Public Participation and Sustainable Development in Devolved Government

Abstract

Sustainable development will not be attained in devolved government without public participation.The new constitution brought new socio-economic and political opportunities and requires public participation to sustain development in most counties. The community elites through county systems of governance should develop strategies to see how the public participation in local, national and globally in exploiting the resources to benefit them. It’s against this background that sustainability of development can be maintained in socio- economic, structural, and environmental through public participation. The paper will examine how public participation leads to sustainable development in devolved government in Kenya. According Bhatnagar and Williams[1992],participation is; “a process by which people, especially disadvantaged people, influence decisions that affect them...participation means influence on development decisions, not simply involvement in implementation or [in sharing]benefits of a development activity, although those types of involvement are important and are often encouraged by opportunities for influence”. The objective, what is the role of public participation in supporting and enhancing the process of economic and social sustainable development in the counties? The research will adopt analytical method of the empirical data. The findings will be vital for community sustainable development and realized public participation makes people become competent to live with and gain some control over local conditions and the changing world. According to Ajayi and Otuya[2006], “sustained community development cannot take place through force or order, but is mostly likely bound to happen if, all actors participate and share ideas, visions and responsibilities equallyand democratically in steering and implementing their community or village development”. So in creating sustainable rural development, it is through giving the main actors [public or villagers living in the community] an equal opportunity to think and plan their own future.