«Electoral Issues», episode seven: civil society's role in strengthening democratic principles in Palestinian society

What is civil society? What is its importance and its role relating to elections? What is democracy?

Dr Talal Abu Rokba answered the previous questions during the seventh radio episode of the Electoral Issues programme, titled “The role of civil-society institutions in strengthening the principles of democracy in Palestinian society”, carried out by Pal-Think for Strategic Studies within the activities and events of the project “Toward a society more aware of its electoral rights”, implemented by Pal-Think in cooperation with the Central Elections Commission within the project “Partnership with civil-society institutions 2021 / phase two”, funded by the European Union.

He opened his remarks saying: “Civil society and the private and public sectors form society; yet the first differs in that it aims neither at profit nor at power, but at deepening the language of dialogue, communal development, and closing the gap in the marginalised areas”. He affirmed that civil society completes the governmental role in strengthening democracy, pointing out that development is one of civil society's goals, which it carries out through democracy — considering that the citizen is the foundation in the political process and the electoral process.

Abu Rokba added: “All the institutions support the democratic option and work through the central elections or through projects, programmes, and interventions in order to strengthen the democratic culture within society's structure”.

He concluded, saying: “Civil-society institutions have succeeded in sounding the alarm in what relates to the participation of youth and women in the political process and in drawing attention to the issues of youth and women; but there was a flaw in the treatment — that is, actual empowerment — during the past years in what is called political participation, for the existence of a problem in collective empowerment because of the division and the occupation”.