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In Colombia, urban management has traditionally proved to be inadequate to handle the spread and structure of urban growth. But with the growing domestic and international public debate in favour of decentralisation, local democracy and the participation of citizens in decisions affecting their lives in the 1990s, we have seen the emergence of new methods for urban planning and management. However, these methods have been adopted by the various local entities in quite different and disparate ways, according to their own interests, their position and their systems of organisation and intervention. As a resuit, the raison d’être for these new models is now being questioned. This article offers a series of reflections based on the diffïculties encountered by the Bogota accounting office called “civic control of public investment” in establishing a participative management system between 1997 and 1999.