I’m sorry for starting a new thread for such a narrow question. Can anyone suggest how to say “civil society” in Chinese? I’ve looked in a few dictionaries and have found 文明社會, which is described in English as a “civilized society.” To me, a “civilized society” isn’t quite the same as a “civil society.” My doubts are confirmed by the 現代漢語詞典’s definition for 文明社會﹕發展到較高階段和具有較高文化的社會. To me, a definition for civil society needs something about the rule of law and/or equal protection for all under the law. All the definitions I’ve seen for 文明社會seem to be more culture oriented. Any suggestions for how to express the concept of “civil society” in Chinese?
Hi Jive,
At GITIS, we use “民間社會”. Not perfect but it rolls off the tongue rapidly. There’s another term but I can’t think of it right now. You might have a look around the United Nations Web site – lots of Chinese docs there and they talk about civil society quite a bit.
Thanks for the tip, Ironlady. I had a look around the UN site, but it seems their translators use “civil society” (民間社會組織) to mean a “civic organization” or an NGO. I’m thinking of the broader idea of a fair society ruled by laws and with a transparent government, people who don’t spit on the streets or kill their neighbors, yadayada… I imagine this is one of those things that will be difficult to translate into Chinese, seeing as how up to now, China has never had a civil society. Hartzell often ponders stuff like this. I remember him writing about the elusive Chinese equivalent to “civil rights” in another thread. Maybe he’ll come around.
[quote=“ironlady”]Hi Jive,
[/quote]
BTW, I prefer JT, or just plain Turkey. 
In Taiwan, civil society is often translated as gung1 min2 she4 hui4 . . . . . with gung1 min2 being the term for “citizen”. (Of course, the implication is that foreigners are excluded, in the typical Chinese xenophobic fashion.) In law, “civil” is min2 shr4, but unfortunately no one says min2 shr4 she4 hui4 . . . . .
It is the same problem when you are talking about “civil rights” . . . . . in my experience, the Taiwanese/Chinese tend to view these as limited to citizens . . . . .
Hi JT (is that better? 
)
We recently had a week-long tutorial with a UN interpreter from Shanghai who said he uses 民間社會 just like that to mean “civil society”, not necessarily NGOs and the like. Of course the whole term “civil society” is a little fuzzy to begin with…anyway, for what it’s worth, he’s very good, well-respected and certainly takes terminology a LOT more seriously than the average person (almost to an unhealthy level, I should say… )
It’s like trying to translate “private sector” beautifully. Yucck!!
Ironlady,
I googled minjian shehui (duh, should have just done that in the beginning) and just as you said, it’s what I’m looking for. Interestingly, just about all of the hits are for Taiwan or Hong Kong websites, with almost no hits for mainland sites. I guess that just confirms what we all already know. 
On a related note, anyone want to explain why “citizen” is translated as gongmin 公民, which means citizens of voting age? (I don’t know about legal documents, that’s just what I’ve seen in the news.) It seems like guomin 國民 would be a closer equivalent because it would include children.
Here’s another word I’m looking for that the Chinese language should (or surely needs to) have: cultural imperialism. The only thing that pops into my head is 文化霸主（主义）; I googled that and only found a few hits. Is this commonly used? Ahem…Ironlady?
Er…we don’t seem to talk about that one much in Taiwan…did you try Googling with Simplified characters? (that is, Google the phrase “cultural imperialism” in English and then insert the character de5 in GB code after it; this is using the English google.com as the google.com.tw will ignore the character de5)…
Sounds like something the Mainlanders would go one more about, next to hegemonism (ba4quan2 zhu3yi4) and colonialism and all that…I love when hegemonism comes out in a speech…
You might like to investigate the meaning of a “fa zhi” society - one that conforms to the idea of “rule of law”. I haven’t got Chinese on this computer, but I’m sure ironlady or someone can provide the characters.
fa3zhi4 法制 … well, I certainly wouldn’t say Taiwan is the best place to investigate this particular concept… 
In my opinion, “gongmin” correctly indicates citizen as someone being eligible to vote.
The term “guomin” correctly means national.
By looking at the terms this way we can correctly view the holder of an overseas Chinese passport as a “Taiwan national non-citizen” because he/she has no voting rights.
P.S. However, under international law it still seems to me that “national, non-citizen” passports should only be given to those who have “right of abode” and “work rights” somewhere within the territorial jurisdiction . . . . . . (indeed this is the situation under US federal law for US “outlying territorial possessions” for example) . . . . . . whereas in Taiwan the “Taiwan national non-citizen” status does not grant these rights . . . . .
Hence, I believe that all the legitimate purposes served by the so-called
so errm… you mean a “civil society” in your definition is a society regulated by law? then i guess you could say its a 法治社會 i think shrugs 
No, pk, it’s not “a” civil society, but “civil society”. It’s a standard term in international development circles.
Certainly not ! 
umm sorry… but whats the difference?
[quote]Ironlady,
I googled minjian shehui (duh, should have just done that in the beginning) and just as you said, it’s what I’m looking for. [/quote]
Well, Turkey, the only dictionary I can find that even lists ‘civil society’ uses 民權社會‧ I’ve tried both terms out on some local comrades here in China. No one knows what 民間社會 means or can even take a guess. One friend giggled, saying it just sounded like a silly word. Not many knew 民權社會, but there were those who did and even knew what it meant.
Ironlady, as for this UN interpreter from Shanghai . . . I don’t know. If he is still based in Shanghai, his views are suspect to me (no apologies offered). I’ve been here 6 months and I tell you EVERYTHING is influenced by politics and ideology here (as well as ultra-nationalism). I was watching a show on the origin of Chinese characters the other day (junk) and this professor managed to work in Marxist theory and the one child policy (supporting both). Maybe something like particle physics can escape the politcal warping, but I doubt it. Certainly something like civil society will not.
Just my two fen.
[quote=“yonglan”][quote]Ironlady,
I googled minjian shehui (duh, should have just done that in the beginning) and just as you said, it’s what I’m looking for. [/quote]
Well, Turkey, the only dictionary I can find that even lists ‘civil society’ uses 民權社會‧ I’ve tried both terms out on some local comrades here in China. No one knows what 民間社會 means or can even take a guess. One friend giggled, saying it just sounded like a silly word. Not many knew 民權社會, but there were those who did and even knew what it meant.
[/quote]
Your findings don’t surprise me at all. I’ve used it in writing where I knew the reader was familiar with the topic and it was understood, but that was in an academic setting. I’ve never been understood when I’ve used it in speech. I’ve ended up just explaining my way around it. I guess that a word only becomes widely used in a language when there is a need; Chinese people don’t have a need for “civil society” in their language because they’ve never lived in a civil society. Why try to describe something you don’t even know well yourself. Harsh, but true.
The interpreter in Shanghai is definitely NOT becoming half a commie…he’s Canadian, in fact.
But it’s true that the average person in China (well, the average person in the US, for that matter) doesn’t go around talking about “civil society”. You really only find the term in speeches about international development and stuff like that.