Citizen Engagement in Promoting Environmentally Sustainable Cities. A Case of Harare

Abstract

The overall objective of the study was to measure the extent of citizen engagement in crafting the City of Harare’s environmental sustainability policies, programmes and activities. The specific objectives of the study were to examine the City of Harare’s environmental sustainability policies, programmes and activities, to assess the nature of citizen engagement in the crafting of City of Harare’s environmental sustainability policies, programmes and activities and to analyse the weaknesses of current policy provisions and improvements that may be adopted to make Harare an environmentally sustainable city. The research adopted an exploratory case study research design using qualitative approaches. In this study, an exploratory case study research design was employed to navigate the role of the public in the execution of City of Harare’s programmes, activities and in the crafting of policy provision aimed at promoting environmental sustainability in Harare. The population of the study encompassed the Harare residents in the metropolitan areas’ busiest streets and those who attend town hall budgetary meetings. The study found that most of the policies, programmes and activities of the city of Harare are championed from the central government to the local authority as policy tools to buttress the Zimbabwe smart sustainable cities roadmap. The researcher also characterised the City of Harare’s citizen engagement efforts as remote and smokescreen enterprises for informing, consulting, involving, collaborating and empowering citizens in the framing of council activities for smart cities and environmental sustainability. The study found that key officials in the City Harare, particularly the administrators and councillors lack understanding of democratic governance and the relevance of the participatory approaches at the local government level. The study found current policy provision on environmental sustainability lacks evidence of empirical collaborative visioning and planning in the framing of the City of Harare’s Vision 2025. The study recommends the training of the administrators of the city council. The city council needs to invest resources in training administrators for them to get a deeper understanding and appreciation of citizen engagement and democratic governance with the council operations. The researcher recommends that the central government should come up with complementary policies and technical approaches that provide robust and tangible solutions for scaling up development initiatives in the local authorities. The study also recommends the residents to refrain from the culture of apathy regarding participation at the local government level and that they (residents) should keep themselves well informed of what is transpiring in their respective local councils.