of differentiation and formation taking place in the NGO community. At the same time these changes seem to take place

against the background of a decreasing acceptance of the neoliberal project. This situation bears the chance for a par-

ticipation of NGOs according to emancipatory interests. Prerequisite is a thorough debate on the strategy, taking the
following aspects into consideration:

1. The economical determinants of the globalisation and their neoliberal orientation have to be put on the NGO
agenda. This may sound trivial, but NGOs taking advantage of being single-issue oriented, have difficulties with
thinking and acting on more complex issues. Since many of them emerged in the post cold war period of
1989/90, they are characterised by the ideological perspectives of this era. This includes a strong anti-ideolog-
ical affect, which is highly suspicious of anything exceeding a single issue standpoint.

. Nevertheless under the conditions of globalisation it is evident that "knowing only something about rainforests
means to know nothing about rainforests.”

|. Placing the process of globalisation on the political agenda requires economical expertise. What we need is a
political economy of globalisation and NGOs need to participate in the necessary discussions.

. NGOs have to overcome their blindness vis a vis of power which in combination with their ignorance of econom-
ic interests lead to the illusion that good arguments presented in lobby meetings could bring about decisive
changes.

. Itis important to focus on the most powerful institutions of international regulation. NGOs have to stop focusing
‘on the UN-system and on participation in meaningless committees. Instead they need to turn to high politics and

influential institutions such as IMF, World Bank, WTO, OECD etc.

Our political culture has to be more combative and controversial. All important historical changes were the result
of controversy and battles, which later were consensually consolidated in historical compromises. In the future
we have to work with both combative and consensual strategies.

Autonomy and independence, including financial independence, are indispensable, if NGOs with emancipatory
strategies want to be successful in the future.

This means that NGOs need to develop effective strategies against the strategies of co-option. The attempt to lull
the public as announced by WTO and OECD is going to be the next challenge.

The current success of NGOs should not lead to the misunderstanding that they are the spearhead of emancipa-
tory change. In the long run NGOs won't achieve anything without allies. NGOs are the most overestimated actor
of the nineties (WAHL 1996), but themselves, they should not take over this overestimation. Alliances with other
actors are indispensable. This means above all to reactivate and intensify the ties to the social movements which
have given birth to the NGOs. This is not about nostalgia and going “back to the roots” of the innocence of non-
professionalism, but about shaping and strengthening a dialectic link between social movements and NGOs.
NGOs should consider themselves as the infrastructure of social movements. Both, traditional social movements
and their organisations, such as the trade unions, and new social movements together with parts of the academ-
ic sector should be included in the concept of alliances of emancipatory NGOs. In certain circumstances this can
also include tactical alliances with a government or parts of it.

Shortened translation of an article published in the German quarterly "Peripherie" No 71- 1998.
The full German version can be downloaded from the WEED homepage (www.weedbonn.org)