Urban Governance and its Significance

Introduction – Urban Governance

Governance is the conscious management of regime structures with a view to enhancing the public realm. Governance refers to the process whereby element in society wield power and authority, and influence and enact policies and decisions concerning public life and economic and social development.

The concept of governance is not n new however, it means different thing to different people. Therefore we have to get our focus right. The actual meaning of the concept depends on the level of governance we are talking about, the goals to be achieved and the approached being followed. Governance therefore not only encompasses but transcend the collective meaning of related concept like the state, governance regime and good government.

It is clear that the concept of governance has over the years gained momentum and a wider meaning. Apart from being an instrument of public affairs management of a gauge of political development.

Urban governance has become a useful mechanism to enhance the legitimacy of the public realm. It has also become an analytical framework or approach to comparative politics

Increasing attention has been paid to forms of urban governance or how public and private sector actors cooperate in generating new policies. Infact almost everywhere urban governance structures have been found. This apparent ambiguity of governance network has ushered in a new era for urban studies but it raises the issue of whether the difference can be measured and used in explaining other dimensions of city difference.

 The argument that the ambiguity problems does not reflect a fatal deficit In urban governance concept but is rather a correctable problems of methods. Urban governance research would benefit greatly from the more widespread use of existing descriptive method and techniques which produce result that are easy to compare across cities and thus, expand the basis for inductive theory building.

The notion of governance is broader than government as it incorporates a lot more stakeholders than just governmental agencies. In addition, the term goes beyond management, focusing on the mechanisms and processes of administration, management and implementation. Thus governance is process oriented, highlighting the progress in decision making, decision taking and implementation” Given that governance is a neutral concept. there is a possibility of actors, mechanisms, processes and institutions to create positive as well as negative outputs. Urban governance which is considered to foster city development processes such as urban poverty reduction, a more equitable share of economic growth and the increase of’ local ownership in development projects, thus adding up to the concept of social inclusion. Recognizing that social exclusion is wider than poverty, often regarded as static income poverty, the quality of governance is considered to determine the ability of urban dwellers to participate in urban facilities and services. Five principles of urban governance, namely effectiveness, equity, accountability, participation and security.

Effectiveness for economic facilities, equity for social opportunities, and participation for political freedom, accountability for transparency guarantees and security for protective security. Thus economic opportunities could be measured ‘by the effectiveness of production and exchange as perceived by the local population. Furthermore social facilities could be reflected by the degree of equity existing in a society as well as political freedom could be measured by the level of participation. While transparency guarantees are associated with accountability, protective security is suggested to be expressed by a security assessment. These relationships are based on “the more inclusive idea of capability deprivation” as a development obstacle, instead of the “exclusive concentration on income poverty”.

Given the rapid pace of urbanization in developing countries, urban decision makers face a variety of challenges which are outlined in the following. However, these cannot be examined separately since they all interact. Thus a city’s financial resources impact on its capacity to meet development goals just like its ability to manage diversity and security issues depends on its financial and capacity dimension.

The inability of cities in the south to keep pace with rapid urban growth first arose in the 1960s and 1970s. At that time slum and squatter settlements grew in number and extend throughout the developing world. Since central as well as municipal authorities appeared to be overextended by the situation, often trying to limit these processes by zoning, low income residents reacted either via building uncoordinated individual dwellings or arranging “land-invasions”. Recognizing the impact of such developments, many countries initiated centralized housing banks and construction agencies. While those were able to account for the construction of a considerable amount of housing units, they were incapable of keeping pace with immigration levels just as maintenance was poor. Hence international agencies, government departments or similar bodies like housing boards, employed two more collaborative approaches, namely the “sites and services projects” and the “squatter upgrading projects”. While the sites and services approach aimed at enabling low income citizens to build their homes on marginally serviced plots via assistance in form of training and loans, the second one regularized land tenure and improved services in slum settlements. However, in the course of time strategies shifted towards reforms in the governance of urban services including Public Private Partnerships (PPP) and cooperation with NGOs.

Given their rapid growth, cities of the south face severe problems regarding service provision. While the urban administration is often responsible for a variety of sectors such as waste, electricity, health, education and transport, there is often a lack of qualified professional staff to meet these responsibilities. In addition, for the most part urban fiscal resource bases and the level of service demand are not in line at all. Such conditions are commonplace in cities of the developing world since the devolution of duties and responsibilities does not always coincide with the authority to generate sufficient financial capital.

As aforementioned, the lack of capacity to meet service demand is highly linked to an inadequate fiscal situation. Although there are several reasons for that, the devolution of responsibilities without sufficient financial authorities to the local level is a major one. While some authors point out that this process has begun to change, however this comes about at a very slow pace. A major factor for this disparity is that cities’ revenues are generally based on property taxes and service fees instead of more lucrative and collectible ones like income taxes. While generation of revenues in southern cities is yet difficult to undertake, most municipalities are dependent for up to one-third of their financial resources on other governmental levels. However, even these mandated revenues are not always reliable. Given enormous corruption, the financial dimension brings about tremendous challenges on urban governance. While recognizing these hindrances, some countries started to implement laws ensuring that a certain amount of central state revenues is directed to municipalities.

As municipalities face the problem of generating revenues, “informal” mechanisms of budget generation can emerge. Thus there is evidence of Chinese local governments gaining “off-budget revenues”. Those are composed of donations by enterprises to specific public projects, profits from township-owned enterprises or incomes from the leasing of public land to enterprises Although there is controversy on the legitimacy of such revenues, evidence shows that off budgets foster local participation and ownership in urban governance.

One of the major difficulties that cities in developing countries have to face is cultural and socioeconomic diversity. Against the background of polarization and segregation, this challenge has a social as well as a spatial dimension. Thus the lack of coherence arises in dual structures.

Gated communities offering exclusive schools and private water services stand opposed to illegal settlements without drainage, scant electricity and high crime rates. Given such a fragmented socio-spatial urban structure, some authors recognize “the widespread retreat of the idea that networked services are ‘public’ services that should be available to all at standard tariffs”.

As crime rates are increasing in cities throughout the developing world, security has become a governance issue ever since. Hence the security dimension of city governance “implies that there are adequate mechanisms/process/systems for citizens’ security, health and environmental safety” and “signifies there are adequate conflict resolution mechanisms through the development and implementation of appropriate local policies on environment, health and security for the urban areas.’ In this regard rapid urbanization is considered to exacerbate the ability of authorities to face security and safety demands due to three factors. First, the incidence of crime and violence is likely to be higher in larger cities since they concentrate victims, crime opportunities and markets for stolen items. Second, prison regime is assumed to be hampered by less expenditure on law enforcement per capita as well as a lower degree of community cooperation with the police. Finally larger cities are presumed to house a higher rate of crime-prone individuals and potential criminals. Against this background the issue of security is highly relevant since it has an enormous impact on the social capital in both formal and informal urban institutions. Thus crime and insecurity are challenging the governability of social institutions as well as the cohesion of neighborhoods and communities.

Since all dimensions of challenge mentioned above are interlinked, this applies to authority as well. As mentioned earlier, developing countries have undergone massive change in the course of democratization and decentralization processes. While these transitions brought about devolution of powers and authorities to the local level, they were accompanied by massive demographic growth and geographical expansion. However, the urban growth, generally taking place at the fringes, is not necessarily in line with administrative borders.

In addition, central governments still hold major responsibilities instead of devolving them o local authorities. Thus housing, land, education or healthcare oftentimes remain in the hands of the central state or private agencies, constraining responsiveness of local authorities to the poor.

Furthermore, particularly urban city in Nasarawa shows a tendency to assign public duties to a wide range of development agencies, public utility companies, or slum clearance boards. Hence transparency and accountability are weak since these authorities are subject to competition, exacerbating maintenance and the operation of services.

There is a broad consensus among academics and practitioners on the significant role of governance for poverty alleviation at the local level. Recognizing poverty reduction as one of the major goals of the international development agenda, one has to explore the interface between urban governance and poverty. Thus a range of characteristics that are specifically faced by the urban poor can be identified.

§  Commoditization (reliance on the cash economy)

§  Overcrowded living conditions (slums, squatter settlements)

§  Environmental degradation (density, exposure and location of marginal settlements)

§  Social fragmentation, violence, insecurity (loss of social capital)

Such risks are enforced by corruption, inappropriate policies and inadequate legal frameworks, giving way to social exclusion. As aforementioned, these issues are governance-related, thus revealing the strong interrelationship between governance and poverty. It is in this context, that governance structures need to address urban poverty in a proper manner. ‘Therefore it is important to explore how poverty is approached as well as regarded by major stakeholders. Do local authorities tend to ignore informal settlements? Does eviction take place? Are pro-poor policies implemented or do they only exist formally? Are there special pricing policies targeting the poor? These questions provide essential information about the governance situation in cities of developing countries. Apart from local authorities’ attitude towards poverty, the legal status of poor people in cities of the south is of significant importance as well. Since southern cities oftentimes feature outdated legislation, local authorities are kept from setting about grievances in informal settlements.

There is also evidence of the being unable to provide water and remove waste from unregistered slum areas. In addition, the municipal government is not authorized to regularize land tenure without the central government’s approval such legal constraints exacerbate a proper governance approach to poverty to a vast extend.

In addition to such crucial elements, the ability of the urban poor to participate in decision making and to access basic services (e.g. sanitation, health care) is of particular importance. As those issues have a huge impact on the potential of poor people to actively take part in urban life, they determine a city’s character – either inclusive or rather exclusive. This challenge is even reinforced by intensive competition for resources and political power between the poor and local or global elites. As cities like Nasarawa are trying to integrate into the global economy, their internal structures change within the process. Thus Nasarawa features two types of economies with different links to governmental structures. On the one hand there is a global corporate economy, endued with connections to higher levels government. On the other hand there is a “localized” economy, only possessing connections to local government. Since almost all decision making on urban development is exercised through higher level authorities, the localized, often informal economy has only little influence on such issues.

Since urban cities are oftentimes overextended in being responsive to the needs of their poor population, the very resort to informal activities and social networks in order to sustain their livelihood. However, such livelihood strategies are again highly dependent on the institutional context. If, for example, informal trading is exacerbated by legal constraints, this has a huge impact on the livelihood assets of the poor. In addition, one has to appreciate the fact that despite sound performance of cities in tackling poverty, the numbers of poor people may still rise.

Finally, as cities in the developing world grow so rapidly, they often feature a wide gap between jurisdictions and their actual size. Hence the issue of boundaries becomes essential as most of the growth takes place at the fringes, where the need for services is greatest. Given that the poor communities live outside the legal responsibilities of municipal governments, their actual infrastructure situation is oftentimes unbearable. This adds up to another governance-challenge.

The present study of Nasarawa has shown that both city development and urban governance are concepts that are difficult to measure. However, it is of utmost importance to keep doing it as data availability and reliability are major concerns in terms of measuring any type of urban progress, specifically in developing countries like Nigeria. Local leaders and decision makers in Nasarawa need to be provided with guideposts on the state of governance in their cities and communities. Recognizing that phenomena like mass poverty, poor health conditions and insufficient education can hardly be ignored, the debate on governance – understood as a broad system of all stakeholders – has to be intensified. As the case of Nasarawa has shown, a relatively effective urban government can positively impact on issues such as waste- management. However, the latter is relatively easy to achieve while endeavors to counter profound inequality or education requires much more fundamental changes. Here the low levels of accountability and equity manifest in poor scores for infrastructure, education and health care. Recognizing that particularly women and children are most seriously affected by such grievances, it is essential to foster attempts of good urban governance in Nasarawa. This statement is also confirmed by the interpretation of expert interviews, which formed the basis of the diploma thesis underlying this study. Decision makers need to take into account the needs of the excluded and disadvantaged. Here an inclusive governance approach will incorporate the informal economy, the socially disadvantaged and especially women as they are prone to a variety of discrimination thus holding key to a variety of development challenges. Bearing this in mind, development politics and particularly urban planning in Nasarawa has to recognize he inefficiency of top-down approaches. Hence taking the needs of the marginalized into account and integrating them into the decision making process is vital for sustainable urban development in Nasarawa town.

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