Marginalization and role of civil society

Marginalization has been defined as a complex process of relegating specific groups of people to the lower or outer edge of society. It effectively pushes these groups of people to the margin of society economically, politically, culturally and socially following the policy of exclusion. It denies a section of the society equal access to productive resources and avenues for the realization of their productive human potential and opportunities for their full capacity utilization. This pushes the community to poverty, misery, low wage and discrimination and livelihood insecurity. Their upward social mobility is being limited. Politically this process of relegation denies people equal access to the formal power structure and participation in the decision making processes leading to their subordination to and dependence on the economically and politically dominant groups of society. As a consequence of the economic, political and cultural deprivation a vast chunk of the population has emerged to be socially ignorant, illiterate, uneducated and dependent. Devoid of the basic necessities of life they are relegated to live on the margins of society.

In developing countries like India, civil societies have assumed much significant role for the social development of the marginalized people. The marginalized community look upon the civil society with expectation as state’s development initiatives have failed to percolate to the bottom strata of the society.In the contemporary development scenario, the concept of empowerment of the marginalized has got a special focus and civil society initiatives have been given special emphasis. As the role of civil society has acquired a role for the social development, it has developed relationship with marginalized community.