Civil Society: Between Concepts and Empirical Grounds

Examining the historical and social trajectories involved in the continuous development of civil society, this volume reveals the contextual nature of the process. Through empirical studies focusing primarily on Denmark and covering the period from 1849 to the present day, it analyses the manner in which civil society has been practised and transformed over time. Presenting a new theoretical framework informed by a relational and processual perspective, the book sheds new light on familiar questions pertaining to civil society, the production of its boundaries and spaces of action, and the means by which these spaces can become causal factors. A fresh intervention in the study of a concept that has been central in defining ideas of solidarity and the common good, and to which researchers and politicians look for solutions to the great challenges of our time, Civil Society: Between Concepts and Empirical Grounds will appeal to scholars of sociology, politics, history and philosophy with interests in civil society.

With the following contributions:

Egholm, L.& Kaspersen, L.B. (2020): ” A processual-relational approach to civil society” Chap. 1. in Egholm, L. & Kaspersen, L.B Civil society –between concepts and empirical grounds. Routledge pp 3-3

Mossin, C. (2020): ”The modern conceptual history of civil society” Chap. 2 in Egholm, L. & Kaspersen, L.B Civil society –between concepts and empirical grounds. Routledge pp. 31-47

Kaspersen, L.B. & Sevelsted, A. (2020): “The “long history” of civil society in Denmark and Western Europe: Civil society – in the shadow of the state (eighteenth to the twenty-first century)” Chap. 3 in Egholm, L. & Kaspersen, L.B Civil society –between concepts and empirical grounds. Routledge pp 48- 69

Clemens, E. (2020): “Different states, different shadows: The particular exceptionalism of civil society in the United States” Chap. 4 in Egholm, L. & Kaspersen, L.B Civil society –between concepts and empirical grounds. Routledge pp 70-80

Grasten, M. (2020): “Civil society and the civilizing mission” Chap. 5 in Egholm, L. & Kaspersen, L.B Civil society –between concepts and empirical grounds. Routledge pp 43-97

Sevelsted, A. (2020): “Christianity, state, and voluntarism: Protestant processes of privatization and deprivatization” Chap 6. in Egholm, L. & Kaspersen, L.B Civil society –between concepts and empirical grounds. Routledge pp 98-111

Egholm, L. (2020): .”Philanthropy as the co-creator of the welfare state” Chap. 7. in Egholm, L. Mossin, C. 2020 “Past and present futures of democracy: The Danish peasants’movement as democracy instigator and cultural mythologizer” Chap 8. in Egholm & Kaspersen, L.B Civil society –between concepts and empirical grounds. Routledge, pp. 128- 144

Mulvad, A. M. & Hansen, B. R. (2020): “Eclipsed by the welfare state: Understanding the rise and declineof the Danish Workers’ Cooperation, 1871–2000” Chap. 9. in Egholm, L. & Kaspersen, L.B Civil society –between concepts and empirical grounds. Routledge pp 145-158

Jessen, M.H. (2020): “Civil society in the shadow of the Danish welfare state” Chap. 10 in Egholm, L. & Kaspersen, L.B Civil society –between concepts and empirical grounds. Routledge pp 159-172

Andersen, D.M. (2020):” Civic action as temporal process-in-relations: Towards an events-based approach “ Chap. 11. in Egholm, L. & Kaspersen, L.B Civil society –between concepts and empirical grounds. Routledge pp 172-186

Adloff, F. (2020): “Epilogue: Civil society as process and valuation” Chap. 12. in Egholm, L. & Kaspersen, L.B Civil society –between concepts and empirical grounds. Routledge pp 189-201