Journal of Emerging Trends in Educational Research and Policy Studies: Home

Abstract:
In the Nigerian context, the basic philosophy surrounding the existence of local government, among others, encompasses the need to foster the exist�ence of democratic self-government. This was aptly captured by the 1976 Guidelines for Local Government Reforms. Since 1976, successive Ni�gerian Constitutions have been amplifying the democratic imperatives of local government and this informed the series of reforms that have been carried out with a view to making local government a veritable tool for democracy. While democratic practices at the local level cannot be adequately discussed in isola�tion, the institution of local government in Nigeria is considered to be a failure manifesting, as it were, in the continuous search for a viable and result-oriented local government system. This study posits that while local government ought to be the spring�board for democratic practices at the State and Federal levels as dominant theoretical standpoints make us to believe, the politics of local-central relations has continued to weaken the capacity of local government. In discussing this, the rest of the study is divided into five sections. The first section gives prelimi�nary notes on the theoretical linkage between local government and democracy while the second section is an overview of the development of local govern�ment in Nigeria. The third section focuses on local government and democracy in Nigeria within the context of local-central politics relations and the fourth segment briefly examines local government in Nigeria in the Fourth Republic. The conclusion then follows.

Keywords: local government, democratic consolidation, Nigeria�s fourth republic

Download full paper