Resource
The state of local governance and public services in decentralized Indonesia
Producer:
Wenefrida Widyanti
Publication year:
2008
Source of the information:
SMERU
Decentralization has been implemented in Indonesia since 2001. Many efforts to improve it have been supported by international and bilateral donor agencies. The Governance and Decentralization Survey (GDS) is one of the initiatives that aim to monitor and evaluate the implementation of the governance and decentralization policy. This publication is about a GDS survey which aims to evaluate the implementation of local governance and decentralization policy in Indonesia. It provides an assessment of many aspects of household access to public services, especially health, education, and public administration, from both the supply and demand side.
The survey had the following three objectives:
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To evaluate the performance of local service providers, consumer satisfaction, and the condition of local governance, with a view towards informing particular policy questions on decentralization.
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To monitor and evaluate the performance of the World Bank, ADB, and GTZ decentralization and governance projects using it to assess the relative impact of individual project efforts over time.
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To provide input for evaluating the unconditional cash transfer for the poor families, school operational funds, health insurance for poor families, and the rural infrastructure programs, provided to mitigate the impact of the fuel price increases.
The findings of the survey include:
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Participation in local elections is quite high at 94% of households voting in the district head elections.
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Few people admitted to knowing of corruption or bribery cases in various public service institutions in the past two years.
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Comparing World Bank project areas, the findings indicate more people acknowledged their awareness of corruption and bribery cases in urban areas than other areas, with the lowest proportion found in poor and disadvantaged areas.
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Only 15% of households have access to information on their village’s budget allocation and only 25% to information on village development programs.
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A higher rate of urban communities than rural ones felt they had good access to publis services.
