Book Reviews 85

INDIGENOUS KNOWLEDGE SYSTEMS AND DEVELOPMENT Edited by David W. Brokensha, D. M. Warren and Oswald Werner University Press of America, 1980, 466 pp.

This book examines the relationship between indigenous knowledge and development, over a wide range of geographical regions and of topics. The editors emphasize the necessity for development planners to take into account the accumulated knowledge and traditional skills and technology of the people among whom they work. The editors also hope that this book will provide some fundamental guidances to those who wish to investigate particular indi- genous knowledge systems.

The modulus operandi selected by the editors includes a regrettably restricted Introduc- tion, Part I, then contains the case studies from Africa and Latin America which provide kaleidoscopic examples. The diversity dealing with e.g. ‘Potato Taxonomies in Andean Agriculture’ and ‘Indigenous Knowledge of Fish Processing and Marketing Utilized by Women Traders of Cape Coast, Ghana’, does not immediately appear to share any common interests. Fortunately each case study is provided with an Abstract which allows some shortcuts to selection of works of special relevance and appropriate detailed studies for those interested. The second part concentrates on techniques and approaches and attempts to indicate some general thread to support the value of ethnoscience. Here again the diversity of approach is broad. Part 111 groups a mixture of ‘General Considerations’. They are designed specially for development planners and contain some rather esoteric buzz-words (often originally from academic sources). ‘Indigenous Network Communication (INC) Model’ (p. 369) and ‘Indigenous Technical Knowledge (ITK)’ (p. 341), provide examples which are clever but they are dubiously practical.

The editors accept that anthropologists have been studying indigenous knowledge systems for more than a century. They see indigenous knowledge as complementary to ‘conventional science’ to solve problems of rural development. Your reviewer had hoped to get some general assistance on ‘what is indigenous knowledge’. Alas he is told ‘Rather than answer- ing this question abstractly, we prefer to use the case studies which indicate the wealth of detailed information that has been accumulated on specific topics in the book.’ Nor is there any clear definition of ‘conventional science’. Consequently while the book will certainly provide a lengthy description suitable for specialist academical browsing, practical general- ists are less likely to find assistance for day-to-day development procedures.

B. J. J. STUBBINGS

PRINCIPLES AND PRACTICE O F PUBLIC ADMINISTRATION IN NIGERIA Augustus Adebayo Wiley, Chichester, 1981, 193 pp.

This work does not reflect prodigious learning. It does not discuss up-to-the-minute theories about the managerial process and postulate exotic Nigerian alternatives. Few academic refer- ences are less than ten years old. And so the bright young scholar of administrative theory may well be tempted to dismiss Augustus Aoebayo’s book as superficial. He will be wrong to do so and it will be his own understanding that is superficial and naive.

For this is the work of a practitioner-a report brought back from the work-face by one who has borne the burden and heat of the day. In present-day Africa-and in most other parts of the developing world-able and dedicated administrators are in desperately short supply. Preoccupied with the day-to-day management of public affairs, they far too seldom find the opportunity to devote time to the activity which this experienced author declares to be ‘supremely important-just plain sitting and thinking’. Still less do they find time to set down the fruits of such sitting and thinking on paper, so that others may learn from them. It is this that Augustus Adebayo has tried to do, and scholars and practitioners alike must be grateful.

86 Book Reviews

And his thoughts have ranged widely and provocatively. The author’s frank assessments of Nigerian administrative practice-of the tensions arising between the technical specialists and the generalist administrators, or between the elected politicians and the permanent civil servants; his ‘credit and debit account’ of military rule in Nigeria: all these topics and many more furnish material for far longer debate than can be permitted here-and debate with relevance far beyond the confines of Nigeria.

It is not always a very tidy book. Two of the chapters have largely appeared before as articles in this journal’s predecessor and elsewhere. Other sections seem to have been prepared originally as independent talks, so that one chapter does not always lead on smoothly from another, and there are occasional repetitions and irrelevancies. But very little of this matters, for this is not a learned treatise, but the notebook of a long-serving prac- titioner, seeking to distill his massive experience for the illumination of his juniors; and teachers of public administration should endeavour to ensure that it will become a prac- tioner’s handbook, a source of instruction and encouragement for young administrators who feel overwhelmed by the enormity of their tasks and lonely in their endeavours to maintain their integrity in the face of apathy, inertia and even corruption. Here is evidence that others, too, have felt such helplessness and loneliness, and yet have endured, and have been able to maintain standards of conduct and industry that are in the highest traditions of any public service.

HUBERT ALLEN International Union of Local Authorities

CONTROL AND POWER IN CENTRAL-LOCAL GOVERNMENT RELATIONS R. A. W. Rhodes S.S.R.C/Gower, Farnborough, 1981, 194 pp.

Although based on material from developed societies this book is also relevant for anyone researching into relationships between governmental organizations in underdeveloped coun- tries. It arose from a commission by the Social Science Research Council’s Panel on Central and Local Government Relationships to Rod Rhodes of the University of Essex. He was asked to review the literature on central-local relations and to develop an analytical framework to guide research.

His book is a major work. It is a thorough bibliographic survey of the literature on British central-local relations, and covers other literatures that contribute to a more sophisticated understanding of such interactions. He draws on interorganizational analysis, writings on intergovernmental relations and corporatism, and neo-Marxist and structuralist approaches.

He extracts skilfully from these diverse contributions the elements of his framework. His message is that central-local relations comprises complex interactions between mutually interdependent organizations. The discretion of each is influenced by the goals, decisions and relative power potential of the other. This power potential is a product of resources, rules of the game and a process of exchange. This exchange process is shaped by the resources of the participants, their strategies, personalities and number of units. The framework constitutes factors to be considered by any researcher into central-local relation- ships. Researchers should use it to explore particular policy areas over a substantial period of time and to determine the relationship between, and the relative importance of, exogeneous and endogenous change.

The S.S.R.C. were so impressed with the framework that they backed a number of pro- jects using it. It is to be hoped that it will guide future researchers who will refine the framework and develop theory. In particular they should clarify the concepts of ‘resources’ and ‘process of exchange’.

G. W. JONES London School of Economics & Political Science