This publication grew out of the workshop Civil Society in Southeast Asia, organized by the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies (ISEAS) and held in Singapore in November 2001. Financial support for the workshop came from the Konrad Adenauer Foundation.

Over the past two decades, civil society has become an important catchphrase in political and development discourses because of its perceived relevance to the quality of governance, empowering public participation, and sustaining a healthy democracy. In the Southeast Asian region, the concept indeed influenced many individuals and groups who were actively engaged in advancing a wide array of interests and causes. Conversely, the reactions of the Southeast Asian state regimes have ranged from adroitly co-opting to fiercely rejecting the idea of civil society. With their diverse colonial histories (except for Thailand which was never colonized by any European powers), ethnic, religious, and class stratifications, levels of economic development, and forms of state regimes, the Southeast Asian region offers an excellent crucible to study how these factors would shape civil society formation and, in turn, how it would affect governance and democracy.

The aim of the workshop was to bring together scholars and researchers from the region to explore the realities and experiences of civil society in Southeast Asia. The realities and experiences were examined through empirical studies of religious, ethnic, gender, and environmental nongovernmental organizations’ (NGO) activities and public participation. That a number of the contributors to this volume were also NGO participants provided first-hand understandings of the complex world of civil society activism.

While the workshop had sought to cover all the countries in Southeast Asia, no papers on Brunei, Cambodia, Laos, and Myanmar were presented because of the lack of success in finding researchers in the region working on those countries. This volume consists of eleven out of the fourteen papers delivered at the workshop. The editor would like to take this opportunity to thank all the paperwriters and discussants for their contributions to the insightful, stimulating discussions during the workshop. The ISEAS Administration staff must be commended for their first-rate support that significantly contributed to the smooth organization of the workshop.

The book would not have been possible without the generous cooperation of the contributors and I must thank them for their patience in consenting to the various editorial changes.