Participatory Urban Governance in Bangladesh: A Study of the Gap between Promise and Realities

摘要

治理话语（discourses)在塑造参与式制度空间方面起到了至关重要的作用。然而，这种话语 的形式和结构引起了争论，争论的焦点主要集中在它们是否适当、有效的反映了南亚国家和参 与公民的社会政治动力。近年来，规划项目的参与程度相当低，说明理论和实践之间存在显著 差距。一项针对影响参与式治理过程中嵌入式因素的深入调查，可以消除这一差距。在本文 中，我希望强调的是理论基础和实践塑造了发展中国家参与式的城市发展。通过调查和分析孟 加拉国的体制建设和社会政治架构，我试图把规划实践与其他跨学科议题重新联系起来，如政 策研究、公共管理、政治科学和社会科学。本文进一步考察了它们对弥补城市規划项目中公共 参与预期与实际效果之间差距的战略影响。这项研究表明，无效的规划管理和官僚主义衍生的 公众冷漢，以及自上而下的规划方法，共同导致了公众参与程度低。此外，基于特权阶层和决 策者之间的非正式社会政治网络的平行治理体系，导致正式的治理体系失去活力。%The discourses of governance played a crucial role in shaping the institutional space of participation. However, the forms and structure of such discourses have given rise to debates on their appropriateness to reflect socio-political dynamics of South Asian countries and engaging citizens effectively. In recent years, participation in planning projects has been significantly low, indicating a significant gap between theory and practice. An in-depth investigation on embedded factors that affect participatory governance process can address this gap. In this article, I emphasize the theoretical foundations and practice shaping participatory urban development in developing countries. Effort has been made to reconnect planning practice with other cross-disciplinary issues such as policy research, public administration, political science and social science by investigating and analyzing the institutional and socio-political settings in Bangladesh. It further examines their strategic impacts on shaping the gap between expected and achieved levels of citizen engagements in urban planning projects. The study suggests that ineffective planning administration and public apathy derived from bureaucracy and top-down planning approach jointly lead to low level of citizen participation. In addition, parallel governance system based on informal socio-political network between privileged citizens and decision-makers leaves the formal governance system inactive.