Papers by Roberts K Muriisa
Routledge eBooks, Dec 30, 2021
Generally, there is a dearth of literature on Executive Policymaking in policy studies. In both p... more Generally, there is a dearth of literature on Executive Policymaking in policy studies. In both presidential and parliamentary settings, it is taken for granted that the role of the executive is to implement policy. Thus, eforts to look into where the executive may be infuential in policy design are limited in policy debates. Executive policymaking is a loose concept despite its common practice, especially in the more presidential systems in Africa, Latin America and the United States. Executive policymaking featured strongly during the era of the development administration and one-party rule across Africa. However, it has often been more evident during the crisis and political transitions in modern political systems. This is because crisis comes with unexpected disruptions to the existing institutional processes. Besides, there is a lack of resources to efectively handle such an event, unclear institutional responsibility among government agencies and a lack of experience in dealing with the current situation. Also, there may be undivided pressures from both the citizenry and elites on the government to act. Therefore, handling a crisis often validates a desperate time-desperate measures approach, thereby attracting unorthodox public policy processes. This is because crises tend to produce a vacuum that naturally predisposes the executive to act, sometimes in an unconventional manner, or employ relatively unchecked interventions. Similarly, the government needs to and must show that it is in control, and, on the other, citizens demand to know how and expect the government to address the situation. This dilemma puts the government's capacity to the test. It gives the executive unquestionable legitimacy and authority to deal with the situation without necessarily following the existing legalistic, political and institutional processes. However, the leeway to make prompt policy decisions may not be adequate for the government to efectively address the national crisis like the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. Recent studies on COVID-19 policy responses or crisis responses indicate an array and an interplay of other factors on the display for the government to succeed under such circumstances (e.g. Christensen and Laegreid 2020). These include public and social trust, the structure of government, the personality of the executive, resources available, efective
The Corona Virus Pandemic sparked a crisis across many sectors of the economy. The virus led to t... more The Corona Virus Pandemic sparked a crisis across many sectors of the economy. The virus led to the closure of many sectors including education. In Uganda, the education sector was closed for 22 months leaving many children and schools stranded on how to 1 We acknowledge the support from government of Uganda research funding of universities through faculty of interdisciplinary studies, MUST. We also acknowledge our respondents.
Civil society includes a vast and diverse set of organisations, associations, networks, movements... more Civil society includes a vast and diverse set of organisations, associations, networks, movements and groups. They are of varying strengths, governance structure, and operational scale.
Africa Journal of Public Sector Development and Governance
VDM Verlag Dr. Müller eBooks, Apr 28, 2009
AIDS is registered as one of the major human catastrophes facing the world today, its consequence... more AIDS is registered as one of the major human catastrophes facing the world today, its consequences far reaching. In Uganda successful fight against HIV/AIDS is well recognised. By 1991 Uganda’s HIV/AIDS prevalence stood at about 30% in some parts of the country. This had reduced to about 5% by 2001. This success largely depended on the social and interpersonal networks referred to as social capital. The book documents the role of NGOs in mobilising social capital at different levels and its effect on HIV/AIDS challenges in Uganda. A major finding in the book is that the ways individuals and groups are connected and interact with each other are important mechanisms for alleviating HIV/AIDS. From Uganda’s story there are three lessons learned; 1. Earlier contextual explanations such as witchcraft as the cause of the disease which had dominated community approaches to HIV/AIDS are demystified;2. Fighting HIV/AIDS goes beyond the medical profession to include the social approaches;3. Emerging issues such as religious fundamentalism have negative impact on Uganda’s success story and may explain new trends in HIV/AIDS prevalence
Journal of Higher Education in Africa
The subject of this paper is the place of leadership in redefining the role of the university in ... more The subject of this paper is the place of leadership in redefining the role of the university in Africa in general and Uganda in particular. The ‘African University’ today, like any other university, has clear mandates and roles; research, teaching and community service, clearly laid down on paper in many of the universities’ manuals and strategic plans. But, in reality, these roles are not performed at all or are performed in a manner that may not warrant clear roles. Increasingly, it is observed that less quality teaching, less research, and less community service are being done. This situation calls for rethinking what role should universities play. While many expla- nations have been offered for the declining performance of the university, in this paper I contend that leadership plays a significant role not only in influencing escalation of crises but also in averting them, especially in Ugandan universities. The paper answers mainly three research questions: (i) How do changes ...
Open Journal of Social Sciences
Autonomy and trust are essential ingredients for local government performance. The trust generate... more Autonomy and trust are essential ingredients for local government performance. The trust generated at local level is further essential in enabling intraand inter-organisational relationships, rational decision-making processes and co-creation. Understanding of centre-local relations within a local government system reveals ways in which the autonomy that resides with local government administrative units may be compromised if attention is restrained from institutional-based trust, a vital ingredient for effective administration. The study interrogates specific questions on how a regulated 1) political autonomy, 2) financial autonomy and 3) administrative autonomy in the local governments affects building institutional based trust and undermines good governance. Based on Uganda's case, the study suggests a key remedy of increasing central government institutions trust through, the formalisation of administrative structures and systems, duty-load and local revenue orchestration, and local capacity building. These are tenable through effective trust assurances and situational normality in a regulated local government system environment.
Global health action, Jan 27, 2010
Uganda has reduced its prevalence of HIV/AIDS from 18 to 6.5% within a decade. An important facto... more Uganda has reduced its prevalence of HIV/AIDS from 18 to 6.5% within a decade. An important factor behind this might have been the response from faith-based voluntary organizations, which developed social capital for achieving this. Three behaviors have been targeted: Abstinence, Being faithful, and Condom use (the ABC strategy). The aim of this study was to explore the association between social capital and the ABC behaviors, especially with reference to religious factors. In 2005, 980 Ugandan university students responded to a self-administered questionnaire (response rate 80%). It assessed sociodemographic factors, social capital, importance of religion, sexual debut, number of lifetime sexual partners, and condom use. Logistic regression analysis was applied as the main analytical tool. Thirty-seven percent of the male and 49% of the female students had not had sexual intercourse. Of those with sexual experience, 46% of the males and 23% of the females had had three or more life...
The subject of this paper is the place of leadership in redefining the role of the university in ... more The subject of this paper is the place of leadership in redefining the role of the university in Africa in general and Uganda in particular. The ‘African University’ today, like any other university, has clear mandates and roles; research, teaching and community service, clearly laid down on paper in many of the universities’ manuals and strategic plans. But, in reality, these roles are not performed at all or are performed in a manner that may not warrant clear roles. Increasingly, it is observed that less quality teaching, less research, and less community service are being done. This situation calls for rethinking what role should universities play. While many explanations have been offered for the declining performance of the university, in this paper I contend that leadership plays a significant role not only in influencing escalation of crises but also in averting them, especially in Ugandan universities. The paper answers mainly three research questions: (i) How do changes an...
International Journal of Innovative Research and Development
Background to the Study Food security is an essential part of the international development agend... more Background to the Study Food security is an essential part of the international development agenda, as stated in the Rome Declaration of the World Food Summit in 1996 and reaffirmed by the participants in the World Food Summit five years later (FAO,1996 & FAO, 2001). The Millennium Declaration reflected the World Food Summit target by making hunger part of the first Millennium Development Goal (UN, 2009). UN has echoed food security once again by making it Goal number 2 of the 17 Post 2015 Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) at the Rio+20 conference (UN, 2014). Food security is a fundamental human right (UN, 1997) and the most crucial of all basic needs (UN, 2009). It is upon this that 16 th October every year is World Food Day and the World Food Day theme for 2014 was Family Farming: "Feeding the world, caring for the earth" (FAO, 2014).This shows how food security continues to be a major global challenge and the need to address it especially in Sub Saharan Africa where the levels of food production are declining. The 2017 theme focused on investment in food security and rural development (FAO, 2017). Emphasis was put on combined strategies and application of indigenous knowledge being one the strategies. Any investment towards food security and rural development without considering IAK is likely to fail as (Brokensha, Slikkerveer, & Warren, 1995)put that ignoring people's knowledge is almost to ensure failure in development. Globally 2 billion people lack food security; about 1 billion people are hungry at any time in the world and of these 254 million people are found in
Canadian Journal of African Studies / Revue canadienne des études africaines
... Ultimately, women do not have the right to deter-mine when to have sex and what type of sex t... more ... Ultimately, women do not have the right to deter-mine when to have sex and what type of sex to have, nor can they negotiate for safer sex (Monico, Tanga and Nuwagaba 2001; Oruboloye 1993; Kelly 1995). ... Page 17. Bibliography Allen, Tim. 2005. ...
Rwanda Journal
This paper explores the neglected role of men in HIV/AIDS mitigation. Much of the efforts to comb... more This paper explores the neglected role of men in HIV/AIDS mitigation. Much of the efforts to combat HIV/AIDS widely acknowledge that the gender dimensions of the AIDS pandemic is critical both for the understanding of its impact and for successful implementation of prevention and amelioration campaigns. It is argued in the paper that for a long time there has been little effort to understand the gender roles and social pressures on men and the relationship with HIV spread. Men are represented as obstacles to efforts to fight HIV/AIDS; they resist using condoms, resist change, molesters of women and carriers of disease. The paper argues that for successful fight against HIV/AIDS, there is a need for a more balanced understanding of gender on a set of structures created by and affecting both men and women. This paper largely relies on existing literature and policy documents for analysis and augmenting men's role in HIV/AIDS mitigation in Uganda and Rwanda. The paper extensively reviews and analyses data in the existing scholarly sources to develop arguments and to make conclusions. We argue in this paper that new strategies which positively look at men's contribution are needed to fight HIV/AIDS. Based on the arguments we make we suggest that men as well as women contribute each in their rights as social categories of people during the fight against HIV/AIDS. Drawing examples from Uganda and Rwanda we look at the evolving approaches to HIV/AIDS and the positioning of men into these programs. The paper concludes that involving men and observing their positive contributions has contributed greatly to the success of these programs and ultimately to the progress in mitigating HIV/AIDS spread in Rwanda and Uganda.
Journal of Education and Practice, 2015
This paper discusses the challenges and experiences which social science students in Africa under... more This paper discusses the challenges and experiences which social science students in Africa undergo to complete the PhD program. Focusing on Mbarara University of Science and Technology, the paper present that many students who register on the PhD program in Africa, are unable to complete the program in the stipulated time. The paper identifies that the challenges which students face can be divided into two categories; institutional and individual students and the supervisors. At the institutional level it involves the nature and the context of the program. This involves lack of resources to support an overall learning environment. At the individual level, the challenges include student and supervisor challenges which they face at individual levels and how they affect completion. To get to discuss these issues, I held one focus group discussion with 7 students enrolled for the PhD program and 1 fresh graduate of PhD at the Faculty of development studies Mbarara University of science and Technology, critical literature review and a review of some of the external supervisors reports for the PhD students who have made an attempt to submit their final dissertations. Basing on the data from the sources identified above, the paper concludes that for students to complete the PhD program, the above challenges need to be addressed especially by establishing training programs in the region and creation of a better learning environment for the PhD students. The issues discussed in this paper and solutions provided provides a basis for improving the training programs in Universities. It is argued in this paper that solutions to completing PhD programs especially in the social sciences will depend on strengthening foundational courses especially in Methodology and theories and most importantly critical thinking.
SAHARA-J: Journal of Social Aspects of HIV/AIDS, 2011
HIV/AIDS has had devastating impacts in many countries, Uganda in particular. However, Uganda is ... more HIV/AIDS has had devastating impacts in many countries, Uganda in particular. However, Uganda is depicted as one of the most successful countries in fighting HIV/AIDS. Among others, Uganda's success story is attributed to the open general environment which allows open discussions surrounding HIV/AIDS when other countries such as South Africa and Kenya denied the existence of the disease in their countries. In addition, the success is attributed to the policy which allowed many actors to participate in the fight against the disease. The primary focus of this article is to map the process of social capital generation by NGOs and how social capital benefits enhance mitigation of HIV/AIDS challenges in Uganda. The key to social capital is nurturing relationships. In this regard, HIV/AIDS NGOs play a central role in the way individuals, groups and communities interact, and how various kinds of social relations are forged with people living with HIV/AIDS and especially for those who are HIV infected. NGOs' success in reducing the number of HIV/AIDS cases in Uganda is based on their abilities to generate social capital. This involves inclusion and building social networks and empowerment at the individual and community levels, and disseminating information to reduce social stigma as well as discrimination. We used a mixed-method strategy to collect data for this study. We used a structured questionnaire having quantitative and qualitative question sets which focused on different social capital measurement indicators. We used observations and in-depth face-to-face interviews. A major finding of the study is that the ways individuals and groups are connected and interact with each other are important mechanisms for alleviating HIV/AIDS challenges in Uganda.
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Papers by Roberts K Muriisa