Empowering People: Insights from a Local Experiment in Participatory Planning

The 73rd and 74th Amendments of the Constitution of India opened up new opportunities for devolution of powers to Panchayati Raj Institutions. Kerala attempted a novel programme of the ‘Peoples Plan Campaign’ in 1996. a few months prior to this, the integrated Rural Technology Centre,a research wing of the Kerala Sastra Sahitya Parishad initiated an Action Research Programme in five panchayats to evolve a set of models of participatory planning for sustainable development and to create micro-level organizational structures to carry out them. This book is a systematic account of the half a decade long study involving thousand of people. The path for realizing the goal of empowerment of the people through participatory planning and implementation is an arduous one as it often upsets the apple carts of vested interests. The book deals with the heavy odds encountered in an action research that tries to modify the existing power structures at the local level. The book argues that there is no need to wait for deglobalisation and deliberalisation to bring succour to the poorest; the impact can be mitigated by recourse to strengthening of local development through people’s participation.