Sustainable City Governance. Which Way Now?

Table of Contents

Abstract

1. Introduction
1.1 Justification
1.2 Scope and Organization

2.0 The Sustainability and City Governance Discourse
2.1 Global Initiatives

3.0 Problems with the Global Initiatives
3.1 Alternative approach: Which Way Now?
3.2 Conclusion

Reference

Abstract

This paper examines various global policy initiatives targeted at addressing sustainable city governance. It aims at proposing a better governance model to creating sustainable city milieu for optimum result. The study gathered relevant literature on the subject matter and adopted James Scott’s thesis on “Matis” (Local Knowledge) as analytical framework. It contends that Brundtland’s Report which outdoored Sustainable Development thesis and others thereafter mostly imposed from international intergovernmental perspective only acknowledge city governance needs facing Least Developing Countries (LDCs) rather than addressing them. Moreover, these global initiatives in practice end up being an oversimplified agenda imposed from above, an agenda that is often insensitive to local needs and realities. The paper recommended that, in a rapidly urbanizing world, the hope for mitigation and adaptation policies that better reflect local needs and realities rests on the key role of cities, citizens and their mayors, who are at a much better position to act effectively than state leaders to address the needs of their cities. It concluded by recommending the roadmaps detailed in section 174 of Act 925 to meet the specific needs of the Ghana.

Keyword: Sustainable Development, City, Governance, Matis (Local Knowledge)

1. Introduction

The creation of sustainable city and urban nature has become an important global policy goal. Urban biodiversity is seen as increasingly crucial to ensuring human wellbeing and livable city. Cities and towns are highly typified as the theater of prosperity and innovation and the World Bank in its Global Monitoring Report estimated that more than 80 percent of global economic activity is produced in cities by just over half of the world’s population (World Bank, 2013). Beal et al (2010) characterized cities as the platform that offers economies of scale for productive enterprise and public investment. The city is further addressed as social melting pots; stage for innovation, political engagement, and cultural interchange; and drivers of social change (ibid). Cities have therefore increasingly assumed jurisdiction for enterprises of production, distribution and consumption. However, beside the apparent benefits of agglomeration, there are also costs. Cities are marked by social discrimination, poverty, conflict, and environmental degradation. Cohen (2006) argues that rapid urban growth throughout the developing world is seriously outstripping the capacity of most cities to provide adequate services for their citizens (Cohen, 2006; IPPC, 2007).

Global efforts at addressing urban development challenges in order to conduct sustainable city since the dawn of neoliberal economic reform were mainly imposed from international governmental perspective with little or no attention to role of local knowledge. These global governance policies and systems have fail to address the negative externalities of the city because they fail to understand the makeup of the city.

These global city governance initiatives to creating egalitarian city do acknowledge the needs of developing countries. However, there is a crucial difference between acknowledging needs and addressing needs, and this is where such global initiatives are deficient. The challenge of Less Developed Countries (LDCs) in the context of a creating and maintaining sustainable cities is surely not a small one. Inequality has been on the increase within and between urban reproductive spaces, tonnages of waste have quadrupled coupled with uncontrolled and unplanned settlement. The rich countries of today have reached high levels of comfort and well-being with an environmental blank check, achieving growth without any restrictions on greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions or any other globally imposed environmental constraint (World Bank 2010). LDCs want to attain the same quality of life as their richer counterparts but will arguably have to play a major role in meeting sustainable development goals particularly, goal eleven (11) of 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development while at the same time having to be resilient to environmental instability in order to develop (World Bank 2010; Ayers and Dodman 2010).

There are mixed scholarships on the sustainable city governance discourse. Many have attempted to investigate and propose best governance approach and practices for better performance (Lindsrom et al, 2006; Jordan, 2008; Evans, 2006). But most of these studies failed to set the subject matter on robust theoretical foundation from city governance perspective as well as how these proposals are failing to address the needs of LDCs and further propose alternative approach based on local knowledge. It is this gap in literature that this paper intends to fill.

This paper first of all present the sustainability argument before providing a brief recap of the global initiatives to tackle sustainable city and discuss how they acknowledge the challenges facing LDCs. The paper further discussed how such initiatives are improper to address the challenges of LDCs. The paper finally adopts James Scot thesis on Matis (Local knowledge) to propose a different governance approach to produce better ways of formulating and implementing global initiative policies targeted at sustainable city making.

1.1 Justification

The empirical evidences available suggest that cities are home to 54% of the world’s population and the population is projected to hit 66% by half of this century (UN Habitat, 2016). Urban growth rate of Africa is almost 11 times more rapid than the growth rate in Europe and averages 3.70% growth from 1995 to 2015 (ibid; UN, 2014b). It is suggested that the current urban governance model (top down approach) that administer this growth rates is unsustainable because it puts many people at risk, creates unnecessary costs, negatively affects the environment, and is not inclusive. It conveys a clear message that the pattern of city development and governance issues need to change in order to better respond to the challenges of our time, to address issues such as inequality, climate change, informality, insecurity, and the unsustainable forms of urban expansion. Changes in urban governance model and narrative should result reversal of urban development challenges, promote and secure both individual and nations physical investment projects.

There is therefore the need to deliberately design city governance policies and practices which readily attend to the need of LDCs. One sided approach from global governance perspective to solving peculiar national and subnational questions is impracticable and at worst ill thought. The recommendation of this paper is one of the means to this end.

This paper is also intended to contribute to the discourse on proactive and innovative ways of fashioning sustainable city governance milieu. Its agenda is to engender discourse on alternative policy direction preferably from the standpoint of local technology and practice. The internalization of localized policies would result in bottom-up approach to sustainable city governance practices as opposed to top-down paradigm proposed for all countries and their cities.

1.2 Scope and Organization

The study is limited to the discourse on global measure to sustainable city governance. Relevant literature on global initiative were considered and presented and the schools of thought on the topic of sustainable development presented.

The study was organized and presented in three major parts. The first part comprises the presentation on the need for the paper, set objectives, methodology, justification and scope of the paper. It is followed with the sustainability argument and successive global initiative to sustainable city governance. The final part presents alternative, and practical approach to creating sustainable city.

2.0 The Sustainability and City Governance Discourse

The notion sustainability emerged mainly in the 1980 with ecological consideration (UNFP, 1980) with little or no regard to the economic, social and environmental dimensions of sustainability. In 1983, the United Nation appointed the World Commission on Environment and Development after the Stockholm declaration in 1972 in response to the environmental degradation, debt crisis, ozone depletion and financial crisis (Neil, 2007). In the same year, the Brundtland Commission was established and came out with a report known as the Brundtlands Report in 1987 dubbed “our common future”. According to the report, sustainable development is a development that meets the needs of the present generation without compromising the ability of the future generations to meet their own need (WCSD, 1987). The concept was globally out-doored and subsequently featured greatly in global policy lexicon during the 1992 ‘Earth Summit’ in Rio de Janeiro. The report proposed that for development to become sustainable, it must be economically feasible, socially acceptable and environmentally feasible. The issue of how to grow an economy, distribute the growth fairly and in the process not degrade the ecology became keenly contested between the expansionists such as Daly and ecologist such as Dixon (1999). Lele (1991), sees the definition as having significant problem because it left sustainability being about everything and therefore potentially nothing. Similarly, Gunder (2006) critiqued that sustainable development as a ploy by planners to regain the relevance to coordinate and facilitate developmental goals. He further contends that the concept exacerbates inequality and does not attend to the needs of the disadvantaged and that meeting immediate needs is more important than meeting future needs. Throgmorten (2003) on the other hand contends that economic growth alone is not enough and that social, environmental, social and economic aspects are interconnected. (Carter and Bayley, 2007). It was thus proposed that what constitute the needs of the future is at best a guess and that resources of todays should be invested to guarantee the future of the unborned.

Key concepts within the definition were deemed to complex and have generated contestation since 1987. Key questions challengers of ask are: what constitute the need of the present and the future generation and how do we know if the needs we are preserving for them would be valued by the future; what constitute enough exploitation or in order words what constitute limit to growth; how can massive current spate of poverty be reduced without exceeding the regenerative capacity of the ecosystem and finally how can we ensure economic growth and at the same time distribute the welfare equitably and without increasing the ecological footprint of the earth’s planet. It is this conundrum and many others not mentioned that are responsible for the tensions inherent within the definition of sustainable development.

The WCSD 1987 was critiqued by Carter, (2007) for its failure to provide comprehensive framework for the key and contestable concepts in the definition. The concept of needs according to Carter (2007) connotes that an overriding priority should be given to the poor in the developed country. The opponents of the sustainability discourse have challenged the argument of what constitute needs both intra-generationally and inter-generationally. Should the need be defined based on consumption levels of the advanced world or consumption levels of LDCs. Currently, it is generally known that the needs of the advance countries are higher than needs of third world countries. The challenge is to be able to ensure intra-generational equity should the consumption patterns be curbed in the developing world and transferred to the developing world and if that should be the case, how must it been feasible should be vigorously pursued. For example, considering a hypothetical case where one wish to provide transportation to its citizenry but faced with limited resources. The country is faced with two main challenges; the first of which is to provide rail transport to reduce traffic congestion, reduce pollution and satisfy the needs of the elite class. Alternative means is for the country to provide buses to meet the needs of the poor but increase environmental pollution.

Related to the above is the notion of how far should countries, individuals and firms pursue growth. Inherent within this conundrum is the issue of limited “what level of pollution, economic growth is permissible”. The proponent of the ecological school or the neo-Malthusian led by Dixon (1999) proposed that, a development does not exceed the regenerative capacity of the recourses. The expansionist such as Esther Boserup on the other hand argues that, innovation would induce infinite human ingenuity through institutions, policy and markets. Put differently, human ingenuity would help sustain the resource supply base to meet man’s needs. Campbel, (1996) categorises these shares of interaction as resource conflict. Exemplifying the phenomenon, he maintained that, what constitutes enough of development is contestable. For instance, industrial capitalist in order to reduce increase labour wage needs to cut down on firm’s profit. Secondly, industrial capitalist in order to curb resource conflict might have to cut down on production, which decrease the level of profit. This according to him might lead to the industrialiser reducing labour quantity thus increasing level of poverty. However, the question of what level of reduction is required to achieve equilibrium is much contested. It is in line with this that, that WCSD, 1987 posit, that sustainable development is not achievable unless there is drastic reduction poverty and inequality levels. While this action would lead reduction in environmental pollution, the redundancy would subject families to poverty, culminating in malnutrition, school dropout which would intern result in what Hardin (1968) prefer to call “the tragedy of the commons”: the exploitation of available resources.

Arguably, the definition of sustainable development sought to predict not only the aspiration of the future generation but also when that future falls due. However, how far into the future should we forecast into and how can we anticipate what the future generations want remained unanswered by the Brundtland report.

Governance for sustainable development became pivotal in the sustainability argument following the Earth Summit in 1992. Particularly, the means of realizing the conduct of sustainable city and its milieu became topical in both academic and policy discourse. This is so because it was argued that sustainability affects all spheres of city development and management. (OECD, 2002, p. 2) asserts that: ‘good governance and sound public management are preconditions for the implementation of sustainable development policies’. Their study failed to recommend the requisite approach to realizing sustainable city besides mentioning it.

This paper adopts the definition of UN-Habitat (2002, p. 15). It defines governance as the sphere of public debate, partnership, interaction, dialogue and indeed conflict and dispute entered into by local citizens and organizations and by local government. It implies the diversity of many ways in which individuals and institutions, public and private, plan and manage the common affairs of the city. It is a continuing process through which conflicting or diverse interests may be accommodated and cooperative action taken (ibid). The definition connotes a system in which local people participate in formulating, realizing and expressing the ideal of the city since local people play major role in city’s development through investment and enterprise. Governance for sustainable city arguably denotes a diffuse network of representation of diverse concerned actors as opposed to imposed international intergovernmental utopian set of ideal in environmental regulation. The world city report recommended the achievement of sustainable city within a frame a local governance system characterized by deep citizen involvement and inclusiveness (UN Habitat, 2016). It is in this light that unlike the Millennium Development Goals, 2030 Agenda for Development for the first time specifically made provision for cities. Goal 11 of the new Sustainable Development Agenda seeks to make cities and human settlements inclusive, safe, resilient and sustainable (United Nations 2015b). However, none of the key indicator attempted to address role of local knowledge to achieving the goal 11. Prior, Christie & Warburton (2001, p. 154) argued that the fundamental driver of sustainable development must be democratic debate decisions reached through open discussion, consensus based on shared goals and trust. Their argument failed to prescribe the nature and scope of the intended governance: whether governance from the top to the bottom or bottom to top.

One of the cardinal global initiatives at whipping sustainability through the lens of local partnership was the out-dooring of Local Agenda 21 (LA21). Witnessing the contribution localization of sustainability agenda, Evans et al (2006) witnessed that changes needed to achieve Sustainable city cannot be secured by governments alone, but through mobilization of citizens, interest groups, local communities and stakeholders. Their study found that the key agency for initiating change is local government itself, and as the history of LA21 in Europe over the last decade has clearly shown, very little would have happened without the energy, leadership and commitment of local government, politicians and officials (Evans & Theobald, 2001, 2003). Thus sustainable city governance is the process of directing and controlling the affairs of the city through active engagement of local and their knowledge through social capital activation. Governance through the deployment of social capital is important at unleashing and capacitating institutional capital and social capital needed for partnership, dialogue and coordination of sustainable development. Institutional capital according to Healey et al (2002) is the internal patterns of behaviour and ways of working, as well as the collective values, knowledge and relationships that exist within any organized group in society. It is the continuing capital that erupts from engagement and deployment of local knowledge. Thus, in most cases sustainable development achievement requires local government to involve external organizations in partnerships, both formal and informal.

2.1 Global Initiatives

The World Commission on Environment and Development (1987), informally known as the Brundtland Commission, was the first global initiative to recognize the “common future” of humanity. The report put forward by the commission defined and popularized the term sustainable development as "development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs", a definition that is still widely cited and used presently. This definition of sustainable development recognizes that environment, economy, and equity (the three E’s) are all part of the same agenda. In other words, its message is that if a government proposes a policy that only takes the environment into consideration, in detriment of growth and social equity goals, it will not be a good policy. The initiative failed to internalize the global governance policy from the perspective of the city’s and local knowledge. Since the aspects of economic growth and social equity are crucial development needs of LDCs, it is therefore possible to say that the needs of LDCs are acknowledged by this global initiative.

The next major global initiative to address environmental issues was the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED), also known as the Earth Summit or the Rio Summit. The story here is similar: the declaration put forward recognized 27 guiding principles to sustainable development, some of which are a direct reference to the needs of LDCs (UNCED 1992). The right to development (Principle 3), the eradication of poverty (Principle 5), and priority for the least developed (Principle 6) are the clearest examples of how the summit acknowledges the specific needs and challenges faced by cities of developing countries.

Arising out of the Earth Summit, Agenda 21 is the action plan to guide the implementation of the goals determined in the conference. The Section I of Agenda 21, entitled Social and Economic Dimensions, provides specific directions to issues pertaining to LDCs, such as combatting poverty and achieving a more sustainable population, amongst others (UNCED 1992). Also coming out of the Earth Summit was the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC 1992), a treaty providing a platform for the negotiation of international climate protocols, such as the infamous Kyoto Protocol.

The Kyoto Protocol is itself another good example of a global initiative concerned with the needs of LDCs. The exemption from GHG emission reductions for non-Annex I (UNFCCC 1997) countries is somewhat of a recognition that in order to grow you have to pollute, and that it would be unfair to place the burden of climate mitigation on countries still striving for a decent level of quality of life. Moreover, the Clean Development Mechanism (one of the flexible mechanisms defined by the protocol) allows poor countries to obtain investment from richer countries in climate change mitigation projects, potentially allowing LDCs to benefit from technology transfers. Hence, the CDM is another way in which needs of the LDCs is acknowledged by global initiatives.

The Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) is another global initiative that attempted to acknowledge the needs of LDCs in terms of city development. These were eight goals that all 191 UN Member States have agreed to try to achieve by 2015. The declaration which was signed in September, 2000 commit world leaders to combat poverty, hunger, disease, illiteracy, environmental degradation and discrimination against women. These goals at best acknowledged the needs of LDCs because LDCs have high levels of vulnerability and least levels of coping mechanism. The gap created by MGDs is its failure to capture targets for effective city governance. Industries are often located within city space and it is within the city space that industrial activities release noxious substances that cause irreparable damage to our earth’s planet. Similarly, majority of the world’s poor are located within the city. The unprecedented platform the city presents for interaction and interrelation within the city environment should have provided sufficient justification for its inclusion in MDGs. This, when included would have allowed for the bridging other relevant issue which often escape policy initiatives such as current spate of land grabbing in global south, dispossessing people who inhabit peri-urban interface of their livelihood in agriculture.

Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) popularly known as Agenda 2030 was international policy initiative that succeeds and addresses the challenges MDGs. This agenda is a plan of action for people, planet and prosperity. SDGs made provision for creating cities and human settlements which are inclusive, safe, resilient and sustainable. Like many other initiative that precedes it, SDGs also failed to make provision for city governance model within the set targets.

3.0 Problems with the Global Initiatives

However, as mentioned before, acknowledging needs is not the same as addressing needs. The major problem regarding these global initiatives is that they are agendas imposed from above, and they are usually not sensitive or adaptable to local needs and realities. The global climate change agenda seems to be prescribing an oversimplified solution to a complex problem; and simple solutions to complex problems are never a good idea (Ostrom 2012). Although global efforts have their merit in seeing the challenges of LDCs, this usually does not translate into efforts to address the needs that these countries face, needs that are often context-specific at a very local level.

The idea of oversimplification is well captured by James Scott (1998) in Seeing like a State. According to Scott, states have the need to oversimplify societies in order to turn them legible and manageable. However, “state-initiated social engineering” usually fails due to: (1) an “administrative ordering of nature of society”; (2) a “high modernist ideology”, that is, overconfidence in scientific/technical progress and a “rational design of social order”; (3) the tendency of states to be authoritarian when imposing agendas; (4) a weakened civil society, which becomes incapable of resisting (Scott, 1998).

These elements cited by Scott are clearly noticeable in the global initiative typified above The nationalization and privatization of common property in the name of more efficient management of resources is a clear attempt of “administrative ordering of nature and society”. However, there is evidence that such approaches, especially privatization, does not always lead to better management and only promotes inequalities, as it unevenly distributes the natural resources of the previously common land amongst the new fragments of private property (Runge 1986; Shanmugaratman 1996). The privatization of security and the endorsement of public – private partnership by these global initiatives has resulted in the retreat of the state from certain social spheres and city spaces typically exacerbating marginalization of low income areas (Jaffe, 2012). These neoliberal global initiatives further resulted in creating disordered society, inequality, poverty as well as emergence of urban crime and violence. Goldstein et al. (2010) found that shrinking public expenditure and emphasis on public – private partnerships have resulted in the privatization of many service hitherto provided by the state, most importantly security, with citizens of LDCs becoming responsibilized for safeguarding their own physical integrity and material belongings.

Moreover, the high modernist ideology present in the climate change agenda often downplays the “depth and breadth of local knowledge” (Ayers and Dodman 2010) and practices, which may already be sustainable. This overconfidence in scientific and technical progress, especially regarding the promise of innovations and technology transfers to LDCs, is clearly present in the discourses of the World Bank (2010) and of Economic Optimists (Dixon 1999). However, there is no evidence that a major scientific breakthrough will occur; but even if it does, it will not necessarily address the specific development needs of LDCs.

The tendency of states to become authoritarian can be seen in the simple action of imposing agendas from above. The imposition of globally defined goals into local contexts is never smooth, as it inevitably conflicts with existing local realities (Scott 1998). This means that it requires a certain degree of power and authority by the state. Policies of nationalization and privatization of land are once again examples of such phenomenon (Runge 1986; Shanmugaratman 1996; Ayers and Dodman 2010; Scott 1998). Scott would call this the suppression of metis knowledge, that is, the local knowledge of local people. Scott provides several anecdotes to show how local communities often already have local solutions to local environmental problems, and how external impositions might harm existing sustainable practices.

Finally, a weakened civil society is of special concern in the context of adaptation to climate change. Scott is concerned with the incapability of citizens to resist to state actions. In the case of climate change, however, this can be expanded into a concern regarding the ability to adapt. With local practices obstructed and local knowledge suppressed, adaptation to a changing climate might become even more difficult. Since, adaptation to climate change is a crucial feature in the context of development policies (Ayers and Dodman 2010), the decreased ability to adapt can be extremely harmful when considering the needs of LDCs.

3.1 Alternative approach: Which Way Now?

The failure of global initiatives raises the question of whether they are the correct approaches to tackle city’s governance. These initiatives require state participation, action, and commitment, something which has proven to be extremely difficult and problematic. Also, as seen in the previous section, the action of nation-states in imposing the global agenda for city governance can potentially be troublesome. Political scientist Benjamin Barber (2013) argues that nation-states are 18th century inventions dealing with 21st century problems; in other words, states are not the right actors to be addressing contemporary global issues such sustainable city governance. In contrast, Barber defends that cities have done and can do much more to provide mitigation and adaptation solutions to sustainable urbia and other important global issues. Cities are more efficient in identifying and addressing local problems and needs. They are governed by mayors who are “homeboys”, individuals who were born and raised in the place they govern, and who therefore have deeper understanding of the local realities and a closer relationship to citizens (Barber 2013).

Cities have demonstrated much more interest and engagement in global climate change negotiations than nation-states. The best example of how cities have been successful in dialoguing and sharing practices is the C40 Cities Climate Change Leadership Group. This is a network of megacities that comes together to discuss and collaborate on climate change actions, such as GHG emission reductions, by harnessing assets from different member cities. It is estimated that the actions of C40 cities will reduce annual GHG emissions by 248 million tons in 2020, and over 1 billion tons by 2030 (C40 2014). Also, few people know that after the failed COP-15 meeting in 2009, members of the C40 network stayed to discuss climate action “behind the scenes” after state leaders left, demonstrating the how much more committed to solutions city leaders were in reaching a agreements (Barber 2013). In Mayor Bloomberg’s words:

[w]hile international negotiations continue to make incremental progress, C40 Cities are forging ahead. Collectively they have taken more than 5,000 actions to tackle climate change, and the will to do more is stronger than ever. As innovators and practitioners, our cities are at the forefront of this issue – arguably the greatest challenge of our time (C40 2013).

The problem of city governance is a local one, but since the world is increasingly urban and 80% of GHG emissions come from cities (Barber 2013), this opens up a historical opportunity to tackle climate change at a more promising and realistic scale of action.

Many countries of the Global North and South including Netherlands, Sweden, Denmark, Brazil and Mexico have found place for their denizens to participate directly in the building and governing the city.

Ghana has made to some extent provision for local participation towards city engineering and governance. Relevant provisions of the Land Use and Spatial Planning Act, 2016 (Act 925) has made provision for local participation in land use planning and administration. Specifically, section 174 stipulates as follow:

174 (2) That, the District Assembly shall make the draft spatial development framework, structure plan and local plan available for public consultation for a period of not less than four weeks. Act, 925 further mandates the District Assembly among other things to make the plan available at the Public Data Room; publish the consultation procedure in a newspaper of national circulation; inform the public by posting of notices at the premises of the District Assembly and by publication on the official website of the District Assembly or by any other means, where and how opinions, objections and submissions may be lodged; invite designated stakeholders to submit opinions and objections; arrange public meetings and hearings; arrange for poster sessions in public institutions; and receive and record opinions and objections as part of the adoption procedure.

These provisions as enshrined in Act, 925 are admission of the importance of bottom-up approach to city governance and a justified cause for deepening local partnership and participation towards crafting sustainable city. It is also an admission that engagement of local knowledge (Matis) is non-negotiable if we want to realize workable and robust land use, sustainable zooning practices and to arrest uncontrolled development. The provisions sketched above if properly implemented in Ghana should attend to the needs of LDCs rather than acknowledging them. This is so because local engagement should stimulate policy ownership by the partners, build social capital, legitimizes public and private projects, better promote self-reliant and therefore culminate into sustainable city development.

3.2 Conclusion

Global initiatives to tackle governance issue of sustainability have their merit in acknowledging needs of LDCs. Nonetheless, acknowledging needs is different than addressing needs. These global initiatives in practice end up being an oversimplified agenda imposed from above, an agenda that is often insensitive to local needs and realities. Moreover, global initiatives rely upon agreements decided at the state level, and states might not be the best actors in dealing with individual local challenges. The multiple failures of international intergovernmental treaties such as climate change treaties and conferences are evidence of the incapability of states to effectively participate in city governance discussions, come up with clever solutions, and hence address the needs of LDCs (and of the planet, more broadly). Alternatively, cities, mostly through the C40 network, have demonstrated much more interest, commitment and engagement in sustainable city governance discussions. They have also been far more successful in reaching agreements and sharing practices. In a rapidly urbanizing world, the hope for mitigation and adaptation policies that better reflect local needs and realities rests upon the key role of cities and their mayors, who are at a much better position to act effectively than state leaders to address the needs of their people. Relevant provisions particularly, section 174 of Act 925 provides roadmap for engagement of local knowledge towards land use planning in Ghana. It is argued herein that implementation of these provisions has the potential of meeting the specific needs of the country than result from deliberations of the international intergovernmental agenda imposed from above.

Reference

Ayers, J., and David D. 2010 Climate change adaptation and development I: the state of the debate."Progress in Development Studies 10, no. 2 (2010): 161-68.

Beall J., Guha-Khasnobis, B. and Kanbur, R. 2010. Beyond the tipping point: multidisciplinary perspective on urbanization and development pp. 3-16.

Bob E., Marko J., Susan S., & Theobald K. 2006 Governing local sustainability, Journal of Environmental Planning and Management, 49:6, 849-867, DOI: 10.1080/09640560600946875

Carter N, 2007 The Politics of the Environment 2nd edit ion (Cambridge University Press, Cambridge)

Christie, I. & Warburton, D. (Eds) 2001 From Here to Sustainability: The Politics of the Real World (London: Earthscan).

Cohen, B., 2006. Urbanization in developing countries: Current trends, future projections, and key challenges for sustainability. Technology in society, 28 (1-2), pp.63-80.

Dixon, T. F., 1999 Two Centuries of Debate." In Environment, scarcity, and violence. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1999. 28-44.

Evans, B., Joas, M., Sundback, S. and Theobald, K., 2006. Governing local sustainability. Journal of environmental planning and management, 49 (6), pp.849-867.

Evans, B. and Theobald, K., 2001 . Local Authorities’ Self-Assessment of Local Agenda 21 (LASALA): Accelerating Local Sustainability–Evaluating European Local Agenda 21 Processes. Freiburg, ICLEI.

Evans, B. & Theobald, K. (2003) LASALA: Evaluating Local Agenda 21 in Europe, Journal of Environmental Planning and Management, 46(5), pp. 781 – 794. Jaffe, R., 2012. Criminal dons and extralegal security privatization in downtown Kingston, Jamaica. Singapore Journal of Tropical Geography, 33 (2), pp.184-197.

Goldstein, D.M., Albro, R., Besteman, C., Coutin, S.B., Burrell, J., Fox, D., Gledhill, J.,

Goodale, M., Greenhouse, C.J., Gusterson, H. and Kovic, C., 2010. Toward a critical anthropology of security. Current anthropology, 51 (4), pp.000-000.

Gunder, M. 2006 Sustainability: Planning’s saving grace or road to petition ? Jouranl of planning education and research, 26(2). Pp. 208-221

Habitat, U.N., 2016. World cities report 2016. Urbanization and Development: Emerging Futures. New York: Pub. United Nations.

Habitat, U.N., 2002. The global campaign on urban governance: concept paper. Nairobi, Kenya: United Nations Human Settlements Programme (UN-Habitat).

Hardin, G. 1968 The tragedy of the commons. Science 162, 1243– 1244.

Healey, P., Cars, G., Madanipour, A. & de Magalhaes, C. (2002) Transforming governance, institutionalist analysis and institutional capital, in: G. Cars, P. Healey, A. Madanipour & C. de Magalhaes (Eds) Urban Governance, Institutional Capacity and Social Milieux (Aldershot: Ashgate).

Jordan, A., 2008. The governance of sustainable development: taking stock and looking forwards. Environment and planning C: Government and policy, 26 (1), pp.17-33.

Lindström, M., Johansson, M., Herrmann, J. and Johnsson, O., 2006. Attitudes towards the conservation of biological diversity —A case study in Kristianstad Municipality, Sweden. Journal of environmental planning and management, 49 (4), pp.495-513.

Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development 2002 Improving Policy Coherence and Integration for Sustainable Development: A Checklist (Paris: OECD).

Scott, James C.. 1998 Seeing like a state: how certain schemes to improve the human condition have failed. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1998.

United Nations 2014b World Urbanization Prospects: The 2014 Revision (CD-ROM Edition) Department of Economic and Social Affairs, United Nations, New York

TED. " Barber B. 2013: Why mayors should rule the world | Video on TED.com."TED: Ideas worth spreading. Accessed February 10, 2014. http://www.ted.com/talks/benjamin_barber_why_mayors_should_rule_the_world.html.

Throgmorton, J.A., 2003 . Planning as persuasive storytelling in a global-scale web of relationships. Planning Theory, 2 (2), pp.125-151.

World Bank 2013. Global Monitoring Report 2013: Rural Urban Dynamics and the Millenuim Development Goals. Washionton DC: World Bank

World Bank 2010 "Overview." In Development and climate change. Washington, DC: World Bank and Oxford University Press, 2010. 1-35.

Brundtland Commission, 1987. Our Common Future. (The Brundtland Report), World Council on Sustainable Development (WCSD).

Lélé, S.M., 1991. Sustainable development: a critical review. World development, 19 (6), pp.607-621.

Big Think. "Ending The Tragedy of The Commons."YouTube. April 23, 2012. Accessed February 10, 2014. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qr5Q3VvpI7w.

C40 Cities. "Climate Leadership Group." Accessed February 10, 2014. http://www.c40.org/.

Dixon, Thomas F.. "Two Centuries of Debate." In Environment, scarcity, and violence. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1999. 28-44.

Runge, F. C. "Common Property and Collective Action in Economic Development."World Development Report 14, no. 5 (1986): 623-635.

"Overview." In Development and climate change. Washington, DC: World Bank and Oxford University Press, 2010. 1-35.

Scott, James C.. Seeing like a state: how certain schemes to improve the human condition have failed. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1998.

Shanmugaratnam, N. 1996 Nationalisation, Privatisation and The Dilemmas of Common Property Management In Western Rajasthan." Journal of Development Studies 33, no. 2 (1996): 163-187.

TED. "Benjamin Barber: Why mayors should rule the world | Video on TED.com."TED: Ideas worth spreading. September, 2013. Accessed February 10, 2014. http://www.ted.com/talks/benjamin_barber_why_mayors_should_rule_the_world.html.

United Nations. "Kyoto Protocol." United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change. https://unfccc.int/kyoto_protocol/items/2830.php (accessed February 10, 2014).

United Nations. "Report of the World Commission on Environment and Development." UN Documents. http://www.un-documents.net/our-common-future.pdf (accessed February 10, 2014).

United Nations. "Report of the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development." General Assembly. http://www.un.org/documents/ga/conf151/aconf15126-1annex1.htm (accessed February 10, 2014).

United Nations. "United Nations Conference on Environment and Development." United Nations Sustainable Development. http://sustainabledevelopment.un.org/content/documents/Agenda21.pdf (accessed February 10, 2014).