Local development and cooperation policies

Lionel ELLA’s book is an odyssey into the process of decentralization in Cameroon. By revisiting its sociogenesis, foundations and application methods, the author seeks to understand the real impact of this system of territorial administration, officially adopted by Cameroon through its 1996 constitution, on the day-to-day life of local authorities. To this end, he uses a commune, not the least of which is Yaoundé II, a large agglomeration in Cameroon’s political capital. His analysis focuses on local development and cooperation. In other words, the question posed by this book is: what impact has the strengthening of decentralization had on local development and cooperation policies within Cameroon’s communes? While focusing on the legal arsenal and the institutions set up by the public authorities, the author questions the impact of this architecture on the effectiveness of the operational autonomy of communes as actors in local development in their territories.