This paper considers the potentials and limitations of partnerships between municipal authorities and local and external groups in addressing environmental problems, and illustrates this with an account of the experience in the city of Nakuru in developing such partnerships. It describes the serious inadequacies in the provision for water, sanitation and solid waste management in Nakuru, and then describes the Localizing Agenda 21 Programme that was developed in the city, supported by a variety of national and international agencies and NGOs. It points to this programme's strengths and limitations and highlights the difficulties facing any under-resourced municipality in developing partnerships without more support from national government and more local capacity to work with low-income groups and their community organizations.

This paper tries to explain why community action and partnering in services upgrading in Nakuru, Kenya, has only produced very modest results. Although inhabitants feel connected to their neighbourhood, they do not automatically translate their attachment into concrete action to improve liveability. This is due to a range of reasons, including competing loyalties of citizens, antagonism between local leaders, pervasive influence of patronage and cronyism, chronic weaknesses of local government and tendencies of CBOs to become more exclusionary. These findings somewhat temper the general optimism in the Habitat literature about the potentials of communities in spurring local development processes. Nakuru is a good place to investigate this issue since it is often portrayed as an example of best practice in local-government—community interaction, especially because of its commitment to the LA-21 process.

Amboseli National Park is regarded as one of the most economically significant parks owing to high tourist visitation and revenue streams. Despite the economic significance of Amboseli National Park, the wildlife dispersal areas outside the park boundaries are shrinking at an alarming rate due to changing land use activities and a growing human population pressure, aggravating human -wildlife conflicts as well as creating unviable ecosystem for wildlife. The park cannot support the current wildlife populations without the dispersal areas offered by the community land. The ecological limitation of the park calls for the management of wildlife resource in the ecosystem to be inclusive and involve the local communities. This study therefore aimed to provide these linkages and fill the existing gap by examining modalities for enhancing community participation in wildlife conservation in Amboseli Ecosystem informed by Social Exchange Theory and supported by the General Systems Theory.

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