Comparative Nonprofit Sector Essay: Pakistan and Turkey. Pakistan and Turkey, as two developing, muslim oriented, trying to adapt and implement democracy have very different structure and history of the CSOs.

University Degree Business and Administrative studies

Nonprofit Management

Comparative Nonprofit Sector: Pakistan and Turkey

From hunter-gatherer collectivities to modern societies, human beings have carefully

created the different ways for social involvement. The government, nonprofit and

community based involvement in providing collective good is a visible feature of

societies. The world today is far more complex than before. The gap between rich and poor , the haves and the have-nots are bigger than it was before. This gaphas directly affected peoples’ access to basic human needs such as water, food, housing, health care etc. In these conditions the basic question of survival is to create foundations of nonprofit activity both locally and internationally. From individual philanthropy to multinational non-governmental organizations, the nonprofit sector is dominating some of the traditional functions of the state.

Since it is something birth from the society, it is totally affected the political, economical, religious, cultural conditions from the society where it comes into being. This explains why the nonprofit sector amon countries vary, have similarities and differences regarding the similarities and differences of their society.

Pakistan and Turkey, as two developing, muslim oriented, trying to adapt and implement democracy have very different structure and history of the CSOs.

I. Historical background and Changes in Society

Voluntary and philanthropic activities and initiative have a long history in the region,

part of which is now Pakistan. Responsively to political and religious situations in the region, role and aim of nonprofit sector has been changed throughout the decades and centuries.

Before the British colonial rule, civil society activities in the area were motivated primarily by religious beliefs and political strategy. Different beliefs created different ways for manifesting themselves with philanthropic institutions activities, since every religion promotes care for poor and sick and education. Hindu concepts were daana(giving) and seva (service) and those were provided in asharams. Stupas of Buddhists, Sikh gurdwaras were also religious institutions to satisfy the obligation of these beliefs. After 8th century till the colonial period, Islamic rule was on the stage in the region. Islamic practices of zakat (offering to the poor) and Khariat(charity) and haqooq-ul-bad (human rights) laid the foundation for voluntary activities. Followers of a mystic branch of Islam, the Sufis, established khanqahs (monasteries) and madrasahs (religious schools) to provide religious education in the 11th century. Wealthy families, motivated equally by religious and political ends, also funded charitable activities.

In the 15th century, a large number of Christian missionaries came to region and introduced western education system and provided health care facilities to people. at the beginning of the 19th century, British colonial invasion has happened. Colonialism led to institutionalization of voluntary organizations, colonial authority promoted philanthropy as a way to reduce demands on government and to maintain control over resulting institutions. British helped to development of society through building numerous schools, colleges and hospitals which still operates. In the second half of the 19th century, British government created several legislations for the civil society organizations in order to monitor their activities and this attempt increased the number of CSOs in Pakistan. During the 20th century, most important CSOs were those began movement against British rule over the country. In 1947, these movements gave results and Britain declared independence of Pakistan. The changing sociopolitical environment shaped the activities of CSOs. Millions of refugees came from to India, and to provide them permanent resettlement. Afterwards, CSOs in Pakistan showed very important development until the modern days. Women, human rights, education, environment based CSOs have been founded and work effectively within the country.

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Civil society organizations in Turkey dated to vakıfs in the Ottoman times. In the archives of General Directorate of foundations in Ankara, the capital city of Turkey, the oldest “trust deed” belongs to a foundation established in 1408 (Yildirim, 1.) The main role of vakıfs were providing the security, protecting property and also donating to people. Besides vakıfs, individuals were making philanthropic investments for the public good which were called khariat. With affect of French Revolutions which spread all through the world, some nationalist and democratic organizations started to be found in Ottoman empire and they played very important role for declaration of meşrutiyet and constitution, independence of different nations from Ottoman and victory of Turkish Independence War. After the establishment of Republic of Turkey; Ataturk, founder of the country, had closed the vakıfs since they were religiously structured and considered continuation of the past which was trying to be abolished. Until the new Civil Law of 1967, civil society lived a silent era since the state and country had other priorities. This might be the fault of Atatürk and other leaders, since the civil society organization would have made easy the work of government while meeting the need of society which was dealing with after-war conditions. After 1969 military coup, there had began a restriction era in Turkey which lasted till 1982 construction after 1980 military coup. Unions, political groups, women and youth branches were band since most of them were polarized and politically oriented. The first turning point for the Turkish society was Habitat Conference held in 1996 which increased public awareness about civil society organizations. The other and most important turning point was the Marmara Earthquake in 1999. After the tragedy of earthquake, the number of civil society and social aid foundations started to increase. In year 2001, Copenhagen Criteria had been declared by EU and several reforms began to be made on civil society organizations as a response to argument of fully protection of human rights. These turning points started institutionalization of Turkish CSOs.

Turks have not live under rule of any other society as in the Pakistan and the environment was durable. There were Ottoman hegemony over 700 years and then the Republic of turkey has been established. There haven’t been the effect of different religions in turkey, they were Muslims from the beginning and still so, just changed the way from sheria to laicism. The dynamics effecting turkey were mostly external and political. In Pakistan, due to political instability, transitions in religion, the state had been never very structured, so CSOs were more active to provide needs of society. They were also under British rule which is one of the most civilized societies of the world. In Turkey with the transition came from the Ottoman Empire, the state was trying to meet all the needs of society since which was considered as its main job. And organizing of people has seemed as a threat for the power of sultans and leaders. So, the civil society organizations had not developed too much in Turkey as in the Pakistan, but in nowadays Turkey seems to pass Pakistan in organization and structure level but not in advocacy. Still, both countries are developing countries and need time to set up a more developed system and structure for the CSOs.

II. Structure of Civil Society Organizations

As we discussed in the history part, SCOs in Turkey are not deeply rooted organizations, they started to be restructured after 1980 military coup and gain speed after 1996 Habitat and 1999 earthquake. In this short time, number of associations and members has increased very quickly. According to research of TUSEV held in 2006, there are approximately 71 million associations –all registered- and 7.2 million members in Turkey, and continuing to increase. They are also shifting from being informal groups to more structured and organized institutions, but still not have strong roots on structure and system basis.

In Turkey, we can clearly see that education is a dominant area for activities of SCOs. 49.26 percent of SCOs are involved in this domain. Health is following domain with the 21.11 percent but the gap is very big for these two tops. Youth, social aid and solidarity, research, culture- heritage, art are other domains after health with percentages of 17.9, 14.8, 13.7, and 13.7 respectively. Children, women, environment, science are at the end of the list. We can conclude that SCOs meet the society needs where the state activities are incapable to provide and doesn’t respond to demand. Activities of SCOs are mostly focused on providing education and scholarship for the students with percent of 37.17 and 32.15. Advocacy is only 4.2 percent of the CSO activities on Turkey. Organizations dealing with advocacy of human rights or environment are mostly international. Turkish SCOs are first trying to solve the main problems of country which are to educate people and provide health service.

The structure of SCO’s in Pakistan is not so different than Turkey. After independence of Pakistan in 1947, they began to have a sense of civil society, but it is restricted with several military coups and political issues as in Turkey. The CSOs are not organized and institutionalized. There are nearly 45625 organizations and more than 6 million members in Pakistan according to study of John Hopkins. Due to the fact that registration for becoming a CSO is not supported by laws, only 25.9 percent of them are registered, of 34.1 percent is unregistered and of 40 percent has been applied for registration. They are also divided into to two categories as organized and unorganized. The unorganized sector is composed of small informal and unregistered entities that work mostly at the grassroots level. The organized sector can further be divided into two as registered and unregistered. Organizations are registered under various laws, and they include a variety of organizations characterized by the particular registration law, size, and scope of activities, and the way in which they are operated and managed. These may include umbrella NGOs, national NPOs, and mid-level and grassroots level organizations. The unregistered segment of the organized sector generally includes small NGOs, CBOs, and grassroots level organizations, although some mid-level organizations may also opt to be unregistered.

The prominent domain on Pakistan civil society organizations are involved is education as it is in Turkey. Nearly half (46%) of the Pakistan’s organizations cite education as their main activity. Differently from Turkey, second largest component in the nonprofit sector consists of organizations engaged in advocacy (18%). Organizations providing social services represent 8% of the total, while about 5% of organizations report religious activities as their main service. A relatively small share work in the health sector (6%).

Not surprisingly, organizations engaged in advocacy of human rights, women or child are mostly international. We see same result in Turkey as well. The reason for that advocacy percentage is higher in Pakistan might be that Pakistan is a country more under influence of other people and less developed in human rights and democracy. It was under rule of Britain till 1947 and got its independence in year 1947, this situation requires protecting of rights and freedom of people.

In Turkey, this not the case, but other facts are on the stage. Organizing is not an activity to which Turkish society is used to due to political situations and regime. Since organizing of people have being perceived as a threat for the power of people managing the country even after establishment of republic. So, people are organizing only for helping other in education, health etc rather than advocating rights of some group of people.

III. Sources of Revenue

Raising funds is most critical point for the nonprofit organizations and this is most important problem of the CSOs of Turkey and Pakistan. As religious countries, we can observe the most of the donations to meet religious obligations such as zakat and fitre.

In Pakistan, 51 percent of the revenue comes from fees, this is very usual for all the civil society organization within any country in the world. Fees are most important sources for the nonprofit sector. The unusual thing is that 43 percent of the revenue of the non profit organizations came from philanthropy in Pakistan. This is over there times the average for all countries (43 vs. 12) Economical support of government was very limited even scarce in Pakistan with only 6 percent. This is the very clear explanation for the high percentage of the philanthropy since in other countries support of government is quite higher than Pakistan. Even though percents are higher than average, since the sources are very limited, the revenue of civil society organizations are also very low if we compared to average of all countries. Philanthropic giving corresponds to 0.22 percent of the country’s gross domestic product. As addition, there is money to CSOs in Pakistan come from international donor organization as a support for the development of country.

In Turkey, the dominant and most active civil society organizations are endowed, so provide their own money such as Sabancı, Koç, Doğan. Support of government is very limited or almost none. According to report of TUSEV, only 3 percent of the CSOs has a good support from the government. There is not such a research for the distribution of fees, government and philanthropy in the Turkish societies as it is in Pakistan, but most of the donations made by people are not organized, i.e. not given to SCOs so we can count them as philanthropic donations since they have been made for the sake of helping others. The religious purposes are dominant in donations of Turkish society. 35 percent of the donations are direct giving to people in close neighborhoods, relatives etc. 22 percent of donations are given as fitre or zekat and 2 percent of them are given to street beggars. Only 37 percent of the donations are organized; so that this 37 percent is composing of 14 percent of religious and 23 percent of secular. We can conclude that people not religiously oriented are mostly making donations to CSOs.

The reason for direct giving rather than donating to a civil society organization is lack of trust to those organizations. People feel more secure when they give directly to people in need instead of giving an organization. The other reason is the CSOs in Turkey has not a long history, so people are not used to give donations them, this portion would be increase in near future when CSOs become more organized and important in the eyes of Turkish people.

IV. State Support

In Turkey, the CSOs are not totally dependent from the government even though they must be so according to the definition. Only 13 percent of the organizations are totally dependent and had only some monitoring regarding the legal issues. 9 percent of them are totally under control of government, 28 percent of them got often unjustifiable intervene and 50 percent got occasionally unjustifiable intervenes. Government does not have a developed communication with the CSOs, only when it is obligatory or inevitable. The economical support is also very limited as we discussed before. The government is supportive at policy level but restrictive in operational level, it is not trying to make easy the job of CSOs rather make it harder to work and operate. Laws and legal structure are also not very supportive in Turkey.

The most common trait between Turkey and Pakistan might be the attitude of the government. The government of Pakistan is exactly same with the Turkish government in support level to the CSOs. The Pakistan government is more moderate to social services, education or health providing civil society organizations but almost hostile to social and political advocacy. Laws are also inadequate to provide enough support to civil society organizations.

V. Conclusion

As a conclusion we can say that Pakistan and Turkey had very common traits most of the time in the structure of the CSOs. The history, disorganized and developing structure, religious orientations, inadequate even preventing government attitudes are very similar in the basis even though there are some differences in details. What makes this structures very similar is that the traits of the countries. Developing, new in democracy and have a long way to succed in human rights, under the pressure of religion and threat to secularism, Pakistan and Turkey both need more time and effort to implement and run the CSOs efficiently.

REFERENCES

Yildirim,Erdal. “The Turkish Third Sector”

TUSEV, “Sivil Toplum Değerlendirme Raporu” 2010

Iqbal, Muhammad Asid; Hına Khan; Surkhab Javed. “Nonprofit Sector in Pakistan: Historical Background.” 2004

Civil Society Briefs. “Overview of Civil Society Organizations: Pakistan.”

Karaman, Lütfullah M. “ The Crisis of Civil Society In Turkey.” 2000

Bikmen, Filiz. “The Landscape of Philantropy and Civil Society in Turkey.” 2006