Abstract:
The participatory approach to sustainable development has become popular in the
world, which is often termed bottom up approach for management and decisionmaking.
It is also considered as an important part of governance and it means
people’s involvement in decision-making, planning and implementing of policy
objectives. In this way, most of the democratic countries have extended their
commitment to ensure the people’s participation in the decision-making process
and it is practiced through democratic decentralization. In Sri Lanka, the elected
local governments are established through democratic decentralization and
represent the lowest tier of government in Sri Lanka. They include Municipal
Council, Urban Council and Pradeshiya Sabha. Hence, this study attempts to
examine the level of people’s participation in the decision-making of the local
government institutions in the selected local governments in Ampara district of Sri
Lanka (Sammanthurai, Nintavur, Karaithivu and Navithanveli). The study is
qualitative in nature. In order to construct the study, the required materials are
gathered from various sources. It includes interviews, observations of meetings,
scanning of official records and secondary source materials both published and
unpublished, as well as informal discussion with possible actors including media.
The finding shows that these institutions are in a crisis with regarding people’s
participation in the decision-making process.
