Decentralization, Participatory Planning, and the Anthropocene in Indonesia, with a Case Example of the Berugak Dese, Lombok, Indonesia

Abstract

Successful government decentralization requires the participation of all levels of government, industry, and civil society, and especially benefits from the traditions, wisdom, and ownership of local communities. However, Indonesia’s central government was not assisted by international aid donors to undertake a decentralization process that was participatory in design or application. Nor did donor invest trust in Indonesia’s government to achieve decentralization, which is typical of critiques on development. Processes have resulted in the failure of complete decentralization, which has had adverse outcomes for people, their communities, and the environmental justice required to achieve a non-anthropocentric stewardship. In providing the Berugak Dese, a locally grown planning institution in Lombok, Indonesia, we present this village level model of participatory planning as an exemplar for participatory planning and distributive governance. We pose that for successful development aimed to enhance the welfare of people, collectives, and planet, that there are lessons to be learned from the engagement of successful and sustained activities at the grassroots.