David Ronfeldt on Rethinking Civil Society from a Network Society Perspective

= considerations in the context of the TIMN Framework, see Tribes, Institutions, Markets, Networks

Discussion

David Ronfeldt:

"RETHINKING CIVIL SOCIETY FROM A TIMN PERSPECTIVE

Defining “civil society” is a slippery task. The concept’s origins date back to ancient Greek philosophy. It gained its modern liberal momentum during the 18th and 19th Centuries when British Enlightenment philosophers Adam Ferguson, John Locke, Adam Smith, and German idealist G.F.W. Hegel used it to denote a layer of civic-minded people and associations that mediated between the state and society at large, with its many uncivil as well as civil folks. Later definitions emphasized voluntary associations (à la Alexis De Tocqueville) that were independent of the state — with business, labor, and other economic actors included as part of civil society.

Newer definitions, still emphasizing voluntary associations, have viewed civil society as a family-, community-, work-, and morality-oriented realm that is increasingly distinct from the realms of government and the market economy. It’s been popularly termed the “third sector” by advocates who favor strengthening civil society’s roles relative to the government and the market economy, which they deemed the first and second sectors. Newer definitions have recognized that economic entities like massive powerful private-sector business corporations should not be considered part of civil society

While that’s all fine, two clarifications are needed from a TIMN perspective. (1) It makes sense for civil society’s early definition to include market actors like businesses that contributed to the growth of home towns and whose personnel participated in local community associations. But too few modern definitions make clear that massive private-sector corporations should not be counted as part of civil society — they’re solidly part of the capitalist market realm, and often indisposed toward civil society. Leaders of the World Economic Forum (Davos) do not regard their entities as part of civil society. (2) From a TIMN standpoint, it’s a misnomer to call civil society the “third sector.” Since civil society is an outgrowth of the Tribes form, it’s historically the first sector to begin evolving, not the third.

Against that background, here’s my updated take on civil society: TIMN’s Tribes, as I’ve noted, is the foundational form for what evolves over time into the realm we call civil society. The original form bonded families, clans, and their extended variants into small communities, settlements, and towns with local identities. Later, these bonds and identifies often fractured when people migrated to anonymous cities where urbanization and industrialization were occuring. So people turned to form new bonds and identities by joining workers guilds, labor unions, clubby voluntary associations, religious organizations, etc., all as parts and partners of civil society. Later, the rise of nationalism provided a still broader sense of family and community togetherness.

This evolution meant that people began to increasingly reach out to each other in new ways. Which raises theoretical questions for TIMN: Are people doing this in keeping with dynamics of the Tribes form that value reaching inward — but now doing so with a widened sense of in-group boundaries? Or is there an outreach aspect to the Tribes form I’ve missed recognizing? Possibly — something to keep mulling.

But there’s another possibility, and that’s what I’m going to emphasize: Remember, all four TIMN forms are present as seed-forms when people first begin to assemble into societies. Thus, even though Tribes is the first form to take hold, some members are already operating in the Networks form, albeit on a minor scale — say by trying to exchange views or gifts with someone in a neighboring settlement. Over time, the quantity and variety of people operating in the Networks form may then increase and become more influential — for example, by way of long-ago religious missionaries or peace activists — even though the clear emergence of +N still lies centuries in the future.

This idea — that the Tribes form becomes more inclusive as people’s identities expand over time, and that the quantity and variety of people operating in the Networks form expands as well — leads to a revised TIMN perspective. I’ve previously viewed civil society simply as a manifestation of the Tribes form — ideally, civil society as “one big family.” However, for so many people from different families, clans, communities, associations, etc. to learn to mingle and get along, cooperating side by side in all sorts of endeavors, it appears that more is going on for TIMN than a progressive morphing of the Tribes form into civil society. And that “something more” is the progressive growth in the minority of Networks actors alongside Tribes actors as a society moves through the TIMN progression.

In summarize this new realization, the civil-society realm is the result of a morphing of the Tribes form under the influence of the Networks form. The growing presence of actors operating in the Networks form helps bring out the bright sides of the Tribes form. In this revised view, Tribes remains the foundational form for what evolves into civil society. But the pace and nature of that evolution depends partly on what’s going on simultaneously with the Networks form (not to mention what may be also be going on with people operating in the order-loving Institutions and freedom-loving Markets forms too).

In TIMN’s grand scheme, both forms are needed for societies to continue progressing. Tribes cannot be substituted for Networks, nor converted into it — nor vice-versa, The two forms, including their motivating impulses and mentalities, are too different for that. Yet, one can become (and be made) stronger than the other. Plus, T can grow in the direction of +N, and the two can become (and be made) more compatible and mutually reinforcing over time. Hybrids are also possible, and may have occurred, and still be occurring, far more than I currently realize.

Rotary International looks to be an illuminating example. I read that it began in 1905 as a single club in a single city, Chicago, for the purpose of promoting professional fellowship and exchanging ideas. It then spread nationally and internationally, changed its name to Rotary International in 1922, and broadened its sense of mission beyond professional fellowship to emphasize humanitarian service, notably with its campaign to eradicate polio worldwide. Rotary International also began engaging in projects with outside actors — for example, it gained consultative status with the United Nations in the late 1940s, and has partnered with the Gates Foundation in recent decades. All of which strikes me as meaning that Rotary began its evolution as a Tribes formation embedded in local communities to the benefit of civil society, then morphed into a transnational Tribes-Networks hybrid, while also evolving a global capacity for some parts to operate as a Networks formation — never shedding its Tribes origin, but transcending it along the way. Have I got that right? Could Rotary be a model example of my updated understanding of TIMN? I mean to keep an eye on it.

I look forward to the future possibility that civil-society actors operating in an expanded Tribes form will someday help call for adding a +Networks realm. We should want America to be a nation of Tribes and Networks, not a country riven by malignant Tribes and polarized Networks. I’m well aware the two forms can be rent asunder, as domestic and foreign Far Right forces are currently campaigning inside American society and culture — a point for another post, not this one.

* PRELIMINARY IMPLICATIONS FOR THEORY AND STRATEGY

About time I surfaced something new for TIMN’s sake. For the past 30 years, since first unearthing it, I’ve mostly kept dusting and shining lights on its fundamental design elements: Four major forms of organization. All present at societies’ origins. Each with its own preferred ways of believing and behaving. Each with its own bright and dark sides. Seed-forms that, when their time and technology comes along, generate societies’ major realms. With all the forms and their realms constantly interacting and affecting each other. In progressions from ancient monoform (T-centric) societies to today’s prospects for the emergence of next-phase quadriform (T+I+M+N) societies. Following a set of system dynamics that recur during each phase transition. And so forth, as of the mid 1990s.

By my reckoning, the best new piece I added after that is the recurrent system dynamic I call decontrol: “To advance through the TIMN progression, control must give way to decontrol” (Ronfeldt, 2009). I first found it over 15 years ago. It’s a powerful piece for both theory and practice. I still yearn to finish writing it up — two posts to go, after making a start with three posts during 2023–2024.

Meanwhile, I’ve supposed there’s still lots more embedded inside TIMN that I have yet to dig up and dust off. Thus what I’ve come up with in recent weeks feels revelatory. As I related in Part I, I’ve been stewing for years over the difficulties I’ve had clarifying the nature of the Networks form and its standing vis à vis the Tribes form. So it’s quite a relief to have these clarifications finally bubble up and take shape front-and-center in my weary mind."

(https://davidronfeldt.substack.com/p/rethinking-what-tribes-and-networks-9ec)