Kenya has grappled with extensive crime and insecurity, ranging from armed robberies, carjacking and street crime, to politically-motivated, ethnically-organised violence, resource conflicts and terror attacks that affect both rural and urban areas. Poor urban neighbourhoods have in particular continued to face serious challenges of crime and insecurity.
As is the case in a number of countries in Africa, public policing in Kenya has not succeeded in complete assertion of state monopoly on violence. Poor infrastructure, inadequate financial resources and deficiency in security personnel numbers are among the key factors that limit state capacity to police the entire terrain of the country.
This policy brief suggests a policy trajectory that draws lessons from the assessment of community-led security mechanisms in Mlango Kubwa in Mathare sub-county and Kawangware, in Dagoretti North sub-county of Nairobi. In an age when policing and security provision has seen the emergence of a range of hybrid measures and joint ventures between the state security agencies and civilians, a fresh policy look at security governance from the lessons at the community level is important.