IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/zbw/ieewps/181.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Decentrallisation as a means of conflict management: A case study of Kibaale District, Uganda

Author

Listed:
  • Schelnberger, Anna Katharina

Abstract

The working paper contributes to the discussion of political instruments of conflict management by providing empirical evidence on decentralisation as a means of conflict management. The case study used in this paper is Kibaale District in Western Uganda. After independence migrants from southwestern Uganda settled in the sparsely populated district. They compete with the original population over the available land. In March 2002 Fred Ruremera – a member of the migrant community – was elected as the district chairman (head of local government). His election was not accepted by the original inhabitants and sparked ethnic conflict and widespread violence. Peace was only restored after the President of Uganda, Yoweri Museveni, intervened, Fred Ruremera agreed not to assume office and a compromise candidate was installed in his place. While positive impacts of decentralisation on conflict are expected because of the increased participation and the possibility of addressing local problems at the local level, negative impacts can stem from increased competition over resources and access to power. The paper identifies four general factors that determine whether decentralisation acts as a means of conflict management: the legal framework of the decentralisation policy, freedom from outside interventions into the workings of local government, the inclusiveness of local government and the type of conflict. The paper comes to the conclusion that – contrary to expectation – decentralisation and the increased participation have increased and created conflict rather than managed it. The reason lies mostly in the design of the decentralisation policy: The electoral system provides for the direct election of the chairman by plurality – not majority of the population and in the position of the district chairman power is actually re-centralised. Local government is also not sufficiently independent from central government, with constitutional clauses in case of a state of emergency allowing a high degree of control.

Suggested Citation

  • Schelnberger, Anna Katharina, 2005. "Decentrallisation as a means of conflict management: A case study of Kibaale District, Uganda," IEE Working Papers 181, Ruhr University Bochum, Institute of Development Research and Development Policy (IEE).
    • Handle: RePEc:zbw:ieewps:181
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.econstor.eu/bitstream/10419/183535/1/wp-181.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Cohen, John & Peterson, Stephen, 1996. "Methodological Issues In The Analysis Of Decentralization," Harvard Institute for International Development (HIID) Papers 294372, Harvard University, Kennedy School of Government.
    2. Crook,Richard C. & Manor,James, 1998. "Democracy and Decentralisation in South Asia and West Africa," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521636476.
    3. World Bank, 2003. "World Development Indicators 2003," World Bank Publications - Books, The World Bank Group, number 13920, December.
    4. Crook,Richard C. & Manor,James, 1998. "Democracy and Decentralisation in South Asia and West Africa," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521631570.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    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. Julia Brown, 2014. "Evaluating Participatory Initiatives in South Africa," SAGE Open, , vol. 4(2), pages 21582440145, April.
    2. Frimpong Boamah, Emmanuel, 2018. "Constitutional economics of Ghana’s decentralization," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 110(C), pages 256-267.
    3. Veron, Rene & Williams, Glyn & Corbridge, Stuart & Srivastava, Manoj, 2006. "Decentralized Corruption or Corrupt Decentralization? Community Monitoring of Poverty-Alleviation Schemes in Eastern India," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 34(11), pages 1922-1941, November.
    4. Andrew Wardell, D. & Lund, Christian, 2006. "Governing Access to Forests in Northern Ghana: Micro-Politics and the Rents of Non-Enforcement," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 34(11), pages 1887-1906, November.
    5. Mogues, Tewodaj & Benin, Samuel, 2012. "Do External Grants to District Governments Discourage Own Revenue Generation? A Look at Local Public Finance Dynamics in Ghana," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 40(5), pages 1054-1067.
    6. Bidhan Kanti Das, 2019. "Denial of Rights Continues: How Legislation for ‘Democratic Decentralisation’ of Forest Governance was Subverted in the Implementation Process of the Forest Rights Act in India," The European Journal of Development Research, Palgrave Macmillan;European Association of Development Research and Training Institutes (EADI), vol. 31(4), pages 957-983, September.
    7. Fischer, Harry W. & Ali, Syed Shoaib, 2019. "Reshaping the public domain: Decentralization, the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA), and trajectories of local democracy in rural India," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 120(C), pages 147-158.
    8. Christa N. Brunnschweiler & Samuel Kwabena Obeng, 2020. "Rewarding Allegiance: Political Alignment and Fiscal Outcomes in Local Government," University of East Anglia School of Economics Working Paper Series 2020-05, School of Economics, University of East Anglia, Norwich, UK..
    9. Narayana, D., 2005. "Institutional change and its impact on the poor and excluded : the Indian decentralisation experience," ILO Working Papers 993769263402676, International Labour Organization.
    10. Binswanger, Hans P., 2006. "Leonard K. Elmhirst Lecture: Empowering Rural People for Their Own Development," 2006 Annual Meeting, August 12-18, 2006, Queensland, Australia 25713, International Association of Agricultural Economists.
    11. Cook, Nathan J. & Wright, Glenn D. & Andersson, Krister P., 2017. "Local Politics of Forest Governance: Why NGO Support Can Reduce Local Government Responsiveness," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 92(C), pages 203-214.
    12. Service Opare, 2011. "Sustaining water supply through a phased community management approach: lessons from Ghana’s “oats” water supply scheme," Environment, Development and Sustainability: A Multidisciplinary Approach to the Theory and Practice of Sustainable Development, Springer, vol. 13(6), pages 1021-1042, December.
    13. Westphal, Nico, 2011. "Political Decentralisation and Local Economic Development: Findings on the pro-poor responsiveness in 5 Cambodian communes," IEE Working Papers 193, Ruhr University Bochum, Institute of Development Research and Development Policy (IEE).
    14. Holzner, B.M. & de Wit, J.W., 2003. "Supporting decentralised urban governance : training women municipal councillors in Mumbai, India," ISS Working Papers - General Series 19145, International Institute of Social Studies of Erasmus University Rotterdam (ISS), The Hague.
    15. Alexander Stoecker, 2021. "Partisan Alignment and Political Corruption: Evidence from a New Democracy," Volkswirtschaftliche Diskussionsbeiträge 192-21, Universität Siegen, Fakultät Wirtschaftswissenschaften, Wirtschaftsinformatik und Wirtschaftsrecht.
    16. Edward Ampratwum & Mohammed Awal & Franklin Oduro, 2018. "Decentralisation and teacher accountability: How the political settlement shapes governance in the education sector at sub-national levels in Ghana," Global Development Institute Working Paper Series esid-102-18, GDI, The University of Manchester.
    17. Stoecker, Alexander, 2022. "Partisan alignment and political corruption: Evidence from a new democracy," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 152(C).
    18. A. Udayaadithya & Anjula Gurtoo, 2013. "Governing the local networks in Indian agrarian societies—an MAS perspective," Computational and Mathematical Organization Theory, Springer, vol. 19(2), pages 204-231, June.
    19. Green, Keith, 2005. "Decentralization and good governance: The case of Indonesia," MPRA Paper 18097, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    20. Pranab Bardhan and and Dilip Mookherjee., 1999. "Relative Capture of Local and Central Governments: An Essay in the Political Economy of Decentralization," Center for International and Development Economics Research (CIDER) Working Papers C99-109, University of California at Berkeley.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    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:zbw:ieewps:181. 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: ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/iebocde.html .

    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.