What Has Urban Decentralization Meant? A Case Study of Delhi

Since 2000 in New Delhi, urban decentralization has mainly come in the form of the highly visible Bhagidari or partnership scheme, inviting city residents to participate in a “process of dialogue and the discovery of joint-solutions.” This paper critically examines this program between 2000 and 2012, through the experiences of primarily middle-class neighbourhood organizations (called Resident Welfare Associations, or RWAs) that were included in the scheme. The paper argues that rather than constitutional decentralization, Bhagidari as an initiative must be read in terms of a larger shift to entrepreneurial governance. Bhagidari’s success has been in delegating management to voluntary middle-class neighbourhood associations called RWAs, at little cost to city government, while seemingly opening up a “participatory” space for middle-class urban residents in civic affairs. However, the article argues that Bhagidari’s impact has come to represent an attempt at harnessing and managing the new middle-class aspiration to engage with urban government for administrative and political ends. In this context, Bhagidarihas also been seen as an important means of cultivating middle-class consent and a constituency through courting RWAs for an ambitious chief executive. Over time, this has become a common strategy for building political and civic visibility for a range of actors, and thus the number of RWAs has proliferated.