Overcoming the Governance Crisis in Dhaka City [Jan 01, 2000] Kamal Siddiqui; Jamshed Ahmed; Abdul Awal and Mustaque Ahmed

The first half of the 21st century is going to be the era of megacities in the developing world. Unless we manage our cities adequately, all hell is likely break loose in the not too distant future. Given the enormous poverty, the gross gender discriminations and the acute environmental degradation already present in these cities, the likelihood of their further deterioration in the coming years in a scenario of no or little reforms is rather obvious. This is a pioneering work on the governance crisis in one such city, namely Dhaka, the capital of Bangladesh. Based on more than a year of extensive field work, the authors analyse the governance problems of Dhaka city from a holistic perspective. The work examines the role of all important service providing organizations individually as well as in relation to one another. Finally, the authors come up with a set of practicable reforms agenda for overcoming the crisis and suggests a strategy for its adoption by the policy makers. The relevance of this book extends far beyond the confines of Dhaka city.