Includes bibliographical references (leaves 80-94). / Democratic decentralisation in South Africa was undertaken as part of post-apartheid restructuring. This signified a shift on local government's status from being a tier to being a sphere with its own and powers functions. The empowerment of local government is evident in five tested indicators, which are the areas that are empowered to lift local government's autonomy as stipulated in the constitution and in supporting legislations. These areas include legal, financial, functional, human resources and public participation. However, these areas are facing challenges which lead to scholars and government to view local government as inefficient and ineffective. As a result, central government is intervening in local government's affairs claiming to ensure the intended constitutional objectives.This dissertation examines the evidence of centralisation by testing five areas that are constitutionally empowered to ensure democratic decentralisation. In South Africa, these indicators are evident in empowering of local government based on the national legislations and supporting local government policies. However, the central government's interference has undermined these powers and function.

Includes abstract. / Includes bibliographical references. / This study explores whether social policy responses for orphans and vulnerable children(OVC) in Botswana address the needs of this category of children. The objectives of social policies and legislation (such as the Constitution, the Children's Act of 2009, the National Guidelines on the Care of OVC of 2008, and the Botswana National Plan of Action for OVC of 2010-2016) in relation to social protection are analysed, and the availability, accessibility and adequacy of the HIV and AIDS social protection measures for OVC, namely prevention of mother-to-child transmission, antiretroviral therapy, and community home-based care and orphan food baskets, are described. The study argues that these social policy responses for OVC are inadequate and do not comprehensively meet the needs of OVC. There is an inadequate legal and policy framework, fragmentation of social protection provisions, inadequate minimum eligibility criteria, shortage of human resources, insufficient funding, lack of awareness, and the presence of stigma and discrimination. These present barriers to the availability, accessibility and adequacy of social protection provision to OVC.

Includes abstract. / Includes bibliographical references. / This thesis examines the South African electricity policy-making regime asking the question "What is the nature of South Africa's electricity policy regime and how does it act as a barrier to reform and the introduction of sustainable energy sources into the South Africa's energy system from 1994 to 2011?" It hypothesizes that a policy regime that amounts to a coalition between energy intensive business, electricity utility Eskom and the Government that has developed in the post apartheid era out of what Fine and Rustomjee called the Minerals-Energy Complex. It hypothesizes that this regime uses its financial and political power and skills asymmetries to ensure policy is made in a supply paradigm, which prefers cheap source of electricity supply to meet growing demand over efficiency and sustainability in the energy system and that this is the major barrier to reform.

This study looked into performance information (PI) utilisation behaviour of senior officials in the City of Cape Town Metro Municipality (CoCT). Inspired by comments around performance information having minimal effects despite its prodigious production, the study sought to determine how performance information is used and how a local government context affects utilisation behaviour. This was assessed based on conceptual approaches identified in the literature i.e. rational, and symbolic approaches to performance information, the latter subsuming both political and cultural approaches to information use. Additionally, contingency theory was referred to in order to better accommodate the notion of context and to combine the various approaches to use into one framework. A survey was administered and semi–structured interviews held with key informants to better explore this phenomenon. Descriptive and correlation analysis was carried out, with findings showing that directors use PI in both rational and symbolic ways. Both types of performance information use were affected by a range of factors, the more predominant ones being resource, internal and external environmental variables. This corroborated various other findings that state that rational approaches to information use, indeed performance management, are insufficient in providing a holistic picture of what shapes bureaucratic behaviour.

This research critically analyses reforms undertaken in Zambia's water sector. Its main focus however, is on the corporatisation of Zambia's urban water services. The objective is to apply some selected indicators of water services improvement to establish whether the commercialisation of urban water services has improved water service delivery. The research uses qualitative and quantitative literature and generally relies on secondary data. Therefore, it is an exhaustive literature review of the available electronic and hard copy sources. Of particular relevance to the research are the National Water and Sanitation Council's (NWASCO) sector reports, which are comprehensive records of the performance of Zambia's Commercial Water Utilities (CUs).

Local economic development (LED) is progressively being implemented by developing countries and has shifted from being a development approach pursued only by industrialised nations. Academic interpretation of LED prioritises strategies based on ideas of grassroots and bottom-up development. These ideas are centred on the self-reliance of communities as well as on highlighting the benefits of creating partnerships with different actors for local development. This approach to development is encouraged in South Africa's post-apartheid local government system and is outlined in the sphere's constitutional philosophies of participatory democracy and developmental local government. As such, from the mid-1990's, LED has been embedded in legislation in South Africa, and local governments have been instructed to support LED projects and to assist in their implementation. The consensus is that the implementation of LED by South Africa's local governments has generally not been a success, and poor rural municipalities have been the most negatively impacted by these results. This dissertation looks at the evolution of LED implementation in the small rural town of Stutterheim. The first LED initiative in the town took place in the early 1990's in line with the national political transformation of South Africa from apartheid to democratic governance. This initiative has been heralded as one of the most successful cases of LED in the country. What is most noteworthy about the case is that it pre-dates the establishment of a formal post-1994 local government system and LED policy in South Africa. The LED initiative in the town has survived this formalisation but with significant revisions and reduction in its LED role in the town. This paper is primarily concerned with such revisions and the extent to which they have been a consequence of the relationship between the town's initial LED coordinator, the Stutterheim Development Foundation, and the new local government constitutionally mandated with LED. The paper further interrogates the implementation of LED in Stutterheim after 2000 and post-Stutterheim Development Foundation.

Rural development has been a part of South Africa's policy agenda since the country's transition to democracy, but it has enjoyed new prominence since the ANC's policy conference at Polokwane in 2007 (ANC, 2008). This renewed interest in rural development as a policy priority culminated in the establishment of the new Department of Rural Development and Land Reform and the adoption of its flagship strategy, the Comprehensive Rural Development Programme (CRDP), in 2009. Even in its earliest incarnations, rural development was classified as a crosscutting policy problem beyond the scope of a single South African government department, therefore requiring horizontal coordination across sectors like land reform and agriculture, as well as vertical coordination with provincial departments serving concurrent functions. On the vertical plane, local government is also considered to be vital not only in identifying the needs of communities, but in their contributions to integrated planning processes. This study aims to examine the policy coordination mechanisms of the CRDP, including the new lead department tasked with its implementation, since the crosscutting nature of the policy problem necessitates such a wide variety of stakeholders coming together and taking a coordinated approach. The dissertation will focus on the town of Riemvasmaak in the Northern Cape as a case study, following a site visit and a series of semi-structured interviews conducted with officials from different spheres of government involved in the implementation of the new programme. The findings suggest that, despite the benefits of having a new national department, political support and financial resources at its disposal, policy coordination in the CRDP is not functioning as it should. The line between rural development and agriculture's mandates are becoming blurred, risking duplication between the two departments, while the CRDP's own chosen mechanism at grassroots, the Council of Stakeholders, seems to be duplicating existing Integrated Development Planning (IDP) processes at local government level. The findings also suggest that none of the chosen mechanisms proved adequate for resolving or overcoming conflict and other complexities hampering coordination at community level.

Includes bibliographical references. / This study looks at service delivery in the context of failed states. The objective of this study is to investigate whether state failure in its provisioning capacity of basic services to its citizens has led to the proliferation of militia groups in Kenya. The study draws upon secondary sources of literature such as research reports, articles, journals, and academic documents, classifications of militia groups, population growth and government service provision in Kenya since independence, and the basic needs of the poor in the slums to retrieve relevant information on the dimensions of fragility. Reports on the analysis of census data since 1963-2009 are reviewed to investigate whether government services in Kenya have been improving or deteriorating. Further, two main militia groups in Kenya: the Mungiki and SLDF (Sabaot Land Defence Force) are analysed to determine their agenda and activities.

This study aims to provide an analysis of the factors which facilitate or impede the capacity of the portfolio committees of the South African National Assembly in the carrying out of the primary function of oversight. Parliamentary oversight presents itself as a key function of legislatures and further than this, serves as a primary indicator of the effectiveness of the legislature as a principle institution in the system of democratic governance. There has not been much contribution to the field of study of the committee system of the South African Parliament much less its institutional capacity. The dissertation conceptualised capacity as the "hard" physical resources available to the committees as well as the "soft" political environment in which the committee operates. The study made use of a number secondary documents relating to the work of committees along with data collected from interviews carried out with chairpersons and committee researchers. From an analysis of these variables in relation to a sample of committees, findings present a varied picture where capacity, in terms of both hard and soft variables, differ from one committee to the next. Overall committees differ from one to the next whether in terms of the scope of their oversight or their workload and this study found that capacity has to mirror these distinctions for effective oversight.

Includes bibliographical references / Caring is typically constructed as a feminized practice, resulting in women shouldering the burden of care-related work. Health-seeking behaviours are also constructed as feminine and men have poorer health outcomes globally. Employing men as carers may not only improve the health of the men they assist but also be transformative with regard to gendered constructions of caring. This dissertation adds to the small but growing literature on men in caring by focusing on men as community care workers (CCWs) and their male clients. Using semi-structured interviews and observational home visits, this study explores whether male CCWs have a unique role to play in addressing harmful health-related gender norms and in supporting HIV positive men's health-affirming behaviour. The empirical analysis draws on the perspectives of eight CCWs and three of their male clients from the Cape Town area. Being problem-driven in nature and situated within a 'gender transformative' agenda, it explores male client preferences for gender concordant care workers and the techniques that CCWs (with a focus on male CCWs) employ to support HIV positive men's health-affirming behaviour. CCWs navigate around hegemonic masculine norms that require men to act tough, suppress emotion and deny weakness and sickness by using techniques such as indirectly broaching sensitive subjects, acting friendly and being clear about the intention of their work. The interviews revealed that CCWs strove not to rupture hegemonic masculine norms while encouraging male clients to engage in health-affirming behaviour . This dissertation also explores male client preferences for gender concordant CCWs and the potential that these pairings have to support health and to be 'gender transformative'. Here 'gender transformative' refers to the creation of more gender equitable environments. The variety of intertwined factors that contribute to male client preferences for male CCWs include gendered power dynamics, comfort in sharing intimate health information and a fear of women gossiping. Drawing on current literature on men, caring and gender transformation to inform the analysis of participant perspectives and experiences, this study explores the barriers to encouraging men to seek health and also considers the challenges in recruiting an d retaining men as CCWs. Employing more male CCWs is a strategy that could improve male client's health outcomes and also contribute to the development of more gender equitable norms. Shifting such norms requires much more than simply hiring men. To contribute to gender transformation, male CCWs should ideally resonate emotionally with their work, possess gender equitable beliefs and ground these beliefs in practice.