Planning from Below. Marta Harnecker

1. General Considerations Regarding Projects

       2. Description of Components that Make Up a Project

       3. Project Documentation

       CHAPTER VII. ESTABLISHING BUDGETARY AND SECTOR-BASED PRIORITIES

       1. INTRODUCTION

       2. COMING UP WITH BUDGET PRIORITIES

       3. COMING UP WITH SECTOR-BASED PRIORITIES

       4. METHODOLOGY

       CHAPTER VIII. PRIOR TASKS TO BE CARRIED OUT BY THE PLANNING AND BUDGET TEAMS

       INTRODUCTION

       FIRST TASK: PREPARE A SUMMARY-DOCUMENT OF THE MULTI-YEAR DEVELOPMENT PLAN

       1) Description of the characteristics of the community we want and the concrete form they take in certain aspirations

       2) Diagnosis

       3) Objectives to achieve with each aspiration

       SECOND TASK: PREPARE A SINGLE LIST OF PROJECTS

       1) Example of information that each project should contain

       2) How do we arrange the projects in the list?

       3) Projects for the first phase of the immediate action plan

       THIRD TASK: CARRY OUT STUDY OF AVAILABLE RESOURCES

       1. ESTIMATION OF RESOURCES

       1) Available financial resources

       a) Own resources

       b) Resources assigned from outside

       c) Outside resources that are expected to be obtained once the plan is approved

       d) Other resources that remain uncertain

       e) Linked and unlinked financial resources

       f) Credit financing

       2) Income calendar

       3) Examples of incomes

       2. CALCULATE GENERAL AND RUNNING COSTS

       1) In the communities

       2) In territorial areas and the municipality

       FOURTH TASK: COME UP WITH A PROPOSED BUDGET

       1. THE ECONOMIC STRUCTURE OF THE BUDGET

       1) Income budget

       a) Fiscal income

       b) One’s own or private income

       c) Transfers and current subsidies

       d) Sale of public patrimony

       e) Transference of capital

       f) Variation in financial assets and liabilities

       2) Costs and expenditure budget

       a) Personnel costs

       b) Purchase of goods and services

       c) Financial costs

       d) Current transfers

       f) Investment costs

       g) Capital transfers

       h) Variations in financial assets and liabilities

       i) Fund for unforeseen costs

       2. EXPENDITURE BUDGET ACCORDING TO OBJECTIVES

       1) The Community Expenditure budget

       a) Operational or functioning costs

       b) Administration costs

       c) Service provision

       d) Maintenance costs

       e) Social action costs

       f) Financial costs

       g) Project costs

       h) Loan repayment

       2. Other aspects

       a) Linked income and expenditure

       b) Budgetary forecasts for subsequent years

       3) An example to explain these concepts

       CHAPTER IX. FORMULATING PLANS

       I. GENERAL ASPECTS

       II. WORK PHASES

       1. Review of proposed budget

       2. Overall review of projects that the working groups have come up with

       3. Distribution of projects over the years

       4. Selection of projects that make up the immediate action plan (at the community level)

       5. Formalizing the different plans and budgets at each level

       6. Approving the proposed development plan, the annual investment plan and the budget

       7. Coming up with the general development plan, annual investment plan, and consolidated budget in the territorial areas and municipality

       CHAPTER X: IMPLEMENTATION, OVERSIGHT, AND EVALUATION

       1. IMPLEMENTATION, OVERSIGHT, AND FINAL EVALUATION OF PROJECTS

       2. OVERSIGHT AND CONTROL OF THE PLAN

       APPENDIX I. EXAMPLES OF FORMS AND TABLES FOR COLLECTING AND CONSOLIDATING INFORMATION INTO A DATABASE

       APPENDIX II. SOME MOTIVATING QUESTIONS TO FORMULATE THE ASPIRATIONS IN A COMMUNITY

       APPENDIX III. FORM TO EVALUATE A PROJECT

       FOREWORD

      Democratic decentralisation and popular participation in the development process were important elements of the agenda of the first communist government elected after the formation of the new state of Kerala, India in 1957. However, comprehensive legislation for empowering local governments was abandoned after the communist government was dismissed by the Centre Cabinet following violent anti communist agitations by right wing forces. Kerala had to wait four decades until the victory of the Left Democratic Front (LDF} in the 1996 state elections for this dream to become a reality.

      By then the national parliament had amended the Indian Constitution making the local governments as a mandatory and uniform third tier of governance below the Central and the State governments. The Left in Kerala utilised this opportunity for large scale mass mobilisation for initiating decentralised planning and to empower the local government structure. More than a third of the state plan budget for new projects and schemes were devolved to the local governments. But they had to prepare comprehensive local plans before they could claim the allotted funds. Procedures were laid down to ensure that the process to develop these plans was inclusive, participatory and scientific.