The third sector in a welfare state

Abstract

The Welfare State
By welfare state meant is such a community where it is the state which takes on itself the responsibility for deprived groups in the population, for those who cannot provide themselves with socially acceptable livelihood. However ludicrous and absurd it may seem to apply the term "welfare" to the contemporary Russia, but such a kind of state is her unequivocal future. So it is better to raise the problems of the construction of such a state earlier than later, otherwise this future may never come.
The term "welfare state" should encompass the structure of the society as a whole. A more exact term, therefore, would be "welfare society". The system of social security based on the idea of material aid to the deprived, brings all the burden down on the taxpayer's shoulders. Even in the richest countries permanent discussions are going on about the balance between economic efficiency and the level of social security for the population as a whole, for its particular groups, about the choice between investments in business activity or allocation of resources directly to final consumption. It is impossible, over a long period of time, to provide simultaneously for a high level in both economic efficiency and social security. When thinking about the formation of a welfare state, it is necessary along with the economic cost, to take into consideration the social cost as well which means lost or constrained (infringed) rights and opportunities for certain (vulnerable, as a rule) social groups.
It is possible to build two ideal and extreme types of social structures according to the price to be paid for the organisation of social security and implementation of social programs by different types of social technologies implied by these structures, i. e. market and centralised. Market structures even theoretically do not admit an exact foresight of the future result but do permit to move toward reduction of social losses. The centralised system theoretically permits building exact programs and achieving low cost but the accuracy and predictability leads to giant social losses and to collapse of the structure itself. The rest of the types are certain combinations of these two types.
The Third Sector Is Part and Parcel of the Welfare State.
Organisations earlier considered as charitable have turned to a political force. They began to be reckoned with by political parties and the government alike. They are taking on themselves the role of articulators of people's needs. The articulation of needs gradually changed to their control over the actions of all those who have influence on the public life, and then to the control over an ever greater part of local social processes. Many of the functions of public affairs management which, in different ways and different times, became the competence of the state have passed now into the hands of spontaneously formed groups of population. In many areas they have become an intermediate party between the state as the set of organisations and the population. These groups and their organisations make up a sizeable share in the so called third sector. The third sector includes organisations created to meet the demands of social groups and individual citizens except for the need of the members of the organisation or of its owners to have a higher money income. According to this, it is also called an unprofitable sector since it is not allowed to use profit as a direct source of money incomes of the members of the organisation or of its owners.
The Third Sector in Russia
At present a multi-organisation field is being created in Russia where social movements are born and functioning. In contrast to West European countries where social movements are a means of mobilisation and opposition and a feeding medium for the formation and functioning of non-governmental organisations, in Russia the process of the formation of public associations is a social movement itself. According to the current Russian legislation, citizens are allowed to form associations without appropriate permits from state bodies, from the RF Ministry of Justice among them. An association is reckoned operative from the moment of its founding meeting, adoption of charter and election of its governing bodies.
The organisation becomes legitimate from the moment of its members' decision and not of getting permission from the Ministry of Justice. This means a turn to the international practice where the creation of associations is not conditioned by authorities' preliminary permission. It is convenient to classify all third sector organisations in Russia on different bases, the most important of which are: the region of action, character of targeted groups, sphere of activity and type of source of finances. By the first base, Moscow prevails. It concentrates the national organisations and is also preferable for almost all foreign charitable foundations and donors of public associations. In the result, over a half of all public associations have been formed and are operating just in Moscow. By the character of the targeted groups, the main group is that of invalids. There are some data that show that the share of organisations of invalids reaches 17%. Next are children and youth organisations. The leading sphere is solving local problems of a different kind (aid to various categories of needy groups, environment protection, protection of rights, protection of health, protection of order, development of physical culture and sports, meeting spiritual needs etc.). Financial resources can come both from internal and external sources. The chief internal source is business activity of their own. It yields 15-20 % of incomes on the average. Sometimes a public association is set up jointly with a commercial organisation, the task of which is to supply the associations with financial means. Among external sources, the highest role is played by state support (about half of inconies) and donations (they also may reach half of incomes).
The aid from foreign foundations does not play any perceptible role. Like in other countries, the organisations of the third sector in Russia take on themselves the performance of functions relating mostly to the organisation of self- and mutual help in satisfying the most urgent needs. In Russia they are associated mainly with survival, and this makes the structure of her body of organisations sharply different from that which is typical of Western nations. According to the data from a survey conducted in Novosibirsk in 1996 (the finding is rather typical of all industrially advanced Russian cities), half of the population over 16 years of age are members of garden associations. This is a sphere of application of great amount of heavy work. According to the data from the observation of low-income families, about 80% of berries, local fruit and vegetables come from own gardens and kitchen-gardens. The tiny land plots and potato fields make for many families a very significant source of additional money incomes.
At the same time, over the last several years these associations have been fully left without support. It is notable fact that the overwhelming majority of the respondents have preferred to use the services of state and municipal organisations (73% of answers to this item). The services supplied by private persons and firms were preferred by 15%, and only 8% reported public organisations and informal groups as preferable. Since the survey was a representative one, we can state that only 7% of the city residents associate the activity of public organisations with low-income groups, only 7% think that work in public associations is disinterested. About a third of respondents did not know anything about public associations. Another 45% heard something but could mention no concrete organisation.
On the basis of the opinions expressed by the respondents, we can speak about three chief directions in the development of the third sector: activity of small informal groups joined together by their common interests, problems, desire and possibilities to satisfy jointly part of their basic and higher needs; associations the main goal of which is to provide help in some particular affairs and particular everyday problems to the members of their organisations and outsiders as well; expression of the interests of the organisation's members as well as, directly or indirectly, of other citizens in their encounters with authorities, in management of individual firms and institutions. The main principles of the activity of public organisations in all three above mentioned directions are their voluntary character, similar interests and preferred forms of their implementation, free supply of services or compensation of costs. The presence or absence in the structure of the society of some elements, the character of the structure can facilitate the implementation of social programs or, else, check them, becoming a barrier to their implementation.
In the former USSR the whole society was permeated with structure of public organisations (communist party, trade unions, various societies of invalids, communist young league etc.) which were instruments of the state government. It is just these organisations which attracted great numbers of people to solving social problems. All these structures collapsed together with the USSR. Russia was left without non-governmental instruments for attraction of additional means to the social sphere. However in the recent three years Russia has seen an intensive restructuring in all aspects, including organisational in the social sphere. In this sphere the structure of the third sector is especially rapidly developing. In many respects the network of NGOs is called to replace the network of pseudopublic organisations that were functioning in the former USSR, and, in particular, the attraction of resources. The growth of their number in 1996 was over 9% against the growth of all registered organisations being less than 8%. The formation of the third sector in Russia is helped by foreign foundations and organisations of the third sector, in particular, from the USA, Germany as well as the European Union within the framework of the TACIS program. But their common deficiency is that they tend to repeat the experience of their countries and reproduce in Russia the familiar image of the third sector. In doing this, they are losing from sight that there are, first, some specific cultural features and specific current situation, and, second, that the third sector both in the USA and Europe was being formed as part of the society structure in evolutionary way, gradually, over more than 150 years. And the basis of its formation was not of communist ideals but catholic and protestant values, individualistic principles of life, achievement rather than ascription. This long and poignant way to restructuring still awaits the Russian society but it will pass it according to its own culture and history.