 GOVERNANCE AND REGIONAL DEVELOPMENT DISPARITIES IN KENYARegional and Sectoral Economic Studies, 2023, vol. 23, issue 1, 51-72 Abstract: This study explores Northeastern Kenya's regional development dynamics pre and post decentralization. The centralized structure of governance in Kenya brought a lot of challenges post-independence; the governance system was plagued with regional development disparities, lack of public involvement in governance processes, and marginalization of some communities. The decentralized constitution recognized the need for equity in development planning across the country. This study was anchored on the growth pole philosophical paradigm, economic development strategy, and cumulative causation theories. We conducted a desk review of two constitutions, government annual financial reports, and decentralized units integrated medium-term development plans. We comparatively evaluated development differences before and after decentralization in the region. With the emergence of political and fiscal decentralization in Kenya, the study revealed that counties in the northeastern region have seen development projects trickling down to their regions since the implementation of the new constitution in the year 2013. In the region, massive infrastructure investments have been made in roads and health programs, local gross domestic products have increased, fiscal decentralization has increased, and primary and secondary education facilities have been improved. There is a lot of promise in decentralization driving regional development in marginalized counties we investigated. Indeed, as demonstrated in this study, there are apparent indications that the northern counties have begun to witness growth because of devolution. Moreover, the main challenge that is bedeviling decentralization and that the government should pay much attention to in Northern parts of Kenya is lack of transparency in financial resource management; this is hurting the implementation of many development projects within the region. Keywords: Decentralization Governance Regional Development Disparities; Kenya (search for similar items in EconPapers) Downloads: (external link) Related works: Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eaa:eerese:v:23:y2023:i:1_4 Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from Access Statistics for this article More articles in Regional and Sectoral Economic Studies from Euro-American Association of Economic Development |
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