Bakti Setiawan

Rukun and Gotong Royong : Managing Public Places in an Indonesian Kampung

It has been argued that a livable and sustainable city can only be achieved if the community is directly involved and participates in the creation and management of the city’s environment.3 It is unfortunate, however, that often little information is available on a community’s potential and problems in this area. This chapter will describe the way in which an Indonesian kampung, i.e., an urban village (or “squatter settlement” to some biased eyes), with limited support from external sources — the state, the private sectors, and the professionals — has successfully managed public places to create a livable and vibrant environment. Based on the traditional Javanese ideas of rukun (social harmony, communality) and gotong royong (sharing burdens, mutual cooperation), the kampung, supported by a strong community organization, has been able to create public places with limited environmental and economic resources. External support and efforts toward strengthening the community, however, are needed to face the rapid and unprecedented urbanization, modernization, and globalization that are putting more pressure on the kampung.

Existing urban management frameworks and heritage conservation in Indonesia

This paper describes the existing urban management system in Indonesia and examines its potential to assist in conserving tourist‐historic cities. Government structure, legal mechanisms, spatial urban development plans, and development control measures are reviewed to see how each of them might contribute to heritage conservation. It is suggested that all of these have potential for this cause and should be considered by politicians, conservation activists, and tourism planners in their decision‐making processes.

The Roles of Planning Education in the Decentralization and Democratization Era: Lessons from Indonesia

This chapter reviews the development of planning education and planning practices in Indonesia. It shows that planning education in Indonesia has tended to serve the needs of government planning practices. In doing so, it has failed to cast a critical eye over government practices and the state of society. The author recommends that planning educators adopt a more critical engagement with the state, enabling planning education in Indonesia to provide the necessary knowledge and training for the betterment of planning ideas and practices in Indonesia. In addition, the chapter also underscores the need for the planning education community to pursue reform for the betterment and enrichment of planning education in Indonesia.