Today, human rights and civic space are under pressure globally. In many countries around the world, repressive laws and policies restrict fundamental freedoms of expression, participation, assembly and association. As part of the Global People’s Assembly, Forus, CIVICUS and CPDE organised a joint panel on the state of human rights and civic space around the globe, with a specific focus on risks and opportunities in the digital era.

Mandeep Tiwana, CIVICUS Chief Programmes Officer, spoke on current global trends and how civic space has shaped global history since the Second World War – in particular the right to peaceful assembly.

"Despite the Covid pandemic, civil society continued to highlight governments’ failures”, Mandeep said. “Rights online and offline are equally important and we need to continue to work towards them”

Biljana Spasovska, CPDE Regional Coordinator for Europe and Executive Director of the Balkan Civil Society Network for Development, provided an overview of civic space and human rights from the Balkans and the “Big Bang of digital civic space”.

“Civic space is narrowing down in the region," Biljana explained. “For the past couple of years, restrictions to basic rights and fundamental freedoms have increased, especially in terms of freedom of expression and association.”

The world is suddenly “smaller” but the digital gap is widening and civil society organisations are having to think about how to approach those “who are not wired”.

Deirdre de Burca, Forus’ Advocacy Coordinator, talked about the challenge of creating an enabling digital environment for civil society globally.

"As the process of digitalization intensifies, the digital divide increases,” Deirdre explained. She presented the findings of the recent Forus report on digitalisation in partnership with TechSoup, and stressed the importance of civil society to align itself with progressive governments to counter illiberal forces that promote close, extremist and nationalistic societies.

Jyotsna Mohan Singh from the Asia Development Alliance moderating the discussion asked “What can governments, civil society and the private sector do to better defend & promote a safe online and offline civic space & human rights globally?”

Bibbi Abruzzini, Forus’ Media and Campaigns Coordinator, shared the process behind the #Let’s Talk Digital campaign and the collective storytelling project A Space for Us podcast. "Are we involved in the digitalisation process? We are not just consumers, we can actually shape it. So, who should decide on the future of the internet?”

An open forum with participants followed and it revolved around key questions linked to the defense and promotion of civic space and human rights, and how digitalization can expand rather than reduce our rights. Participants talked about how “we must acknowledge now that there are different forms of democracy” and of how “direct democracy is much closer to being a reality today in the digital age.”

Attendees highlighted the role and responsibility of multinational corporations in the discussion about digital democracy and civic space-  how can we hold these mega-companies accountable on human rights and inclusion? Others talked about the need to include economic and social rights, together with environmental justice to the conversation.

The event was held in English, Spanish, and French.

Watch the session here.

Picture: Josh Hild