Public concern about inequitable economic globalization has revealed the demand for citizen participation in global decision making. Civil society organizations have taken up the challenge, holding governments and corporations accountable for their decisions and actions, and developing collaborative solutions to the dominant problems of our time. Critical Mass: The Emergence of Global Civil Society offers a unique mixture of experience and analysis by the leaders of some of the most influential global civil society organizations and respected academics who specialize in this field of study.

Co-published with the Centre for International Governance Innovation

Contributor: James W. St.G. Walker

James W. St.G. Walker is a professor of history at the University of Waterloo, where he specializes in the history of human rights and race relations. His books include The Black Loyalists and “Race”, Rights and the Law in the Supreme Court of Canada (WLU Press, 1998), and he has published numerous articles and book chapters analyzing campaigns for human rights reform.

--- Contributor: Andrew S. Thompson

Andrew S. Thompson is a Special Fellow with the Centre for International Governance Innovation (CIGI) in Waterloo, Canada. His areas of specialization include human rights and international governance. He has written a number of book chapters and is co-editor of Haiti: Hope for a Fragile State (WLU Press, 2006).

"If the ideals of worldwide justice and equity are ever to be realized, if our planet and its people are ever to be rescued from shortsightedness and greed, it will only be through the workings of a vibrant international civil society. This groundbreaking book neither exaggerates the promise of such society nor underestimates its problems. Instead, by combining the insights of academics and activists and drawing upon both theory and cases, it illuminates a field of study only beginning to be mined. Both those of us who toil in civil society organizations and those who are affected by them have reason to be grateful."