Civil society’s claimed independence from the state renders its critique dismissable

Evidence

In the (anyway superficial) polemic over the functions of the State (which here means the State as a politico-juridical organisation in the narrow sense), the expression “the State as veilleur de nuit ” corresponds to the Italian expression “the State as policeman” 327 and means a State whose functions are limited to the safeguarding of public order and of respect for the laws. The fact is glossed over that in this form of regime (which anyway has never existed except on paper, as a limiting hypothesis) hegemony over its historical development belongs to private forces, to civil society— which is “State” too, indeed is the State itself. — Antonio Gramsci, Selections from the Prison Notebooks, 972 (#complicates, via linked claim)

The institutional shapes the horizons of possibility for the individual, while individual interventions license and limit the possible reaches of the institutional. This renders such normative distinctions less easily sustainable as reified contrasts. The state articulates a civil society; civil society extends definition to the state representing it. Civil society and the quality and range of civilities it embodies impart to the state its peculiar personality, its apparently cohering character, just as the state shapes and massages civil society to “speak” – to state itself – in its institutionalizing terms. — David Theo Goldberg, The Threat of Race, 286 (#complicates, via linked claim)

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: Deliberative inclusion in civil society lacks force without state institutionalization — David Schlosberg, Defining Environmental Justice:…, 695; State and civil society mutually constitute each other’s form — David Theo Goldberg, The Threat of Race: Reflections on…, 286; Civil society makes state repression livable yet also feeds resistance to it (+7 more)

Broader Connections

• Civil society itself exercises hegemony and thus is the State proper #complicates (0.80) — Antonio Gramsci, Selections from the Prison Notebooks, 972
• Hegemony requires a separation between civil and political society #complicates (0.79)
• State and civil society mutually constitute each other’s form #complicates (0.78) — David Theo Goldberg, The Threat of Race, 286
• The State is an equilibrium between coercive political society and hegemonic civil society #complicates (0.76) — Antonio Gramsci, Selections from the Prison Notebooks, 1869
• Democracy emerges from the tension between state and civil society, not apart from it #complicates (0.75) — David Theo Goldberg, The Threat of Race, 243
• Ruling-class unity is forged through the organic ties between State and civil society #complicates (0.73) — Antonio Gramsci, Selections from the Prison Notebooks, 415
• Civil society makes state repression livable yet also feeds resistance to it #complicates (0.72)
• The state operates as both civil and political society #complicates (0.71) — Antonio Gramsci, Selections from the Prison Notebooks, 998
• Coercive State power can progressively wither into regulated civil society #complicates (0.70)