Reviews a wide range of experiences in maternal, child health, and family planning programmes in an effort to identify factors and conditions that encourage effective community participation. Addressed to health planners, the book concentrates on issues of management and behaviour that can influence the nature and course of health programmes that rely on community participation. Throughout, numerous case studies and anecdotes are used to illustrate the strengths and weaknesses of various programmes. The book has four main chapters. The first provides a brief history of community participation in health care, concentrating on the changes in attitudes since the Second World War and the influence of new ideas on community participation in health care. The second chapter discusses the various interpretations of community participation, emphasizing those most relevant to the delivery of maternal, child, and family planning services. The analytical framework for the study is developed in the third chapter, which describes programmes on the basis of their objectives and the ways in which those objectives are pursued. The author suggests that the progress and success of a programme are governed by two sets of factors: descriptive factors, which are mainly of an environmental nature, and action factors, which refer to organization, management, and resource mobilization. The final chapter draws a number of conclusions concerning the questions that will need to be addressed and answered by planners and agencies.

ara eng fre spa.

WHODOC

WHO monograph

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