LCEP’s Approach to Governance and Economic Empowerment1
1. A “People-Centered” Vision
The prolonged war, authoritarian regime, lack of opportunities to make ones own choices and decisions has created a syndrome of dependency, lack or responsibility and self-denial in the Afghan communities. So, people wait for things to happen in terms of their relations to the external ‘world’. But, despite the hardships people have experienced, inherent in the Afghan culture and traditions are the sense of self-affirmation, civic responsibility, consultative processes in decision making and participatory practices.
People must be given opportunities to make choices and decisions concerning their own development. The process of change must be sustained by the beneficiaries and their institutions that have the “vested interest” in their own development. The development process must be engineered from within. No matter how much money is spent, no community development approach seems to succeed unless it brings about a change in the way villagers use their resources and use the technical input. But besides access to knowledge and resources, equally important will be building confidence and positive attitude about development, time, labour and sense of community.
The principle tenet of LCEP approach is to pursue a people-centered development process emphasising that the intended beneficiaries must be at the centre of analysis, discussion, planning, implementation and monitoring of the program. Furthermore the program stresses that development is a concept that has as much to do with the minds of the people as with physical development of resources and their productivity.
A people-centered approach to self-reliance is the foundation for this approach and is represented graphically in the form of the “Self-Reliance Tree”. In the “Self-Reliance Tree,” family groups form the roots of the program, leading up to the CDC as the base of the tree. The roots anchor the CDC, highlighting the importance of regular consultation between the CDC and small cluster groups to ensure transparency and accountability.
From the base of the tree, the project cycle (now termed the “learning ladder”) forms the trunk. The analogy is that communities must travel an initial journey of experiential learning in order to understand their potential for self-reliance. Along the journey, many activities are initiated, such as the Community Box and Community Self-Initiatives that will grow to become the branches of the tree. Additional branches, such as human capital development, income generation, animal husbandry, health, etc., can be grown naturally or may be grafted on by external actors. A mature CDC will be able to support many different types of activities and programs. In short, the Self-Reliance Tree graphically represents the vision of, and the path for, CDCs to become the foundation for good local governance and holistic rural development.
The concept recognizes that communities, as they travel on a learning journey of their own development, broaden and diversify their sphere of activities beyond the first block grant project. This community’s first journey through the project cycle (now known as the Learning Ladder) builds confidence and initiates many activities that, with proper care and nurturing, will set communities firmly on the path to self-reliance.
2. “People-Centered” Process
The realization of the “people centered approach” also requires a “people-centered process”. This process must ensure that the people and their institutions are provided freedom of choice and informed decision making opportunities. A process of “consultation” among themselves followed by “reflection” and sharing of their understanding (further “consultation”) needs to be followed. After this the people will be able to make informed choice or “decision” and take responsibility for their “action”. This is a journey every individual member and their institution must experience in this process of “people-centered” approach.
First, rural households will be encouraged to organize themselves into self-help groups to address their urgent institutional, economic, physical and spiritual needs as well as to achieve development results at the household level. The people will meet on a regular basis to solve their problems through consultation in each village and neighbourhood.
The people will regularly elect a representative Community Development Council with vested authority from the community to make local decisions on their behalf and to serve as trusted intermediaries with outside agencies. The CDC will be registered with local authorities. Involving the people through this process will enhance their participation and ownership in community development. The program will follow an approach of focusing on social mobilization for institutional development of the rural communities.
Second, the approach emphasizes capacity building of the community members and the elected CDCs so that they will be in a position to govern and manage local affairs. The capacity building activities will enhance the competence of both men and women in the communities in planning and management, social mobilization, useful technical skills and building a relationship of trust and mutual respect between governing institutions, and local citizens. Capacity building activities should also focus on strengthening the provincial and district government bodies encouraging them to become responsive to the needs of the rural people while respecting principles of good governance. Therefore the capacity building approach should focus on (a) capacity building of service institutions so that more appropriate services are available to the communities and (b) capacity building of people so that they can utilize available services and seize opportunities.
Third, with the formation of self-help cluster groups and during their regular meetings they will mobilize local resources utilizing the traditional Afghan practices of Ashar and Sanduq. The self-help cluster groups will establish community boxes and invest the collected funds in a revolving credit program that will serve as a capacity-building bridge to enable communities to access credit from micro-finance institutions (MFIs) in the future.
Labour and financial mobilization to implement community self-initiative projects or as local contribution for implementation and maintenance of other development activities will be an integral part of the program. Cost recovery, user-fees and regular maintenance will be considered in the preparation and management of every project. For the implementation of every project “preference” will be given to employ the labour and resources within the community before considering contracting to external contractors. This will contribute to recycling the funds within the rural economy. These activities will help to build confidence and interest among the rural communities for self-help activities to solve their own problems. The concept of public audit during and after completion of the projects will assure transparency and accountability.
Fourth, the CDC will facilitate the preparation of a rolling community development plan through a participatory planning process that includes analysis of their problems and an integrated and synergetic set of solutions to address their defined problems. The planning process will ensure that separate men’s and women’s CDCs, through a broad-based inclusive decision making process, will make decisions on mobilization and effective and accountable use of both locally mobilized and externally provided resources. Conservation and protection of local physical, social and cultural resources will be considered in all investment plans. The community development plan constitutes a bottom-up investment plan which will be reviewed periodically but this should not be bureaucratized and should not supplant the community driven approach to development that is at the heart of the NSP.
Fifth, together, these elements can lead to the creation of a forum which decides on the type of development the people need and that channels their demands to the appropriate service providing agencies. Therefore another core element of the program will be linking local institutions to external agencies with available services and resources. It will be important for the communities to realize that external assistance will only supplement and contribute to their own efforts, labour and resources. This linkage will also extend to collaborative action and collaborative experience through networking with neighbouring villages and neighbourhoods, to share experiences and solve inter-village problems. To implement the program that will address the widest possible needs and requirements of the rural communities, an implementation structure of multiple partnerships through a structure of pluralistic arrangement institutional networks will be required. These external agencies will respond to the need based demand requested by the communities on the basis of comparative advantage they have to address the request.
3. Multi-Level, Two-Stage Approach
A multi-level and long-term approach is required to implement the LCEP. This means that activities should be implemented not only at the community level but also must feed into initiatives at district, provincial and central levels. This will ensure that activities at the grassroots are appropriately supported:
- At the micro-level (households, clusters and CDC) the program will encourage social mobilization and rural self-help institutions.
- At the meso-level district and provincial level institutions should be supported to respond to the needs of the rural communities.
- At the macro-level policy dialogue between MRRD and other key Ministries relating to governance, decentralization and poverty alleviation.
To view the People Centered Process, click here.
- This text is an excerpt from a larger document produced by UN Habitat for LCEP in 2005.