Amazon.com description: Product Description: The new challenges of globalization - of economy, society, and politics - appear in the Europeanization of social and political networks in different policy areas. New forms of citizens' involvement in policy processes - as well as planning, implementation, and evaluation - require new forms of governance on local, regional, and European levels, as well as global participation of European actors. In this process, civil society emerged as a political program, and as a scientific and theoretical challenge for the social sciences. The issue of civil society in the axis of the different fields and directions of political and social research in a European context is the focus of this anthology. The book breaks the barriers between the traditional division of labor of European governance and national-regional-local oriented social and political research. Two leading questions are addressed: What do civil society organizations contribute to social, cultural, and leisure time services in the context of Europeanization? In a European comparison and at the organizational level, what risks and opportunities result from the inclusion of civil society organizations in new concepts of governance?