Planning has failed to exert effective influence on the growth of human settlements in Ghana. As a result, the growth of cities has been chaotic. The district assemblies, which are the designated planning authorities, are commonly blamed for this failure, yet little attention has been given to district assemblies’ perspectives of what factors lead to failures in planning. This paper attempts to fill this gap. Drawing on fieldwork in Ghana, it argues that, from the perspective of district assemblies, five major challenges inhibit planning, namely: an inflexible land ownership system, an unresponsive legislative framework, undue political interference, an acute human resource shortage, and the lack of a sustainable funding strategy. The paper concludes with proposals for reforming the planning system in Ghana.

Public participation as a democratic right has gained wide acceptance in local governance, both to improve accountability in service delivery and to enhance civic consciousness. Uganda now has two decades’ experience of various forms of decentralisation. However, the extent of public participation both in local planning and in holding local politicians to account has been inconsistent. Taking Buikwe District local government as a case study, the authors argued that three key factors influence public participation in local governance – access to information, ability to use information effectively, and awareness of citizens’ rights, roles and responsibilities. They found that these factors positively influenced overall respondents’ participation in local government projects by 10.2%, 19% and 22% respectively based on Pearson Correlation Coefficient. The study further found that information is not readily accessible or effectively disseminated to the majority of citizens and therefore is not fully harnessed for planning, monitoring and evaluating government projects. Reasons for this inadequate access included: limited and costly infrastructure for handling information: lack of skills in relation to how and when to use information; and lack of analytical and simplification skills among those disseminating information. In light of these findings, the paper recommends that information dissemination must be planned and carried out in a targeted and systematic way, if citizens’ awareness of their rights, roles and responsibilities in service delivery is to be achieved.

Decentralisation and local governance aim at local economic development, but collaboration among key actors at the local level is essential in realising this objective. However, at district assembly level Ghana exhibits problematic conflicts between district chief executives (DCEs), who head the executive committee, and presiding members (PMs) who convene and preside over assembly deliberations, acting as speaker. This study aims to unpack the main causes of such unsavoury conflicts by using 13 case studies from the Ashanti Region. Both primary and secondary data were collected for the study. Primary data was gathered from a selection of 40 key informants drawn from three main groups including DCEs, PMs, and other stakeholders such as regional coordinating council members, assembly members and chiefs. The main research instrument was one-on-one in-depth interviews with participants. The study found deep-seated conflicts between DCEs and PMs, in some cases even transcending these two actors to involve a greater section of actors within the local government administration. The study noted that professional bureaucrats within the local government service are affected when allegations of affiliation are levelled against them. The study also found that the legal status of DCEs and PMs appears to be the main driver of potential conflict, although other context-specific issues were also prevalent.

Canada has experienced two formal federal ministries dedicated to addressing urban issues. The first, the Ministry of State for Urban Affairs, encountered resistance from provincial governments and its fellow departments. Both worked to undermine it. The second, the Ministry of State for Infrastructure and Communities, was created with a more conciliatory tone towards the provincial governments and its ministerial colleagues. This paper examines the establishment of both ministries and tracks their efforts using a policy learning and lesson-drawing framework, concluding that common institutional actors, such as the Privy Council, were responsible for the Ministry of State for Infrastructure and Communities’ change in tone and approach to multilevel governance. General lessons are drawn about inter-governmental relations and multi-level policy formation in federal systems.

This paper begins with an explanation of the nature of local government in Botswana, its structures, and their functions and accomplishments since independence. It then proceeds to look at the challenges, and considers measures for meeting them. It ends by looking at future prospects and draws some lessons.