THE FUSE

With the local government elections just months away, South Africans are thinking about the neighbourhoods they want their children to grow up in. Municipalities create the conditions for children to thrive, working alongside national and provincial governments. Families, NGOs, businesses and other non-state institutions also shape children’s lives. It’s a collective effort. The shortcomings in municipal service delivery are well known; some businesses are focused solely on profit and NGOs may lack sufficient scale. Yet even when institutions and organisations are in place, and even where each performs its respective role reasonably well, often the child development outcomes they collectively seek to influence fall short. Why?