2005 Volume 5 Pages 27-52
Neighborhood associations are little studied by political scientists but such local, community organizations can have important indirect influences on public policy. This article argues that neighborhood associations (NHAs) intersect public policy in two important ways. First, NHAs are beneficiaries of public policy support. Second, neighborhood associations support the effective and efficient implementation of public policy, through their sustaining of social capital : in a word, “governance.”
One of the only points of agreement in the study of civil society is that the organizations be independent from the state. State-linked groups, it is held, typically drum up a kind of ersatz involvement by citizens through pressure, patronage or manipulation. However, state-linked associations can vary widely in the kinds of participation they encourage, the political roles that they play, and their relationship to local communities.
This article is structured as follows. First, it identifies and defines neighborhood associations, including a discussion of their participation rates and activities. Second, it investigates what NHAs do for government, and what government does for NHAs. The article argues that NHAs are “ambiguous associations,” or “state-society straddler organization” that benefit from “local corporatism.” On the one hand, NHAs are supported by the government, creating an effective state-society interface that is nonetheless resistant to utilizing NHAs as vehicles for advocacy except in limited local cases (as a demand transmission belt, or for NIMBY resistance). On the other hand, the article contends that NHAs do create and sustain social capital in Japan, occasioning a more detailed discussion of these mechanisms.
