THE EFFECTS OF POOR INFRASTRUCTURAL FACILITIES ON SOCIO-ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT
CHAPTER TWO
REVIEW OF LITERATURE
2.0 Introduction
The local government serves as a form of political and administrative structure facilitating decentralization, national integration, efficiency in governance and a sense of belonging at the grassroot. The local government is a unit of administration all over the world. Agagu (2004).
Although, it is a universal Institution, it however exists in different political system. Whatever the form of existence, the local government has been essentially regarded as the path to and guarantor of administrative efficiency, effective service delivery and participatory development (Arowolo 2005)
It is a critical tier of government because of its closeness to the people Gboyega (2003).
Local government appeals to both the people and the government as a feedback institution that relays the opinions and demands of the grassroot to a higher government (Adejo 2003).
“Local government is government at local level exercised through representation council established by how to exercise specific power within definite area. (Government prints 2006)”.
In this same line of thought, Tornquist (2012). Also purports that development is referred to as a process where resources are put to ‘better use’ the phrase ‘better use’ is varied depending on who is concerned as to use. It may be advantageous to some and disadvantageous to other. Such resources include natural resources, technology and capital. Reflecting these views therefore Owen Bardernoted some general point about the idea of development:-
1. It should be an all encompassing change, not just an improvement in one direction;
2. It should be a process which builds on itself where change is continuous and where new improvements precede previous improvement;
3. It should be a process that occurs at the social level and in the individual human being at the same time.
Infrastructure development in Nigeria
The development of any nation’s infrastructure is a sine qua non for nation building in economic terms. Without it, there can be no development regardless of what progress there may seem to be. Most developed nations in the world jumpstarted their economies by accelerating their infrastructure and building on it; and example is India and the United States of America. The late President J.F. Kennedy of USA once stated that “America has good roads, not because America is rich, but America is rich because it has good roads”. The crux of this matter is that a country cannot be rich without good infrastructure. All the great civilizations attained greatness only through the entrenchment of adequate and sustainable infrastructure. The World Bank estimates that every 1% of government funds spent on infrastructure leads to an equivalent 1% increase in Gross Domestic Product (GDP), which invariably means that there is a correlation between any meaningful inputs in infrastructure development which reflects on economic growth, indices, hence the value of infrastructure cannot be underplayed.
Infrastructure development has in recent times assumed a central importance in Nigeria’s fight to attain social and economic stability. The federal government and all state governments are using infrastructure as the focal point of their administrations and policy enactments. Infrastructure generally has to do with the fixed provision of tangible assets on which other intangibles can be built on. Not limited in scope, it revolves the provision of Housing, Power (electricity), Transport, Education, Communication, and Technology.
In the history of Nigeria, it has been a mix of daunting challenges and boundless opportunities. But since the transition to democracy in 1999, though we cannot yet say “Uhuru”, the country has laid a solid foundation for economic growth and development. Nigeria’s rich human and material resource endowments give it the potential to become Africa’s largest economy and a major player in the global economy. The present government of Nigeria has proposed to be among the top 20 economies in the world by the year 2020. Nigeria’s experience however is that huge infrastructure deficit has greatly constrained economic growth and development, thus inhibiting our ability to improve the quality of life as envisaged in the Agenda of the Federal Government. Thus we can say that as of yet, Nigeria’s infrastructure is in a deplorable state (the only exception being the improvement in telephone and air services due to The Public Private Partnership (P3) Drive) and the Nations infrastructural needs are evident for all to see. There is therefore the need for the development of an infrastructure base comparable to those of other nations in the world. These Infrastructure and related Investments are critical in achieving and sustaining a high double-digit annual growth rate necessary for Nigeria to achieve its Vision 2020.
Given the huge amounts needed and the drive necessary for development, the Nigerian government does not have the requisite capability to achieve this on its own and has thus among other options embarked upon the use of Public Private Partnerships (PPPs), for infrastructure development and thus addressing the challenges constraining the growth of the Nigerian economy. The Federal Government of Nigerian has further established the Infrastructure concession regulatory commission through the Infrastructure Concession Regulatory Commission (Establishment, Etc) Act of 2005 (The ICRC Act) in this regard.
The Federal Governments Policy on P3 is to the effect that it will develop regulatory and monitoring institutions so that the private sector can play a greater role in the provision of infrastructure, whilst ministries and other public authorities will focus on planning and structuring projects. The private sector will be contracted to manage some public services, and to design, build, finance and operate some infrastructure. It is the Government’s expectation that private participation in infrastructure development through PPPs will enhance efficiency, broaden access, and improve the quality of public services. This policy statement sets out the steps that the Government will take to ensure that private investment is used, where appropriate, to address the infrastructure deficit and improve public services in a sustainable way; and it will ensure that the transfer of responsibility to the private sector follows best international practice and is achieved through open competition.
The ICRC Act therefore seeks to provide for the participation of the private sector in financing, construction, development, operation, and maintenance of Federal Government infrastructure or development projects through concession or contractual arrangements. The Infrastructure Concession Regulatory Commission (ICRC) and its Governing Board were then established to regulate, monitor, and supervise the concession and development projects. The Infrastructure Concession Regulatory Commission (ICRC) is responsible for setting forth guidelines to promote, facilitate and ensure implementation of Public Private Partnership (PPP) Projects in Nigeria with the objective of achieving better value for money (VFM)for infrastructure services and enhanced economic growth.
Infrastructural provision and local government in Nigeria
Infrastructure is seen as umbrella term for many activities and basic structure and facilities necessary for a country to function efficiently. It is designed as the totality of basic physical facilities upon which all other economic activities in a system depend (African Development Bank, 1999, Geet, 2007). Infrastructure comprises the assets needed to provide people with access to economic and social facilities and services such as roads, water, drainage, bridges, electricity e.t.c. Rural infrastructure is a broad term covering the basic facilities and services needed for rural communities and rural development (FAO, 2006).
Local government is a government at the grassroots level of administration meant for meeting the peculiar needs of the rural people (Agagu, 1997). In his analysis, he viewed local government as a level of government which is supposed to have its greatest impact on the people at the rural areas. It is a tier of government which in physically terms is closet to the citizenry and it is saddled with responsibility of guaranteeing the political, social and economic development of its area and its people (Enero, Dadoyin and Elumilade, 2004).
Appadorai (1975) observed that there are problems that are local in nature and such problems are better handled by local government because they are better understood by the local people themselves. Based on the 1976 guidelines for local government reform, it is expected that local government should engage in rural infrastructural provision to engender development and good governance at the grassroots.
But unfortunately local government still lacks behind in the area of infrastructure, this ugly trend is particularly greater in the area of water and sanitation, rural road access and electricity.
According to World Bank (2004) Nigeria’s infrastructure in terms of quality and quantity is grossly inadequate and inferior to that existing in other parts of the world. Out of the 102 countries assessed in the global competitiveness report in 2004, the Nigeria’s quality of infrastructure was ranked 3rd to the last, this is consistent with the World Bank survey results where manufacturing firms listed infrastructure as their most severe business constraint.
The Nigerian roads were described as the lowest in density in Africa, where only 31% of the roads are paved as compared to 50% in the middle income countries, and even where roads are provided, only 40% of these roads can be said to be in good condition (Alabi and Ocholi, 2010). Currently only 20% of Nigeria’s rural population have access to electricity.
In Nigeria, Ipmgbemi (2001) observed in Amuro district in Kogi State that passengers pay 3 times for kilometer on untarred rural roads compared to tarred needs. A nation-wide survey was conducted by the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) on the state of roads in the country, the survey revealed that the road network, as at December 2002, was estimated at 194,000 kilometres, with the Federal Government being responsible for 17%, state government 16% and local government 67%. It was also shown that most of the roads were in bad condition, especially those in rural areas (CBN, 2002). Some of the roads constructed over 30 years ago had not been reliabilities even once, resulting in major cracks and numerous potholes that make road unsafe.
Water is critical to human existence but yet a serious problem of human survivals, health and economic development. Millions of people in developing countries are faced with acute water stress from inadequate supplies. Survey conducted by Hall (2006) revealed insufficient or lack of provision of pipe borne or portable drinking water where 50% of the city dwellers and 90% of rural dwellers lack access, as a result, large proportion of households have resorted to drawing water from unhygienic sources.
Most of the rural areas in Nigeria are in a pathetic state of infrastructure delivery, even, some of the urban local government areas are also deficient in infrastructure delivery. Some of these infrastructures that are available were left uncared for. The implication of this is that local governments in Nigeria have been consistent over the years in their failure to enhance their capacity to engage and mobilize the people and to respond to their needs and to administer effectively and responsibly the various local services needed for grassroots development. Local roads are left unrepaired, rural electricity are in state of dilemma, rural health centres are dilapidated with absence of drugs and necessary health personnel, rural boreholes and water pumps have no water, rural water scheme/projects are deserted. The only visible things in the rural areas are the sign posts that shows the location, direction, and physical status of these rural infrastructure. So many of them are not functioning due to long years of existence, lack of maintenance, uncompleted nature of the projects, vandalization, lack of quality job and absence of community ownership of such projects.
Challenges of infrastructural delivery in the local government system
Infrastructural provision in the grassroots faces serious challenges; one of the obvious problem is the lack of maintenance culture. Local government is found of constructing new projects with the little fund given to them rather than taking good care of the existing ones. These new projects sometimes are used by the politician to boost their image and that of their political party to enable them get necessary support from their people. In another dimension, embarking on a new project makes diversion of public fund to private use easier than the maintenance of the existing one.
Also, financial crisis is another factor that impedes the capacity of local government to provide infrastructure. Many local governments lacked the required fund to provide and maintain infrastructure, for instance, 96% of their monthly allocation is expended on recurrent expenditure, leaving only 4% for capital expenditure.
Odoh (2004) argued that local government as instrument of rural infrastructure development has remained inactive over the years as a result of excessive control and various interferences exercised by the higher levels of governments. This arises from the fact that most of the funding for local governments come from federal transfer to the local governments. This has made local government heavily dependent on federal government funding which is not adequate to execute meaningful projects.
Agagu (2004) hinges the inability of local government to facilitate rural infrastructure on the incessant changes in policies and structures of local government in Nigeria, he argues that this situation is in contrast to what obtains in many developed countries such incessant changes no doubt constitute some problems to the operations and performance of this level as they subject the institution to perpetual learning of new rules with little or no opportunity to fully exploit, let alone improve upon existing rules. Instability and frequency of change in the area of leadership selection and types of management also affects local government ability to provide rural infrastructure.
Between 1976 and 1983, the civilian governors rather than allow elections to hold choose to appoint their party loyalists as committee members to manage the local government areas across the country. By 1984, the military government that took over resorted to the use of sole administrators chosen among the civil servants. Between 1987 and 1933, elections were used again to select the leaders at this level. By 1994, sole administrators were reintroduced. Even elections held into the local governments during General Sanni Abacha’s era were based on subjective criteria where candidates who did not share the aspirations of General Abacha and his cohorts were disqualified from contesting elections. Since 1988, there have been over fifteen chairman or leaders manning each local government. This frequency of change in leadership also affects policies and programme implementation. More often than not, policies and projects of predecessors are abandoned as each new set of leaders want to award new contracts and start new projects rather than continue with previous ones.
Low level of people’s participation in their own development constitute a big challenge to rural infrastructure delivery. From the colonial period of local government administration till date, much noise had been made about development from below, “Bottom up” approach to development, “popular participation” and other catch phrase to argue for people’s involvement in their development. There have been more noise than action. Local governments prepare estimates and projects for their revenue and expenditure without proper recourse to and due consultation with the people for whom the exercise is being carried out to know their needs, problems and potentials (Sikiru, 2000).
Also, there are problems of corruption, poor management, misappropriation and misapplication of the funds accruable to local government that also affect infrastructure delivery at the grassroots. The local government is not free from corruption. Those who are in charge of fund meant for infrastructural provision tend to do away with substantial portions of the fund, thereby leaving the project uncompleted and abandoned.
Model of development
Stolir and Taylor (as cited from potter 2009) provided an informative overview of development form below. Their account stresses that there is no angle recipe for much strategies as there is for development form above. Development form below, he purports, needs to be closely related of specific socio-cultural, historical and institutional conditions. Bottom – top strategies are varied but most importantly they stress the concern for local and community participation in development design and implementations of projects, reducing outside dependency and promoting sustainability.
Alternative development has come to be associated with new and under conceptualizations of planning and development with its main distinguishing features being the fostering of participatory development with its more equitable principles of growth, where social exclusion inherent in rural areas would be eradicated. And given the long hagemony of the ‘top-division’ western, rational planning and development, is imperative [chamber 2005 (as sited by Potter 2009)] averred that it was time for the last to be put first. In his context, participation means much more consultation (Potters 2009). While these calls seems eminently reasonable; the question remains “how is this to be achieved”?
The answer is simple through democratic rights to participate and through the devolution of powers to the people concerned.
The concept of good governance
Writing for the World, Bank, Landell Mills and Seralgeldin (2010) define governance as the use of political authority and exercise of control over a society and the use of its resources for social and economic development. It encompasses the nature of the functioning of a state’s institutional and structural arrangements, decision making processes, policy formulation and implementation capacity effectiveness between the ruler and the ruled.
Different kinds of governance exist, but in many African States, the most common are centralized and decentralized governance. The United Nation (UN) 2005. Sachs report on the implementation of the UN Millennium Development Goals urged that poor governance in African States was one of the key reasons for on-going problems in meeting the goals of development. The principle of good governance was launched in international aid circles at the end of the cold-war as a guiding principle aimed at the internal restructuring of government machinery of development aid, which was concerned with improving the political leadership of democracy and integrating economics and social goals. In effect, it is enclosed as a core element of development strategy (Doornbos 2004). Implicitly, good governance and democracy are inseperatable, that is, they converge both “conceptually and practically” in the study of practice of formulation and implementation of public policy (Doornbos 2004). Its landmarks include; accountability, transparency, effectiveness and efficiency; it is also participatory, consensus oriented, equitable and inclusive and follows the role of law. It ensures that corruption is minimized (like in the case of election malpractice).
For good governance to be efficient, democracy must be operational. Expanding democracy whose indicators include multi-party system, Freedom of speech and the press-improves including individual opportunity for prosperity and improved well-being, this contributory to the growth of the society. The concept of good governance is of important in this study because it brings out the idea of democracy which gives freedom and empowerment to the people. Here, there is an attempt to establish a link between building good governance (democratic governance) and development where I very much agree that this issues are not sequential but go hand in hand. The reasons for exploring the concept of good governance are rooted in my interest to draw a focus on the symbiosis between politics and development for a fuller understanding of the problem of development.
Democracy and Democratic theory
Adonide (2006) addresses the concept of democracy as ‘a local political cosmology which emphasis the value of Justices. Civility and open communication between rulers and subjects, where according to Schumpeter, political decisions are realized for ‘common good’ by making the people decide issues through the elections of individual who are to assemble in order to carryout their will.
Schumpeter further, states that this common good implies providing answers to questions in order that every measure taken can unequivocally be classified as ‘good’ or ‘bad’. It is the rule of the people, depiciting liberty and freedom.
M. Sartin (2009) gives the following definition of democracy:
1. Representative democracy is defined as the government by the representatives of the people;
2. Abraham Lincoln’s famous stipulation of democracy as government for the people, of the people and by the people meaning government that works in accordance with the preferences.
He also outlines eight (8) criteria for defining and measuring democracy proposed by Robot A. Dahl (1971) quoted from M. Sartin (2009). They include
a. A right to note,
b. A right to be elected
c. The rights for political leader to compete for support and votes
d. Free and Fair election
e. Freedom of association and expression (civil liberties)
f. Alternatives sources of information
g. Institutions for making public policies opened on votes and other expressions of preference.
h. Democratic freedom permits political parties to mobilize and draw support on the basis of their preferred espousal interests and identities.
Defining democracy as our on-going search for an institutional resolution of the problem of power that lies at the care of politics, Shapiro (2003) in his theory attempt to establish a link between democracy and development. In his view, democracy should be.
In this regard, decentralization and democracy are elements and indicators of good governance, hence, the three frameworks are interrelated, where decentralization and democracy are perceived as development. Promoting form of governance.
The local government is thus a decentralized political unit that may promote well-being at the grassroot level.
Functions of local government in socio economic development
The move towards democratization and decentralization has added new roles and responsibilities on the local governments. When government is actually transferred to the local government, it provides significant opportunities for popular participation and increased involvement by the people and communities in decisions that directly affect their lives. Moreover, it is through the empowerment of local government that municipal programmes, plans and service provision have a higher likelihood of reflecting local needs more accurately than in centralized system of government (Materu 2010). Olowu (2000) in analyzing the prosperity of Zimbabwe in the 1908 attribute this partly to the local government institutions.
Jager (2006) also contents that local government have the ability to provide services more efficiently and cheater compared to central government citing example of EL Salvador, the analysis point to the fact that many public works were implemented by municipal governments at cost from one-third to two-thirds lower than when the same types of works were executed by central government agencies.
The reasons for this include: ‘greater control over work crews, closer supervision, and shorter travel distance to work sites, scruitiny by the electorate and greater accountability, by elected and appointed local officials’. The capacity of local governments to mobilize local resources cannot be over emphasized because they can be more accurately reflect local priorities, they can also accurately develop more sense of accountability among their constituencies. More stills, local governments ensure that local process are democratic and good democratic practice at the local level greatly improves construction, reconstruction and service delivery.
Attuned to voters’ needs and reactions, local governments have the potential to build community consensus around controversial issues, including infrastructure building, and other environmental programmes.
In sum, this is to reveal the ability of local governments to act generally as a catalyst to economic and social development. This general motion of the contribution of local government in socio-economic change will provide a basis for the evaluation of local government in Ido. If they are structured to function in an adequate manner and if their performance meet the expected standard.Based on rational collectives actions and not a majority rule because this will force the minority to become tyrany. He stresses the role of deliberations in the promotion and achievement of common good.
Expanding this nexus under level of democratic performance will be discussed to explain the extent of democratic output. On democratic performance, Elgston pays more attention to certain political events and institution and the nature of election.
Decentralization
Mzihatina Ghandi architect of Indian independence, advocate “survey” or self rule, which implies the rule of the people. This concept forms the basis of democratic decentralization and the establishment of paunchanyati raj- (people’s council) institution of self government at the village “tahik” and district level. It is built upon the premises that, all “paver” in a democracy rightfully belongs to the “people”. Thus, the essence of democracy lies in empowering the people to given their own affairs by themselves within their jurisdiction.
Decentralization is a step to promoting democracy. It is the transfer of responsibilities, in the management of local government affairs, from the central government to the local government. The purpose is to bring administration closer to the people and this has proven to be the better way to improve the living standards of the population local community stand out to the principal pools of local development. There are four different kinds of decentralization. But I will be primarily concerned with two which are important to my study.
1. Deconcentralization: designates an administrative process of decentralization of resources whereby the local services remain under the control of the central government. Eriksen et al (2002) refer to this as administrative decentralization. The transfer of authority is from the central government. In this content, the participation of the local population is only a tool in the accomplishment of projects. Hence, it is a form of centralization in disguise.
2. Devolution: this on the contrary is the delegation or surrender of pavers of the central government to local authorities (Mukete 2004) or an institution which are based on local political representation (Hariss et al 2000).
It could also be referred to as political decentralization and this means that the institutions to which this power is devolved must be governed by local elected person.
The three concept above- good governance, democracy, and decentralization are relevant to this study as they usher us to the main concept of the study-empowerment.
Good governance has been used here to demonstrate that in a democratic state, people are compared and can therefore make choices and their voices heard.
Decentralization is a means of bringing this democracy, devolution of paver closer to the people at the grassroot.
2.5.1 Empowerment
Barnes conceives power as are of these things which makes its existence apparent to us through its effect, and hence it has always been found much easier to describe its consequences than to identify its nature and basis. (Barne 2007).
Basing on political power, he draws a line between empowering and authorizing. He elicited the fact that when an agent is empowered, discretion in the direction of a body of routine activity is transferred to him, which actually results to his possessing it.
Have we ever asked ourselves what a society we would have if everybody (both and women) are given opportunity to be hard about decision that affect their lives, that is, if people are politically empowered what effect, would this have on development? In other words, instead of participation and involvement becoming a source of empowerment, how can empowerment boost participation and involvement of all?
The concept of empowerment is briefly discussed because it is all implied in the above concepts and theories. That is (good governance, democracy and political decentralization).
However, I wish to draw attention to the slight differences in my treatment of this concept to clear the doubts off the mind of the reader. It will be treated as a care concept in this study, and focus is an political empowerment which is purported by pyne (2009) to be a situation where people are free and have the strong political motivation to make positive changes (democratic rights). It is a situation where the common folk are given the opportunity to enjoy equal privilege to make unbaised choices on their own. Although, development is an element of empowerment, also held that empowerment is the counterpiece of development with regard to the fact that it gives people the freedom. (About everything that promotes well being) to express their choices.
Empowerment is therefore used here to embrace autonomy of the local government and the people.
Empowerment from a gender perspective
Potential and contribution of women in Socio-Economic Development.
Over the decade, women all round the globe, have been completely excluded from any development effort, albeit in varying degrees. In African societies, the situation is worse.
Boserup explains the inability of women to get involved in such project to their lack of qualification, a trend that started right from the colonial days where according to her, the curricula of missionary schools for African girls laid more emphasis on domestic activities.
Even in the pre-colonial days, girls were not even allowed to go to school; they were subjected to the role of housekeepers. It was held that an educated woman stood little chance of having a husband and in the Africa context it was stigmatizing to find a woman at a certain age still in the house of her parent, or unmarried because marriage was a norm for all children. (Boserup 1990).
Though the seclusion and exclusion of women in decision making and in the service sector is losing its grips, the proportion in relation to men in their occupation and in decision making is low. This low rate of female participation is still consistent with men’s pattern of categorizing women as the weaker sex, and the viability of women to measure up with the men because of the gap that has already existed.
Moreover, men as policy maker only design policies that subject women to second class citizens. Therefore, women are still marginalized. As such, it will be important to find out if the achievement of the Saki Rural Area presents different consequences for men and women.
Theoretical framework
The theory of decentralization will be adopted in this paper. This is because development itself needs to be decentralized so as to achieve its purpose.
The theory of decentralization explains the transfer of authority and responsibility for public functions from the central government to subordinate or quasi-independent government organizations and or the private sector (Roindinelli, 1981, Heywood 1997, Bonal, n.d). It is concerned with how functions and responsibilities are given to different institutions from the central government for efficient and effective performance in terms of service delivery.
In the literature, two major forms of decentralization are discerned; namely, decentralization and devolution (Olowu, 1995). The former alludes to the transfer of state responsibilities and resources from the centre to the periphery within the same administrative system. It indicates an internal form of delegation of responsibilities. On the other hand, devolution entails the transfer of specified responsibilities and resources to community who are usually represented by their own lay or elected (i.e non appointed) officials. Adeyeye (2000) argued that in reality, devolution and decentralization are not mutually exclusive when implementing decentralization programmes, a balance of these elements is usually sought.
In the wake of widespread disenchantment with the centralized state structure, transfer of some power and resources from the central to local government and organizations has been advocated (Anifowose and Enemuo, 1999).
For most African governments, however, decentralization is now viewed as a strategy for mobilizing local resources and initiative for national development. Since it has become evident that federal or state governments alone cannot guarantee development in the rural areas, it then becomes imperative for power, authority and responsibility to be transferred from the central or state government to the local government for the purpose of enhancing development in the local areas. This is important because of the remoteness of the federal government to the rural people. It is believed that decentralization would make local governments more competent in the provision of rural infrastructure. Decentralization can be therefore viewed as an initiative to enhance rural development. It is encouraged by the need to improve service delivery to large populations and put in place meaningful structure to provide good governance at the local level. Local government in Nigeria is widely acknowledged as a viable instrument for rural development and for the delivery of social services to the rural people. It is believed that this level of government is strategically placed to fulfill the above functions because of its proximity to the rural people which enhances its ability to easily articulate and aggregate the demands of the people. The 1976 local government reform in particular was aimed at decentralizing some significant functions of the state government at local levels in order to harness local resources for refined development.
Representation theory
Pitkin (2008) observes that in modern times everyone wants to be governed by representatives, either individual or institutions. But what is the idea behind representation, and what expectation do voter have of representative?
He further explains that representation is used as a device to furthering local interest, as a control over the paver of state.
Representation means popular representations, and to be linked with the idea of politics, of every one’s right to have a say in what happened to him/her. What make people feel represented? When is it to correct to say that they are represented? What count as evidence that they are represented? Is it voting identification? In the midst of the debate as to what representation means, (Hobbes 2006) lays down some formal arrangements that accompany representation;
1. Authorization: the representative has to be given authority to act through voting.
2. Accountability: the representative has to take responsibility to be accountable for his action.
In totality, the concept and theories discussed above have a profound bearing on the subject or main theme of study- that empowerment and freedom are instrumental or requisites in development endeavors because they boost participate and involvement (the later is also true of the former).
The concepts and theories have helped to identify same of the common features which a good decentralize democratic state must posses to be admitted that powers has been devolved. The frameworks have also been selected to highlight areas of possible connections for my interpretation