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Paper short abstract

This paper explores how twilight institutions in conflict environments in Kenya broker and instrumentalise service delivery under devolution to gain power and contest competing authority, drawing on micro-level insights on ethnic tensions.

Paper long abstract

Kenya’s 2010 devolution aimed to reduce ethnic tensions by improving service delivery for marginalised communities (Akech, 2010). Yet, in conflict environments such as Chepyuk Ward in Mount Elgon constituency, service delivery remains a challenge. Chepyuk, an ethnically diverse agricultural frontier, suffers persistent underdevelopment in health, education and road infrastructure. Historically marked by violent identity and land conflicts (Médard, 2009, 2010; Lynch, 2011; Lynch and Anderson, 2014), the territory has long been a site of power struggles. Before devolution, elected elites directly exercised control over service delivery along micro-ethnic lines. Since 2013, new twilight institutions—those that are not the government but exercise public authority (Lund, 2006)—have emerged, reshaping local politics. Drawing on nine-month ethnographic research, May 2022 to February 2023, this paper shows how two rival institutions from the same micro-ethnic group—a local NGO and an informal group—broker and instrumentalise service delivery to gain power and contest authority. These struggles deepen micro-ethnic divisions, selectively delivering and disrupting services, particularly in social, education and road infrastructure. The paper argues that service delivery in such contexts is not neutral but political, shaping agency and governance while influencing how communities imagine their futures amid uncertainty.