Community involvement, engagement and management? Presentation by Dr Richard Franceys, Cranfield University for the India Community Water Plus Project

1. Community Involvement, Engagement and
Management?
Rhetoric and Reality ……
Dr Richard Franceys
International Research Coordinator
Cranfield University, UK

2. The overall research question, to be answered through the ’18’
Case Studies is:
What type, extent and style of supporting organisations are
required to ensure sustainable community managed water
service delivery relative to varying technical modes of supply?
Specific research sub-questions are:
• What are the current modalities of successful community
management and how do they differ in their degrees of
effectiveness?
• What supporting or partnering organisations are in place to
ensure sustainable water service delivery relative to
alternative modes of supply?
• What are the indicative costs of effective support
organisations?
• Can particular trajectories of professionalising and
strengthening the support to rural water be identified?

3. • Global interest in this research
– Not only in India
• Because India is ahead on the water supply
development trajectory …
• And has invested much in CM
• But wondering about what level of CM can be
both effective and efficient?
• DRA and CM where the contractor pays the 5%?
• Have we asked too much of CM?

4. • Community involvement spectrum
• Partnering entity spectrum
• Technical spectrum

5. • Local government ‘failure’ ?
• ... funding has been declining and many completed systems are in
disrepair or have been abandoned. This state of affairs has led
many experts to question whether the emphasis on centrally
managed schemes needs to be re-evaluated and a new approach
taken to the provision of rural water supply as a public service.
• Community management has been proposed as one possible
alternative strategy in view of the increasing evidence that systems
are more sustainable when designed, established and operated
by the community.
• Externally imposed solutions do little to build capacity, increase
empowerment, or create support structures that represent the
interests of users willing to maintain these RWSS systems on a
long-term basis.
•
Community Management of Rural Water Supply and Sanitation Services , McCommon, Warner and Yohalem,
WASH Technical Report 67, UNDP-World Bank, 1990

6. • By the mid-1980s most development organizations
formally supported the idea of community
participation, although few included the concept in their
programs and fewer still could claim any success in
applying it.
• World Bank definition:
• "an active process whereby
beneficiaries influence the
direction and execution of
development projects rather
than merely receive a share
of project benefits" (Paul,
1986).

7. The objectives of community participation in the context of
development programs may include:
• a) sharing project costs (beneficiaries contribute money or
labor)
• b) increasing project efficiency (beneficiaries assist in project
planning and implementation)
• c) increasing project effectiveness (beneficiaries have a say in
project design and implementation)
• d) building beneficiary capacity (beneficiaries share in
management tasks or operational responsibilities)
• e) increasing community empowerment (beneficiaries share
power and increase their political awareness and influence
over developmental outcomes)
•
Community Management of Rural Water Supply and Sanitation Services ,
McCommon, Warner and Yohalem, World Bank, 1990

8. • Community management failure?
• We have moved from supply-driven centralised government
programming to more demand-driven approaches, based on the
philosophy of community participation with community-based
management . . .
• the reality behind these aggregated figures is often quite different:
– communities unable to cope with management of their
schemes,
– poor maintenance, lack of financing, breakdowns, poor water
quality,
– lack of support and, ultimately, an unreliable and disrupted
supply of water to households.
• Commonly cited figures from a range of countries put nonfunctionality at somewhere between 30-40% of all systems at any
one time.
Lessons for Rural Water Supply: Moving towards a Service Delivery Approach, Lockwood, H. and
Smits, S. 2011

9. LEVELS OF COMMUNITY MANAGEMENT
Management Cash payments
capacity
(from community)
Contributions in
kind) from
community
External support
(from agency)
Level
Responsibility
Authority
Control
V
Full community
responsibility
Full community
authority
Full community
control
High
All O&M and most
capital costs
All noncash needs
Access to loans
and grants
IV
Community; external
support
Community;
external support
Community;
external support
Sufficient
All O&M and some
capital costs
Most non-cash
needs; strong
Some capital
costs
III
Joint: community
responsible for O&M
Joint; collaborative
role for community
& agency
Joint; strong
community
participation and
Moderate
All O&M and minimal Self-help labor; local Most capital costs
capital costs
materials; active
committee support
II
External agency;
community
External agency;
External agency;
limited formal role
External agency;
External agency;
moderate
External agency;
Limited
Some O&M
I
Insufficient
None to limited
little community
responsibility
informal
community
consultations
limited community
participation
Some self-help labor; All capital and
local materials
most O&M costs
None to limited
Full external
support

10. Community Management spectrum

11. Involve
Consult
Inform
Partnership
Placation
Consultation
Informing
Therapy
(Education)
Influence
Manipulation
Robinson,
2003
Arnstein, 1969
Degree of
citizen power
Partner
Supporting
independent
community initiatives
Acting together
Bargaining
Deciding together
Degree of
tokenism
Delegated
Power
Nonparticipation
Empower
Citizen Control
Consultation
Consultative
Information
Authoritative
Wilcox, 1994
Vanderwal,
1999

12. People participate by taking initiatives independently
Self mobilisation
of external institutions to change systems.
Such self-initiated mobilisation and collective action may or may not
challenge existing inequitable distributions of wealth and power.
Interactive participation
People participate in joint analysis, which leads to action plans and the formation of new local institut
It tends to involve inter-disc. methodologies that seek multiple perspectives and make use
These groups take control over local decisions, and so people have a stake in maintaining
Functional participation
People participate by forming groups to meet predetermined objectives related to the project, which c
Such involvement does not tend to be at early stages of project cycles or planning, but rat
These institutions tend to be dependent on external initiators and facilitators, but may bec
Participation for material incentives
People participate by providing resources, for example labour, in return for food, cash, or other materi
It is very common to see this called participation, yet people have no stake in prolonging a
Participation by consultation
People participate by being consulted, and external people listen to views.
These external professionals define both problems and solutions, and may modify these in
Such a consultative process does not concede any share in decision making, and the pro
Participation in information giving
People participate by answering questions posed by extractive researchers using questionnaire surve
People do not have the opportunity to influence proceedings, as the findings of the researc
Passive participation
People participate by being told what is going to happen or has already happened.
It is a unilateral announcement by an administration or project management without listeni
The information being shared belongs only to external professionals.
What do we mean by participation?' Tear Fund based on Pretty (1994) adapted from Adnan et al (1992)

13. How to account for ‘non-scaleable’
cases of ‘charismatic leadership of
communities eg. Gangadellipalli,
Andhra Pradesh

14. Community Partnering (support) spectrum
PartnershipContinuum.pdf

15. PARTNERING
• LEVEL 3 interactions Party A and Party B will typically have shared
aspirations and a strong desire to work as equal partners toward a
goal or set of goals that both wish to achieve but cannot achieve
alone. These engagements are usually long-term in nature and
require substantial commitments (and sometimes sacrifices) to be
made by each party. We consider this to be “Alliance.”
• LEVEL 2 interactions are characterized by greater collaboration
between the parties. In this case, both Party A and Party B are
willing to share ideas in the expectation that by doing so each will
benefit in some way. We have labeled this level of engagement as
“Collaboration.”
• LEVEL 1 interactions are tactical in nature. In a two-party
interaction, for example, Party A may have something of value to
Party B and is willing to provide it to Party B in return for some
other form of consideration (tangible or otherwise). We have
labeled this level of engagement as “Transaction.”

16. www.servq.co.uk/systems-andtools/partnership-continuum/

17. Technical supply spectrum
• Hand-dug well with/without
handpump
• Borehole with handpump
• Borehole with motorised pump
• Gravity flow piped system
• Powered small piped system (SVS)
• Rural distribution from bulk
supply
• Powered medium piped system
(MVS)
• Package Reverse Osmosis Plants

18. Danger of expecting too much in
• Limited community capacity situations
• Limited governance capacity situations
• Relatively sophisticated technical situations
• What is a ‘good enough’ level of community
management?

19. Community Water Plus ?

20. ‘the coevolution of economic institutions,
social developments and technological innovation’
(Kay, 2004)
Richard Franceys, DFID Water
Forum, February 2006

21. • Community Management – England and Wales
• Water service providers (private companies) have to
report at public CCWater meeting twice a year
• Customer Challenge Groups have been established and
have to approve private company business plans
(billions of dollars) for the coming Price Review to
agree prices for 2015-202

22. Appropriate customer involvement mechanisms
‘Weaker’
knowledge
related to
everyday
experience
'Stronger'
knowledge
related to
exposure to
regulatory
process and
water issues
Involving large numbers of
customers
('non-deliberative')
Questionnaire surveys
Quantitative tool
+ standardised
- sampling may
information;
conceal issues
time series and
pertaining to
targeting
certain groups
(location,
only
income groups)
possible
Consumer forum Large, open
meetings to air major issues
+ interactive
(moderately),
good for
publicity
- agenda likely to
be determined
by
influential/confid
ent speakers;
can be
superficial
Involving small samples of customers
('deliberative')
Focus groups
Qualitative tool
+ facilitates detailed
- costly and
understanding of
time-consumer;
customer
limited reliability
perceptions with
('snapshot'
immediate
overview)
feedback/moderation
Customer committees
Proactive complaints' auditors and
informed questioners of providers
+ direct involvement unrepresentative
in complaints
members;
auditing &
needing
adjudication;
resources and
educator role
training; danger
of system
capture

23. Delft
Hoogheemraadschap van
Delfland
Civil Society Involvement

25. James, A.J., 2011. India:
Lessons for Rural Water
Supply; Assessing
progress towards
sustainable service
delivery.

26. • What added value
from Community Water plus ?
• Quantifying in resource terms – financial and
quantity/quality person hours – what it takes to deliver and
sustain ‘good enough’ community involvement and the
water services they can deliver
• Partnering does not stop with completion of new systems
• Understanding what this means for the ‘hard to reach’ final
15% whilst sustaining the 85% as they continue the
transition to ‘conventional’ water supply….
• Sharing this knowledge with low-income countries
(consultant & academic opportunities) who are significantly
behind on the transition curve …..

27. • A key output from this research will be a categorisation of different
community-management and sustainable services partnering models
along with trajectories for professionalization, including costing, for
the sustainable delivery of the range of alternative technologies.
•
We see this categorisation giving us the confidence to plan in any
forthcoming project proposals that ‘
– rural water supply through handpumps in type ‘X’ socio-economic
context’
– requires a ‘level 2’ support system
– with ‘Band A’ capital maintenance budgetary support and
– zero potential cost recovery
– whereas a ‘single village piped scheme’ in a ‘Y’ setting
– requires ‘level 4’ support system with
– ‘Band C’ budgetary support but
– ‘level IV’ potential for cost recovery.

28. The overall research question, to be answered through the ’18’
Case Studies is:
What type, extent and style of supporting organisations are
required to ensure sustainable community managed water
service delivery relative to varying technical modes of supply?
Specific research sub-questions are:
• What are the current modalities of successful community
management and how do they differ in their degrees of
effectiveness?
• What supporting or partnering organisations are in place to
ensure sustainable water service delivery relative to
alternative modes of supply?
• What are the indicative costs of effective support
organisations?
• Can particular trajectories of professionalising and
strengthening the support to rural water be identified?

29. • Selecting the most useful cases to study ….

30. •
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
Mr. Sujoy Mojumdar, Director (RWS)
Dr. James A.J., (Viju), Independent Consultant
Dr. Manish Kumar , WSP-SA
Mr. Arumugam Kalimuthu, Country Director,
Water for People
Mr. Hemant Kumar Joshi, CCDU, Rajasthan
Mr. R. P. Kulkarni, Chief Engineer, K RW S & S
Mr. Ravi Narayan, Advisor to Arghyam
Mr. Joe Medith, Gramvikas

31. Research Team
• Dr Kurian Baby, IRC, Co-Director Stakeholder, Engagement and
Communications
•
•
•
•
•
Prof Srinivas Chary, ASCI, Co-Director Academic Research
Dr Mekala Snehalatha, National Research Coordinator
Dr Richard Franceys, International Research Coordinator
Stef Smits, IRC, The Netherlands
CEC, Chennai, MS Vaidyanathan, Dr Rema Saraswathy, Dr
Gladston Xavier,
• MNIT, Jaipur, Dr Urmila Brighu
• ASCI, Hyderabad, Ms Shaili; Cranfield, Paul Hutchings

32. Requested support from Steering Committee
• Provide overall advice for effective
implementation of action research
• Guidance on methodology and tools
• Advice on choice of case studies
• Review of outputs
• Advocacy support- national and international

34. • Key activities
• Debriefing – steering committee
– Group email
• Case study – ver 0 draft
• Common understanding on criteria, methodology and tools
• Feb meeting – deliverables
– Develop a work plan
•
•
•
•
•
Advocacy and communication
Preparing for tomorrow
Debriefing – stakeholder consultation
Contracts and management issues
Admin arrangements – if any.

35. • Key messages – Steering Committee
– Clear methodology with flexibility
– Water quality is an important criteria
– Service delivery improvement for disadvantaged communities is
a criteria for defining success
– Measuring “plus” – resource implications – is the key
differentiator of this research – Richard
– Collecting secondary information
– Success stories – documents and no documents – in lagging
states should be considered
– Water security issues + O & M – are important
– Engagement with state level agencies / district level agencies to
capture “plus”

36. • Defining Success
– Service levels – quantity (40-55 lpcd), quality (BIS –
10500) , access, reliability, citizen satisfaction - as per
the design criteria / parameters
– scale / replicability
– Equity – and inclusion (caste, income, vulnerable
groups if any)
– Sustainability – time, cost recovery
– Water resources
– Degree of empowerment
– Support by the Government