Public participation in environmental decision-making in kenya: Analysis of law and policy

Abstract

In recent years public participation has become to be seen as a vital part of addressing environmental problems and bringing about sustainable development. In this context, vacating the limits of solely relying on technocratic bureaucratic monopoly of decision-making, allows governments to adopt policies and enact laws that are relevant to communities and take into account their needs. The principle of public participation holds that those who are affected by a decision have a right to be involved in the decision-making process. Public participation implies that the public's contribution will influence the decision. Borrowing from the advancement of Public participation as part of a "people first" paradigm shift, this study challenges the concept that "big is better" and the logic of centralized hierarchies, advancing alternative concepts of "more heads are better than one" and arguing that public participation can sustain productive and durable change. The right to public participation is to a considerable extent enshrined by laws of the land and the notion of public participation in environmental decision making (EDM) and is gaining currency in post-modern democratic practice. However, there is little concomitant and literal engagement of the people at the earliest stages of environmental assessments. Access to environmental information for all who choose to participate in such decision-making is integral to the concept of environmental democracy. The policy of access to information, provides the foundation, and advocates providing basic information to the public. Informed with basic facts about the quality of their environment, citizens can become active participants in identifying and resolving issues at both local and national levels. Across the globe, many countries have adopted this policy and have shaped it to meet their particular needs. Advocacy in matters related to the environment has coalesced around the notion of public participation in Vlll

EDM The role of the community sector in helping these decision-makers to make good decisions cannot be over-estimated. While public participation has been advanced as a means of democratizing environmental management and conservation of the country's ecosystem, it is surprising that there are very limited compliance mechanisms or proper processes that have been put in place on how it can be actualized Individuals and community groups find it very difficult to participate meaningfully in environmental decision-making unless they have access to information relevant to the decision to be made. Ideally, the public should have access to the same information as the decision-maker. In practice, this rarely occurs. The study seeks to establish the nature and contours of public participation in EDM, with specific focus on the environmental legislations, policy and practice in Kenya; to establish the efficacy and efficiency oj the provisions of environmental related law in advancing public participation in environmental matters in Kenya; to identify Jactors limiting the ability Jor participatory environmental decision making in Kenya; and, to make appropriate recommendations on policy, legislation and practice where weaknesses exist, with a view to strengthening public participation on environmental decision-making. The study posits that unless homage is paid to these conundrums, ours is likely to be a mere perfunctory erection oj legislative frameworks without proper ideological foundations or normative processes that nurture them. In this regard, the study states at the outset that public participation in EDM must entail a bold but radical remodification of the concept and its normative edifice. This will not be attained by merely creating institutions with lofty aims, but rather, in a deliberate process of political transformation that is interwoven with virtues of IX

democratic environmental governance and normative processes. Or else, public participation will continue to remain tucked somewhere between rhetoric and reality.