This article sets out to solve the scholarly problem of determining the place of non-governmental organizations (NGOs) in current international relations and their role and relations with states. The author analyzes the concept of civil society, the starting point in the study of modern NGOs over the past 30 years, and considers by turns (1) the problems of defi ning the concepts of NGOs and civil society; and (2) the formation of these concepts in connection with the transformation of the system of international relations in the early 1990s and the policy of the Western countries in the post-Soviet space. He goes on to conclude that that civil society in the modern Western liberal reading should be considered as a historical phenomenon without any claim to universal signifi cance. The article addresses the current foreign policy practice of the United States and the European Union in working with NGOs, noting that Western states and private foundations are losing their monopoly position in the fi eld of NGOs as other states master this tool and create their own infrastructure for working with it on the domestic and foreign political circuit. The further development of the NGO sphere, the author concludes, will be aff ected by the processes of increasing interstate competition and regionalization.