Every once in a while a trend is born. Its genesis is almost always unclear. Nonetheless there is merit to its inception which ensures that it continues to remain in fashion and is appropriated into other contexts. The only contention however is that its appropriation is not always done in keeping with the values which had formed the basis of its initial appeal. Such however is the tragedy of trends- these seemly creatures often fall easy prey to gross misapplications.

The predicament of ‘trends’ is an affliction which has penetrated social science as well. In our famed semantics we often like to display our hipness by terming it a ‘buzzword’. One such buzzword which took root in the development discourse is the concept of ‘participation’. This concept took root around the 1960-70’s when traditional measures of accountability such as elections, audits etc, were found to have limited success[1]. Citizen’s participation in state’s activities it was felt could play an important role in strengthening accountability and responsiveness in the delivery of public services.

Like all trends, the trend of participation had its phases. The form of participation that emerged during this initial period focussed largely on consultative mechanisms such as user committees. As a result, this period witnessed the proliferation of several such committees, such as the community health councils, tenant councils, parent committees, etc. It was hoped that the increasing participation of clients in service delivery would ‘ensure fair processes and make for better decision making’ [2]

However while participation became the new discourse to describe state society relations, there still existed an ‘arms length’ type of relationship between the two. Participation of citizens in service delivery was circumscribed to the implementation of specific government programmes with measures for responsiveness limited largely to citizen consultations, and those for accountability largely to monitoring of outputs.  Citizens were thereby prevented from exercising their agency to make choices outside this frame of reference. Moreover, the complexities of power-relations between service providers and community members and within communities themselves were summarily ignored. This was largely a fallout of the Weberian model of bureaucracy, which many developing countries had come to emulate. One of the fundamental principals of such a model called for the insulation of the bureaucracy from citizenry so as to maintain the objectivity of the public service[3].

In more recent years a ‘transgressive’ stream of research has questioned the above approach and has argued that accountability is best achieved in ‘cogovernance’ spaces. The idea of co-governance is linked to the notion of creating spaces for more direct citizen participation and involvement. This involves a repositioning of the notion of participation, wherein citizens engage in their capacity as actors rather than users and where such an engagement includes the formulation as well as the implementation of policies. This form of accountability has been termed ‘hybrid’/ social accountability, which is distinguished from other forms of accountability in that it breaks the state’s monopoly over official oversight and legitimises citizen inclusion into hitherto exclusive affairs of the state [4].

Indian policy makers have taken cue from this new notion of participation and inserted provisions for ensuring greater participation of citizens in the implementation of social sector programmes such as the Right to Education (RTE). The RTE in particular lays emphasis on involving communities in monitoring and overseeing the functioning of the schools. At the school level, School Management Committees (SMCs) are required to be established for ensuring the participation of parents in school functioning. In addition to being monitoring bodies these committees have also been empowered with important responsibilities which include formulation of school development plans, monitoring teacher attendance, controlling school finances and deciding on school expenditure.

However, just inserting clauses are not enough for co-governance to be achieved, as a brief study undertaken by Accountability Initiative indicates. The study, done across states, assessed the levels of awareness of the members of these committees. We currently only have data for one state, Andhra Pradesh.  Below are some of the findings from our study conducted with 35 SMC members across two districts;

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• 69% of the respondents could not describe their roles and responsibilities.
• None of the members knew the total amount of money received by the school in 2009-10 or 2010-11.
• 83% of the SMC member did not know of the annual grants received by the school in the previous year.
• 28% of the members stated that the HM took decisions on how the money was spent. 10% of the members stated that the SMC as a whole took such decisions while 5% stated that the SMC president took such decisions. 58% of the members did not know who took such decisions.
• 69% of the members had not heard of the RTE.
• 97% of the members did not know which children were exempted from paying a fee in government schools.

 

While some may argue that these insights are quite preliminary (which of course they are), I believe that they shed interesting insights into the nature of institutional design.. Much like the stereotype, SMCs in the name of participation have been given responsibility without sufficient agency. Consequently, SMC members are required to monitor teacher attendance and teaching without being able to take any action against them in the event that they find that teachers are not carrying out their responsibilities. Moreover SMCs have not been given specific training in carrying out their responsibilities. For instance in AP 78% of the members stated that they had not received any training. Further in cases where SMC members have been trained these trainings have not focussed on equipping members with the skills to carry out their functions. A most glaring example of this problem is how SMC members are expected to make plans and oversee expenditure without any training on the manner in which plans are required to be made, the type of funds which are disbursed to the schools and the type of expenditure which can be incurred.

Thus terms such as participation by virtue of the trendiness are inserted in precious legislation without a simple care for the fundamentals which uphold and define their very meaning. The trend of ‘trends’ thus continues!

 

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[1] Goetz, A.M and Gaventa, J. (2001) ‘Bringing Citizen Voice and Client Focus into Service Delivery’, IDS. For details see

[2] Cornwall, A. and Gaventa, J. (2001) Bridging the Gap: Citizenship, Participation and Accountability, IDS

 

[3] Aiyar, Y. etal (2009), ‘Institutionalizing Social Accountability: Considerations for Policy’ http://www.accountabilityindia.in/sites/default/files/working-paper/36_1255255017.pdf

[4] ibid