gan, “Energy development and environmental NGOs: The Asian perspective” in P. Chasek (ed), The global environment in the twenty-first century: prospects for international cooperation

123

Hilary French110 described how the numbers of NGOs, specifically environmental groups have continued to increase, in particular since the 1980s. She cited statistics that document the percentage of environmental groups within all transnational social change NGOs, from two percent in 1953 to 14 percent in 1994.111

NGOs are often defined by acknowledging what they are not - that they are not organized by the state or the government. Paul Wapner112 defined NGOs as “political organizations that arise and operate outside the formal offices of the state, and are devoted to addressing public issues.”113 He attempts an “ideal-type formulation” that describes environmental NGOs as “groups dedicated to protecting the quality of air, land, and water throughout the world, and the continued existence of the non-human species.”114 However he admits that this is a very narrow and limiting description because “protecting the environment is often a by-product of efforts to protect a community’s economic base or resist social dislocations.” He emphasized though that the complexity of issues that environmental NGOs deal with requires that “NGOs engage multiple levels of collective life and enlist numerous forms of political power to alter widespread practices.”115 This practice of multiple engagements of NGOs supports the idea of NGOs as intermediary organizations. From CEC’s experience, this intermediary role was critical in the progressive contextualization of its educational practice, as the thesis argues.

110

Hilary French, Vanishing borders: Protecting the planet in the age of globalization (London: Earthscan, 2000).

111

French, p. 164.

112

Paul Wapner, “The transnational politics of environmental NGOs: Governmental, economic and social activism” in P. Chasek (ed), The global environment in the twenty-first century: prospects for international cooperation (Tokyo: United Nations University, 2000), pp.87-108.

113 Wapner, p. 89. 114 Wapner, p. 91. 115 Wapner, p. 88.

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Based on a study of Asian NGOs involved in energy issues and environmental protection, Gan identified three types of NGOs: research-oriented NGOs, lobbying NGOs and mediating NGOs.116 He described them as follows:

Research-oriented NGOs are those with informational and advisory characteristics. They are motivated by the value of their service accomplished through scientific knowledge development, consultation and policy advice.

Lobbying NGOs are those with critical, sometimes radical attitudes toward development projects with major environmental impacts. … This type of NGO focuses on advocacy when they conduct lobbying activities against policies of governments and international aid agencies.

Mediating NGOs are those providing network services. … Their main interest lies in making connections and providing information on important issues to concerned interest groups and individuals.117

David Korten identified four types of NGOs, namely, volunteer organizations, public service contractors, people’s organizations and governmental nongovernmental organizations.118 However, of more practical significance to this study is what Korten’s classification of NGOs based on the their organizational strategies.

First generation strategies (Relief and Welfare) involve the NGO in the direct delivery of services to meet an immediate deficiency or shortage experiences by the beneficiary population, such as needs for food, health care or shelter.

Second generation strategies (Community Development) focus the energies of the NGO on developing the capacities of the people to better meet their own needs through self-reliant local action.

116 Gan, p. 113. 117 Gan, pp. 113-117. 118

David Korten, Getting to the 21st century: Voluntary action and the global agenda (Connecticut: Kumarin Press, 1990), p. 2.

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Third generation strategies (Sustainable Systems Development) look beyond the individual community and seek changes in specific policies and institutions at local, national and global levels.

Fourth generation strategies (People’s Movement) look beyond focused initiatives aimed at specific policies and institutional subsystems. Their goal is to energize a critical mass of independent, decentralized initiative in support of a social vision.119

Breitmeier and Rittberger, 120 on the other hand identify two types of NGOs these are advocacy and service organizations. They described advocacy NGOs as often involved in educating, mobilizing and organizing the general public around certain issues often to act as a pressure group to lobby politicians and decision-makers. Service NGOs, on the other hand, assist other organizations by providing a specific service or in implementing public policies.

In particular for environmental NGOs, Breitmeier and Rittberger present another scheme of describing NGOs based on their relationship with economic actors.

‘Pragmatic’ environmental NGOs believe that environmental protection can be achieved within a market economy and that openness to discussing even divisive issues with political adversaries will promote the goals of environmental NGOs in the long term even accept donations from private firms.

‘Fundamentalist’ NGOs are more opposed to a political approach accepting the rules of the market economy [and] argue that these contributions will make environmentalists dependent on their adversaries and will thwart environmental goals.121

119

Korten, pp. 114–127.

120

Breitmeier and Rittberger, p. 135.

121

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Attempting to classify CEC using the above categories is rather difficult. Based on Gan’s typology CEC would qualify with all three of the types of NGOs, namely research, lobby and mediating. Using Korten’s classification, CEC would primarily employ a second generation strategy, but would be also involved in third and fourth generation strategies, particularly with its networks. The same is true for Breitmeier and Rittberger’s general classification of NGOs where CEC qualifies as both an advocacy and a service NGO. However applying Breitmeier and Rittberger’s classification of environmental NGOs, CEC is more the fundamentalist type given its critical stance against private corporations and the government. Clearly, in the real world, these descriptions and typologies tend to blur, and more importantly are very context specific. The classification of CEC as an NGO is further examined in relation to the development of NGOs in the Philippines in chapters 5 and 6.

Many of the authors examined acknowledge that the Earth Summit was a watershed for the “democratization of global environmental governance”122, particularly in terms of the participation of civil society before and the during official conference. Naidoo123 described that there were some 2,400 NGO representatives who attended the main conference together with their respective official government delegates, not to mention the 17,000 delegates who attended the simultaneous International NGO Forum (INGOF). This level of participation of NGOs, according to Breitmeier and Rittberger124 has continued even in the post-Rio period, specifically in the political processes of the UN system, World Bank, and a large number of international conventions,

But despite this democratization, Thomas Princen, Matthias Finger and Jack Manno point out “many NGOs invested in strengthening the UNCED process, but neglected

122 French, p. 170. 123 Naidoo, pp.34+. 124

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the positions of NGOs operating at the grassroots level.” 125 This observation is consistent with the role that Filipino NGOs played during the INGOF. Hector Soliman reported the following during a round table discussion after the Earth Summit.

I am happy to note that the Philippine NGO delegation was very active both in the preparation, conduct and follow-up of the International NGO Forum. In fact, one of our NGO personalities, Mr. Junie Kalaw, was a co-chairperson of the Forum. The principal design of the process was also delegated to the Philippine NGOs. The participation of the Philippine NGOs at the Forum consisted of both being part of the Secretariat, which was handling the day- to-day activities of the Forum, and at the same time, of involvement in what we now call the alternative treaty making process.126

However, some Filipinos who attended UNCED claim that the involvement of the Filipinos in facilitating the conference process took time and energy away from advocating for the local issues that were identified in extensive series of pre-UNCED workshops in the Philippines. Isagani Serrano describes this situation as the reality of lobby campaigns, whether,

… during the Earth Summit in Rio or during annual meetings of the IMF and the World Bank, we have seen how ideas and people get swamped or “coopted” in an arena that pits the powerful against the less powerful.127

But Serrano emphasizes that these situations are valuable learning opportunities.

125

Thomas Princen, Matthias Finger and Jack Manno, “ Transnational linkages” in T. Princen and M. Finger, Environmental NGOs in world politics: Linking the local and the global (London: Routledge, 1994), p. 222.

126

Hector Soliman, “Reaction” in Joseph Sedfrey Santiago and Edna May Grecia (eds), The United Nations Conference on Environment and Development: Myths and Realities (A Round Table Discussion) (QC: University of the Philippines Institute of International Legal Studies, 1992) p. 70.

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Breitmeier and Rittberger128 claim that NGOs representing local civil societies in international negotiations are often haunted by the question regarding whom they represent, given that they do not have the legitimacy that governments, who are voted in periodically have. Wapner agrees with this observation and is explicit that NGOs are “ultimately accountable to their funders, and yet, those funders do not necessarily represent the public interest.”129 They emphasized that environmental NGOs, despite their emphasis on working for the betterment of the environment are not above the influence of political loyalties. These are clearly additional contradictions that need to be examined in the context of the experience of CEC.

In particular, this thesis focuses on the class of environmental NGOs that are locally based, compared to international NGOs like Friends of the Earth and Greenpeace. This focus is due to the fact that CEC is a national NGO that is based in Manila, but works, within and outside the Philippines, particularly through its network of groups that share a similar focus on social change.

Princen and Finger are explicit that they “do not assume that NGOs are the solution to the global environmental crisis.”130 Given the global context that we face, they stress that we cannot be “doing more of the same … societies must learn their way out of the environmental crisis.”131 This situation, they emphasize, calls for a new form of politics, where NGOs play a role that goes beyond the usual lobbying at the national level. They argue that this new form of politics challenges the reliance of the state on science to solve what are strictly not solely scientific and technical problems. This form of politics is consistent with their argument that,

128

Breitmeier and Rittberger, p. 135.

129

Wapner, p. 94.

130

Thomas Princen and Matthias Finger, Environmental NGOs in world politics: Linking the local and the global (London: Routledge, 1994), p. 11.

131

129

… traditional, state-centered political and scientific problem-solving mechanisms have been atomistic – single-species, single- chemical, single- medium – not systemic and holistic in their approaches.132

They identify a critical feature of NGO intervention that provides a succinct summary of the role and tensions experienced by environmental NGOs as mediators through their ability

… to link the essential knowledge base (scientific and earth-centered) to the world of politics, to translate biophysical needs into choices a wide range of actors can make at many levels of decision making.133

Therefore they are more than just a lobby group, in fact, they are “agents of social learning”134 that manage to link the biophysical with the political, while simultaneously acting at various levels along the spectrum of the local and the global. NGOs can achieve this, they continue, because of their ability to form coalitions and networks as part of their work.

This ability of NGOs to network and form coalitions supports the previous observation of Wapner135 regarding the multiple levels of engagement of NGOs and the argument of the thesis regarding the intermediary role of NGOs, like CEC. However, this intermediary role includes not just mediating between different forms and levels of organizations, but equally between different knowledge bases, such as the scientific and the political. Both intermediary roles contribute to the identification of NGOs by Princen and Finger as “agents of social learning.”136

132

Princen, Finger and Manno, p. 220.

Similarly, both these types of intermediary roles are identified by the thesis to have facilitated the progressive contextualization of CEC’s educational practice.

133

Princen, Finger and Manno, p. 223.

134

Princen, Finger and Manno, p. 228.

135

Wapner, p. 88.

136

130

The following section examines further the challenges of facilitating social learning that responds to the impacts of economic globalization.