Community participation in local governance in Cambodia: learning from the village networks approach

Cambodia has embarked on a process of decentralisation and democratisation, including the establishment of elected Commune Councils in early 2002. Given the lack of a tradition of encouraging civic participation in public affairs, however, there was initially little general awareness of how to engage with these Councils. The authors describe a project supported by the Ministry of Rural Development and the German bilateral agency, GTZ, and undertaken with local non-government organisations, to identify and support active community groups and improve their capacity to interact with the Commune Councils, while at the same time seeking ways for the Commune Councils to support the different groups.     

Informal governance and participation in non-democratic international organizations

This article uses the informal governance framework to elucidate the connection between regime transition and participation in regional international organizations (IOs). In particular, this study focuses on non-democratic regional IOs and examines the empirical case of the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS). We investigate how the level of regime transition of each CIS member state affects its participation in the CIS. The paper utilizes an original dataset that contains information regarding the number of CIS-related agreements that have been signed by each CIS member state during the 1991–2010 time period, which can be used to measure the level of participation of each state in the CIS. We find that states with a lower level of democratization and a higher level of marketization are more likely to participate in agreements within the CIS. The paper contributes to the wider application of informal governance framework by demonstrating the usefulness of these theories for understanding the nature and dynamics of regional IOs, such as the CIS.     

Operationalising local governance in Kilimanjaro

Decentralisation is a policy feature common to many African countries. Local governance is therefore gaining in relevance, though not yet in clarity. Based on the experience of a development project in Kilimanjaro, Tanzania, the article examines the case of local governance in practice, grounding this in a historical analysis and focusing on the relationship between local government and civil society. Through a phased process from experimentation through piloting to lobbying, the PAMOJA project develops interface mechanisms to structure local government-civil society relations at the district level. Three actors are identified for the success of the project: the external agent as process facilitator, local champions as change agents, and strategic partners for the lobby component. A successful outcome would ultimately strengthen decentralisation processes.     

Reducing poverty in sub-Saharan Africa: the need for participatory governance

Traditional approaches to fighting poverty have yielded unsatisfactory results in some African countries, and have been positively damaging in others. Economic growth and social expenditure on the part of both national governments and international donors have been ineffective in some countries, while in others they have exacerbated poverty. The author considers that this is due to the absence of participatory governance. From a theoretical perspective, support for participatory governance stems from Amartya Sen's approach to understanding poverty, which conceptualises poverty as a lack of capabilities, leading to social exclusion. The lack of such governance has led to the failure of traditional approaches in the fight against poverty in sub-Saharan Africa. Finally, the author proposes a tool for assessing the quality of governance, and its application in Cameroon.     

Older people’s conceptualisation of poverty and their experiences of government programmes in Uganda

This article explores older people’s understandings of poverty and analyses their experience of government policies for fighting poverty. It employed qualitative methods, including focus group discussions and key informant interviews. A total of 120 older people in two districts in Uganda participated in the study. Based on thematic analysis and observation of non-verbal communication, older people’s perspectives on poverty included a wide range of deprivations in their household. Findings reveal that there is a lack of legislation support and effective information for old people to demand accountability or influence policy strategies to address poverty. Despite the difficult living conditions of older people in poverty, the majority live independent lives, are self-reliant and use a variety of strategies to address poverty. Therefore, there is a need for scrutiny to ensure that poverty alleviation support reaches those who need it most.     

Trade liberalisation,rural poverty,and the environment: global discussions and local cases

Much has been researched and said about the impacts of international trade liberalisation at the country level; but little is known about its social and environmental local-level impacts. Since national averages can mask the existence of winners and losers, national-level studies may be a poor guide to addressing the plight of the rural poor and the environment that are at the core of the agenda of the social and conservation movement. This article compares the international trade-liberalisation debate with the findings of local rural-based case studies in seven countries, co-ordinated by WWF and the World Bank during 2004–2007. It discusses some actions that the conservation and social movement could take to improve the discussion and the practice of trade liberalisation, poverty alleviation, and environmental conservation.     

Supporting local climate adaptation planning and implementation through local governance and decentralised finance provision

Policies developed at national levels can be unresponsive to local needs. Often they do not provide the rural poor with access to the assets and services they need to allow them to innovate and adapt to the ways that increased climate variability and change exacerbate challenges to basic securities – food, water, energy, and well-being. In development deficit circumstances, common pool resources are important for climate adaptation purposes. In order for climate adaptation actions to deliver resilience, local perspectives and knowledge need to be recognised and given due priority in formal planning systems. Basing formal adaptive development planning on local strategies can support and strengthen measures that people have been tested and know to work. Local climate adaptation through collective action can address current increases in climate variability, future incremental changes, and the need to transform existing systems to deal with qualitative shifts in climate. These types of adaptation can work in cumulative ways. The results of local adaptation collective action that have benefits of low rivalry between users while being highly inclusive can be considered “local public goods”. Evidence is beginning to emerge that when local governance systems facilitate high levels of participation in planning collective action for climate adaptation, and direct access to resources for implementing local plans, “local public goods” can be created and common pool resources better managed.     

Mainstreaming climate change into local governance: financing and budgetary compliance in selected local governments in Ghana

Through an interpretive research paradigm, we investigated the extent to which six local governments across three administrative regions of Ghana have complied with mandated climate change financing and budgeting guidelines. Five interesting findings emerged. First, there is enormous evidence of climate change budgeting compliance across all six local governments despite weak compliance incentives. Second, local governments that are most vulnerable to the impacts of climate change are more willing to comply and also allocate more resources for adaptation-related activities than those that are less vulnerable. Third, local governments that complied least are likely to take ad hoc adaptation actions which are often uncoordinated and poorly monitored. These local governments are least likely to attract auxiliary funds that could provide additional resources for adaptation financing. Lastly, the evidence of compliance is only quantitative, presented in various local governments’ fiscal documents, with no qualitative or other relevant explanatory factors on the extent of impact on adaptation.     

Assessing international aid for local governance in the Western Balkans

This article investigates the impact of international efforts to cultivate effective and authoritative local governing institutions in the Western Balkans, a prime testing ground for democratization aid to post-war states. It explores three hypotheses, each of which argues that a particular approach of international actors toward domestic officials best improves the quality of local governance. The study's gathering of interview and survey data from field-based actors enables it to evaluate local government reforms' impact on domestic communities. This investigation arrives at three findings. First, in the view of Western Balkan peoples, local governance reforms do not produce benefits when they are either imposed or ignored by international authorities. Secondly, reforms produce benefits for local communities when they are designed to meet domestic concerns. More specifically, reforms valued by local communities are designed in ways that respond to domestic, rather than international, concepts of good local governance that emphasize socioeconomic aspects and produce tangible benefits. Well designed reforms also include significant aid targeting local governance that is coupled with the promise of a larger political settlement that is attractive to powerful domestic elites and contingent on clearly articulated local governance reforms. Thirdly, such aid best characterises European Union efforts only in Macedonia.     

Capture the flag: local factionalism as electoral mobilization in dominant party Uganda

ABSTRACT

This article addresses a question relevant to many non-democratic regimes: how can a successful dominant party be an institutionally weak one? President Yoweri Museveni and his National Resistance Movement (NRM) have dominated Ugandan politics since coming to power in 1986. However, the NRM does not possess many of the institutional endowments that other dominant parties use to control mass and elite politics, such as central control of candidate selection, autonomous mobilizing structures, or dispensation of sufficient political finance to its candidates. Instead, the party secretariat has no real institutional power independent of the personalist Museveni regime, and its local branches house fierce internal competition each election in which most incumbents lose office. This article argues that the NRM mobilizes so well for Museveni despite its institutional deficits due to the precise nature of the competitive process its local elites go through to win its nomination (or “flag”) and the subsequent general election. This process sees self-organized and self-financed candidates and their factions rejuvenate the party and mobilize votes for the concurrent presidential election as a by-product of their competition with one another. The article makes this argument with qualitative data from three districts gathered during the 2016 elections.     

'New learning in old organisations': Children's participation in a school-based nutrition project in western Kenya

The integration of learning into community development processes and how that learning can stimulate positive change pose challenges that development practitioners have met with mixed success. Who the most effective change agents are, how they can be supported, and how their efforts can be diffused in the community and scaled up are key questions in the community development literature. The authors designed and implemented an action-research project in western Kenya on traditional vegetables, recruiting pupils as co-researchers. The purpose of the research was two-fold. One goal was to explore the feasibility of increasing the intake of traditional vegetables through a school-based horticulture programme. The other was to increase pupils' competence as effective change agents by empowering them in culturally compatible ways. The results offer lessons for practitioners regarding creative means to identify and empower change agents within traditional organisations and encourage innovative creation and diffusion of knowledge.     

Decentralisation and local governance in Mozambique: the challenges of promoting bottom-up dynamics from the top down

Since the conclusion of the peace accords in 1992, Mozambique has undergone several changes in the field of governance and institution-building. One key aspect of such reforms, strongly promoted by donors in peace-building contexts, has been the agenda of decentralisation and local governance, which has entailed political devolution in selected municipalities, and deconcentration and the creation of local councils in the rural districts. This article examines this agenda and its implementation focusing on two domains. First, it discusses the different interests that have shaped the political decisions taken on this agenda at the national level. Second, it examines the case of the local councils in the district of Angoche, critically debating the extent to which they epitomise the increase of local representativeness and, thus, whether or not they enhance bottom-up dynamics of governance. I argue that the limited effectiveness of such reforms in Mozambique reflect the inherent contradiction between the strong top-down dynamics that shape this process and the bottom-up effects that it aims to promote.     

Farmers,peanuts, and aflatoxins in Uganda: A gendered approach

This article describes a collaborative research for development project that used participatory methods to engage smallholder farmers in Uganda in post-harvest aflatoxin management. It is based primarily on qualitative research with peanut growers tracing ‘the path of the peanut’ through their hand-drawn maps and journal writing. By focusing on everyday life and including recipes and drawings, this research encouraged women's participation and emphasised women's roles. A unique partnership among universities, women's organisations, and farmers created an environment of mutual learning and produced a book documenting food preparation and other post-harvest practices as part of a study and capacity-building effort on peanuts and aflatoxins.     

Regionalisation, inter-regional cooperation and global governance

The contradiction between trans-boundary issues largely driven by globalisation and conventional authority based on sovereign state leads to the problem of global governance. Regionalisation emerges as a process in which nation states within geographic proximity take collective measures to cope with problems of global governance. With the increasing tendencies of regional cooperation, a new issue thus arises as to the interaction among regions. In fact, the more regionalized the world, the more necessary, enabled and willing for regions to construct connections with each other. Inter-regionalism and trans-regionalism therefore become a further step which regional blocks take to build one layer in the hierarchy of global governance. The paper takes the Asia–Europe Meeting as the case to analyze the above thesis. In the first section, it presents the observation that the global system is characterized with regionalisation, then analyzes the coordination problems facing regions interdependent upon one another and then formulates a modified framework for analysis of the Asia–Europe Meeting. In the second section of rational design, it analyzes the process in which Europe and Asia rationally establish the cooperation structure of ASEM as a means to tackle the coordination issues between the two regions. In the third section of governing globalisation, it discusses the effects and implications of ASEM’s contribution towards global governance mainly in ways of rationalizing international relations and strengthening regional identity in the era of globalisation.

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Impact of microcredit on income,poverty, and economic vulnerability in Peninsular Malaysia

This article examines the effect of Amanah Ikhtiar Malaysia's (AIM) microcredit programme on low-income households' income, poverty rate, and vulnerability in Peninsular Malaysia. This study employed a quasi-experimental approach, cross-sectional design, and stratified random sampling method. Findings indicated that participation in AIM's microcredit programme leads to an increase in household income and reduces both the poverty rate and level of economic vulnerability. AIM and policymakers, therefore, should focus on promoting a supportive environment to improve cooperation among participants by designing a dynamic and well-diversified microfinance programme and specialised skills-building training programme.     

Improving citizen participation in local government in Latin America through international cooperation: a case study

Issues related to democratic restructuring and citizenship at the municipal level in Latin America have been the subject of increasing interest and debate among scholars and development practitioners in recent years. This study investigates how international cooperation may facilitate enhanced citizen participation in local‐level decision making in the region by examining a specific Canadian‐sponsored linking project involving the cities of Charlesbourg, Quebec (Canada) and Ovalle (Chile). The study presents a relatively optimistic account of the role that innovations transferred as a result of this project have played in enhancing citizen involvement in local government. At the same time, it suggests that any such gains may be limited and must be viewed within the larger politico‐administrative context in Latin America and attendant factors restricting the establishment of a broad democratic culture at the local level.     

Environment,advocacy, and community participation: MOPAWI in Honduras

This paper analyzes the work of Mosquitia Pawisa (MOPAWI) in relation to the development of its strategic linkages among the grassroots, the state, and ultimately the international level of politics in practice. Over the years, MOPAWI has developed a large and complex program addressing many aspects of development in La Mosquitia. Working strategically at two levels, MOPAWI has endeavored to change government policy for the region through continued lobbying and advocacy. It has also worked alongside with local communities to find ways of improving livelihoods without harming the environment. The key strength of the MOPAWI work has been the high level of community participation and mobilization by managing their own development in a time of profound change. Overall, the experience of MOPAWI suggests that nongovernmental organizations can play a strategic role in obtaining environmental protection, government recognition of ethnic diversity, and rights for indigenous people.