John A. Hall is Dean of Arts and James McGill Professor of Sociology at McGill University Montreal. His books include Civil Society: Theory, History, Comparison (editor), Power and Liberties, and Is America Breaking Apart? (with Charles Lindholm). Frank Trentmann is Senior Lecturer in History at Birkbeck College, University of London, and Director of the Cultures of Consumption Programme. His publications include Paradoxes of Civil Society (editor) and Markets in Historical Contexts: Ideas and Politics in the Modern World (co-editor with Mark Bevir).

'Frank Trentmann and John Hall rescue the concept of civil society from hazy approbration and lazy usage. By inserting contestation, complexity and change into the past and present of the concept, in theory and in practice, in west and the rest, their selection of texts is an indispensable starting point for thinking about civil society.' - Professor Martin Daunton, Master of Trinity Hall, University of Cambridge 'The editors wear their erudition lightly, but their masterful editing of over seventy contributors creates a vibrant conversation. The volume succeeds because of their wisdom and intellectual creativity.' - Deborah Davis, Professor of Sociology, Yale University, USA

• Preface PART I: INTRODUCTION Contests over Civil Society: Introductory Perspectives; J.A.Hall & F.Trentmann PART II: EMERGENT PROPERTIES OF CIVIL SOCIETY Civil Society as Political Society Civil Society as Political Society; R.Hooker Civil Society vs. the State of Nature; J.Locke Natural Societies Compared; G.W.Leibniz Toleration and its Limits Of Superstition and Enthusiasm; D.Hume Remedies for Sectarianism; A.Smith Freemasonry; G.Lessing Civil Society, Christianity, and State; Rev. Dr. T.B.Clarke Civility, Sociability and Associational Life Good Nature; J.Addison Gender and Public Life in the History of Civilisation; J.Millar The Threat of Effeminacy; The Female Tatler Self-Help and Regulation: A Women's Friendly Society; The Friends United Of Sympathy and of Self-Command; A.Smith The Craze of Clubs Ridiculed; Of the Farting Club Paradoxes of Commercial Life The Civilizing Force of Commerce; Montesquieu The Burden of Civilization; J.J.Rousseau The Social Benefits of Deception; A.Smith Civil Society,War, and Cosmopolitan Peace The Threat of Commerce to Republics; A.Ferguson The Commercial Sources of Military Power; E.Gibbon Cosmopolitan Vision; I.Kant PART III: CIVIL SOCIETY IN THE MIDST OF MODERN IDEOLOGIES Radicalism vs. Conservatism Established Religion and Social Order; E.Burke Rights of Man; T.Paine Common Will; E-J.Sieyès Liberalism and Empire Public Functions of Associations; A.de Tocqueville The Dangers of Public Tranquility; A.de Tocqueville The Legacy of the Separation of Classes; A.de Tocqueville The 'Barbarous' and 'Anti-social' Passions of the Hindu; J.Mill Imperial Mission; A Village Missionary Meeting Bürgerliche Gesellschaft Corporation and Ethical Life; G.W.F.Hegel Split Consciousness; K.Marx Natural Hierarchies; H.von Treitschke Associational Practices: Moral Order, Popular Emancipation, and Escapism Reforming Others; The Girls' Friendly Society Cooperation and Emancipation; Mrs. Layton Sociability as Nostalgia; Schlaraffische Club (society ofmilk and honey) Organic Associationalism and the Critique of Liberalism Gemeinschaft und Gesellschaft; F.Tönnies The Purposes of Association; O.von Gierke Communal Life and the Limits of the State; J.N.Figgis Federalism; C.Cattaneo Guild Socialism; G.D.H.Cole Corporatism; E.Durkheim PART IV: UNDER ASSAULT ; V.I.Lenin The Crisis of Parliamentary Democracy; C.Schmitt The Cult of the Member; K.Tucholsky Hegemony; A.Gramsci Socialist Nationalism; J.Goebbels The State as a Moral Project; V.M.Perez-Diaz The Liberal Threat to Self-Government; M.J.Sandel PART V: REVIVAL The Power of the Powerless; V.Havel The Pitfalls of Civil Society for Post-Communism; C.Hann The Myth of Human Self-Identity; L.Kolakowski A Setting of Settings; M.Walzer Maternal Voices; Madres de Plaza de Mayo Churches, Peace and Human Rights; G.Ruden The Decline of Social Visibility; P.Rosanvallon Deliberative Politics; J.Habermas PART VI: CONTEMPORARY DEBATES Communitarian Controversies The Strange Disappearance of Civic America; R.Putnam What If Civic Life Didn't Die?; M.Schudson Unravelling from Above; T.Skocpol Bursts of Civic Reconstruction; R.Putnam Ordering Civil Society; D.Blunkett Compelled Association; N.L.Rosenblum Associative Democracy; J.Cohen & J.Rogers Beyond Europe Civil Society and Public Sphere in China; D.Strand Hegemonic Ideas and Class in Chinese Associations; J.N. Wasserstrom & L.Xinyong The Inner and Public Practices of Qigong; N.N.Chen The Vitality of Islam; E.Gellner Religious, Ethnic, and Informal Associations; A.Varshney Pockets and Deficits of Civility in the Middle East; A.R.Norton Civil Society and the Political Imagination in Africa; J.L.Comaroff & J.Comaroff Postcolonial Perspectives; P.Chatterjee Global Civil Society Global Civil Society?; J.Keane NonGovernmental Organizations in the United Nations; D.Otto Civicus; M.D.de Oliveira & R.Tandon Further Reading