IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/cog/poango/v8y2020i4p191-200.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Local Participation or Elite Capture in Sheep’s Clothing? A Conundrum of Locally Led Development

Author

Listed:
  • Aidan Craney

    (Department of Social Inquiry, La Trobe University, Australia)

Abstract

This article discusses concepts of legitimacy and elite capture in locally led development through a case study of the Pacific-based Green Growth Leaders’ Coalition (GGLC). GGLC is a fellowship of persons identified for their developmental leadership potential on issues of sustainability and economic growth. Members are recruited into an exclusive grouping dedicated to influencing positive developmental change through informal networks and political backchannels. With their membership representing people who both self-identify and are locally recognised as leaders, queries exist to the extent to which their efforts represent a shift towards greater ownership of developmental processes at local levels or simply reinforce elite capture of ‘local voice’ in the most aid-dependent region in the world. Rather than necessarily offering straightforward answers to questions of legitimacy and elite capture, the example of GGLC demonstrates how complex the notion of locally led development can be in practice.

Suggested Citation

  • Aidan Craney, 2020. "Local Participation or Elite Capture in Sheep’s Clothing? A Conundrum of Locally Led Development," Politics and Governance, Cogitatio Press, vol. 8(4), pages 191-200.
    • Handle: RePEc:cog:poango:v:8:y:2020:i:4:p:191-200
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.cogitatiopress.com/politicsandgovernance/article/view/3343
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Lund, Jens Friis & Saito-Jensen, Moeko, 2013. "Revisiting the Issue of Elite Capture of Participatory Initiatives," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 46(C), pages 104-112.
    2. Ghazala Mansuri, 2004. "Community-Based and -Driven Development: A Critical Review," The World Bank Research Observer, World Bank, vol. 19(1), pages 1-39.
    3. Sam Wong, 2010. "Elite Capture or Capture Elites? Lessons from the 'Counter-elite' and 'Co-opt-elite' Approaches in Bangladesh and Ghana," WIDER Working Paper Series wp-2010-082, World Institute for Development Economic Research (UNU-WIDER).
    4. Cornwall, Andrea, 2003. "Whose Voices? Whose Choices? Reflections on Gender and Participatory Development," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 31(8), pages 1325-1342, August.
    5. Thania Paffenholz, 2015. "Unpacking the local turn in peacebuilding: a critical assessment towards an agenda for future research," Third World Quarterly, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 36(5), pages 857-874, May.
    6. Neil McCulloch & Laure‐Hélène Piron, 2019. "Thinking and Working Politically: Learning from practice. Overview to Special Issue," Development Policy Review, Overseas Development Institute, vol. 37(S1), pages 1-15, June.
    7. Sheely, Ryan, 2015. "Mobilization, Participatory Planning Institutions, and Elite Capture: Evidence from a Field Experiment in Rural Kenya," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 67(C), pages 251-266.
    8. Andrea Rigon, 2014. "Building Local Governance: Participation and Elite Capture in Slum-upgrading in Kenya," Development and Change, International Institute of Social Studies, vol. 45(2), pages 257-283, March.
    9. Lewis, David, 2019. "Big D and little d: two types of twenty-first century development?," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 100881, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    10. Aidan Craney & David Hudson, 2020. "Navigating the dilemmas of politically smart, locally led development: the Pacific-based Green Growth Leaders’ Coalition," Third World Quarterly, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 41(10), pages 1653-1669, September.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. David Hudson & Nicolas Lemay-Hébert & Claire Mcloughlin & Chris Roche, 2020. "Leadership and Change in Asia-Pacific: Where Does Political Will Come From?," Politics and Governance, Cogitatio Press, vol. 8(4), pages 131-135.
    2. Chris Roche & John Cox & Mereani Rokotuibau & Peni Tawake & Yeshe Smith, 2020. "The Characteristics of Locally Led Development in the Pacific," Politics and Governance, Cogitatio Press, vol. 8(4), pages 136-146.
    3. Theresa Meki & Jope Tarai, 2023. "How can aid be decolonized and localized in the Pacific? Yielding and wielding power," Development Policy Review, Overseas Development Institute, vol. 41(S2), December.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Saguin, Kidjie, 2018. "Why the poor do not benefit from community-driven development: Lessons from participatory budgeting," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 112(C), pages 220-232.
    2. Whaley, Luke & Cleaver, Frances & Mwathunga, Evance, 2021. "Flesh and bones: Working with the grain to improve community management of water," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 138(C).
    3. Grillos, Tara, 2017. "Participatory Budgeting and the Poor: Tracing Bias in a Multi-Staged Process in Solo, Indonesia," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 96(C), pages 343-358.
    4. Buntaine, Mark T. & Daniels, Brigham & Devlin, Colleen, 2018. "Can information outreach increase participation in community-driven development? A field experiment near Bwindi National Park, Uganda," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 106(C), pages 407-421.
    5. Jusrut, Poonam, 2022. "Localization of elite capture in wood charcoal production and trade: Implications for development outcomes of a forest management program in rural Senegal," Forest Policy and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 135(C).
    6. Arcand, Jean-Louis & Wagner, Natascha, 2016. "Does Community-Driven Development Improve Inclusiveness in Peasant Organizations? – Evidence from Senegal," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 78(C), pages 105-124.
    7. Andersson, Krister P. & Smith, Steven M. & Alston, Lee J. & Duchelle, Amy E. & Mwangi, Esther & Larson, Anne M. & de Sassi, Claudio & Sills, Erin O. & Sunderlin, William D. & Wong, Grace Y., 2018. "Wealth and the distribution of benefits from tropical forests: Implications for REDD+," Land Use Policy, Elsevier, vol. 72(C), pages 510-522.
    8. Chris Roche & John Cox & Mereani Rokotuibau & Peni Tawake & Yeshe Smith, 2020. "The Characteristics of Locally Led Development in the Pacific," Politics and Governance, Cogitatio Press, vol. 8(4), pages 136-146.
    9. Arjan de Haan & Ward Warmerdam, 2012. "The politics of aid revisited: a review of evidence on state capacity and elite commitment," Global Development Institute Working Paper Series esid-007-12, GDI, The University of Manchester.
    10. Ardanaz, Martin & Otálvaro-Ramírez, Susana & Scartascini, Carlos, 2023. "Does information about citizen participation initiatives increase political trust?," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 162(C).
    11. Green, Kathryn E. & Lund, Jens Friis, 2015. "The politics of expertise in participatory forestry: a case from Tanzania," Forest Policy and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 60(C), pages 27-34.
    12. Nguyen, Tu Chi & Rieger, Matthias, 2017. "Community-Driven Development and Social Capital: Evidence from Morocco," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 91(C), pages 28-52.
    13. Wibke Crewett, 2015. "Street-Level Bureaucrats at Work: A Municipality-Level Institutional Analysis of Community-Based Natural Resource Management Implementation Practice in the Pasture Sector of Kyrgyzstan," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 7(3), pages 1-29, March.
    14. Jean-Benoit Falisse & Hugues Nkengurutse, 2022. "Citizens Committees and Local Elites: Elite Capture, Captured Elites, and Absent Elites in Health Facility Committees," The European Journal of Development Research, Palgrave Macmillan;European Association of Development Research and Training Institutes (EADI), vol. 34(3), pages 1662-1683, June.
    15. John‐Michael Davis & Yaakov Garb, 2019. "Participatory shaping of community futures in e‐waste processing hubs: Complexity, conflict and stewarded convergence in a Palestinian context," Development Policy Review, Overseas Development Institute, vol. 37(1), pages 67-89, January.
    16. Parmar, Divya & Banerjee, Aneesh, 2019. "How do supply- and demand-side interventions influence equity in healthcare utilisation? Evidence from maternal healthcare in Senegal," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 241(C).
    17. Vicol, Mark & Neilson, Jeffrey & Hartatri, Diany Faila Sophia & Cooper, Peter, 2018. "Upgrading for whom? Relationship coffee, value chain interventions and rural development in Indonesia," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 110(C), pages 26-37.
    18. Breuer, Anita & Asiedu, Edward, 2017. "Can Gender-Targeted Employment Interventions Help Enhance Community Participation? Evidence from Urban Togo," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 96(C), pages 390-407.
    19. Louise Mubanda Rasmussen, 2017. "In the Name of Sustainability: Contradictory Effects of NGO-Driven Development in Malawi," The European Journal of Development Research, Palgrave Macmillan;European Association of Development Research and Training Institutes (EADI), vol. 29(2), pages 312-327, April.
    20. Wilfahrt, Martha, 2018. "The politics of local government performance: Elite cohesion and cross-village constraints in decentralized Senegal," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 103(C), pages 149-161.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:cog:poango:v:8:y:2020:i:4:p:191-200. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: António Vieira (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.cogitatiopress.com/ .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.