The International Journal
of Not-for-Profit Law

Volume 8, Issue 1, November 2005

This issue of the International Journal of Not-for-Profit Law features a special section on helping civil society flourish. We open with the Statement of the Johns Hopkins International Fellows in Philanthropy Conference on fashioning an enabling environment for civil society. Next, Radost Toftisova comprehensively examines NGO-government cooperation agreements, or “compacts,” their history to date, and some of the lessons learned through experience. Finally, using Tanzania as a case study, Jared Duhu considers some of the challenges facing those who seek to strengthen civil society in the South; Emeka Iheme offers a response.

Our other articles open with a report by David Moore on pathbreaking reforms of civil society law in Afghanistan. Thomas Silk follows with a look at how the charitable sector has responded to recent regulatory legislation in California. Herrington J. Bryce outlines a global framework for analyzing nonprofit organizations and their role in civil society. Next comes a lively and informative debate on the future of American nonprofits, featuring an essay by Pablo Eisenberg and responses from Diana Aviv, H. Peter Karoff, Arthur Drache, Susan Raymond, and Bill Landsberg.

We gratefully acknowledge the generous assistance of the University Press of New England, Lester M. Salamon of the Center for Civil Society Studies at Johns Hopkins University, HTML wizards Kareem Elbayar and Erin Means, IJNL volunteer Sabrina Querubin, and, especially, our expert authors.

Stephen Bates
Editor
International Journal of Not-for-Profit Law
sbates@icnl.org