3. Electronic Theses and Dissertations (ETDs) - All submissions
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Item The nature of participatory democracy practices in Madibeng municipality(2017) Sephai, Moyagabo LouisaThis report sought to determine the nature of participatory democracy practices in Madibeng municipality. In order to achieve the intension of this study, two research questions were formulated (1) what is the nature of participatory democracy in Madibeng municipality? (2) To what extent does the implementation of participatory democracy mechanisms influence municipal policy decisions? A hypothesis was formulated in respect of the second question that: The implementation of participatory democracy mechanisms in Madibeng is limited to compliance with existing laws and regulations. Data was drawn from two strata’s (population samples), [ward councillors and community members] from Madibeng municipality. A probability simple random sampling was used to collect data from a total list of 36 ward councillors, whilst a non-probability convenient sampling was used to collect data from 27 community members. In respect of ward councillors, the study targeted 26 respondents and only achieved 52% response rate, whilst a total of 11 respondent was targeted and 27 responses were attained, indicating 145% response rate in respect of data collected from community members. The general finding in relation to the first question is that participatory democracy practice in Madibeng municipality is characterised by the implementation of five mechanisms; IDP, Ward committee structures, Mayoral imbizos, Policy public hearings and Petitioning system. A revelation was made that communities prefer to participate in IDP and ward committee structures meetings than the other three mechanisms reflected in the report. However, it remained unclear as to how effective and efficient is the exercising of the two preferred mechanisms. The general arguments found in various literature sources, that the practice of participatory democracy in South Africa’s local municipalities seem ineffective and often do not often yield positive results, was also confirmed by this study. This conclusion was based on the revelations made from the contradicting responses given by ward councilors and community members. In general, ward councilors considered the implementation of available participatory democracy practices in Madibeng as effective and strongly believed such practices informs the municipal Executive Council’s policy decisions to a large extent. On the other hand, community members seemed unsure or inadequately informed about the influence, their participation in policy decisions has on the overall service delivery by the municipality.