In the FSU region, the absence or a very weak and nascent civil society is very evident. This is limiting progress on democracy and poverty reduction efforts. The following statement by one of the presenters in the South Asian workshop sums up the feelings across the regions on this topic. In reality however, the people of all the South Asian countries are mostly powerless, vulnerable and poor. In both Africa and the FSU region, participants pointed to the well-constructed constitutions that define the rights of citizens and basic freedoms and to the reality that they do not exist in practice.
Citizenship is reduced to mere identity with a geographical territory.
Meager resources are allocated to substantiate freedoms and rights to security, equity and participation in national affairs. In some cases, as in Armenia, rights to land were given, but because the owners did not have resources to work the land, the trend is the rich amalgamating the land back. Similarly, the loss of jobs across the FSU region was cited as one of the factors contributing to the disempowerment of the citizenry. In some African countries citizenship was shown to be tenuous. Women, minorities and borderline communities were often subjected to hardships that took away their rights.