Deliberative Democracy Innovations at Citizen Level: Challenges of Local Government in Indonesia

This paper examined the roadmap for deliberative democracy development through village-level regional development planning forums in Indonesia and connected it with the strength of traditions and local values of a region. Roadmap innovations can solve problems and increase governance capacity. This study aimed to identify innovation challenges & factors affecting the innovation environment; using a qualitative method with a case study design. As a result, innovation is able to increase interaction and agreement on solving public policy problems and improve local government governance capacity. The challenge was determined by the open leadership, responsive village leadership behavior. Forums transform as a formal dialogue space and media for the contestation of knowledge with informal meetings in the community. The community traditions are present, recognized, valued through institutionalizing local institutions, local actors, and features that drive democracy in community consultation and cooperation. Several factors affecting the innovation environment included legal culture and policy, political& administrative environment, government & civil servant traditions. The government needs to carry out institutional conversions along with changes from the government, deliberation spaces, &communities to achieve these two goals.