Cultivating change

In late-twentieth-century Mexico, the NGO boom was hailed as a harbinger of democratic transition, with NGOs poised to transform the relationship between states and civil society on a global scale. And yet, great as the expectations were for NGOs to empower the poor and disenfranchised, their work is rooted in much older civic and cultural traditions and complexly implicated in neoliberal governance. Analiese Richard examines what the growth of NGOs means for the future of citizenship when a widening chasm between rich and poor threatens democratic ideals and institutions. Analyzing the growth of NGOs in Tulancingo, Hidalgo, from the 1970s to the present, The Unsettled Sector explores NGOs' evolving network of relationships with donors, target communities, international partners, state agencies, and political actors. It reaches beyond the campesinos and farmlands of Tulancingo to make sense of the NGO as an institutional form. Richard argues that only if we sec NGOs as they are-bridges between formal politics and public morality-can we understand the opportunities and limits for social solidarity and citizenship in an era of neoliberal retrenchment.