Embracing the State-Community Divide: Lessons from International Experience
Abstract:
Ironically in a globalised age, many groups and communities in a range of states, both rich and poor, remain vulnerable and excluded from access to basic goods and services, including justice. They include ethnic minorities, refugees, and inhabitants of remote impoverished areas - sometimes as a result of civil strife. Dr Collins will draw lessons from international development experience, especially civil society engagement in donor-supported poverty alleviation for marginal communities. He will examine some of the typical problems that are encountered, as well as some of the strategies that are adopted. He will also consider lessons learned from embracing the state-community divide, particularly through enhancing outreach and access that empowers citizens of a given state.
Speaker:
Dr Collins has been Editor of Public Administration and Development for 15 years and has served at Universities in the UK (Sussex and Bath), the Americas (Connecticut, Texas and Sao Paulo) and Africa (Tanzania, Nigeria and Ghana). He served at the UN in New York 1981-91, latterly as Principal Management Adviser of UNDP in its Policy Bureau. He returned to the UK as Principal Consultant of the then Royal Institute of Public Administration International Division for a few years, and has since been adviser to the World Bank, UK DFID, UNDP and EC in over 50 countries in Central America/Caribbean, Africa, E/Central Europe and Asia. Over the last 4 years, he has run workshops and made presentations in Hong Kong, China, Singapore and Taiwan, and has just completed a term as Visiting Professor of Public Policy at the City University of Hong Kong.