Community participation for urban services in Butajira Urban Center, Ethiopia: Assessing institutional features of community participation

Abstract

The purpose of this article was to investigate the institutional features that foster the community to participate in urban services in Butajira Urban Center, Ethiopia. To achieve the research purpose, the researchers employed a qualitative research approach. Qualitative techniques namely key informant interviews, document analysis, interviews, and focus groups to collect qualitative data were used. The study's findings revealed that in Butajira urban center, there were legal provisions concerning the community's right to participate in urban service provisions. Nevertheless, there was a significant disparity between legal provisions and their actual implementation. The organizational capacity of the Urban Center Government was insufficient to facilitate community participation in urban service provisions. As a result, this case study contended that in order to guide community participation, explicit regulations and rules must be established. Besides, this study contended that the urban center required intensive capacity development in order to fulfill its duties of promoting community participation. To focus on creating supportive institutional culture and favorable organizational structure, capacity development is required.