Shaping Globalization: 
Civil Society, Cultural Power and Threefolding

— chapter one —
threefolding: the language of the new tri-polar world

Civil society emerged from the Battle of Seattle as a third global force. It took its place beside business and government¹ as one of the key global institutions that now determine the quality and direction of globalization. The emergence of global civil society changes the world from a uni-polar or bi-polar world to one that is tri-polar.

The Battle of Seattle and the Emergence of a Tri-Polar World

We now live in a tri-polar world where the forces, capacities, and resources to change the world are clustered in the hands of business, government, and global civil society. In many countries and towns, another constellation of forces is becoming increasingly visible. Three global powers are now determining the understanding and fate of burning social issues. We can see the meaning and significance of this development when we consider the world history of the last 55 years.

From 1945 to 1989, humanity lived in a bi-polar world, created by the cold war between the economic forces of capitalism and the political power of communism. During this era, leaders viewed world events and initiated policies, laws, and programs on the basis of predominantly political and/or economic concerns and perspectives.

After the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989, the bi-polar world started to ebb away. We seemed headed towards a uni-polar world characterized by the “end of history”² and the global triumph of neo-liberal capitalism³  over communism. Leaders increasingly viewed world development from the narrow perspective of a fictitious “free” market. The precious ideal of democracy became increasingly hollow, as elite economic powers made a mockery of elections and other forms of democratic activities.⁴  The dubious creation of the monolithic World Trade Organization (WTO) in 1995, with powers exceeding that of legitimate aspects of nation states, was a chilling demonstration of the coercive force of this increasingly uni-polar world.

But then the Battle of Seattle, preceded by years of work by global civil society, broke the monotony of the hyper-capitalist empire. Civil society broke down the monopoly of the neo-liberal, capitalist-centered discourse on globalization. Civil society, in an act of cultural rebellion, re-framed the whole globalization debate in terms of values and meaning, taking the momentum away from the prevalent elite discourse that basically rationalized as legitimate the prevailing greed for money and unbridled lust for power. In this defiant act, culminating years of resistance, global civil society dramatically introduced the beginnings of a tri-polar world and the birthing of a new history.

Threefolding as the New Language of the Tri-Polar World

The Battle of Seattle showed millions around the globe that we now inhabit a tri-polar world. This had been true for some time, but was only perceptible to those who follow such developments closely.

We need to become familiar with the new social landscape of the tri-polar world. For its social topography will strongly influence our future and that of our planet. And in order to be familiar enough to live in this landscape, we need to know the key words of the language spoken in this new tri-polar world.

The word threefolding⁵  is a good place to start. It is a new term for many and I use it extensively in the book, for threefolding is key to understanding the new social landscape and what goes on within it. The term integrates and sheds light on many of the new concepts in the tri-polar world. For these reasons, it is important to be clear about its meaning from the very beginning. Understanding threefolding means understanding many facts, events, and details in this book and, even more important, illuminating what we see in the social world around us.

As we proceed, please note the words or phrases in italics. These are points of emphasis including the most important terms in the new language. Knowing what they mean will make it much easier to understand what I mean by threefolding and related ideas in this book. Knowing this terminology will also make it much easier for readers to grasp the central points in Chapters 9 to 16.

Two Preconditions to Understanding Threefolding

There are two keys or entry points to understanding the meaning and importance of threefolding.

The first key is to understand why our world is now tri-polar. It is so because there are now three contending institutional powers that reside in the world—global civil society, government, and business. These three powers, through their interaction, determine the direction of world development.

There is something very important that is directly connected with the emergence of civil society as one of the three institutional powers. Though its emergence, civil society also gives birth, consciously or not, to cultural life as an autonomous realm within larger society. This event is so important that we will see it come into play in our considerations below on de facto threefolding. (See Chapter 13 for a related treatment of this observation.)

Recognizing the existence of three institutional powers—and the de facto emergence of an autonomous cultural realm through the presence of civil society—is the first key to understanding what threefolding is. But it is not enough. We need to add another key so that, taken together, these two keys will unlock for us the meaning and importance of threefolding.

For the second key we need to turn to social science. There we learn that there are three realms in social life or three subsystems in society—cultural, political, and economic.⁶  All societies, no matter how small or large, have these three realms which are also sometimes referred to as the three spheres of society. What we call the “social” is an emergent⁷  higher-level organization that comes about from the interaction of the different realms of society.⁸  In this book, realms, spheres, habitat, and subsystems of society are used interchangeably, even if there are very fine nuances of difference in meaning among them.

The interactions of these three realms determine what kind of social life or society we have. We live in a healthy society if the three realms mutually recognize and support each other and develop their initiatives with awareness of their potential impacts on the other realms. We live in an unhealthy society if one realm dominates and tries to subjugate the others. For example, in that destructive form of globalization we call “elite” or “ corporate globalization,” one sphere of society, the economic, dominates over the justified concerns of the political and cultural realms. In addition, economic and political institutions, in general, have only a vague understanding and appreciation of culture and the role it plays in social life.

Now we can combine the two keys by asking a crucial question. Is there a connection between the three realms of society and the three global institutional powers that are active in the tri-polar world?

Indeed there is. Businesses as institutions derive their force from their work, destructive or otherwise, in the economy. Their natural habitat is the economy. Governments as institutions gain their power, legitimate or not, from political life. They naturally inhabit the realm of polity. And the institutions of civil society derive their strength, deserved or not, from their defense and articulation of the worldviews and values of cultural life.⁹  Their natural habitat is culture. Businesses have economic power. Governments have political power. And civil society organizations have cultural power.¹⁰  None has a monopoly of power.

This is the reason why we can now say that civil society, government, and business are the three key institutions of social life. Each of these powerful institutions has the potential to “represent,” in its own way, the realm of society from which each is active—civil society represents culture; government represents polity; and business, the economy.

Business cannot truly represent the interests of culture or polity. Nor can civil society truly understand the detailed workings of the economy or truly represent the political system. Nor can government articulate economic and cultural aspirations. Because the processes and concerns of the economy are quite different from those of polity and culture, threefolding recognizes that business, government, and civil society will naturally emphasize different aspects of society as a whole.

On the other hand, all three key institutions have the right to criticize each other when their respective institutional activities are starting to harm people and nature, within or outside their respective realms. This is bound to happen, since the boundaries between the realms of society are fluid and the actions of key institutions are bound to have impacts beyond their own natural habitat or realm.

This possibility of intruding into another institution’s habitat makes it important to note the distinction between two similar phrases. The phrase, ‘three key institutions of social life’ is not the same as the ‘three institutional powers of a tri-polar world’ used earlier.

The three institutions may be “institutional powers of a tri-polar world,” but they are not necessarily aware what social realms actually constitute this “tri-polar” world. Nor do the institutional powers necessarily know which social realms they inhabit and have affinity with. They may only be aware of their opposition to each other and not necessarily whether they come from the economy, polity, or culture. For example, if a civil society activist thinks that civil society belongs to the political realm, then this indicates a usage reminiscent of being an “institutional power” in a tri-polar world. Civil society, in this case, is merely aware of its power but not which social realm it comes from. Or worse, none of the three may think that the cultural realm is of any importance and all three would therefore prefer to inhabit either the political or economic realms only.

The term key institutions of social life, on the other hand, implies that the actors within these institutions have a definite and clear idea as to what the three social realms are and which one their institution belongs to. Business, for example, is aware that the three social realms are economy, polity and culture and that its realm is the economy.

In terms of time sequence, it is normal for civil society and the other institutions to be aware first that they are an institutional power in a tri-polar world. Later on, they become aware that they are key institutions of social life. And, as we shall see, this makes a big difference in societal transformation and evolution, in general, and in threefolding, in particular.

This distinction will play a vital role in understanding the different kinds of threefolding to be discussed shortly. Although the difference between the two usages may seem trivial and unnecessary to some, the consequences are profound. Not being able to locate the natural realm of an institution would make an individual or an institution vulnerable to various problems including co-optation and commodification, as discussed in Chapters 7 and 8.

Let’s suppose one of the three key institutions thinks it comes from a realm of society other than its own. Let’s say that a civil society organization, for example, thinks it comes from the political realm of society and neglects its own realm (culture) to gain political power. As shown in Chapter 7, disastrous consequences may ensue. Or suppose government wants to decide the content of education (culture’s role) instead of ensuring the right of education for all. Again, there are far-reaching negative consequences.

Threefolding in Essence

We can now begin to understand threefolding. I say “begin,” even though threefolding, once understood, is fairly simple and straightforward. For bringing a new concept into the full light of understanding always takes some concentration. In this case, the effort is well worth it, for threefolding is a concept that can help us shape and transform globalization in a way that gives meaning and improves the quality of all life on the planet.

Generally speaking, threefolding means the autonomous interaction of the three realms of society, through any of its three institutional powers or three key institutions, to advocate for or to achieve genuine or comprehensive sustainable development.

We have already discussed the phrases: three realms or subsystems of society, three institutional powers, and three key institutions. Let us now take a closer look at the phrases autonomous interaction, genuine or comprehensive sustainable development, and to advocate for or to achieve.

Autonomous interaction can be unconscious or conscious. Thus we can have unconscious autonomous interaction and conscious autonomous interaction in threefolding giving rise to different kinds of threefolding. (See below.) We can understand unconscious autonomous interaction as follows.

Despite their rhetoric to the contrary, many development approaches today basically ignore cultural, social, ecological, human and spiritual considerations in their actual policies, programs and projects. Instead they have an almost addictive fixation on purely economic and political considerations. Because of this fixation, most societal interactions are basically two-fold or bi-polar or even one-fold or uni-polar.

However, when civil society enters the picture, the dynamics and the substance of development changes. Culture emerges as an autonomous realm of society worthy of serious consideration, because cultural concerns and actions are embedded in the advocacy and initiatives of civil society. This is true whether or not civil society is conscious that it is mobilizing cultural power. With the involvement of civil society, the “autonomous interaction” of the three realms actually begins, even when civil society is not consciously aware that it is a cultural institution. The de facto result of civil society activism is the liberation of cultural life and its autonomous interaction with the political and economic realms of society. This is unconscious autonomous interaction.

This autonomous interaction can, of course, also become conscious. In fact, in later phases of threefolding, the awareness of autonomous interaction needs to be there. Thus conscious autonomous interaction means that each of the three institutions is aware of the differences between the terms, “three institutional powers,” “three key institutions” and “three realms of society,” as explained above. This means, for example, that civil society is aware that its source of power is cultural power, its social realm is in culture, and it is a key institution of culture. And the same should be true with government and business. Failure to understand the distinction and the relations between these three terms diminishes the potential of threefolding to achieve beneficial changes in the world.

The consciousness or unconsciousness of the autonomous interaction leads us to distinguish between whether “institutional powers” or “key institutions” are “advocating” or “achieving” “genuine sustainable development” or “comprehensive sustainable development.” It is important to note first the correspondences between the terms or phrases. Immediately after, we will explain the significance of the phrases and their correspondences.

In unconscious autonomous interactions, the three institutional powers, especially civil society, advocate for genuine sustainable development. In this form of interaction, which is characterized by either intense dialogue or debate, the participants try to clarify or resist an idea, framework, policy, program, or project.

In conscious autonomous interactions, the three key institutions strive to achieve comprehensive sustainable development. This form of interaction is more in the volitional or doing mode, striving together towards a common goal.

Clarifying the phrase comprehensive sustainable development will allow us to explain the other terms and their correspondences.

Comprehensive sustainable development means that the goal of the conscious interaction of the three key institutions is not just conventional sustainable development but comprehensive sustainable development.

Conventional sustainable development often just means environmentally sound economic development, which entails the almost impossible attempt to make neo-liberal economic models of development compatible with environmental concerns. Granted that this attempt is doable, success is highly unlikely because of structural defects in neo-liberal economic theory.¹¹  This synthesis is still not enough and is too narrow. Often business concerns dominate the discourse on conventional “sustainable development.”

Comprehensive sustainable development, on the other hand, starts with the premise that there are three key institutions that represent the three realms of society, and thereby potentially the wholeness of social life. These three realms will bring perspectives appropriate to the realm to which they belong. Business will bring economic concerns. Government will bring political concerns. Civil society will bring cultural, social, ecological, human, and spiritual concerns. Comprehensive sustainable development therefore considers seven dimensions of development: economic, political, cultural, social, ecological, human, and spiritual.

Because comprehensive sustainable development seriously brings in the perspective of the three key institutions of society, its understanding of the economic foundations of globalization will also change. Chapter 5 shows in detail how the current unscientific dogma of neo-liberal economics is the root cause of the huge problems of elite or corporate globalization. Even mainstream economists are beginning to emphasize that the health of market economies is highly dependent on the health and vitality of other realms of society.¹²  Therefore, neo-liberal economics cannot be the economic substance of comprehensive sustainable development. It will be something quite different. Some are already calling it associative economics,¹³  where the chief motive for economic activity is not profits and competition but servicing human needs and cooperation.

We are now prepared to explain the correspondences above and clarify the different terms in the process. We will tackle the first correspondence: “In unconscious autonomous interactions, the three institutional powers, especially civil society, advocate for genuine sustainable development.”

The unconsciousness or consciousness of an autonomous interaction is what determines the rest of the sequence. In an autonomous but unconsciously autonomous interaction of the three realms, the three institutional powers are still not aware of their natural realm. Because civil society is unconscious of its role in liberating cultural life, for example, it can advocate for genuine sustainable development but not comprehensive sustainable development, which requires the full understanding of the role of culture and all that that implies. Something similar can be said of the other two institutional powers. In their advocacy, all three institutional powers long for genuine sustainable development more as a criticism of existing efforts at sustainable development rather than as a clear vision of what comprehensive sustainable development really is or can be.

Now let us look at the other correspondence: “In conscious autonomous interactions, the three key institutions strive to achieve comprehensive sustainable development.” It is the key institutions that are involved in a conscious interaction, since they have achieved the stage of knowing the realm to which they belong. Because of the awareness of their respective societal realms, they can conceive of comprehensive sustainable development and actually strive to achieve it together. There is mutual respect and appreciation of the differing but complementary contributions that each institution and realm can make to the goal of comprehensive sustainable development. They can move from actual criticism of past activities towards beginning the creation of a new future.

Two Aspects of Threefolding: Process and Substance

Having clarified the general idea of threefolding, we can now focus on an important related aspect of threefolding: the connection between threefolding process and threefolding substance.

The autonomous interaction of the three realms—culture, polity, and economy—can be conscious or unconscious. The agents of these autonomous interactions can be the three institutional powers or the three key institutions of society. The goal of the autonomous interaction of civil society, business, and government can be genuine or comprehensive sustainable development. Whichever kind of threefolding it is, the autonomous interaction of the three institutions (process) is just a means to the end of genuine or comprehensive sustainable development (substance).

No abstract program (substance) can be created by any one institution of society. In threefolding, the concrete program is created in conflict, dialogue, or partnership, that is, in active processes between the three institutions of society. Out of these processes will come the concrete measures needed to achieve genuine or comprehensive sustainable development.

This last point is very important. For threefolding is first and foremost a social process. Out of this social process, the substance of threefolding emerges. Without a genuine threefolding process, there can be no authentic threefolding substance. This is the reason why the term, threefolding, is used in an active sense denoting a process, a social activity, not a finished social product.

We also need to keep in mind the distinction between threefolding process and threefolding substance. Process comes from the interaction of the three key institutions. And substance comes from what these institutions bring to the interaction out of their own background in the economy, polity, or culture.

A threefolding process is complete and authentic if there is meaningful and true participation by all three key institutions of society, all of which are aware of the social realm from which they come. A multi-stakeholder process is not necessarily a threefolding process, since all three key institutions are not always represented in such a process. There can even be a multi-stakeholder process whose participants belong to various sectors of the same realm—government, for instance, or business. But this is not a threefolding process, because all three key institutions are not represented. The very term multi-stakeholder leads to fuzziness and an unhealthy mixing of the representatives of the different realms of society.

Neither would it be a threefolding process if business, civil society and government were all present, but the societal realm of the institutions was confused. For example, the multi-stakeholder process of global Agenda 21 was not a threefolding process, even though the three key institutions were present. This is because global Agenda 21 has collapsed civil society and business into the same grouping as a “basic sector” without a clear idea of the societal realm from which the different sectors of civil society or business are coming.

Threefolding processes are thus inherently richer and more comprehensive than multi-stakeholder processes, because the different realms of society are taken into account through the representation of their key institutions.

In threefolding, substance is incomplete if the different dimensions of development are not present. As we have seen, business brings in the economic dimension. Governments bring in the political dimension of development. And civil society brings in the cultural, social, ecological, human, and spiritual dimensions of development. Of course, all the dimensions of development cannot be achieved in the very beginning. But they must be consciously taken into account in the process and substance of threefolding.

Threefolding is a balanced way to bring about social healing and social wholeness. Threefolding brings in an integral and holistic approach to the process and substance of development. As a social process, threefolding can either increase or harmonize the conflict between the three global forces that inhabit the tri-polar world. The quality of the social interaction of the three global forces—now understood in threefolding as the three key institutions of social life—will determine the directions of globalization and whether or not this interaction will be able to resolve the burning social issues of our times and those of the generations to come.

Kinds of and Stages in Threefolding

Threefolding, as described above, cannot manifest in a complete way during its first appearance in social life. There are different kinds of threefolding and there are different stages through which authentic threefolding will have to pass. Threefolding, like a human being, passes through the stages of childhood, adolescence, and adulthood and therefore the actual concrete manifestations of threefolding can vary with time and place, depending on the actual conditions of social life.

According to this analogy, advanced threefolding (adult phase) will have to first pass through two earlier phases: de facto threefolding (childhood phase) and conscious threefolding (adolescent phase).

De facto threefolding results when one of the three global institutional powers asserts its autonomy and defends its realm from perceived or real invasions from the two other powers and realms of society. In recent history, de facto threefolding initiatives came almost exclusively from civil society. In the past decade, civil society has been defending the cultural realm from the increasingly totalitarian tendencies of various governments and businesses. In any region, country, or global arena where civil society successfully asserts its autonomy, de facto threefolding emerges.

In de facto threefolding, civil society is in a critical and often “rejectionist” mode. The Battle of Seattle is one of the best examples of de facto threefolding.

However, it is important to realize that de facto threefolding can also be attained without confrontation once culture is recognized and established as an independent social realm. This happens in cases where the key institutions of social life, which have historically overstepped their realms, practice the concept of “auto-limitation.”¹⁴  In this approach, an institution voluntarily limits its scope of power to its own realm in order to make way for the legitimate activities of the other institutions in society. Privatization is one example.¹⁵  In privatization, the government steps back from directly running economic enterprises. Similar arguments can also be made for the voluntary recognition of the autonomy of cultural life from both politics and economics.¹⁶ 

De facto threefolding is the “childhood phase” of authentic threefolding. It is de facto because it results in the de facto liberation of the cultural realm of society from the control of either economic and/or political institutions. It is also de facto, because, just like a child, the three institutional powers do not fully comprehend that they have embarked on a journey towards advanced threefolding. The child has a different consciousness than an adult and does not fully understand the ways of an adult. Likewise, the actors within the three institutional powers of de facto threefolding do not fully understand all the consequences of what has happened, where they are in the social developmental phase, or even that there are developmental phases in societal evolution.¹⁷ 

While de facto threefolding may not be perfect, it is, however, an important sign that a real possibility for threefolding has emerged and that there are inherent possibilities in the situation that can be harnessed for the greater ends of humanity.

Conscious threefolding results when the three institutional powers recognize that society has three realms and that they are the three key institutions of these three social realms. In conscious threefolding, the three key institutions are aware that they have consciously entered into a social process that mobilizes the unique perspectives, strengths, resources and capacities of the cultural, political, and economic realms of society. The three key institutions know that, in conscious threefolding, they place their respective talents towards the pursuit of comprehensive sustainable development, balancing economic, political, and cultural, social, ecological, human, and spiritual imperatives of development.¹⁸ 

Conscious threefolding is alive when all three global forces are open to coming together for a principled dialogue and/or engagement in order to create a different kind of globalization. Business and government, for example, can freely choose to honor the cultural, social, ecological, human, and spiritual issues that civil society will bring to any conscious threefolding process. Civil society, in turn, can choose to recognize the legitimate roles that business can play in the economy and government in political life when these roles are divested of their pure profit and power motives respectively. In conscious threefolding, the key institutions try to harmonize their agendas as much as possible and try to work in a mood of mutual respect and trust.

The substance of conscious threefolding will increasingly include consideration of the seven dimensions of development. Politics and economics will remain as important considerations. But increasingly ecological, social, cultural, human and spiritual considerations will enter into the program details of comprehensive sustainable development efforts.

In a conscious threefolding world, the economic concerns of businesses no longer take precedence over everything else. The dogma of “trade above all” is anathema in this world. The concerns of the two other key institutions of the threefolding world have to be factored in and balanced. One-sided economic policies that favor business institutions over and above governments and civil society can no longer be justified. Otherwise, the world will continue to see the spirit of the Battle of Seattle deconstructing the agenda of elite economic and political powers.

In a conscious threefolding world, the three world powers strive to ensure that their perspectives continue to be heard in a constructive manner in the debate over globalization. Therefore, conscious threefolding will increasingly play a central role in the future of the planet.

In conscious threefolding, civil society is in a critical engagement mode. Philippine Agenda 21 is an exemplar of conscious threefolding at work. (See Chapter 14.)

Advanced threefolding is the adult phase of threefolding viewed from a developmental or evolutionary perspective. In advanced threefolding, mutual trust and respect are established and institutionalized, something that still has to be continuously worked for in conscious threefolding. In advanced threefolding, the substance of the different realms represented by the three key institutions is so well understood that creative, albeit radical new initiatives start to increasingly determine the substance of the threefolding process.

For example, in conscious threefolding, many aspects of neo-liberal economics will still be active in the debates on threefolding substance. And the same will be true with many conventional approaches to governance. In advanced threefolding, only true empirical discoveries of neo-liberal economics will be retained, and these will be placed within the context of associative economics discussed above. Thus the concept of an open market will be retained, but price and profits as signals for economic decision-making will be removed from their central position. Instead, price and profits will be among the considerations for economic associations as they try to ensure that the human needs of all are adequately satisfied by the economic system.¹⁹ 

In advanced threefolding, process concerns are mostly understood, implemented, and institutionalized. Thus advanced threefolding is preoccupied with mobilizing threefolding processes to further elaborate and implement advanced threefolding substance. One test for entry into the phase of advanced threefolding is whether the government voluntarily removes its control over education, which is the responsibility of the cultural realm. Another test is whether businesses stop the commodification of labor and stop speaking of “labor markets,” as if the work capacities of human beings were just like dead commodities to be bought and sold in the market and subject to the “law” of supply and demand. A further test, a tough one indeed, is whether nature, including land, is no longer commodified in the economic system. Instead, in advanced threefolding, the far-reaching vision of land trusts is understood and implemented on a wide scale.

In advanced threefolding, civil society is not only critically engaged. Its role and task is widely recognized and institutionalized. As such, gift money from economic surplus goes directly to civil society as a right, not out of the arbitrary kindness of business institutions. Both business and government fully understand and appreciate the role of civil society in, among others things, the formation of social, human, and ecological capital that is so essential for the continued vitality of both business and government.

There is no inherent conflict between the three different kinds of threefolding. De facto threefolding is an essential task of civil society. Just as, without a child, there would be no adolescent; without de facto threefolding, conscious threefolding cannot take place. Existing business and government powers often have to be forced to yield the cultural space that they long to occupy. These political and economic powers often need to be awakened by a demonstration of cultural power in order to appreciate the reality of civil society and the cultural realm.

Even when conscious threefolding is being undertaken, de facto threefolding is often still taking place. Because institutions are inhabited by people, there are such things as institutional habits. And problematic institutional habits often die hard and need to be countered by the activism of civil society.

Similarly, when de facto threefolding has been achieved, it is important to try to work towards conscious threefolding, where appropriate. For no amount of de facto threefolding can create a new world that moves towards comprehensive sustainable development. There has to be a genuine understanding that there are three realms in society and that none of the key institutions can dominate the other. This understanding is fundamental to conscious threefolding and, in turn, the pursuit of comprehensive sustainable development. Only conscious threefolding has the power to truly shape globalization away from elite globalization and towards comprehensive sustainable development.

Again, the maturing process is similar to that of a child. He or she must pass on to the adolescent phase and not want to remain in the phase of childhood. Otherwise, all kinds of psychological pathologies manifest themselves and the child cannot fully mature as a productive, loving, and creative adult.

Table 1 summarizes the similarities and differences of the kinds of, and phases in, threefolding.

Entry Points to Threefolding

We have seen that threefolding has developmental phases. De facto threefolding can move to conscious threefolding, and enter into the wide-ranging and truly revolutionary phase of advanced threefolding. It helps therefore to know that there are entry points to threefolding.

An entry point to threefolding is a social process, concern or practice that can ultimately move into the various kinds of threefolding. An entry point has the potential to trigger a threefolding process. It is important to know that these entry points exist because one who is equipped with this knowledge can move social processes, concerns, and practices into the domain of threefolding.

Take the term tri-sector partnership, a term heard with increasing frequency at the highest policy levels. (See Chapters 15 and 16.) This term refers to three-way partnerships between civil society, business, and government. Depending on the actual situation, tri-sector partnerships can be an entry point to de facto threefolding or to conscious threefolding.

Tri-sector partnerships can be an entry point to de facto threefolding. With the inclusion of civil society in a partnership, cultural perspectives are de facto brought into the discussion, even if the sectors involved have no conscious awareness of the three realms of society and the key institutions in those realms.²⁰ 

Tri-sector partnerships can also be an entry point to conscious threefolding. This is possible if the proponents of tri-sector partnerships understand the three realms of society and also acknowledge that business, government, and civil society come from those three realms.

Furthermore, it is important to remember that advanced threefolding depends on whether such partnerships are carried out with mutual trust, respect and understanding. If all three sectors agree that civil society’s cultural priorities have the same degree of importance as the economic and political priorities of business and government respectively, tri-sector partnerships can be a legitimate entry point to advanced threefolding and can help usher in a more comprehensive approach to sustainable development. These partnerships are not authentic when, for instance, corporations use them as a means to reduce larger society to a mere market society, instead of situating a market economy within the bounds of the larger social sphere.

Multi-stakeholderships can also be entry points to conscious threefolding. But they will first have to be divested of their inherent limitations. (See related discussion above on multi-stakeholdership.)

Social inclusion is a term that is heard increasingly in development debates ever since Amartya Sen won the Nobel Prize for Economics in 1998. Sen argued that modern economics should include the interests and well-being of the poor as prime considerations in economic activity. Social inclusion is an entry point to de facto threefolding, since it will inevitably legitimize the role of civil society in the formulation of development programs. Civil society is widely seen as working very closely with the poor. And of course, civil society already championed this concept even before Sen formalized it in his economic work.

The presence of thousands of civil society organizations during the U.N. Social Development Summit attests to the recognition of civil society’s role in the work connected with poverty. The Social Development Summit also shows that the concept of social inclusion has become an important consideration at the highest levels of policy making. It is highly symptomatic that the G-8, in a recent communication after their meeting in Okinawa, recognized both the importance of civil society in the age of globalization as well as the importance of tackling social issues including poverty.²¹ 

There are many other entry points to threefolding, including direct or participatory democracy, area development, institutional economics, and cultural pluralism or diversity. This book is not the right context for a detailed discussion of all these entry points. More essential is the realization that such entry points to threefolding exist and that they will be important in birthing new and better social processes.

Unfortunately, there is a dark side to entry points. Just as entry points can lead to threefolding, they can also lead to co-optation. Because entry points, by their very nature, are not yet expressed in full, they can be diverted from their good potential. Whether entry points lead to threefolding or co-optation will depend on how adeptly civil society helps to move from the entry point to de facto threefolding and on to conscious threefolding.

Understanding this dual potential of entry points for threefolding or co-optation is an important foundation for future discussions. As we shall see, the movement from an entry point into threefolding is related to civil society’s awareness of its own identity (Chapter 9). Some understanding of entry points will also be useful in later discussions about splits within the key institutions of society (Chapter 8) and in assessing whether such entities as tri-sector partnerships are entry points to threefolding or to co-optation. (See Chapters 15 and 16.)

The Tensions in Threefolding

The movement from de facto threefolding to conscious threefolding, as with any movement from one developmental phase to another, involves both opportunities and challenges. Both possibilities are discussed extensively in the various chapters of this book. I will limit myself here to preliminary comments.

Misunderstandings are going to be pervasive. Government leaders may question the mandate of civil society, asking whom civil society really represents, since individuals in civil society are not “elected” like politicians. Corporations who see civil society as a nuisance may set traps to buy off its organizations. Within civil society, there will be long and bitter debates on whether or not a particular civil society organization is party to a “whitewash,” “greenwash,” or “bluewash”²²  engineered by insincere government and/or business institutions.

The need to resolve conceptual misunderstandings within civil society is particularly urgent. Some members of civil society may think, for instance, that it is misleading and dangerous to define civil society as a cultural institution, that such a definition masks the political nature of civil society and tends to discourage activism. Or civil society may allow itself to be defined as mere service delivery agents. Meanwhile, members of civil society are now engaging in a lively, and sometimes bitter, debate, as to whether civil society should reject, critically engage, or ignore the increasing number of overtures from mainstream global powers to form tri-sector partnerships.

So, although the Battle of Seattle is a major victory, it is one that creates challenges as well as opportunities. The question of the true identity of civil society is crucial. Different mental maps mean different tactics and strategies. These differences, in turn, bring splits within civil society just at the very moment when unprecedented opportunities have opened up²³  and new challenges are being put in place by economic and political institutions.²⁴ 

Global civil society has tremendous capacities and influence for good. But if civil society is to build on the defeat of the powerful WTO agenda in Seattle, it must understand the true nature of global civil society as a third force. Meanwhile, civil society has to resolve internal weaknesses and develop more sophisticated approaches in addressing the initiatives of the economic and political powers of the world. No less than the future direction of globalization and its profound impact on the natural world and billions of people are at stake.

Civil Society: Different But Complementary Meanings

Having clarified the idea of threefolding, let us now turn our attention to a brief clarification of the three different uses of the term civil society in this book.

The most common use of civil society in this book is the one articulated above. Here civil society is made up of those cultural institutions that are active, whether through demonstrations or partnerships, in shaping globalization—moving it towards genuine or comprehensive sustainable development. Most of the civil society institutions included here are non-government organizations (NGOs), people’s organizations, youth and women’s groups.

The book also uses civil society as a generic term for cultural institutions, whether or not they are involved in the globalization and sustainable development debate. These include the institutions of civil society mentioned above plus the media, religious groups, foundations, voluntary organizations, professional groups, academe, and others whose direct and dominant activity does not involve business or government operations.²⁵

There is a third possibility for the use of the term civil society that is not used in this book, but which is an equally valid use of the term. In fact, if the process of “ institutionalization”²⁶  of civil society values permeates all the realms of culture, polity, and the economy, then this third usage of the term civil society is the most appropriate.

In this third understanding, the term civil society is used to describe society as a whole and not just the cultural sphere. The usage here, of course, presumes that civil society values have so permeated both the political and economic realm that the operations in these realms are guided by the values of civil society. When this happens and all three realms of society articulate civil society values, albeit each in its own different and unique way, then the whole of society becomes a truly “civil society.”

This is a visionary use of the term civil society since this kind of civil society does not exist today. However, if threefolding reaches the stage of advanced threefolding, then we can say that the whole of society has indeed become a “civil society.” In this usage, the term civil society is equivalent to the term “sustainable society” which can also be used to describe regional areas that have achieved comprehensive sustainable development.

It is useful to contrast this “civil society” with the term capitalist society that applies to many industrialized countries, and is starting to apply to many more, as a result of elite or corporate globalization. Here I would like to quote David Korten who has articulated this visionary understanding of civil society on the basis of his own thinking as well as the language and framework of this book.

The defining political struggle of the 21st century is not so much between political ideologies as between life values and financial values—between a civil society and a capitalist society. . . . .

The stark contrast in values and institutions that distinguish a civil society from a capitalist society can be simply illustrated in relation to these three spheres of collective activity, as in Figure 1. The civil society is built on a foundation of spiritual values that permeate its culture. Personal and institutional relationships are defined by the self-organizing flow of the spiritually grounded life energies of its members. The processes of cultural regeneration are grounded in the rich and dynamic community life and authentic inner spiritual experience of each of the society’s members. The result is a rich and dynamic authentic culture grounded in life affirming values.  

In the civil society the institutions of polity and economy are mindfully structured by its citizens to reflect and nurture the life-affirming values, symbols, and beliefs of the authentic culture. An active citizenry is engaged in constant vigilance to assure that the institutions of polity and economy function as their servants, not their masters. They will insist that the institutions of polity be radically democratic in terms of openness, equity, active citizen participation and consensus-oriented decision making. Similarly, they will demand that the institutions of economy function on the principles of self-organizing markets with the primary goal of providing productive and satisfying livelihoods for all while maintaining a balanced human relationship with the non-human environment. We might thus expect the economy to be comprised primarily of local enterprises and to vest in each individual a share in the ownership of the productive assets on which their livelihood depends. The civil society is radically self-organizing and predominantly cooperative in the manner of all healthy living systems, and seeks to maximize the opportunity for each individual to fully and freely develop and express their creative potential in service to the whole of life. Thus a civil society differs on every dimension from the capitalist economy in which we currently live.

In the capitalist economy money is the defining value and the primary mediator of the relationships among persons and institutions. The whole of public life is dominated by global financial markets that value life only for its liquidation price. Using money as an instrument of control, the capitalist economy co-opts the life energies of each individual and directs them to the task of replicating money as the defining purpose of capitalist society.

The control of productive resources is consolidated in global mega-corporations answerable only to the managers of huge investment funds who in turn are answerable only for the financial returns produced on their portfolios. The wages of working people are suppressed to increase the returns to those who already command vast financial holdings. Economic affairs are centrally planned by the heads of corporations that command internal economies larger than those of most states. Through their ownership of mass media, influence over school curricula, commercialization of the arts, and mass advertising global mega-corporations dominate the processes of cultural regeneration—creating a global mono-culture grounded in values of materialism and consumerism that strengthen corporate legitimacy and alienate each individual from their inner spiritual life so that corporate logs become the individual’s primary source of identity and meaning.

Similarly, the dominant corporations use their massive financial power and control of the mass media, corporate think tanks, public relations firms, and pseudo citizen front groups to control the institutions of polity—buying politicians and dominating public discourse to create a grossly distorted one dollar one vote democracy. All but a tiny elite are deprived of a meaningful political voice and alienated from the political process.

Spiritually impoverished and pressed into a struggle for survival, those deprived of both political voice and an adequate means of livelihood become increasingly indebted to a system that demands they devote ever more of their life energies to its imperatives. Ideals of equity are out the window and individual freedom becomes largely illusory.

Destructive of both life and spirit, the capitalist economy must be considered a social pathology. Even its apparent capacity to create vast wealth is largely illusory, as while it produces ever more glitzy gadgets and diversions, it is destroying the life support systems of the planet and the social fabric of society—and thereby impoverishes the whole of humanity. Its institutions function as cancers that have forgotten they are part of a larger whole and seek their own unlimited growth without regard to the consequences.²⁷ 

These different uses of the term, civil society may seem contradictory. In one use, civil society refers only to institutions of the cultural sphere, one of three realms in society. In the visionary version, civil society refers to the whole of society including all realms of society—culture, polity, and economics. However, these different uses of the term civil society are complementary when viewed from a temporal perspective. For there is a developmental sequence involved in the three different possible understandings of civil society.

In the beginning phase, a very potent core of cultural institutions emerges and confronts the challenge of globalization. This is the civil society that successfully resisted the advance of the WTO in the Battle of Seattle. This is the civil society also active in the field in challenging globalization in many different countries around the world.

As the influence of this core of civil society grows through time, it also influences the activities and priorities of other cultural institutions. This is where the second, more expansive use of the term civil society emerges.²⁸ 

With the increasing vitality of cultural life through civil society, culture’s corresponding impact on the political and economic life of society is becoming more and more significant. This process of “institutionalizing” or mainstreaming the diffusion of civil society values in polity and the economy will take years, even decades to achieve. Inevitably, this is the process that has to be undertaken by civil society as a cultural institution in order to create the visionary civil society that will replace the virus-like capitalist society that is slowly infecting different parts of the world.

The visionary concept of civil society is hardly used in current debates on civil society. From a developmental perspective however, the current conception of civil society organizations and their networks as being cultural in nature allows us to view them as seedbeds for the creation of the future civil society (in the wider sense). They are the starting points for this process of large-scale societal transformation. It is in culture, and within the civil society institutions in culture, that the process of societal transformation is actually happening today. A continuation of this process through time, especially the diffusion and internalization of civil society values in polity and the economy, will ultimately result in civil society in the larger, visionary sense.

The Framework for the Book

To complete our overview of the new language of the tri-polar world, I will now make explicit the overall framework that I use in the book. I have meticulously developed the social scientific basis for this framework in Chapter 9. However, respected friends advised me to make this framework explicit in the beginning chapter of this book to give readers a deeper appreciation of the subsequent chapters. The framework underpins the whole analysis of globalization and the struggle to transform it to comprehensive sustainable development. In addition, the framework summarizes the discussions above on threefolding, civil society, and sustainable development.

Drawing on the discussions in Chapter 9, Figure 2 summarizes the framework of the book.²⁹  This framework views society as threefold. Only when society undergoes a threefolding process can elite globalization be transformed to comprehensive sustainable development. Only then can the capitalist society that fuels elite globalization become a civil society that champions comprehensive sustainable development.  

This threefolding society is concerned with its proper and fruitful relationship with nature, the individual, and the spirit.

The current and long-term basis for this global transformation of capitalist society into a civil society through threefolding is a cultural revolution that is going on around the planet. (See Chapter 12.) Concretely, a cultural revolution means that millions of individuals are undergoing self-transformation, especially regarding the values they hold and aspire to realize in the world. In this process of self-transformation, a large number of highly influential individuals are also directly entering into the realm of active spirit, the source of creative beginnings in society.

A threefolding society also wants to renew its relationship with the earth, with nature as a whole. All realms of society and all individuals in a threefolding society will seek to regenerate Nature and develop a greater respect for her.

Based on this understanding, the sequence from spirit to a global sustainable society or civil society in a societal and visionary sense is as follows.

Individuals actively pursue various psychological and spiritual disciplines to purify their inner worlds from all kinds of inner pollution. Through the clarity of spirit and the integrity of their values and behavior, these individuals become active agents of change in the world at large. Through their spiritual “action,” they begin the process of creating a new “social order.” They naturally tend to seek a more spiritual and sustainable society. These are the cultural creatives whom we will discuss in more detail in Chapter 12.

Through their life circumstances, these individuals enter the various realms of society. They inaugurate socially responsible businesses. They become principle-driven government officials. Most, however, become active in culture, within civil society in the cultural sense.

Within civil society institutions, these individuals begin to advance the different forms of threefolding. They look for individuals in government and business who share their values and who are cultural creatives like them. The cultural creatives in the three realms of society form strategic alliances to advance threefolding.

Through time, the values of cultural creatives permeate an increasing number of institutions in culture, polity, and the economy. Increasingly, capitalist society starts to change and elite globalization loses momentum. Comprehensive sustainable development initiatives become more widespread. The contours of a truly civil society begin to emerge. Free spiritual activity creates a new civil order. A new era of civilization has commenced.

This sequence of events is also the vision and hope of this book. And it is towards this vision that we now turn.

1. For business, we can also put the word, "market." For government, we can also put the word, "state." Both market and state are higher-level institutions of the economy and polity respectively. As a beginning approximation, a more visible institutional representation and for easier comprehension by intelligent laypersons, I initially use business and government instead of market and state. Later on, in various parts of the book especially Chapter 9, I use the market and the state as institutional representatives of both the economy and polity respectively. This would align the discussion with other streams in the social science community that are dealing with these issues.  back to text

2. See chapter 17. back to text

3. Neo-liberal capitalism is a form of economic organization that places a one-sided trust and reliance on the workings of an idealized and fictitious "free market."  back to text  

4. One need only think of the campaign funds scandal of the U.S. and Europe where economic power blocs were basically buying the loyalties of politicians.   back to text

5. One can also use the term, "tri-partitite" or "tri-sectoral." However, as will become increasingly clear in the book, there are other aspects of threefolding that cannot be adequately contained in the concept of "tri-partite" or "tri-sectoral." For one thing the term "tri-sector" only focuses attention to the outer aspects of social phenomena. It does not indicate where in the structure or system of society the sector actually comes from, where it derives its meaning, its inner logic, its worldview, its task, its reason for being. Threefolding, on the other hand, is a relatively new term, although, for a while it gained global exposure in the early parts of the 20th century due to the writings and activities of the prominent spiritual scientist and social philosopher, Rudolf Steiner. Thus the term, "threefolding" still has the flexibility and openness of usage to enable it to point to the underlying deeper structure that animates a sector. Thus civil society understood as a sector will not indicate that civil society is beginning to understand itself as coming from and articulating the concerns and visions of the cultural realm. Culture, together with the economy and polity constitute the threefoldness or the threefold nature of all social life. See Chapter 13 for more details.   back to text

6. The technical references to this concept of society are found in Chapter 9.   back to text

7. Emergent means that, from one perspective, the characteristics of social life, although made up of cultural, political, and economic activities, are more than the sum of its parts. Thus, social development means paying attention to the social dimension as a whole. Poverty is an example of a social problem that needs to be addressed as a whole, not just its economic aspect.   back to text

8. The social level, in turns, influences the dynamics of its component realms—cultural, political, and economic.   back to text

9. Chapters 9, 10, and 11 expound in greater detail the notion that the natural habitat of civil society is in culture.   back to text

10. See Chapter 11.   back to text

11. See, for example, the book by Paul Ormerod, The Death of Economics and the various issues of Third World Economics and Third World Resurgence.   back to text

12. The rise of "institutional economics" is a prominent symptom of this dissatisfaction with neo-liberal economics. Another prominent symptom is the awarding of the Nobel Peace Prize to Douglass North in 1994 (role of institutions in economic history) and Amartya Sen in 1998 (importance of poverty eradication and ethical concerns in economics). Both are prominent articulators of "institutional economics" broadly defined.   back to text

13. See Nicanor Perlas. Associative Economics: Responding to the Challenge of Elite Globalization (Metro Manila: Center for Alternative Development Initiatives, 1997).

14. This is a term used in theories of the state according to lawyer, Raphael Lotilla, Deputy Director General of the National Economic Development Authority, Republic of the Philippines. The book broadens the concept of "auto-limitation" to include all realms of society, not just polity.

15. This is not a blanket endorsement of privatization. Actual circumstances may require some form of government oversight on the privatized enterprise to ensure that business does not abuse its take-over of a public enterprise, especially those which are utilities.

16. Weizenbaum, J. Foreword to Steiner, R. The Renewal of the Social Organism (Spring Valley, New York: Anthroposophic Press, 1985).

17. See Ken Wilbur. Integral Psychology (Boulder, Colorado: Shamballa Press, 2000). In this truly wide-ranging work, Wilber describes the existence of phases in both human and societal evolution and the connection between the two.

18. Note that, in addition to culture, civil society also brings in social, ecological, human, and spiritual aspects of development.

19. This is not a return to centralized state planning. Rather, associations of consumers, traders, creditors, and producers will deliberate among themselves as to where the factors of economic production are best allocated to in order to meet human needs. For details, see Nicanor Perlas, Associative Economics, op.cit.

20. See related discussion above unconscious and conscious autonomous interactions.

21. G-8 Communique Okinawa 2000 dated 23 July 2000. To access: http://www.g8kyushu-okinawa.go.jp/e/documents/commu.

22. We are familiar with the terms "whitewash" and "greenwash" as derogatory descriptions of attempts by some institutions to project a good image to the public while continuing their questionable practices. "Bluewash" is a term coined by civil society organizations who recently criticized some transnational corporations who signed a "Global Compact" with the U.N., thereby hiding their bad environmental or human rights record under the blue flag of the United Nations. See Kahn, L. "Multinationals Sign U.N. Pact on Rights and Environment," The New York Times, 27 July 2000.

23. See Chapter 8.

24. See Chapter16.

25. This is not to say that none of these institutions are involved in the globalization debate. One is speaking here of a general tendency.

26. See Chapter 9 for an in-depth discussion of the meaning and importance of institutionalization.

27. David C. Korten, "Civil-izing Societies." Unpublished paper, 13 July 2000.

28. In the context of threefolding and globalization, it is hoped that traditional cultural institutions can truly become civil society in the more activist sense.

29. Note that Figure 2 is a little more comprehensive than Figure 9 in Chapter 9. The focus in Chapter 9 is on the synthesis of the social scientific understanding of civil society, not necessarily its relation to nature and its task on transforming elite globalization to comprehensive sustainable development.