Legal empowerment for local resource control

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emphasise helping clients themselves make the strategic choices in their
empowerment process.
In addition to activities and materials to build the capacity of local resource
users, para-legal tools also include efforts to work with government and
private-sector actors. Addressing power asymmetries requires not only
building the capacity of weaker actors better to articulate their views and
have their voice heard; but also building the capacity of stronger actors
better to listen to and take account of weaker actors’ concerns. Working
with government may include building the capacity of government officials,
judges and others better to apply legal tools to the benefit of local resource
users. Working with foreign investors may raise awareness about the
positive and negative impacts of investment projects on local resource
users; and about ways to maximise benefits and minimise costs, showing
that these may be consistent with and even supportive of the investor’s
business interests.
The diversity of the para-legal tools that have been experimented and used
in different parts of Africa calls for lesson-sharing and exchange of
experience among legal services organisations; and for disseminating
lessons learned and experience gained to a wider audience that may be
inspired to start similar processes elsewhere. However, these issues are only
briefly touched on in this study, mainly through boxes accompanying the
main text and aimed at providing a flavour of the range of para-legal tools
that can be used. These tools deserve far greater attention, and will be
tackled more comprehensively in subsequent activities of the “Legal tools”
project (see above, Box 1).
2.3.3. To sum up
Appropriate legal tools can help local resource users have greater control
over the resources on which they depend, through strengthening protection
of their legal entitlements (in terms of both content and remedies).
Implementation and outcomes of these legal tools are shaped by extra-legal
factors (political, economic, social, cultural and other) that affect the
capacity of local groups to claim their entitlements. Legal tools must
therefore be accompanied by para-legal tools that strengthen local capacity
to use the opportunities offered by the law (Figure 2).