A Terrain of Struggle: The Limits of Civil Society Initiatives in Policymaking and Digital Spaces

Increasing transparency and holding the elite accountable should be a priority for democratic states. Nonetheless, parliaments may often disfavour such openness, due to the lack of appropriate checking mechanisms that allow for good, effective communication flow between policymakers and the civil society. This research contributes to the literature on critical civil society studies and popular mobilisation in the quest of transparency and digital access to the wider citizenry in the policymaking process. It helps address a gap in how European national parliaments may recycle a narrative that appeases, controls, and excludes the participation of a healthy civil society in the policymaking process, with particular reference to digital spaces. Conversely, by obtaining a deeper understanding of the limitations posed, we have a better chance at assessing how parliaments can benefit from openness and transparency. This proposal seeks to assess current practices and gaps in transparency and accountability within democratic European state parliaments. It concentrates on specific country-cases like Cyprus, where the current infrastructure does not allow for civil society itself to engage directly with the policymaking process. Our research’s primary mission is to convey a better understanding of how the lack of transparency traps civil society and social movement bodies, binding them to the will of the ‘hegemon’ – that is, the national parliament and supporting entities. As such, it employs a hegemonic analysis through a neo-Gramscian framework of civil society. The selected framework is applicable for a number of reasons. First and foremost, it authorities) can use civil society elements to overcome popular mobilisation and to establish a dominant narrative, thereby rendering active citizenry powerless. The hegemon can overcome the criticism and inquiries of scrutiny by civil society actors through digital spaces, intimidation and fear, and image projection through special advisory committees on issues of corruption, by appearing to collaborate with civil society partners. A mixed qualitative methods approach is formulated to include (a) ethnography, as participants-observers, whereby the authors developed personal insights through their participation in and organisation/observation of public events and other ventures, as well as through discussion with public and private stakeholders on matters of corruption and transparency in the digital space; (b) in-depth, semi-structured interviews with elite (governmental and/or public figures, media representatives) and non-elite (civil society and NGO representatives, activists, academics) interviewees; (c) critical discourse analysis of key texts, speeches, legal documents, and established law; and (d) comparative analysis of work already in place elsewhere in the European continent.