Advanced Search
MyIDEAS: Login

Participatory Development in the Presence of Endogenous Community Imperfections

Contents:

Author Info

  • J-P. Platteau
  • A. Abraham

Abstract

The participatory or decentralised approach to development is now favoured by most bilateral and multilateral aid organisations. At the root of this approach lies the belief that rural communities can be an effective channel of development if they receive a genuine delegation of powers and responsibilities. This article argues that there unfortunately exists a widespread tendency to downplay the community imperfections that plague many rural societies while simultaneously stressing market and state failures. In fact, such imperfections, as illustrated in the case of lineage-based societies of Africa, increase as development proceeds by way of expanding economic opportunities, growing resource scarcity, as well as rising aspiration and education levels. Under these circumstances, any early implementation of the approach runs a high risk of causing considerable disillusionment, as well as undue appropriation, by local elites operating within a logic of patronage, of the resources channelled through rural communities in this way.

Download Info

If you experience problems downloading a file, check if you have the proper application to view it first. In case of further problems read the IDEAS help page. Note that these files are not on the IDEAS site. Please be patient as the files may be large.
File URL: http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/00220380412331322771
Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to look for a different version under "Related research" (further below) or search for a different version of it.

Bibliographic Info

Article provided by Taylor and Francis Journals in its journal Journal of Development Studies.

Volume (Year): 39 (2002)
Issue (Month): 2 ()
Pages: 104-136

as in new window
Handle: RePEc:taf:jdevst:v:39:y:2002:i:2:p:104-136

Contact details of provider:
Web page: http://taylorandfrancis.metapress.com/link.asp?target=journal&id=108555

Order Information:
Web: http://www.tandf.co.uk/journals/subscription.asp

Related research

Keywords: decentralised approach; participatory development; community imperfections;

References

No references listed on IDEAS
You can help add them by filling out this form.

Citations

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

Cited by:
  1. Platteau, Jean-Philippe & Gaspart, Frederic, 2003. "The Risk of Resource Misappropriation in Community-Driven Development," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 31(10), pages 1687-1703, October.
  2. Platteau, Jean-Philippe, 2009. "Institutional obstacles to African economic development: State, ethnicity, and custom," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 71(3), pages 669-689, September.
  3. Riedl, Arno & Exelle, Ben D, 2008. "Elite Capture, Political Voice and Exclusion from Aid: An Experimental Study," Research Memoranda 024, Maastricht : METEOR, Maastricht Research School of Economics of Technology and Organization.
  4. Jean-Marie Baland & Sanghamitra Das & Dilip Mookherjee, 2011. "Forest Degradation in the Himalayas: Determinants and Policy Options," Working Papers 1116, University of Namur, Department of Economics.
  5. Krishna, Anirudh, 2007. "For Reducing Poverty Faster: Target Reasons Before People," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 35(11), pages 1947-1960, November.
  6. Deininger, Klaus & Liu, Yanyan, 2009. "Economic and social impacts of self-help groups in India," Policy Research Working Paper Series 4884, The World Bank.
  7. Theesfeld, Insa & Pirscher, Frauke (ed.), 2011. "Perspectives on institutional change - water management in Europe," Studies on the Agricultural and Food Sector in Central and Eastern Europe, Leib­niz Institute of Agricultural Development in Central and Eastern Europe (IAMO), volume 58, number 109519, February.
  8. Tai, Hsing-Sheng, 2007. "Development Through Conservation: An Institutional Analysis of Indigenous Community-Based Conservation in Taiwan," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 35(7), pages 1186-1203, July.
  9. Bastiaensen, Johan & Herdt, Tom De & D'Exelle, Ben, 2005. "Poverty reduction as a local institutional process," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 33(6), pages 979-993, June.
  10. Bernard, Tanguy & Collion, Marie-Hélène & de Janvry, Alain & Rondot, Pierre & Sadoulet, Elisabeth, 2008. "Do Village Organizations Make a Difference in African Rural Development? A Study for Senegal and Burkina Faso," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 36(11), pages 2188-2204, November.
  11. Klaus Abbink & Matthew Ellman, 2004. "The donor problem," Economics Working Papers 796, Department of Economics and Business, Universitat Pompeu Fabra, revised Jan 2005.
  12. Classen, Lauren & Humphries, Sally & FitzSimons, John & Kaaria, Susan & Jiménez, José & Sierra, Fredy & Gallardo, Omar, 2008. "Opening Participatory Spaces for the Most Marginal: Learning from Collective Action in the Honduran Hillsides," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 36(11), pages 2402-2420, November.
  13. Yoshito Takasaki, 2011. "How is disaster aid allocated within poor villages?," Tsukuba Economics Working Papers 2011-004, Economics, Graduate School of Humanities and Social Sciences, University of Tsukuba.
  14. Tranchant, Jean-Pierre, 2007. "Decentralization and Ethnic Conflict: The Role of Empowerment," MPRA Paper 3713, University Library of Munich, Germany.
  15. Janssens, Wendy, 2010. "Women's Empowerment and the Creation of Social Capital in Indian Villages," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 38(7), pages 974-988, July.
  16. Fritzen, Scott A., 2007. "Can the Design of Community-Driven Development Reduce the Risk of Elite Capture? Evidence from Indonesia," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 35(8), pages 1359-1375, August.
  17. Schultz, Lisen & Duit, Andreas & Folke, Carl, 2011. "Participation, Adaptive Co-management, and Management Performance in the World Network of Biosphere Reserves," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 39(4), pages 662-671, April.

Lists

This item is not listed on Wikipedia, on a reading list or among the top items on IDEAS.

Statistics

Access and download statistics

Corrections

When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:taf:jdevst:v:39:y:2002:i:2:p:104-136

For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: (Michael McNulty).

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 references are entirely missing, you can add them using this form.

If the full references list an item that is present in RePEc, but the system did not link 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 profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

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