Decentralisation and the empowerment of local communities in Tanzania with special focus on water issues

ABSTRACT

Action researchers are empowered because they carry out research with rather than on participants. Likewise, the Tanzanian government has been attempting to devolve power to the people since independence. The latest efforts started in the 1980s and focused on the devolution of power from central government to the people through local governments. The uniqueness of the decentralization process and the associated reforms in the country have attracted some scholarly attention, with researchers asserting that the existing model of local government, famously known as Decentralization by Devolution (D-by-D), has considerable potential. However, past research on decentralization has generally been disempowering. Using Action Research (AR), this study aimed to explore strategies to empower local marginalized communities, as co-researchers, to identify key local challenges in accessing public resources, notably water, and enable them to take initial steps towards addressing them through existing local government structures. The application of AR suggests that Tanzania has strong local government structures that can accommodate the participation of marginalized communities in the management of water and other public resources. Nevertheless, local communities need to be empowered through participatory approaches to best interact with the local government structures and ensure accountability in the management of such resources.

KEYWORDS:

• Action research
• decentralization
• local government
• Tanzania
• empowerment
• water

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Funding

The work was supported by the TGNP Mtandao [TGNP is a Tanzanian national NGO advocating for gender equality and justice in Agriculture, Water, Health, Education, and Extractive Industries (TGNP, 2023)].