GOVERNANCE OF SOCIAL SERVICES - THE CASE OF POTABLE WATER AND BASIC SANITATION SERVICES DELIVERY WITHIN WA MUNICIPALITY.

Abstract

The global recognition of governance in policy formulation has resulted in a shift from attention to a macro-level (national/global) questions of policy making and state-society relationship. As social development experts looked for answers to problems of access sustainability, ‘governance’ entered the vocabulary of social services operation and delivery as a means toward realising those answers. However, the approach to governance has been largely statist in the realm of a globalised world. The policy direction relative to water and sanitation in Ghana, just as any developing economy, has been toward expanding access coverage across the country to meet the global goal. Therefore, concentration on access expansion had left little room for policy makers, researchers and the academia alike to delve more into investigating the nature of user-provider relationship, beyond access to services. Hence, through exploratory as well as survey design, this study focused on governance practice at the organisational level, as relates to service delivery. The motivation is to establish a service user-provider relationship framework relative to the existing policy regime. In that regard, extent of user-participation in the service delivery framework within the Wa Municipality of the Upper West Region of Ghana was determined. The findings of the study indicated an element of governance at the organisational level in relation to the operations of water and sanitation services providers. The organisational management of service-provider makes room for interactive and responsive participatory channels, revealed in this study. However, the extent of participation significantly varied between water and sanitation service-users. Whilst the sanitation management service had shown high user-participation, that of water instead was very low. On this basis, the study concluded that, the policy regime determines which and how serviceprovider operates relative to delivery of water and sanitation services. However, it is the nature of organisational management of the service-provider which determines the extent of userparticipation in the user-provider relationship in the sector. Therefore, the study recommends for a deliberate policy to promote effective competition in both water and sanitation sectors, among service-providers. This will lead to a more user-inclusive in management operations of service providers, hence promoting participation (i.e. governance).