http://repub.eur.nl/res/aut/22925/ List of Publications en http://repub.eur.nl/static-eur/img/logo.png http://repub.eur.nl http://repub.eur.nl/res/pub/32910/ 2012-07-16T00:00:00Z From 2006 plans were implemented to create a deep-sea water port linked to an Economic Zone in the coastal Province of Ha Tinh, located in north central Vietnam. The multi-purpose Zone entitled ‘Vung Ang’, was to attract foreign investors, while the port would provide a link to nearby Laos and Thailand. The project obviously had large implications for the administrations at various levels of governance from Hanoi to the coastal communes and villages, but even more serious impacts on the people living in the affected areas. A large area of about 23,000 hectares was to be cleared, affecting the people of 9 communes, in some of which all inhabitants had to leave their houses and homesteads, to be relocated to completely new settlements about 10 miles inland. These tightly knit communities were not too happy with the prospect to leave their homes and land, the burial places of their ancestors, and the long term comforts of community support networks. While initial decision making process started at the highest levels of Vietnam Governance, the implementation of port and industrial park construction and the related relocation policy was delegated to Ha Tinh province, which is consistent with current decentralisation policies in Vietnam. Actual implementation was carried out by the affected District and Commune level officials – with support from the Communist Party led Mass Organisations – who were in charge of the planning and implementation of the relocation process. This entailed a complex and sensitive series of steps to inform affected households, prepare relocation areas and allocate compensation and alternative housing. This paper describes the implementation dynamics of relocation by depicting and assessing the roles of all stakeholders involved, including the impacts - for better or for worse – of the relocated households. It brings out the way local authorities dealt with affected people, including efforts linked to the ideal of grass-roots democracy. Key areas of contestation are uncovered, such as inadequate infrastructure and low compensation rates. The paper has a second objective to assess the degree to which decentralisation in Vietnam has been actually implemented, and how this affects policy making processes such as the Vung Ang port/industrial zone project. The paper concludes that the relocation policy was implemented in a fairly efficient and harmonious way – with a very intensive engagement of the entire provincial administrative machinery, but that it is too early to assess the livelihood opportunities of the relocated households. http://repub.eur.nl/res/pub/32700/ 2010-01-01T00:00:00Z http://repub.eur.nl/res/pub/32734/ 2010-01-01T00:00:00Z http://repub.eur.nl/res/pub/32735/ 2009-01-01T00:00:00Z Abstract: Efforts aimed at urban poverty reduction and service delivery improvement depend critically on slum dwellers’ collective agency. Adding to a long history of community participation approaches, there is a now growing incidence of so-called ‘partnerships’ between municipal agencies, non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and slum organizations. Such approaches require a fair representation of a majority of the poor by local community-based organizations (CBOs), the potential and interest of both poor men and women to organize pro-actively in collective action, and a CBO leadership that works for the common good. This article puts some key assumptions underlying grassroots-based strategies under scrutiny. That relations amongst the urban poor are unequal and that they are divided in terms of income, gender and ethnicity has been well documented, but there has been less attention for the fact that the poor, facing conditions of scarcity and competition, rely on vertical relations of patronage and brokerage which may hinder or prevent horizontal mobilization. Rather than being vehicles of empowerment and change, CBOs and their leadership often block progress, controlling or capturing benefits aimed at the poor and misusing them for private (political) interests. Presenting evidence from community-based projects in the slums of three large Indian cities, the article argues that municipal agencies, donors and NGOs cannot easily escape the logic of patronage and often themselves become part of a system of vertical dependency relations. http://repub.eur.nl/res/pub/18729/ 2008-12-01T00:00:00Z The concept and practices of accountability enjoy considerable interest today, not least due to the World Development Report WDR 2004 on service delivery, which formulated the ëtriangle of accountabilityí - specifying relations between the poor, service providers, policy makers and politicians. This paper  explores accountability starting from realities faced by the poor across countries and diverse institutional contexts. It is postulated that, even while the WDR does acknowledge the importance of clientelism and the risk of politicisation of policy, there is insufficient recognition ñ especially for the poor and women, but not limited to them- of the power dimensions of accountability, institutionalised inequalities and low claim making powers, access problems and the importance of bribes to get things done. Such issues undermine accountability mechanisms in what may be called ëmoderní or formal institutional settings. The question arises as to whether there are well performing accountability mechanisms in more traditional/ëindigenousí or informal institutions and settings, where people may (still) rely on or build on well established and culturally rooted accountability practices. This paper is an initial exploration and analysis of accountability mechanisms in a sample of 22 ëmoderní, ëindigenous/traditionalí or ëmixedí institutions - and attempts to identify patterns of mechanisms that seem to be effective, and to assess conditions that may be conducive to effective accountability arrangements. http://repub.eur.nl/res/pub/32795/ 2007-01-01T00:00:00Z Introduction: In the context of the VASS-ISS project research has been carried out that is relevant for the project‟s core concern of capacity building for local governance and that is to feed into the training workshops provided under the project. The present document is a report on research carried out into the broader context of local governance in Vietnam. It focuses on the efforts under way to decentralise tasks and funds from the national Government in Hanoi to provincial and lower level governments - initiated by the state -, as well as the corresponding – and more people focused - trends to allow more scope for people‟s participation in planning and implementing local level policy. ... http://repub.eur.nl/res/pub/19145/ 2003-12-01T00:00:00Z http://repub.eur.nl/res/pub/19069/ 2000-10-01T00:00:00Z http://repub.eur.nl/res/pub/32241/ 2000-01-01T00:00:00Z The present report contains the findings of a review study of the BUPP programme in the context of the SINPA programme. This study aims to be relevant in a practical, operational sense, first for the Bangladesh city of Tangail, then for other cities in Bangladesh which want to set up Urban Platforms, and also for the other SINPA countries Zambia and Bolivia. It aimed to collect concrete and applicable suggestions and recommendations leading from the experiences of stakeholders involved in the BUPP programme (see an abstract of the study’s Terms of Reference in annex II). http://repub.eur.nl/res/pub/19011/ 1997-12-01T00:00:00Z http://repub.eur.nl/res/pub/32796/ 1990-01-01T00:00:00Z Introduction The title of a concluding chapter of the proceedings of a seminar on people's participation in housing the poor, "Participation is difficult but necessary" (Anzorena, 1980), is an adequate reflection of the prevalent view on community participation in low-income housing policy and projects. Generally speaking, acknowledgement made of the practical problems involved in the practice of participation is accompanied by optimism or sincere belief in its potential. In most of the relevant literature, it seems as though there are only practical (and solvable) problems to tackle. Case studies in which governments and communities (qften with the assistance of non-governmental organisations) have wholly or partly solved critical obstacles to community participation dominate the empirical documentation.