PLA NOTES IS published three times a year, in February, June and October, by the Sustainable Agriculture and Rural Livelihoods Programme of IIED. Its objective is to enable practitioners of participatory methodologies from around the world to share their field experiences, conceptual reflections and methodological innovations.
The themed section for this issue is on local government and participation, and discusses examples of local government agencies using participatory learning and action approaches to address issues of concern to their constituencies. In an overview article addressing the special theme for this issue, the guest editors, Andy Inglis and Ced Hesse, examine the many issues surrounding participation and local government. These include how local government officials in both the North and the South can learn from each other and how participation can be used to influence new styles of leadership that are more democratic, transparent and accountable.
The rest of the special themed section includes a diverse set of 12 articles covering a wide cross-section of experiences, from participatory democracy and budgeting to building community toilets and influencing externally driven initiatives, with experiences from both Southern and Northern countries. Most of the articles in this special local government section focus on the practical ways in which local government officials and those working on their behalf have sought to engage with their citizens on issues of concern to them. The issues that arise deal more with the “hands-on” ways of seeking genuine and useful participation rather than on the underlying academic debates concerning such issues.
The general section for this issue contains five articles covering: the benefits and experience of adopting participatory methodologies to better inform and conduct research in India; the experience of training staff used to top-down approaches to become participatory facilitators in Uttar Pradesh, India; assessing the positive gains participation can bring to a rural community in Nigeria; how PRA was used to develop an action plan to reduce environmental degradation in a German village, and its appropriateness as a methodology in societies with functioning local democratic institutions; and the experience of using community participation to design and build sustainable flood control measures in Bangladesh.
The issue also contains other regular PLA Notes features, book reviews, events and tips for trainers (taken from Robert Chamber’s new book Participatory Workshops: A Sourcebook of 21 Sets of Ideas and Activities).
As a leading informal journal on participatory approaches and methods, this is a vital resource for community workers, activists, researchers and anyone working to enhance the participation of ordinary people in local, regional, national and international decision-making, in both South and North.