ABSTRACT
This chapter shows the outcomes and limitations of implementing top-down strategies of decentralization in highly centralized governments in developing countries. It emphasizes the organizational aspects and environment surrounding the experience. The Technical Assistance National System was created in Venezuela with the enactment of the Housing Policy Act in 1989. The act was part of a national strategy for decentralization and transference of power to the regional and local governments. The training program revealed weakness in the subjects of organization and administration. People were not confident enough about the mechanisms to provide legal and administrative forms to their housing community organizations. The innovations proposed by the Technical Assistance National System were the product of the review and analysis of the relationships of the existing housing sector. The sector was the network of public, private and community-based organizations in which all the housing actors were included, but their interrelationships were very limited.
