Decentralisation In Uganda

Decentralization - an essential pillar of institutional reform - is of critical importance in developing countries, particularly in regard to democratization, effective development, and good governance. Uganda, since 1986 and the start of decentralization measures under Yoweri Museveni and the National Resistance Movement, has represented one of the most serious commitments in Sub-Saharan Africa. With the benefit of extensive fieldwork, Fumihiko Saito demonstrates how conflict resolution, information dissemination, and encouragement of the many and varied stakeholders to form partnerships are critical to successfully bringing services "closer to the people. Decentralization and Development Partnerships: Lessons from Uganda goes beyond theory to compare academic assumptions to the reality of decentralization implementation in modern Uganda. Although the process is by no means free of difficulties, Saito concludes that a "win-win" outcome is a real possibility.

Uganda?s decentralization policy is one of the most ambitious and radical in sub-Saharan Africa. A long tradition of local government already existed in Uganda in 1986 when the National Resistance Movement came to power, so when the Presidential Policy Statement on decentralization was issued in 1992, it only formalized and articulated the Ugandan government?s commitment to the decentralized system of governance. This commitment was subsequently strengthened and maintained through the provisions of the 1995 Uganda Constitution. Decentralisation led to the devolution of broad powers of administration and implementation to the districts, leaving the centre with responsibility for matters of defence, and law and order. This book examines the decentralization project after it has been in place for a number of years and deals with relevant crucial issues. Delius Asiimwe is a Senior Research Fellow at the Makerere Institute of Social Research, Uganda. Nakanyike B. Musisi is the Executive Director of the Makerere Institute of Social Research, Uganda.

Why do some African local governments perform well, while others fail to deliver even the most basic services to their constituents? Gina Lambright finds answers to this question in her investigation of the factors that contribute to good and those that result in ineffective institutional performance at the district level in Uganda. Examining the conditions under which local populations are able to shape the performance of their local governments, she adeptly combines quantitative analysis across 56 Ugandan district governments with in-depth case studies of Lira, Mpigi, and Bushenyi.

This handbook sets out the relevant legislation, and explains the rationale behind the policy. It presents the legal framework of the local government system, and discusses the pertaining acts of parliament. The areas covered are: the legal framework for local government; the local governments act, 1997; good governance indicators; financial management; intergovernmental fiscal relationships; accountability; human resource management; and procurement at local government level.

Over the past three decades the developing world has seen increasing devolution of political and economic power to local governments. Decentralization is considered an important element of participatory democracy and, along with privatization and deregulation, represents a substantial reduction in the authority of national governments over economic policy. The contributors to Decentralization and Local Governance in Developing Countries examine this institutional transformation from comparative and interdisciplinary perspectives, offering detailed case studies of decentralization in eight countries: Bolivia, Brazil, China, India, Indonesia, Pakistan, South Africa, and Uganda. Some of these countries witnessed an unprecedented "big bang" shift toward comprehensive political and economic decentralization: Bolivia in 1995 and Indonesia after the fall of Suharto in 1998. Brazil and India decentralized in an uneven and more gradual manner. In some other countries (such as Pakistan), devolution represented an instrument for consolidation of power of a nondemocratic national government. In China, local governments were granted much economic but little political power. South Africa made the transition from the undemocratic decentralization of apartheid to decentralization under a democratic constitution. The studies provide a comparative perspective on the political and economic context within which decentralization took place, and how this shaped its design and possible impact. Contributors Omar Azfar, Gianpaolo Baiocchi, Pranab Bardhan, Shubham Chaudhuri, Ali Cheema, Jean-Paul Faguet, Bert Hofman, Kai Kaiser, Philip E. Keefer, Asim Ijaz Khwaja, Justin Yifu Lin, Mingxing Liu, Jeffrey Livingston, Patrick Meagher, Dilip Mookherjee, Ambar Narayan, Adnan Qadir, Ran Tao, Tara Vishwanath, Martin Wittenberg