Devolution: Restructuring the Kenyan State

Abstract

This essay was originally presented as a lecture to the African Research and Resource Forum at the Kenya International Conference Centre, Nairobi, on 23 November 2007. The author has previously served as Chairperson of the Constitution of Kenya Review Commission, and Chair of the National Constitutional Conference, popularly known in Kenya as ‘Bomas’. The essay surveys his thoughts on the status of the constitutional debate in Kenya as the election of December 2007 approached, in the midst of that campaign. The text has not been amended in any way in light of the electoral crisis and violence that has consumed Kenya since 29 December 2007, and so reflects a pre-crisis perspective.