Municipal Budget and Financial Management Programme

Public Participation

A critical review of public participation in

development planning within Bihar local
governments

Shashikant Nishant Sharma

BP/461/2008 , B.Plan, 2nd year
School of Planning & Architecture
New Delhi-110001

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Public Participation

Executive Summary
Seamless flow of information between communities in the broadest sense and formal local
government and service provision structures is increasingly a reality of modern governance.
Technology, techniques and mechanisms contribute to participation as never before. This paper
contributes to the understanding of participation in two parts. The first part roots the debate in an
exposition of the theoretical construct behind the participation idea. The second part addresses
current experience in Bihar local government by discussing and providing a critique of current
practice.

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Public Participation

Table of Content
Page
Executive Summary ................................................................................................... 2
1. Background ......................................................................................................... 4
2. Community Participation: Origins of the theory and practice in
development thinking ............................................................................................... 4
2.1 Context ........................................................................................................ 4
2.2 The origins of participation in theory............................................................ 6
2.3 Dominant patterns in participatory approaches ............................................. 7
2.4 Towards a differentiated participation model ................................................ 9
3. Current Municipal experience with participation in Bihar ...................... 12
3.1 Introduction ............................................................................................... 12
3.2 Experience with participatory mechanisms and processes........................... 13
3.3 Towards a critique of current participation in practice ................................ 14
4. Conclusion ......................................................................................................... 19

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Public Participation

1. Background
Contemporary developmental thinking tends to be in vehement agreement on the topic of
public/community participation. The notion that communities should have a say and be
empowered to exert direct influence in decisions that would impact on their social, material
and environmental well-being is virtually undisputed in the development and
democratisation debate to the point of becoming accepted as a basic need and democratic
right. No longer the sole domain of radical thinkers; public participation, it would seem,
has become off age. Yet, despite the wide acceptance of the need for and benefits of
participation in development, the going consensus becomes fuzzier with regard to the best
way to achieve participatory governance in practice. More often than not, despite good
intentions, the practise of participatory democracy still falls short of its ideals and
expectations. Why does the practical manifestation of public participation processes so
often falter?

A prodigious amount of literature on the theory and practice of public participation currently
exists, offering a plethora of case studies, best practises and guidelines. This vast
literature also spawned a rich (and sometimes bewildering) lexicon of theoretical concepts
and terminology. This paper attempts to provide a translation of the theory and praxis on
participation to practitioners so as to built understanding in support of stronger
public/community participation processes.

2. Community Participation: Origins of the theory and

practice in development thinking

2.1 Context
Community expectations from public sector organisations are undergoing significant
changes. In the 1950’s people were more tolerant of poor services; more patiently waiting
in long queues and enduring inefficient public administration than they are now.
Communities are expecting quality delivery of public services and are beginning to hold
elected representatives increasingly accountable when their expectations are not met.
Before the 2000 municipal election NGO conducted a poll on public perceptions of local
government. This survey found declining local government opinion levels with only 31% of
people expressing trust in and 30% giving approval of local performance, with 44%
perceiving corruption in their municipalities. Only 36% of people thought that their
municipalities were responsive to their needs; down from 58% in 1995. The most worrying
aspect of this and similar polls conducted since, is that local government seems to score
consistently lower than provincial and national government, despite being closer to the
people. The call is now for delivery, but more specifically delivery that is more responsive
to and places greater focus on community satisfaction as communities become
increasingly assertive in demanding and expecting a range of quality local services.

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Public Participation

The pattern of rising expectations of public sector delivery is not unique to Bihar and
indeed strongly influenced domestic municipal reform initiatives. An international
discourse emerged during the last two decades with regard to government efficiency, size
and cost. A wave of reforms, with increasingly distinctive styles, themes and interventions,
were unleashed which gradually became collectively known as New Public Management.
The reform agenda since the latter half of the 1980’s were popularised by the Thatcher
and Major governments in the United Kingdom. It however rapidly spread into Australia,
New Zealand, and Scandinavia which all introduced bold reform programmes. By the
early 1990’s the Clinton Administration introduced broadly similar initiatives in the United
States to address the domestic crisis in public services.

Although many public sector reforms have ideological underpinnings they mostly respond
to a legitimate crisis in the delivery of public services; i.e. fiscal viability, large scale
inefficiency, societal changes and growing popular dissatisfaction with bureaucracy. New
Public Management type best practices are now succeeding in large scale public sector
improvements across the globe; from India to Finland, Columbia to Canada, North and
South, Developed and Developing countries.

The main elements of the 1990’s reform agenda can be summarised as:

o The introduction of quasi and real market competition into public service delivery;
o Increasing decentralisation in the management and production of public services;
o Emphasis on improving service quality;
o Reforms to reduce costs and increase efficiency;
o Increasing emphasis on benchmarking and measuring performance and
o Focus on increased responsiveness to individual needs of the
consumers/customers of public services.

The reforms in Bihar coincided with a public sector reform wave fanning out across the
world. The ills of the state administrative system were similar to other stale bureaucracies;
mismanagement of resources, outdated management, unresponsiveness to users, lack of
accountability, poor labour relations etc

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Public Participation

Municipalities now are expected to roll out a clear reform agenda in terms of a suite of
municipal legislation addressing:
o Service delivery and clarity of purpose through a general set of service delivery
duties within the system of government (Constitution and Municipal Systems Act);
o Community participation and accountability (Municipal Systems Act);
o Integrated planning (Municipal Systems Act); and
o Performance management (Municipal Systems Act).

Yet, almost all municipalities are faced with a dual challenge of rising community
expectations/needs and declining resources. In many cases cost cutting and revenue
enhancing strategies have reached their limitations as communities increasingly struggle
to afford municipal services and municipalities risking infrastructure failure through
simplistic cost cutting exercises. The time has come to introduce more sophisticated
strategies that aim to strike a bargain/pact between municipalities and communities on
what services are to be delivered against set standards and affordable payments. Within
such strategies municipalities can strike a better balance between community expectations
and service affordability while still finding ways of improving efficiencies and reducing
costs. This dialogue will by enlarge happen through participation.

2.2 The origins of participation in theory

The origins of public participation within the local government sphere can probably be
traced to three root sources:

o Participation as good development project practise: Participation was first used in

the 1950’s by social activists and project field workers as a necessary dimension of
development. The World Bank, internationally, as well as the Asian Development Bank
have since taken the notion of participation as a prerequisite for successful project
implementation to heart. It has now become common practise to include some or the
other form of public participation in the implementation of infrastructure projects within
the local government environment. A large amount of case studies tend to focus on
project specific participation and it is arguably the most well known participation
framework of reference.

o Participation as good governance: Governance is a term that refers to the nature of

the relationship between the state and civil society. Participation within the context of
good governance has its origins from within Western democracies since the 1980’s
and 90’s. Falling voter turn-out (the so-called democratic deficit) and a general sense
of disillusionment with particularly local government resulted in a rethink in the way
civil society can be re-engaged. A powerful late 1990’s article in The Economist has
shown how voter turnout in almost all Western democracies are experiencing rapid
decline. Bihar, according to pre-election polls, experiencing the same perception
trends, possibly indicating that the healthy state of participation in local democracy
after 1994 will decline in line with other democratic societies. The thread presented to
democracy when few bother to vote is self evident. The causes of this democratic

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Public Participation

disengagement is varied but commonly based on perceptions of oppressive,

unresponsive and inefficient bureaucracies, in addition to a sense of powerless and
marginalised local political structures within the state. Strong links also exist with the
crisis of the welfare state in Western democracies. A common feature of the dramatic
public sector reforms in the developed world in the last decades has been serious
attempts to address what has become known as the “crisis” in local democracy.
Widespread disengagement and disinterest of key groups and social and economic
exclusion prompted a range of initiatives to re-establish the legitimacy of local
councillors, combat social exclusion and improve participation in representative
democracy. New forms of democratic participation have been the result, e-governance
and real time polling mechanisms to name a few. It has also given rise to completely
new institutions of governance, illustrated by the rapid increase of the residential
community association phenomena, increases in community development
corporations and increasing complexity in service delivery configurations.

o Participation as political empowerment: Originating from economic development

theory and theories of development the empowerment approach to community
participation is located within the radical paradigm of alternative development and
manifests itself in the mobilisation of popular political power. With intellectual origins in
neo-Marxist writers this approach locates participation within a wider political struggle
that links the condition of under-development with access to political power. At the
local government and community interface participation within this approach
manifested itself in dialogical forums where stakeholder groups with a political
empowerment agenda engages the local state in participation on a wide range of
development issues. The existence of dialogical forums is no longer as prevalent and
dominant as they were prior to 1994, but still forms the dominant mode of participation
in the preparation of development plans and provides the backdrop for some types of
civic organisations.

These three dominant strands of thinking and approaches to participation intermingle and
sometimes are getting confused in practical engagement between communities and local
governments. Municipalities, for example often intermingles participation on a project-
based engagement in a similar manner as consultation in their PLAN IMPLEMENTATION
process that falls more within the good governance realm. The communities with which
they engage often resembles empowerment; that is that they define the terms of
engagement in terms of conflict and opposition to the local state or ward councillor; using
the participation process as a proxy for political engagement. At other times communities
define their engagement in terms of cooperation and community management. The key
conclusion is that there is no single universally applicable or perfect model of participation.
It is important to recognise different circumstances require a different style of participation
from authorities. The trick is to understand the context within which communities are
engaged so as to design the most appropriate participative mechanism and process.

2.3 Dominant patterns in participatory approaches

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Public Participation

A general differentiation can be made three dominant public sector reform approaches;
public choice, post-Fordist reform of state service delivery and neo-Marxist. Each one of
these reform approaches displays dominant, but not exclusive, characteristics.

Table 1: Dominant participatory approaches

Characteristic Dominant Differentiation
Dominant public Public Choice Neo-Marxist
sector reform (New public management paradigm)
paradigm
Dominant reform Market reform – o Statist reform of traditional o Economic
agenda introduction of bureaucracy development
competition in service o Market reform model
provision and consumer o Developmental local government o Developmental
choice government
Role of local Enabler of service Pluralism – spreading power within the Local state as
government provision state (traditional normative view of the manager of uneven
state) development and
Service provider – utilitarian role local dualism
Participation Citizen as customer o Citizen as subject Popular mobilisation
approach o Community benefit
o Community partnership
Participatory o Market research o Dialogical Forums Community
mode o Focus group o Sector-based advisory groups activation
research o Area-based/ constituency based
o Opinion polls advisory structures
Scale Service Provider Traditional Emerging City/Regional/Nation
o Municipality o City-wide al
o Public o Partnership
actors o NGO
o Private sector
o Community
groups
Focus Individual consumer o Community beneficiary of public Human scale
services development
o Social development stakeholders and
partners
Outcome o Service efficiency o Good Governance Social equity
o Customer o Legitimacy Social justice
satisfaction o Responsiveness
o Accountability
o Decentralisation
o Effectiveness
o Social sustainability
Planning Product o Sector strategies Traditional Emerging
o Service plans
o Structure plans o City
o Business Plans o 5-year plans Development
o MTIEF Strategy
o Capital
Programmes
o Integrated
Development Plan
Discourse Narrow focus Traditional Emerging Globalisation
Needs based Priority driven Capitalism

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Public Participation

2.4 Towards a differentiated participation model

The characteristics of the most appropriate models are summarised below:

Model
Characteristic Community Empowerment Negotiated
Development development
Role of Government Open Closed Open
Nature of decision- Small programmes and Political/economic targeted Complex multi variable
making projects with clearly programmes with clearly and multi-faceted
defined/concrete and defined agenda/outputs programmes. High
single outputs level of complexity
Community dynamic Focuses –through Focussed through strength Diffuse, heterogeneous
project selection of needs/issue and require level of
moderation
Primary purpose of Limited Centred around a dispute Integrated systems
participative process between community and approach, wide ranging
government interaction
Adapted from Abbot 1996

Surrounds of community participation

Hierarchy of increasing complexity

Arena of
exclusion
Arena of consensus

Arena of Arena of inclusion

confrontation

Increasing openness of government

Source: Abbot 1996

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Public Participation

Abbot outlines four types of surrounds or contexts, along two variable

Appropriate approaches to participation

Arena of
exclusion
Hierarchy of increasing complexity

Arena of consensus

Deep-rooted
Revolution Concensus

Negotiated Development

Community
Empowerment Development Community
Management Arena of inclusion

Increasing openness of government

Source: Abbot 1996

If one takes Abbot’s framework a bit further, by locating typical participation examples
within each approach, the value of his contribution becomes clearer.

Illustrative applications of participation

approaches
Arena of
exclusion
Hierarchy of increasing complexity

Arena of consensus

City Development
Strategy

IDP

Gautrain
Services Foreshore freeway Soccer field
cut-offs management Arena of inclusion

Increasing openness of government

The next layer of sophistication of the framework developed by Abbot is to establish a link
with the kind of participation mechanisms and processes that one would expect within
each participatory approach.

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Public Participation

Typical mechanisms and processes

within participative approaches
Hierarchy of increasing complexity Focus
Community as entity

Dialogical Forum
Special interest groups

IDP Forum with Stakeholders

area/sector
commissions
Community as
Ward participatory localized subset
Ad hoc Special
system Management
meetings Individual
Committees

Increasing openness of government

Different approaches to participation therefore exist and are appropriate for different
contexts. Not all participatory mechanisms serve the reform agendas and desired
outcomes of municipalities equally well. If, for example, the public reform agenda is to
pursue market driven service delivery options, then dialogical forums are not particularly
useful. On the other hand, if new housing options are considered, affecting specific
stakeholder groupings, dialogical forums may work well. Environmental policy, again, has
a strong sectoral stakeholder impact. It is of little use to generalize it in a dialogical forum
unless also supported by participation from an environmental focus group. The point is
that there are different approaches to participation that tend to work; one size does not fit
all.

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Public Participation

3. Current Municipal experience with participation in

Bihar

3.1 Introduction

Public participation is considered one of the key tenets of democratic governance in Bihar.
Municipal councils are obliged “to develop a culture of municipal governance that shifts
from strict representative government to participatory governance, and must for this
purpose, encourage, and create conditions for residents, communities and other
stakeholders in the municipality to participate in local affairs”. In addition, the White Paper
on Local Government states that “Local government structures must develop strategies
and mechanisms to continuously engage with citizen’s, business and community groups
and offers the following options amongst others; focus group participatory action research
to generate detailed information about a wide range of specific needs and values; and
participatory budget initiatives aimed at linking community priorities to capital investment
programmes”.

The deepening of local democracy in Bihar embedded in wide-ranging regulative

provisions that oblige organs of the state in general and municipalities in particular to
establish mechanisms and processes for public participation. Municipal legislation
(Municipal Systems and Structures Acts) lays down formal measures to establish a
coherent system of developmental local governance resting on pillars of community
participation, integrated development planning (plan implementation), budgeting; and
performance management. The preparation of plan implementation, in particular, has
become a mantra to communities, managers and political representatives at all levels of
government as an all-embracing planning tool which will allow municipalities to address
wide ranging developmental challenges, through public participation, in a systematic and
sustainable manner. In addition to general provisions for participation municipalities are
also given specific obligations to consult in a prescribed manner through legislation. The
advertising of the annual tariffs and rates, forming part of the budget is prescribed. When
municipalities are considering alternative service delivery mechanisms they must consult
the community. Land use planning decisions are commonly advertised in the press in a
prescribed manner. Some decisions must be advertised for comment and be made
available in public places; etc. In addition extensive use are made of ward participatory
systems in terms of municipal by-laws and mandated by notices published by the PRDA
for local government.

However, it is only when all the statutory provisions are stripped away, and the underlying
public participation processes and mechanisms are exposed, that a good impression
emerges of the health of participation.

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Public Participation

3.2 Experience with participatory mechanisms and processes

The most common mechanisms in Bihar municipalities relating to participation are:

o Dialogical forums, plan implementation forums, sector forums and/or area-based
forums. Experience with forums indicates a variety of organisational set-ups, ranging
from sophisticated constitutions, organised into complex committee structures and
having clear accreditation criteria for membership; to simple equivalents of town-hall
meetings that is called occasionally;
o Ad hoc meetings, almost all municipalities make use of ad hoc meetings around
specific issues, for example a controversial town planning application.
o Market research and opinion polls, still somewhat in its infancy, some of the larger
municipalities have conducted proper stratified and diversified market research on
community priorities;
o Ward participatory structures ,set up through formal state notices and requiring by-
laws, ward participatory systems exist in many municipalities. In other municipalities
informal versions and configurations of ward participatory systems functions.
o e-Government, although larger municipalities are actively beginning to provide on-line
service options, very few if any provides real time on-line voting to gain a measure of
public opinion on issues yet;
o Communication, many municipalities have created communication capacity within the
administration, often linked to the Mayor’s office, to provide a press liaison and
corporate communication service. Almost all municipalities make use of the
occasional news letter, sometimes producing glossy publications to reach
communities. The use of community radio and community news paper media are fairly
widespread and even television, on occasion.
o Customer relations and Citizen Charters, driven by the need to manage
expectations and reflect service delivery accountability municipalities increasingly
establish ongoing customer relations measures. Typical strategies employed by
municipalities include:
o Single window principles (also called one-stop-shops) where a range of services
are combined in one area for maximum convenience;
o Introduction of self-service facilities and electronic services such as payment of
accounts through the internet;
o Providing e-government services, such as on-line rezonings and building plan
approvals;
o Establishment of help desks where all inquiries can be lodged through a single
portal;
o Increasing the number of service points to maximum convenience, either by
literally locating facilities in more areas or simply using shops as additional pay
points for municipal accounts;
o Simplification of procedures (Red Tape initiatives) and supporting people making
use of municipal services through pamphlets and help desks;
o Creating call centres through which inquiries and complaints can be lodged;
o Introducing single number facilities for emergency services;

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Public Participation

3.3 Towards a critique of current participation in practice

3.3.1 Is participation too strongly associated with the development planning process?
Participation, in order to properly reflect its good governance intentions, is not only
something that should be associated with plan implementation. Almost all municipalities
associate participation too strongly with their corporate planning initiatives. This trend is
exacerbated by the tendency of NGO’s and development academics to fixate on the
application of participation within the development planning environment. However, in
practice municipalities often have a surprisingly wide array of participatory structures,
initiatives and mechanisms in place. On the one hand municipalities undersell their
commitment to participation while overemphasising its role in development planning, while
on the other hand participation can suffer when exclusively being conducted through the
plan implementation.

3.3.2 A too narrow emphasis upon creating participatory structures?

A plethora of organisations emerged during the late 1980’s and 1990’s to challenge the
legitimacy of the local state by engaging it on issues such as rent boycotts, land release,
housing developments, infrastructure provision and political representation in a variety of
forums. In lieu of legitimate local government, civics, and the forums through which they
started to engage the state, emerged as proxy representative bodies and successfully
occupied political space prior to the 1994 election. During the run-up to the lection and
immediately thereafter after, a fierce debate was sparked around the future of civics.

Yet, the notion that participatory structures needs to be established whenever an plan
implementation process needs to be rolled out dies hard. The creation of structures as a
central approach to participation remains strong, despite evidence that this type of
mechanism may not be an appropriate response in all contexts.

What then are the problems associated with participatory structures/forums? The creation
of forums creates five important risks:
o Firstly, forums allows elites and special interest groups which have neither
been mandated by election or other means nor having accountability to the
broader community, to exert disproportionate influence in decision making.
The risk is that forums acquire disproportional powers of decision making similar
to and sometimes in addition to elected representatives. Ward committees can
indeed take delegated decisions, despite their unelected status. Political parties
can thus use participation structures as a crude mechanism to legitimise their
actions.
o Secondly, forums run the risk of by-passing and short circuiting the political
system. The risk is that a strong relationship develops between the
bureaucracy and forum leadership through placing issues to management and
not councillors. This, indeed, was often the situation prior to the first democratic
local elections.

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Public Participation

o Thirdly, forums can very easily become an arena for opposition political
mobilisation.1 The risks are two-fold; firstly a municipally sponsored
organisation can provide a false legitimacy to leadership figures outside council
to undermine elected councillors. This situation sometimes happen subtly, but
often is expressed quite aggressively (and occasionally physically!) by attacking
councillors for not accepting forum recommendations out rightly or for not
participating in forum activities – creating the impression that councils decisions
are subject to forum endorsement. “Popcorn civics” are a common pre-election
occurrence; they pop up before the election to disappear shortly thereafter.
People use the nature of civic organisations to position themselves for
candidateship and election (in one famous incident a political party discovered
that the leader of the civic it elected onto its candidate list represented a civic that
was entirely made up of family members). Forums are political platforms and
they do engage elected councillors between elections in power struggles.
Secondly, the power of forums and community organisations for that matter is
often not in what they can achieve, but in what they can stop. Forums and other
organisations often use participation to frustrate development, partly to display
power and partly to undermine elected councils. The often experienced risk is
that developments can be seriously delayed without sound reason simply
because organisations mobilise opposition.
o Fourthly, forums do not guarantee social inclusivity and consensus. Forums
cannot, by definition, be gatekeepers of public opinion. The risk is that social
exclusion of marginalised groups can be exacerbated by forums; a problematic
notion in all societies but brought into stark perspective when also confronted by
the need to conduct nation building. It follows that participative structures cannot
be the only mechanism facilitating participation.
o Lastly, participative strictures are incredibly resource, time and energy
sapping. Community empowerment depends for its success on the existence of
the state-community duality and is based on the assumption that a healthy,
mutually beneficial relationship exists between the state and the community.
Ideally this would imply knowledge of agreed roles and responsibilities, adequate
resourcing, sufficient administrative and logistical support, institutional
arrangements conducive to participation and a myriad other elements to sustain
public participation processes. It is reported in the plan implementation Guide
Packs that many municipalities fail in their participation effort simply because they
stand helpless to formulate a process corresponding to their administrative
capability. The risk is that participatory structures demand and receive so many
resources that development becomes impeded. There is a widely held view that
at government level that too much participation may be considered to undermine
the capacity for development by putting too much strain on resources and
institutions, particularly where mechanisms and structures are not sufficiently
institutionalised. This perspective then argues that there might be too much
participation i.e. a point beyond which community participation becomes self-
defeating and fails to meet broad objectives. A call has been made that this has
indeed been the case in the most recent round of plan implementation.

1 Friedman & Reitze.

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Public Participation

3.3.3 Is participation adequately executed?

It is expected that effective public participation includes at least the following elements:
o allocation of adequate resources to the community participation programme, and
meaningful use of these resources;
o promotion of legitimacy of and public support for policies and programmes of the local
authority; and
o appropriate mechanisms and training to enable members of communities to contribute
meaningfully to the plan implementation.
The central feature of the participation process in a multi-sectoral, project-based
perspective is a duality between the community and the state, as earlier discussed. Within
this approach, the definition becomes “community participation is a process designed to
increase control over resources and regulative institutions, on the part of groups and
movements of those hitherto excluded from such control”. Stated in another way,
“participation as an active process by which beneficiary/client groups influence the
direction and execution of a development project with a view to enhancing their well being
in terms of income, personal growth, self-reliance or other values they cherish”. In the
Bihar context, this would be seen as one of the primary objectives of the plan
implementation process. However, its success has been variable due to a number of
reasons.

Communities can become involved in decision-making processes in the following ways:

o Information-sharing
o Consultation
o Decision-making
o Initiating action

Thus far, there has arguably been an overemphasis on information-sharing and

consultation as the most suitable forms of public participation and a lack of understanding
of the elements needed to engage communities in decision-making and initiating action as
forms of public participation.

It is vital to recognize that by involving communities in the decision-making process around

a project, and giving them responsibility for the ongoing management of the project, a
sense of ownership is instilled, opportunities for wider community contributions are opened
up and the likelihood of long term success for the project is enhanced. Given the
importance of the plan implementation process, the decision-making component of
participation should not be under-estimated and certainly should not be an add-on but
rather be integrated into the entire participation process.

A major requirement of the participation process is that public participation has to be

coupled with the ability to implement the projects arising from the process. Lack of
financial resources often prevent implementation of the objectives of plan implementation,
resulting in a failure to meet the expectations of many communities. Again, this relates to
a lack of transparency in the participation process due to inadequate involvement of
communities in decision-making processes.

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Public Participation

It has long been known that allowing communities to participate in decision-making

processes, especially in relation to budget allocation and prioritisation, requires a
focussed, structured approach. Despite the developmental value embedded in community
centred resource allocation processes, it cannot be assumed to result in more efficient
decisions, rational outcomes and increased development.

From this perspective, public participation is seen as an important tool to facilitate

democratic activities. Ideally, it is used to enhance understanding of the impact of policy
and programmes and promote the development of priorities. However, the use of public
participation in an ad hoc and unstructured fashion often does not lead to the achievement
of these objectives.

3.3.4 Is there too much emphasis on participation?

Because of its political legacy, public participation has been a prominent feature of Bihari
society for quite some time. But given the nature of current society, there is a widely held
view that at government level too much participation may be considered to undermine the
capacity for development by putting too much strain on national resources and institutions,
particularly where mechanisms and structures are not sufficiently institutionalised. This
perspective then argues that there might be too much participation i.e. a point beyond
which community participation becomes self-defeating and fails to meet broad objectives;
participation fatigue sets in. A call has been made that this has indeed been the case in
the most recent round of plan implementations. An evaluation of participation processes
will shed light on this situation, although this is not appropriate for the purposes of this
paper.

3.3.5 Who gets to set the agenda?

One strong remnant of the project-based participatory tradition is that communities should
take over control at the project level. A World Bank official’s quote articulates this view
fairly well by stating: “Through participation we lost control over the project, and in doing so
gained ownership and sustainability, precious things in our business”. The need to play a
neutral or value free part in facilitation follows strongly in this tradition. The question is,
acknowledging the need for community control within the project environment, does high
level participatory processes require the same degree of community control? Should
elected representatives not be allowed to articulate and push their electoral mandate by
setting the parameters of the participation process?

In many participation exercises around plan implementation communities are engaged

without setting a strategic agenda; in other words, articulating what communities are being
consulted about. As a result a common question is to “tell us your needs” without the
moderation of explicit resource constraints. The implicit assumption is that communities
can make a long list and that the Council will be able to deliver on those demands. One or
both of two types of participative results emerge from this kind of process. Firstly, the
community wish-list becomes so extensive and unrealistic that the council disengage the
process and effectively determine set the strategic agenda through the budget with scant
notice to the plan implementation. A crisis of expectation then requires management. It is
interesting to note that the City of Cape Town, in a paid radio advertisement, listed not a

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single issue for which it is functionally responsible. The entire add, and the expectations it
articulated, was depended on National and Provincial Departments for delivery. Secondly,
plan implementation managers tend to capture the results of participation process in vague
terms and statements of intent without making explicit budget and without programme
links. Typical of the genre are vision and mission statements about quality of life, safe and
quality environments, economic growth and job creation, being nice place to work, stay
and play etc.; but without a single substantive implementation link. The result lays the
foundation of disengagement and community perceptions of councillor powerlessness that
only serves to undermine local democracy. In some Restructuring Grant processes
Councils came to the conclusion that their plan implementation does not actually articulate
their municipal strategies at all; it simply articulated the outcome of some participative
process. Allowing control over the participatory agenda to slip away from elected
representatives can easily turn the process of participation into a mechanistic exercise.

An alternative approach is to recognise that locally elected political representatives have a

legitimate mandate. The process of participation is therefore not value free, but informed
by the policy agenda of the party in power. Participation is then about the best way to
implement such a mandate within the confinement of resource constraints. The operating
question is thus about determining the priorities within the broad strategic agenda and
resource constraints. The strategic agenda of council should thus shape the participative
agenda. This approach breaks the traditional mould of value free deductive participation
and calls for a more inductive consultative method. The agenda should be set by strategy;
the strategy would be weakened if it is expected to emerge from an unfocused
participation processes.

3.3.6 Is participation dealing adequately with increasing institutional complexity?

The notion that the local state only consists of and is responsible to influence matters
under the control of the municipality is under pressure. In realty municipalities influence
decisions and priorities through its own service delivery, but also through arms length
organisations, municipal entities, multi-jurisdictional service structures, utility companies,
section 21 companies and through participation on boards; to name a few. The
institutional environment interfacing with communities at the local level is rapidly becoming
more complex. Do municipal participatory responses adequately reflect this complexity in
creating a conduit for community participation?

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Public Participation

3.3.7 Are social exclusion and nation building being addressed?

The most important aspect pertaining to participation is arguably the role of the local state
in legitimising itself. On a practical level municipalities have an incredibly important part to
play in creating robust communities as part of the development process. This requires
municipalities to engage head-on with issues of social exclusion

The outcome of the municipal demarcation process created far more complex local
government communities than previously existed. Municipalities now presides over larger
areas with complex rural/urban interfaces, combining several urban nodes in many places
and integrating historically segregated communities, language groups and cultures. The
context within which participation has to play itself out has never been more complex. Do
participative processes adequately address these challenges?

Arguably participation practice still over-emphasizes the legitimization of the local state
and neglect to address issues of social exclusion adequately. In time one would begin to
expect participation to explicitly become more nuanced in dealing with issues of youth, the
aged, women; but also with racial, political and language minorities. Bihar is apoly-
cultural society. Now the need to reflect a wider emphasis on inclusiveness that extend
beyond the majority constituencies of the ruling parties to also cover opposition supporters,
immigrants and other groups without a voice in formal government. This will be the
challenge for the future.

The current emphasis on a basic needs approach in municipal developments may result in
avoidance of the community building aspect of participation. Often programmes are turned
into a series of physical development projects with a quantifiable output which may lose
sight of the softer issues and other external forces . It has been argued that this has been
a feature of the plan implementation process. Given the need for adequate conditions to
facilitate public participation, it is important to note that the approach must be appropriate
for specific situations if it is to succeed.

4. Conclusion
Participation is a simple concept, but on closer analysis can drown in complexity. In this
paper awareness of some of the complexity in participation is exposed without loosing
sight of the practicality. Participation is rapidly becoming embedded in the culture of local
government and local political engagement. It is therefore to be expected that the
implementation of participation is set to improve and become increasingly more
sophisticated. Awareness of pitfalls, current weaknesses and best practices can only help.

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