Public Participation in Development: Awareness and Views of General Public about Major Development Initiatives in Sri Lanka

Abstract

This research have been conducted by me to get the information of the people’s awareness about recent implemented development programmes in Sri Lanka, from 2010 January to 2011 January by the present Government to achieve its MDGs. After the political independence in 1948, Sri Lanka has adapted many development efforts, primarily considering as paddy farming as the base of rural economy. According to this development policy, import substitution with some export promotion under the state regulations with strong control has been tried out until the open market economy in 1977. Apparently this divides the development efforts into two categories; programs & policies introduced before the open economy and after the economy. Before open economy, policy frameworks were setup & programmes were launched to achieve self-sufficiency in food, mainly the rice. With the advent of open economy rural sector was more neglected as evident by closure of the primary producers so creating unemployment in the rural sector more than before. Sri Lanka has emerged from decades-long civil war, and is now enjoying an economic revival. And also have started several development projects. Among them Colombo-Katunayake Expressway, Tourist hotels in Eastern province, 556 Gama neguma development ,Fly overs and road development ,Jaffna fort development project, Development in Vanni, International airport for Kilinochchci, COB bay fisheries harbor project, Oluvil Port Development project are some of them. Following objectives were set at the designing phase of this study.  To measure the degree of awareness among ordinary public about major development initiatives being rolled out in Sri Lanka  To scale the view of beneficiaries as well as government practitioners on the contemporary development initiatives  To draw some recommendations that could be useful for practitioners, designers and policy makers in particular 3  Study was designed to carry out as a survey in order to find out the level of awareness and different views of public about major development initiatives. It targeted two types of informants; 1) the ordinary public and 2) divisional or grassroots level government officers. A Random sample method was used and research assistants (second year undergraduates) were trained to maintain the gender and age balance in the field with respective informants to be interviewed. A structured questionnaire was formulated as main tool of data collection from ordinary public while a structured interview guide was employed to interview officers.  Data analyzing was also a two-folded process: filled questionnaires were analyzed using SPSS Version 16.0 (Statistical Package for Social Scientists). Percentages as well as values of cross tabulation of main variables were derived for discussion. Significant representations against main variables, correlations and the shape of the sample is described by using aforesaid values. A simple content analysis was done to filter outputs of structured interviews. Firstly, initial codes assigned for broad topics of the interview guide and secondly similarities, topic specific issues between these broad categories as well as recurring regularities were identified by further looking into condensed data. Finally typologies were consolidated sorting data into more explicit patterns.