[URBANTH-L]Re: AAA 2005 Annual Meeting
David W. Haines
dhaines1 at gmu.edu
Mon Jan 17 16:47:00 EST 2005
Note to: SUNTA members
From: David Haines, program chair
Re: AAA 2005 annual meeting
The following information comes from
Geoffrey Nwaka, who is interested in finding a
relevant panel for his paper. Information and abstract
follow below. You should respond to him directly
if this seems relevant to your own interests.
****************************************************
Geoffrey I. NWAKA
Professor of History
Abia State University
PMB 2000 UTURU, Nigeria
geoffreynwaka at yahoo.com
Paper title
"Using Indigenous Knowledge to Strengthen
Local Governance in Nigeria"
Abstract (Long)
Many advocates of indigenous knowledge now claim that it is "the single
largest knowledge resource not yet mobilized in the development
enterprise". Recent titles like "Tradition as a Modern Strategy", "Modern
Dilemmas and Traditional Insights", "The Indigenisation of Modernity", and
so on reflect the growing prominence accorded culture and tradition in
current development thinking and research. For a long time, African
customs and traditions were misperceived as irrational and incompatible
with the conventional strategies for economic development, or at any rate
as ineffective in coping with present day needs and challenges. But with
the economic crisis of the 1980s and '90s, and the policy failures
associated with the formal government system, there has been increasing
loss of faith in the Western, 'external agency' model of development
imposed from the top by national governments and international development
agencies. The undue emphasis which this pattern of development places on
purely economic and quantitative growth is now blamed for the worsening
problems of environmental degradation, widespread poverty, inequality, and
the undermining of those values and institutions which hold these negative
forces in check.
The problems of poverty, neglect and exclusion are most pronounced at the
local community level, in the villages and urban slums, where these
communities ought to be encouraged to participate in, and bring their own
agendas to bear on governance and development. This paper considers how
indigenous knowledge and practice can be put to good use in support of
local government and public administration in Nigeria, especially in some
of those spheres of activity in which local governments have exclusive or
concurrent constitutional responsibility:- in agriculture and health care,
environmental protection and sanitation, land and natural resource
management, basic education and rural finance, law reform and conflict
resolution, poverty reduction and the provision of essential services. How
can development programmes in these areas be made to reflect local
priorities, and to build upon, and strengthen local knowledge,
organisation, and capacity?
The renewed interest in indigenous knowledge and institutions is in line
with the current advocacy of the minimalist state and the 'enabling
approach' as condition for good governance in a period of structural
adjustment and public sector reform. Governments are urged by donor
agencies, and are in fact obliged to reduce their role to what their
dwindling resources and capacities permit; to decentralise the structure of
governance, promote genuine partnership, and enlist the broad participation
of non-state actors and stakeholders, including traditional institutions
and other civil society/community based organizations. This trend has been
reinforced by the UNESCO sponsored 'World Decade for Cultural Development'
(1988 - 1997), the Earth Summit in Rio on Environment and Development
(1992), and other scholarly debates which have stressed the cultural
dimension of development, and the need to take local knowledge and practice
fully into account in the development process.
The paper questions the uniform, single-tier structure of local government
introduced in Nigeria in 1976 for both the rural and urban areas. This
arrangement, now under critical review, overlooks the country's cultural
pluralism and diverse local practices. We shall revisit the Dasuki and
Political Bureau Reports of the late 1980s which tried to address these
concerns, and also highlight the provisions of the laws establishing DFRRI
and MAMSER which sought to create the framework for reconciling indigenous
institutions with the formal state machinery. These programmes were meant
to link Town Unions and other informal sector groups structurally to the
formal government institutions as agencies for community development. The
paper considers the pattern of local governments that would make governance
less distant from the people, less bureaucratic, more accountable and more
responsive to local needs; how the village or community to which most
citizens hold moral allegiance could constitute the primary unit of a
multi-tier local government system, as was attempted in the immediate post
civil war period in parts of the former Eastern Region; how certain
positive traditional attributes and values can be harnessed to bolster the
moral tenor and performance of government and public sector management; how
to adapt modern ideas and techniques of governance and development to
local condition and organization, and also adjust indigenous institutions
appropriately to come to terms with contemporary realities.
In Nigerian towns and cities, the distinction between indigenes and
strangers is still strong, and is even recognised by the Constitution. The
study will consider how to classify the urban centers, and design an
appropriate form of municipal government for the various categories of
large, medium and small towns; how to enlist traditionally based
institutions and the associational life in urban neighbourhoods and the
informal sector in the effort to ameliorate the adverse impact of rapid
urban growth, especially in the critical areas of housing, environmental
health, infrastructure provision, and services delivery. We shall, for
instance, consider the value of local building materials, informal land
transactions, the appropriate laws, codes and standards that are compatible
with local conditions and flexible enough to accommodate the urban poor and
disadvantaged groups. There are already hopeful pointers in this
direction: e.g. how the principles of traditional rotational credit system,
and the traditional apprenticeship practices have been deployed in the
establishment of Community and People's Banks, and in the programmes of the
National Directorate for Employment. A few lessons on decentralization and
local government reforms from the recent experiences of other developing
countries like South Africa and Ghana, India and Brazil etc. will be
discussed briefly for comparative insights.
The paper concludes with some general reflections on the indigenous
knowledge movement as an appropriate local response to globalization and
Western knowledge imperialism, and as a means to promote inter-cultural
dialogue, and reaffirm Africa's historic contribution to the larger body of
international knowledge. We shall also consider the implications of the
indigenous knowledge agenda for applied research, and for development
policy makers and practitioners.
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