Understanding the Concept of Capacity Building and the Nature of Land Administration Systems

Capacity building is a “buzz word”. Capacity building is increasingly seen as a key component of donor project in developing and transition countries – e.g. World Bank projects. However, the capacity building concept is often used in a very narrow meaning such as focusing on staff development through formal education and training programmes to meet the deficit of qualified personnel in the short term. The paper argues that the concept of Capacity Building should be viewed in a wider context to include the ways and means by which the overall goals are achieved. In the case of Land Administration, education and staff development may certainly be one of these means. However, development of institutional infrastructures (including issues such as good governance, decentralisation, and public participation) may be even more important. Also, the adoption of an adequate land policy framework may be the key to get anywhere at all. It can be argued that even if the key focus is on education and training to meet short and medium term needs, capacity building measures should be assessed in a the wider context of implementing land policies in a sustainable way. The paper aims to develop such a broad definition of “capacity”. The paper also analyses the nature of Land Administration Systems in order to identify the key issues to be addressed when carrying out capacity analysis and developing capacity building measures in this area.