Some of the problems experienced with regard to community participation in the
Community Based Public Works Program in its first phase(from 1994to 1997) included:
participatory processes were determined externally; there was uncertainty of roles and
responsibilities; there was lack of clarity on the decision-making process which caused
conflict. there were constraints in terms of sufficient resources, capacity and information;
there was a lack of clear definition of rights and processes to address concerns raised in
the participation process; unequal power relationships effected the negotiation process;
and there was a lack of ongoing participatory monitoring and evaluation. Participation
also had significant costs which went beyond financial in terms of time and the costs of
changing attitudes and traditional ways of working.
These were some of the conclusions of this dissertation which is a critical analysis of the
nature and extent of the community participation process in public works programmes in
South Africa. The Community Based Public Works Program (CBPWP) a post apartheid.
government-funded programme that targeted "the poorest of the poor" and used labour intensive construction
methods and community labour in the building of infrastructure
was used as a case study to conduct this critical analysis. The aims of the CBPWP were
to address infrastructure shortages, create jobs, provide training and build the capacity of
communities to contribute to the development process.
This dissertation includes a review of literature and theory of community participation,
which finds that: participation needs to be considered in the context of its relationship
with the internal development process; successful participation depends so much on the
adequate provision of information, access to resources and understanding of local level
dynamics; and that participation can be both a means (to improve project performance)
and an end (to empower communities to participate in their own development); that it is
not without costs and that the nature and type of community participation varies from
purely information sharing, through consultation, decision-making and the initiation of
action.
This report also includes a background to public works programmes and their context
internationally and locally. Public works programmes are multi-purpose and range from
strategic, long-term economic interventions to emergency relief programmes. They are
essentially instruments through which public spending can be directed towards the poor
and range from community-based, labour-intensive infrastructure building programmes
to programmes to address natural resource management goals. In post-apartheid context
of South Africa in the 1990s they are intrinsically tied to transformation and
reconstruction and incorporate objectives ofthe empowerment ofcommunities in the
development process and the transformation of development institutions and top-down
development processes. Many of these programmes in South Africa including the
CBPWP recognise community participation in particular as an essential component of
meeting their objectives.
This dissertation builds a profile of community level stakeholders in the CBPWP and
examines how these stakeholders interact with the CBPWP at each stage ofa typical
project. Data from two broad evaluations ofthe CBPWP (conducted by (i) CASE and the
ILO and (ii) by SALDRU and described in Chapter 5 of this report) is interrogated to do
this. Research findings are then analysed (according to key research questions outlined in
Section 1.5) and summarised in terms of: how communities participate in the CBPWP;
what their incentives for participation are; whether they are provided with sufficient
information and resources to participate effectively; who takes responsibility for ongoing
community participation; a cost benefit analysis of participation for the various
stakeholders; how participation should be measured and, finally, identifies important
issues which need to be considered in the design, implementation and monitoring of
community participation processes in development programmes. / Thesis (M.Env.Dev.)-University of Natal, Pietermaritzburg, 2000.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:netd.ac.za/oai:union.ndltd.org:ukzn/oai:http://researchspace.ukzn.ac.za:10413/4935 |
| Date | January 2000 |
| Creators | Morrison, Belinda Jean. |
| Contributors | Marcus, Tessa. |
| Source Sets | South African National ETD Portal |
| Detected Language | English |
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