Power to the people?

This study takes its point of departure in community participation processes. It shows that development efforts aiming to enhance community participation tend to underplay both local inequalities and power relations within communities. Theoretically, the study reveals how the community participation concept builds on a long range of silent assumptions, which tend to underestimate the influence of power. On the basis of empirical studies from two rural communities in Ghana, the study further explores what actually happens when participatory strategies are implemented, and aims at providing in-depth knowledge on how community participation unfolds in the everyday context of local communities. The case studies demonstrate how participatory spaces seen as ‘produced space’ are shaped by existing forms of organisation, relations of power, and perceptions of authority and legitimacy. Moreover, it is shown how neglecting these structures can result in reproducing uneven power relations instead of challenging them. As such, the study sheds light on how participatory spaces becomes a terrain for negotiating, contesting and maintaining authority based on different strategies of legitimation.