GOVERNANCE AND SUSTAINABILITY

Governance is not synonymous with government. This confusion of terms can haveunfortunate consequences. A public policy issue where the heart of the matter is a problem of "governance” becomes defined implicitly as a problem of “government”, with the corollarythat the onus for “fixing” it necessarily rests with government. Since governance is not aboutgovernment, what is it about? Partly it is about how governments and other socialorganizations interact, how they relate to citizens, and how decisions are taken in a complexworld. Thus governance is a process whereby societies or organizations make their importantdecisions, determine whom they involve in the process and how they render account. Since a process is hard to observe, students of governance tend to focus our attention on the

The United Nations Development Programme(UNDP) 1997 defines governance as the exercise of economic, political and administrativeauthority to manage a county’s affairs at all level. It comprises the mechanisms, processesand institutions through which citizens and groups articulate their interest, exercise their legalrights, meet their obligations and mediate their differences. Governance opens newintellectual space. It provides a concept that allows us to discuss the role of government incoping with public issues and the contribution that other players may make. However, andtable 1 shows a summary of definition of governance from a various scholars.