NEW PARTNERSHIPS IN URBAN SOLID WASTE IN DEVELOPING WORLD 33
information campaigners and public health inspectors Most urban administrations are
not really in position to properly arrange all this. Therefore, stories of contractors
flouting contract stipulations, corruptive practices, poor complaint handling and
inferior labour conditions keep recurring in the analysis of privatised waste collection
services in Indian cities.
Kenya
For quite a long time Kenya’s development strategy has been profoundly nationalist,
attempting to achieve three major goals: to reduce the power of the foreign capitalist
class that controlled huge parts of the post-independence economy, to Africanise the
economy, and to kick-start the industrialisation process. In order to guide the economy
in the desired direction the government became actively involved, and the government
executive, notably the president and the cabinet, was given substantial regulatory
powers (Gatheru and Shaw, 1998).
As a matter of fact the country’s favourable resource endowment ensured a relatively
strong economic performance until the 1980s. However, in the early 1990s the
economic situation deteriorated sharply due to both internal and external factors
(world wide recession, the Gulf War, poor rainfall). It drove the Kenyan government
in the arms of the Bretton Woods institutions that imposed a structural adjustment
programme. Through the familiar package of deregulation and liberalisation of
markets, privatisation of parastatals, and reduction of government spending the
economy was expected to be revitalised. But despite signs of recovery the overall
performance was disappointing.
Kenya’s economic problems can largely be attributed to the peculiarities of the
country’s political system. Considering the state’s firm control on the economy and its
role as the most important dispenser of resources, state power is the central preoccu-
pation of politics. The KANU government of president Arap Moi has successfully
used the deeply entrenched system of patronage and corruption to build an alliance of
minority ethnic elites that constitutes its power base. The current political order,
however, is extremely unstable. There are continuous clashes between the government
and oppositional groups, culminating in occasional outbreaks of ethnic violence, as
well as ongoing rivalry between pro and contra-reform factions within KANU.
Furthermore, the government’s legitimacy is threatened by people’s growing indigna-
tion about the skewed distribution of basic services, rising political repression, and
failure to turn the economic tide. Forces of change towards a further democratisation
of society and a de-emphasising of the role of ethnicity are therefore gradually gaining
ground (Southall, 1999).
The Kenyan state is notoriously unaccountable and unresponsive to the needs of the
majority of its citizens. Most representatives of the state are understandably reluctant