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EU assistance for Kosovo is the most ambitious external relations venture embarked upon by the Commission to date. Not surprisingly, much of the aid is framed in terms of 'civil society' and channelled through a handful of local non-governmental organizations (NGOs). But attempts by foreign donors to promote civil society exogenously across post-socialist Eurasia are deemed to have achieved little in terms of stimulating individual participation and civic engagement. In response the EU appears to have refined its approach by combining the usual support for larger NGOs with more basic assistance for grassroots networks and community-based initiatives. Whilst such a twin-track strategy is arguably appropriate in the context of Kosovo where civil society participation is particularly low, in terms of maximizing the critical development of transactional capacity the approach may fail to target resources most effectively. It is argued here that there is a danger that normative concerns about liberal pluralism, enriching civil society and ensuring that assistance is widely dispersed may ultimately detract from the imperative of deploying limited resources first and foremost to secure a core of sustainable NGOs with developed capacity to engage government, the international community and other non-state actors in the process of policy reform. Indeed, drawing on the experience of civil society assistance in new member states of Central and Eastern Europe, it would seem that although NGOs are often criticized for their detachment from community organizations and campaigns, they perform a critical 'behind the scenes' role in policy change and state transformation. They can, if donor funding is appropriately targeted, facilitate the emergence of civil society networks through which small community organizations are then linked with larger, established and capacity-endowed organizations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article contributes to a growing literature critiquing non-governmental organizations (NGOs) as civil society in post-communist Europe. From the perspective of the Czech environmental movement, although over a decade of foreign assistance and know-how transfer has resulted in a tier of professional NGOs that have obtained political influence at the elite level, these organizations have made little progress in rooting themselves in society at large. This gives rise to the claim that what exists today are NGOs without civil society. It is argued that, in light of the withdrawal of large American donors since May 2004 and EU accession, NGOs need to make links with the enmeshed community-based organizations that have emerged in recent years and focus much more on fund-raising and developing sustainable strategies for their future development. Fifteen years after communism collapsed, it is time to take stock of what has evolved under the banner of civil society, particularly in a state where the concept has been fiercely debated. At a theoretical level, it is argued that, in order to assess the capacity of NGOs to fulfil the democratic functions of civil society, we need first to acknowledge the ideological rationale that has dictated their development. It is only by returning to a more normative understanding of the concept of civil society that we gain a critical insight into the apparent disconnection between NGOs and society and their limited capacity to mobilize popular support. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]