Engaging Traditional Leaders in Local Governance

Devising a Generalisable Framework for Sub-Saharan Africa

Bibliographic Data

ID20303142
AuthorsKanishka Balasuriya (0000-0003-0721-4207, Independent researcher, corresponding author)
Year2023
Volume59
Issue5
Pages637-652
Publication date2023-05-04
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenueThe Journal of Development Studies (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0022-0388 • E-ISSN: 1743-9140
PublisherInforma UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/00220388.2023.2172332
OpenAlexW4319317464
LanguageEN
Citations received2
References cited21

In Sub-Saharan Africa, traditional leaders play a significant role in local communities and their cooperation is viewed as mandatory for successful development interventions. However, systematic guidance in engaging them has been scarce due to significant heterogeneity between communities and difficulties in borrowing lessons from other contexts. Outcomes are shaped by many variables relating to the state’s engagement strategy and the community’s inherent characteristics. These variables interact in an ad hoc manner to produce outcomes. This paper demonstrates how the selectorate theory—a political economy framework originally devised to analyse national-level politics—could be adapted to local communities to interpret local power relations. Avoiding a range of indistinct variables, the selectorate theory reduces local political dynamics into two common variables, e.g. ‘selectorate’ and ‘winning coalition’, providing both a logical basis for positive engagement and a structured framework for comparative analysis

Corporate governance · Economic system · Economics · Management · Political science · Politics · Power (physics) · Psychological intervention · Sociology · State (computer science) · African studies and sociopolitical issues · Computer Science · Culture, Economy, and Development Studies · International Development and Aid · Law · Psychology

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