Interpreting Education Decentralization: Flexibility and Policy Innovation

Indonesia has been implementing decentralization reform since 2001. The reform has had significant impact on the relationship between tiers of government and responsibility for public service, including in education. This paper examines how decentralization influences the education service delivery in Kabupatenn Bantul. It addresses the implications of decentralization on human resources, in particular teachers, curriculum development, bureaucracy and stakeholders, local financing on education, and stakeholders and community participation in education sector.

The paper reveals that decentralization has generated several significant impacts on education service in Kabupaten Bantul. First, subsequent to decentralization, local government has pioneered a program to improve teachers? quality by providing a financial scheme for teachers to pursuing further studies; the program has made Kabupaten Bantul the first district in Indonesia to have a majority of teachers holding master‘s degrees. Curriculum development has not much changed, as prior to decentralization, central government had adopted school based management (SBM) in 1994.

Following decentralization, curriculum development was devolved to local and schools, but they still have adhered to the 9 National Education Standards which are determined by the central government. However, local government acknowledged that decentralization has enabled them to determine the more appropriate local content in the school curriculum that demanded for its region. Thirdly, Kabupaten Bantul has set the education sector among the first priorities of its development program, as the key sector, and spending on education has been increased since 2000 to 2009. Lastly, the paper evidenced that local government has attained community participation in education sector, particularly parents.


Keywords: Educational Decentralization; Governance; Policy Innovation.
JEL Classification: H3, R28.