Participation and partnership in urban infrastructure management

The paper defines participation as a form of partnership between government and service user communities which may be promoted in the context of programmes for improving service management capacity. Participation in infrastructure service management includes goal and policy formulation, planning, programming and monitoring, as well as implementation, operations and maintenance. The paper emphasizes the mobilisation of additional community resources and increased effectiveness in the use of available resources. It highlights the issue of empowerment and the role of partners in participatory infrastructure management which include: (1) community-based organisations (CBOs), their leaders and, in particular, women as service consumers, infrastructure producers, and managers of community affairs; (2) Non-Governmental Organisations (NGOs) as mediators; (3) private sector actors, e.g., informal workers and small scale enterprises such as waste collectors and scavengers; and (4) local government authorities who are primarily responsible for the provision of infrastructure and other urban services. The paper describes the basis and objectives, characteristics and main elements of the four major strategic approaches for participation which are: (1) community-based support strategies; (2) area-based involvement strategies; (3) functionally-based collaboration strategies; and (4) process- based decentralisation strategies. It also highlights the strengths and weaknesses of each approach. It contains case studies which demonstrate various participatory infrastructure development experiences in 16 developing countries in Africa, Asia and Latin America. Three annexes list objectives and issues, define urban infrastructure services, and show a diagram of urban infrastructure systems.