Civil society now is one of the main pillars that democratic governance stands on. It is acting away from the dynamics of the state and the market for just the hopes and goals of the society. Its main goal is to address the societal needs, hear well the public opinion and address them to the decision makers. Also they can coordinate with decision makers in issuing policies that can address these needs of they are found in an interactive democratic systems.

 

It is supposed that countries aspiring for democracies like late awaking Arab countries must enhance and empower the role of civil society as an effective stakeholder in the society in order to reach a strong democratic corporatist regime.

 

 

No doubt that the big uprising in the Arab countries are caused by purely social needs that were not addressed by governmental agencies, and it is appearing that civil society can't deal alone in the face of this accumulated needs in all Arab countries.

 

Civil society organizations were based on the funds, loans coming from international organizations and European Union in arab countries but these loans were worthless. Civil Society couldn't deal with corruption, poverty rooted in the system of these societies.  Human rights and political liberties were disregarded in these societies despite the existence of Civil Society organizations for human rights. Organizations targeting poverty, social gap between classes also failed in narrowing this gap and the result was strong revolutions and broke outs in the Arab streets. That's why the donors started to re-study these funds, supervise these organizations and advice them may be they will try to study new procedures for these goals.

 

Actually The role of civil society can't be marginalized in the democratic governance but it was marginalized in the political life in Arab countries and couldn't address well the social needs of the society without any support from the state. Too much money and loans were given without inspections about its sources and the channels of spending them. There was a clear absence of coordination between different civil society organizations in targeting specific social goals or issues like educations, poverty, and corruption.   

 

We can't blame only the civil society for that, but we have also to say that absence of transparency from the governmental sides, no open and secure access for information for these organizations to work on were contributing more to the weak role played by civil society and contributing more in the dynamics that make ordinary people exploded in the face of their political system to form what is named by "Arab Spring".

 

Arab Spring can be defined as a huge accumulated desires and hopes of different segments in arab societies for a good democratic system that can benefit both the poor and the rich. The main slogans that were raised and still being raised till now by the Arab streets now are "change...Freedom...Social Justice" and "People want to down the regime".

 

For example, in Egypt there were too many warnings that people living in slums and beside graves of dead people are representing a great danger on the urban life and they will explode one day. After the 25^th revolution they exploded and still exploding because of their marginalization, no services presented to them and the bad societal status they were given forced them to revolute against the regime who misused the national resources.

 

 

Indeed, No actor can feel these segments and study the marginalized people needs more than the civil society. Therefore Arab countries who succeeded in downing there regimes and those on the way of downing there regime must pay attention to this pillar (Civil Society) in their developmental process. It is not just about tackling social needs for societies (it is very important now) but also it is highly beneficial in the process of choosing the best policies that can address these goals. The concept of democratic corporatism must be raised again during the establishment process of the new systems.

 

The new civil society has a very difficult mission and needs must be answered on the short run and the long run. From these goals that both the state and society are seeking is the Human Development. The civil society must address the rooted corruption in the governmental agencies, present many policies for having good education so that the individual can meet the requirements of the market and he can be able to assist his country in the developmental process.  We can't move our eyes away from Poverty and wide social gap between rich and poor cases. Thus, Initiatives for employment and small entrepreneurships must be encouraged by these organizations.

 

On the other hand and in order to build a complete sound regime, Civil Society must also play an effective and efficient role in the political life. Organizations advocating Human Rights, Woman Rights, Increasing Political Awareness, Civil Liberties must be activated and allowed to work in a free democratic atmosphere without any disturbances from the security apparatus.

 

One more lesson must be learnt from the bad experiences of the old regimes is that decision making process were exclusive on the big heads in the ruling party. But now and after removing these totalitarian authoritarian regimes, civil society organizations can play a role in this process. Think tanks and brain storming institutions if they have full autonomy and independence can perfectly listen to the public opinion, can guess the prior needs of the societies and by its academics it can formulate the best policies for any government to address these issues.

 

 

The international and regional sphere can contribute more to the promising role of civil society in Arab countries. the neighbors of these Arab countries like Turkey, European countries on the Mediterranean sea can share their experiences with the Arab civil society organizations. For example think tanks in Turkey and Arab countries can hold many meetings, conferences and discussions groups in order to discuss the major issues that are facing their nations on the political level and social, economic level too. Organizations focused on increasing the quality of education can meet and brainstorm their policies for increasing the quality of education in both countries and share their experiences together.

 

It would be more fruitful if countries sharing same culture and identity like Islamic countries to make this kind of meetings. They are coming from the same background and same culture but from different environments with different constraints. This is a good chance for the new democratic Arab countries to awake their Islamic identity beside their Arabic identity in order to benefit from experiences in Islamic world like Turkey, Indonesia and Malaysia.

 

At the end, we have to say that there is a big mission waiting for the civil society in the Arab spring countries. The probabilities of its success are high in comparing to the previous times. The new governments will be formulated will put the social needs on the top of its agenda and thus there is no good friend for these government except civil society. The governmental agencies are like the fat big man with its bureaucratic and corrupted mechanisms unlike the fit elastic body of civil societies which can easily and quickly go to the marginalized places, slums and remote areas.