IN SEARCH OF THE RIGHT FORMULA: PUBLIC, PRIVATE AND COMMUNITY‐DRIVEN PROVISION OF SAFE WATER IN RWANDA AND UGANDA
| Author | Frederick Golooba‐Mutebi |
| Published date | 01 October 2012 |
| Date | 01 October 2012 |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1002/pad.1638 |
IN SEARCH OF THE RIGHT FORMULA: PUBLIC, PRIVATE AND
COMMUNITY-DRIVEN PROVISION OF SAFE WATER IN RWANDA AND
UGANDA
FREDERICK GOLOOBA-MUTEBI*
Africa Power and Politics Programme, UK
SUMMARY
Over the last two decades, efforts have been made to find the right formula or formulae for delivering services to poor rural
communities. Beginning in the late 1980s, decentralisation entailing the dispersal of powers and redistribution of resources
and responsibility for public goods provision from the centre to local authorities assumed centre stage in public administration.
This was in reaction to what was widely agreed to be the failure by highly centralised governments in developing countries to
deliver basic services to their citizens. The failure justified a shift away from centralised public administration systems to their
decentralised variant, with democratic decentralisation as the strategy of choice for reformist governments across the developing
world. Accompanying decentralisation as part of the broad good governance promotion were efforts to empower local commu-
nities to participate in decision-making processes as a strategy seeking to ensure both accountability of service providers to
users, and ownership over public goods and the infrastructure through which they were supplied. There is broad agreement
today that the hopes of the advocates and architects of these reforms were not fulfilled. On the contrary, many of the failures
and weaknesses they were intended to address proved intractable, mostly for the same reasons highly centralised systems had
failed to tackle them. Indeed, it was that very intractability that led to a renewed search for a new right formula and the eventual
adoption of privatisation or public–private partnerships as an alternative or complement to public and community-driven
actions. This article examines the evolution of these efforts in Rwanda and Uganda and analyses their impact in terms of out-
comes in the water sector where private contractors were brought in to mediate between a decentralised state and community
in the provision of safe water in rural areas. It argues that, as was the case with democratic decentralisation and associated
popular participation, privatisation or public–private partnerships are in themselves not the answer to problems of maladminis-
tration and accompanying failures in service delivery. It demonstrates that ultimately, the key to effective public goods provision
is capacity for vertical and horizontal co-ordination, inspection and supervision, and the strength of accountability enforcement
mechanisms. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
key words—right formula; public; private; community-driven; Rwanda and Uganda
INTRODUCTION
This article examinesthe delivery of safe water to rural communities in Masakadistrict in Uganda and in Nyamagabe
district in Rwanda. It presents the findings of fieldworkfocusing on two service delivery arenas:maternal health, and
water and sanitation.
Masaka district is located about 150 km to the south-west of Uganda’s capital city, Kampala, and is well-served
by better-than-average road and other communications infrastructure. The research was conducted over 5 months in
three of the district’s 16 sub-counties: Lwabenge, Kyamulibwa and Buwunga, and in seven villages.
1
Buwunga
sub-county is semi-rural and borders Masaka town. Lwabenge and Kyamulibwa are more remote in location.
*Correspondence to: F. Golooba-Mutebi,Africa Power & Politics Programme, UK. E-mail:fgmutebi@yahoo.com
1
Sub-counties are the administrative units below the district.
public administration and development
Public Admin. Dev. 32, 430–443 (2012)
Published online in Wiley Online Library
(wileyonlinelibrary.com) DOI: 10.1002/pad.1638
Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
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