It is that time of our political lives when we as citizens have to assess the performance of our public representatives and make decisions about whether to re-elect them or dump them for those we perceive to be capable of delivering on the mandate we give every five years.
Regrettably, as citizens we do not always play our role as constant monitors of how our leaders perform during their term of office. As individuals we are too weak to tackle the political heavyweights and as organised civil society there is a tendency to either lose focus of what we expect our government to do or to become too scattered to speak loudly enough to be taken seriously.
But, what is the role of civil society between elections, especially with regard to influencing public policy? And what can citizens expect from a well-functioning municipality and active citizenry?
The role of civil society in policymaking has always been a key question in addressing the state of democratic consolidation. Theoreticians and practitioners grapple with the extent to which space should be created for the public to interact with the government at policymaking level. It is important to identify convergence, complementation possibilities and coordinate and document such work among development agencies. Particularly with respect to developing and sustaining need-based initiatives and promoting awareness and rights of citizens.
Civil-society organisations have a crucial role to play in this. It is important to discuss development, participatory and representative democracy as drivers for public participation in policymaking. As we go to the polls on March 1, citizens should understand that elections are one form of deepening democracy and representative democracy in particular. They should keep in mind that even between elections they have a role to play.
Representative democracy is based on the principle that representatives must answer to the mandate that citizens give them. This covers the entire range of public policies, both in the phase of elaboration and in their implementation. Citizen participation is essential because nobody knows better what the needs are than those who are close to them.
The local government integrated development planning approach should be driven by citizens. They should participate in setting priorities for the agenda, in the design and distribution of resources and in the evaluation of achievements. If the priorities on the agenda for development are set in a participatory fashion and mechanisms for transparency and accountability are created, then there is authentic participation.
A well-functioning municipality has its citizens in the centre of planning and implementation for development. The question is whether individuals or organised civil society organisations can influence change in municipalities and who comprises this “civil society”?
Over the years there has been a realisation that governments can no longer be influenced by unorganised, powerless individuals. Instead, communities have organised themselves into groups with a specific issue to lobby and
advocate for and have since gained the strength to confront the most powerful of state machinery. This organised community is regarded as civil society organisations (CSOs) or NGOs.
Civil society keeps the state in check and will immediately act on injustices to the point of removing an autocratic regime, without seeking to replace it. It is not a party seeking political power and waiting on the sidelines for the incumbent regime to falter. If we agree that citizens have a role in making and keeping our public representatives and institutions in line with the majority’s wishes, and that, as individuals, citizens are too weak to engage the state machinery, we acknowledge that a collective is needed to ensure the gains made are for the entire population.
March 1 is the beginning of a five-year period in which we ensure that we have efficient and effective public and developmental municipalities. The 21st century is characterised by the over-legitimisation of democratic governments. Africa is succumbing to pressures to democratise, but this is accompanied by the challenge to define the content of public policy that is developmental and creates public spaces for community engagement.
In providing content and creating public spaces for discourse, thereare fundamental concepts that need to be unpacked. Municipalities that perform well must ensure that these concepts are not just niceties in public policies and frameworks, but that citizens see them as realities in places where they live.
Citizen participation is based on the principle of an active citizenry that, in addition to what has already been mentioned, demands accountability from its elected representatives, who periodically report on their actions and maintain transparent mechanisms. For the purpose of this discussion, accountability is understood as those efforts directed at establishing a close and objective relationship between the explicit intentions of public officials and their actions or services on the public’s behalf, as well as the efficient and effective use of public resources.
Accountability is one of the characteristics of the democratic process at the macro-institutional level, as well as in relation to the experience of democratic mechanisms on the micro level. One of the objectives sought by international cooperation institutions such as the European Union, the African Union, the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund and development fund agencies, is the legitimacy granted to political systems by mechanisms of accountability. Legitimacy is one of the essential elements for achieving good governance.
Finally, accountability must be central to reconstruction and transformation of our country, not just for ethical reasons and political legitimacy, but also for efficacy. Answering to our actions enables us to demand the same from others. This indirectly establishes a system of general supervision that makes it easier to monitor achievements and the appropriate use of resources.
Transparency is another principle that must govern the efforts toward transformation. By this we understand the high visibility of programmes and the availability of information to the public. Without transparency and adequate information, it is not possible to exercise the duties of accountability. Transparency is a guarantee that enables us to know who did what, when and why and this allows us to determine political, legal and administrative responsibilities and consequently set up appropriate policies.
The development of the principle of public access, understood as visibility, must be implemented by making as much information available to the public as possible on the amounts of and mechanisms for implementing local and national cooperative governance principles and resources allocation. One of the challenges to South African notions of public participation is the poor capacity of communities to understand and interpret the information supplied by the state. There is a high level of illiteracy.
Transparency and accountability are also guarantees in the face of discretionary and arbitrary actions by officials. They guarantee that state resources arrive at the final destination and that the funds are used efficiently. The upheavals that we continue to see in municipalities, where
communities sometimes use illegal means of making their demands heard, is a symptom of citizens alienation from public representatives.
This demonstrates the fact that a government’s legitimacy is compromised as soon as the public is removed from policymaking and implementation. To meet these conditions, citizens need to be involved so they can be active participants even during the policy review because then they will understand the need for review.
In conclusion, representative democracy cannot be limited to electoral democracy; it demands the creation of channels of communication between citizens and their representatives in the periods between elections. At the same time, participatory democracy cannot be reduced to street protests or plebiscites on special occasions, but rather implies deliberative democracy, rational and well-informed debate on public affairs.
The participation of civic groups and recognised social actors in the processes of setting priorities for agendas, as well as in designing,
implementing and evaluating development projects, results in effectiveness and legitimacy. This allows for a balance between the need for flexibility and the requirements inherent in the monitoring and proper use of resources based on criteria of integrity and honesty. Citizen participation contributes to good governance not just from the perspective of legitimacy, but also in terms of the effectiveness of public policies and the efficient use of resources.
Siyabonga Memela is manager of the Local Government Centre at the Institute for Democracy in Southern Africa