The Counter-Associational Revolution: The Rise, Spread, and Contagion of Restrictive Civil Society Laws in the World’s Strongest Democratic States
In recent years, an increasing number of democratic states, including fully consolidated, long-standing democratic states, have adopted laws that impose new restrictions on the ability of civil society organizations (CSOs) to operate autonomous from government control, a phenomenon that is unsurprising in authoritarian contexts, but perplexing in democratic ones. This Article explores this curious phenomenon, often referred to as the closing space trend, which began in earnest at the turn of the 21st century, and has been gaining momentum and intensity ever since. This trend, which has caught the attention of political scientists, global civil society watchdogs, and scholars of non-governmental organizations (NGOs) has inexplicably gone unnoticed by legal scholars. Moreover, the non-legal scholars and watchdogs who track this phenomenon tend to focus exclusively on the most egregious examples from non-democratic (or weakly democratic) contexts, such as Russia, Egypt, and China. This Article, which falls at the intersection of comparative, international, and not-for-profit law, and draws on democratic theory, international relations
Recommended Citation: Chrystie F. Swiney, The Counter-Associational Revolution: The Rise, Spread, and Contagion of Restrictive Civil Society Laws in the World’s Strongest Democratic States, 43 Fordham Int'l L.J. 399 (2019).