Saturday, October 13, 2018

Informational Capabilities and Transformation of Digital Culture (A Case study of Four Villages in Java)

This Project was funded by Kemristek DIKTI/PTUPT 2017-2018  
Direktorat Penelitian Universitas Gadjah Mada 

Researchers
Arie Setyaningrum Pamungkas
Ika Ayu Kristianingrum
Ika Kusmiyati
Muhammad Amrun

Introduction


The mandate of the Law of the Villages No. 6 of 2014 requires a principle of equitable distribution of development to be conducted for rural and disadvantaged areas in Indonesia. This mandate emphasizes a subsidiary system for rural development through a recognition by the nation in order to treat villages not only as unitary units of government but also as cultural institutions. In other words, the Law of the Villages No. 6 of 2014 necessitates governmental agencies (bodies) to recognize villages as 'the subject' of development, not merely object. It also means that public services should be conducted by the central government by encouraging participation of villagers for their socioeconomic improvement which also means efforts to overcome socioeconomic gap between rural and urban developments. The whole process can be developed by utilizing a facilitation model that passes between subjects focus on each potentials of every villages area and by managing a mutual platform. This facilitation is expected to facilitate subjects (people who will be involved in the community) with their various accesses to ICT and their different types of social and cultural forums. In practice, such a digital platform is developed through an application of ‘Sistem Informasi Desa’ (SID) – or the village information system.

The assessment of the implementation of village digitalization is thus fundamentally addresses at how the management of the village information systems (SID) have been conducted and how the village potentials are institutionalized through various potentials that will support the establishment of a village owned enterprises (Badan Usaha Milik Desa - Bumdes). Bumdes can be managed through various engagements that are rooted within socio cultural ecosystem of each villages.

The major concerns on utilizing ICT for rural development through the application of SID thus intends to examine the practice of rural development plan and what impacts generated through various managements of village information systems that can be integrated or linked within the institutionalization of the village enterprises (Bumdes).

On this account, governmental endorsement of Bumdes for rural participation especially for the well being of the villagers are also important to be assessed due to the fact that such various programs also provide opportunities for different social classes in the rural areas. This is important to be observed, given the fact that rural elites still dominates access to major information, for example information related to the inventory of citizen assets. At this point, the economic potentials of the smallest unit in the village to gain a wider marketing scope can be easily manipulated to attract investment. This issue needs to be ethically discussed especially because the discourse of BUMDES becomes one of the prerequisites for withdrawing (liquifying) the village funds (dana desa) from the central government. This policy of constituting the establishment of Bumdes is considered as an implementation of the Village Law No. 6 of 2014 which in fact the allocation budget funds is starting in 2017.

The central government through the Ministry of Villages, Disadvantaged Regions and Transmigration (the Kemendesa PDTT) has encouraged the efforts to maximize ICT function especially for developing the village information system (Sistem Informasi Desa) whilst at the same time developing alternative rural development to promote the villages’ economic potentials, sustainability development and increasing village productivity. So it can be said that ideally the government runs a major knot in the effort to distribute resources and efforts to maintain sustainability of development in the villages by involving community nodes at the grassroots level as well as with other civil society organizations. Efforts ideally could also be made with 'platform' or blueprint for village development by optimizing the distribution of information and utilization of technology involving the participation of villagers. However, such platform of ICT for rural development is not yet fully achieved (or comprehended) by the government due to other priorities in utilizing the village funds (dana desa) especially for completing basic infrastructure development in rural areas.

Research Questions, Method and Theoretical Framework

The ideal expectation of ICT for rural development is actually aimed to transform social relations between citizens from old cultural patterns to a new pattern in order to support good governance and economic sustainability or economic improvement.
Three research questions employed are:
  1. With regard to the application of SID for good governance, is the SID used as a tool to develop the village sustainability that ultimately has implications for social change and the improvement of citizens' well being? Or is the village itself (the village government) just developing SID because it is one of the main tasks required by the Village Law?
  2. With regard to the utilization of SID for alternative rural economy, is it true that Bumdes can provide a uniform and equitable economic impact, or simply transfer the outside capital (large capital / modern) to enter the village without considering the sustainability of the village as a cultural institution or cultural entity?
  3. With regard to the ICT utilization for good governance and increasing people wellbeing, what would be the advantages as well as vulnerabilities in the implementation of SID and Bumdes?
Aims of the research are:

(1)  the implementation of village information system (SID) and its application for good gorvernance of providing transparency and public accountability and involving citizen participation for rural development;
(2) the evaluation of the rural economic development, especially in the practice of establishing 'village-owned enterprises' (Badan Usaha Milik Desa or commonly abbreviated as BUMDES).

In order to gain the aims of the research, the case study employed an ethnography method in which the observation is also conducted by a participatory observation. An ethnography study in this case is crucial for further exploration on socio cultural impacts. A base study on the SID and Bumdes have been conducted by two related NGOS namely CRI (Combine Resource Institution) and IRE (Institute for Research and Emporwerment) – both have experiences in empowering rural development.

Four villages involved in the ethnography study were: Murtigading Village, Sanden District, Bantul Regency, DIY Province; Panggungharjo Village, Sewon District, Bantul Regency, DIY Province; Nglegi Village, Patuk District, Gunung Kidul Regency, DIY Province; Pejambon Village, Sumberrejo Sub-District, Bojonegoro District, East Java Province.

The four villages were selected because they have implemented the village information system (SID) and initiated the formation of a village-owned enterprise (Bumdes). The selection of the four sites was also based on the importance of gaining a comparative study of the practices of SID and Bumdes by considering differences in geographic and demographic conditions, as well as the influence of urbanization in their respective regions. Two villages in DIY region were selected as the case study, i.e, Nglegi and Murtigading villages because they are villages with less influence of urbanization than those in Panggungharjo Village which seems to be a buffering zone for the urban expansion of Yogyakarta City, so this village also experiences a rapid urbanization process and has a likely urban life despite the fact that it is administratively recognized as a village administration area. While the selection of the village outside the province of Yogyakarta, Pejambon Village, in Bojonegoro, East Java, was selected due to the fact that the village has become a pilot project for the development of a good village information system (SID), despite its obstacles in developing alternative economic potentials through Bumdes.

Informational capability is a concept that supports the idea of sustainable development through an empowerment of community base development and the practice of democracy at a grass root level. In developing sustainable development by emphasizing cultural aspect especially for improving well being condition of poor villagers in the era of digital technology, the ICT utilization suggests to emphasize a combination of ICT medium and individual capabilities in processing and utilizing information base that assigns individuals roles within their social agencies and their connections at multiple community bases. Bjorn-Soren Gigler (2015) argues that informational capability paradigm helps to explain how ecological changes in information communication systems take place whereas the ecology is not just a matter of individual or group adaptation on ICT devices alone but also on how to integrate 'information literacy' as a 'shared' capability within community.


Research Findings: Comparative Practices of Informational Capabilities in Four Digital Villages in Rural Java

There are two main indicators of 'informational capability' in the utilization of ICT for rural development applied in this study, as follows:

(1) ICT utilization access which is undertaken and facilitated by the village governments and communities involved in rural development to include citizen participation for rural development
(2)  The institutionalization of participation in organizing communities through the application of SID (the village information system) particularly for rural economic development

These indicators help to explain the quality of cultural implications of utilizing village information system for rural development where the application of digital technology is expected to increase the development capability more rapidly without injuring the democratic processes and participation at the local level which in turn has also a significant impact on the tradition and specificity of the village community in general. 

The four villages selected as a case study in this research according to the development index in Indonesia are considered as the representatives of the autonomous and the developing villages.  Panggungharjo village and Mutigading village in Yogyakarta are autonomous villages (desa mandiri) which means the villages have autonomous economic income and thus potentially become developed villages (desa maju) in the near future. Meanwhile, Nglegi village in Yogyakarta and Pejambon village in East Java are considered as developing villages (desa berkembang) that still need more governmental supports for infrastructure development, but have potentials or advantages to be economically autonomous in providing alternative employment for their citizens. 

From the fieldwork notes it can be said that in general the development of informational capability in each village observed is not yet fully achieved due to two main problems located on:

(1)    the interpretation of utilizing SID and the village data management which means authority of utilizing the village data and data privacy of the village assets including monograph data and demographic data whether they should be publicly accessible or not

(2)    the interpretation of building or forming Bumdes due to the fear of facing legal risks and the resistance of citizens (villagers) who are afraid of being threatened because of competition in almost the similar business.

Those two main problems of the implementation of ICT for rural development because the central government itself has not yet formulated a general platform of the village information system (SID) that determines standards of public services and the pre-requisite for building Bumdes seems to be comprehended only by some village elites in most cases in order to meet the requirements of gaining the village funds (dana desa) from the central government.

One of the main problems of the implementation of ICT for rural development that underlies this research is the fact that can be found in determining priorities for rural development. This is exemplified for instance in the Decree of the Ministry of Village, Disadvantaged Regions and Transmigration which is called ‘PERMENDESA’ whereas the PERMENDESA No 22 of 2016 on 'Determination of Priority of Village Fund Usage Year 2017' is changed to PERMENDESA No 4 of 2017 on 'Changes on PERMENDESA NO.22 Year 2016 on Stipulation Priority of Village Fund Usage 2017.’ In the first year after the ratification of the Village Law, the vision of the Village Law is implemented through the priority of village funding allocations to apply to establish the village information systems (SID) in almost all villages throughout Indonesia. In the subsequent years, the priority was also given as much as 30% of village funds for the construction of rural physical infrastructure. In 2017 the vision of village development is also aimed at strengthening the village economy and developing the village's creative economy by forming the village-owned enterprise (Bumdes). This has implications for the village governments’ responses and how to organize the village communities at the grassroots level.

In practice since the implementation of the Village Law, two other issues have arisen regarding the management and distribution of village information systems. The first is the matter of village autonomy, and the second is the distribution of information through the ICT practices that tend to be elitist. The issue of village autonomy concerns on how to manage data and information owned by villages that are accessible for wider public, not just by the villagers. Village monograph data for instance is not only administrative data that can be utilized by the government alone, but also opens up other opportunities or loopholes that can be utilized by other parties who seek benefits from rural development by excluding the involvement of local residents. On the other hand, there are still village elites who control information unilaterally so that the data is very likely to be misused. For example, with regard to the inventory of citizen assets (such as land ownership), the economic potential of the smallest unit in the village (Micro Small Medium Enterprises - MSMEs) to the wider scope can be easily used to attract investment. While it may open up rural economic opportunities creatively outside the traditional village economic sector (such as agriculture), this needs to be addressed more deeply when the discourse of developing the village's creative economy through village-owned enterprises (Bumdes) is strengthened. In fact, Bumdes cannot always provide a uniform and equitable economic impact because the development of the economic institution is not always include the villagers’ participation due to pragmatic reasons. For instance the village governments seem to view the establishment of Bumdes as a requirement imposed by the central government therefore they have to manage a limited time and energy – in order to achieve a quick profitmaking rather than considering social benefits of the Bumdes for the villagers. In some cases, the establishment of Bumdes, seem simply transfer the outside capital (large capital / modern) to enter the village without considering the sustainability of the village as a cultural institution or cultural entity and at the same time threatens the solidarity of the villagers have traditionally had a mechanism of defense in keeping their communities from the threat of social conflict due to economic disparities among citizens.

In general, there are two important aspects that need to be critically reviewed in assessing the village information system (SID), e.g: 
(1) Appropriate approach model that will be used in the village information system; 
(2) Appropriate content that should be filled into the village website that is publicly accessible. 

In the first aspect there are two models of approaches implemented in the village information systems (SID) relating to the distribution of village authorities. First is the SID model that is top down. In this model, village top-down management makes the bureaucracy central, either as an initiator or organizer, or a facilitator in the implementation of government programs. Second is the bottom-up SID model which in this approach runs from the community's initiative in the village development plan. In this context, the informational community independently supports building the required facilities such as the development of the village website, and other support for enlarging networks. For example, in Pejambon Village Bojonegoro has an online site with a very detailed administration of village administration data such as salaries of village government officials, to data on school conditions in the village. The existence of complete data such as shown by Pejambon Village is possible to be presented due to a strong initiative from the informational community who empower the villagers for ICT literacy.

The second aspect concerns how the village builds the website content that can be incorporated into the SID that supports village management. It delineates the ideal outputs generated by SID that the data originating from the people used as a database in village development planning should be benefitted the people, so it is not limited to display village profiles that have many loopholes to be misused. In other words, the SID implementation should not be limited to the supporting system of the village-wide system, but as an entry point for discussing authority issues. 

In other words, the SID is only a tool, but it can be useful otherwise it can be risky as well, because at this point SID (the village information system) can be functioned to encourage a better governance and thus optimizing the SID is directed at measuring the village government's commitment to democratic values ​​that underlie SID's implementation of transparency, accountability and community participation. Therefore, the discourse of practicing SID should be extended from the issues of technology tools only (both hardware and software), but moves forward to socializing the function of the SID into community or villagers so that they can participate optimally as well. In many cases, the SID implementation in villages involving government synergy (central and local), community, and village institutions, where all three should be able to control each other. Another major obstacle is the unavailability of internet access where not all villages have internet connection. 

Despite the fact that infrastructure for internet network is already facilitated by the central government, discrepancy of knowledge in digital literacy may occur due to limited human resources, for instance in the case of a gap in updating the data because the officials have been more accustomed to input data manually. In addition there is a problem of data centralization with the level of density if the village data is collected centrally into one server. There is an imbalance knowledge gained by the system managers (officials who run SID) and citizens. This inequality can be clearly seen in the village where the village bureaucracy controls all citizens' data to be displayed on the village site, but the villagers themselves as part of the data owner do not know (realize) that their data has been used by the village bureaucracy. The disparities in the implementation of the SID has enabled the tendency of increasingly less citizen participation in the planning processes of village development. In other words, the use of SID applications without a clear platform can also threaten the existing traditional citizen forums.

With regard to authority and data privacy, another obstacle is how to manage and process what information that can be publicly displayed. In the SID there are three key figures involved to run the system management, consisting of village officials, the operators, and the village volunteers (the informational community). These three key figures play the roles to encourage the involvement of all citizens-including building synergies for system management and minimizing the risk of particular group or elites that want to take advantage of situation where dispute of data management is present. With regard to the SID practice and the formation of Bumdes for instance, when the data is incomplete, while the village funds from the central government will continue to be liquefied then a program that is perfunctory will be found. From the observations and interviews conducted with village activists, the most important aspect in managing village data is the planning of the existing data in the village so that anyone who will enter the village development roles, whether NGOs, the government or academia, must adjust to the potentials of each village. Currently Bumdes opens opportunities for all businesses run by the people, but at the same time the village government should also provide protection on the business people with small capital.

Conclusion

In general, it can be summed up that the SID cannot be simply interpreted as a practice of a digital application for data input, indeed not even just a village website. The village system information (SID) and websites are only a small part of the expected goals of ICT for rural development. Since the SID contains village data including village development data, village areas and other important information, it can be functioned as media to convey data or public information so that people (citizen) can easily gain public services. On the other hand, the application of digital technology should prioritize the consideration of community access to technology. Technology that is too forced to be rushed built into particular community will create another problem of lacking social participation. The availability of data that is not accompanied by community access to the data itself also impedes community participation. 

The application of SID should consider how the community can utilize or benefit the information contained in the information system. Access to information is a basic prerequisite to ensure it. In general, the principles of the implementation of ICT for rural development are participation and accountability of being transparent, inclusive and sustainable. These aspects of utilization and engagement will make a measurable development milestone.

Bumdes's main goal is to improve the well being of the villagers, therefore the benefits cannot be only enjoyed by a handful of village elites. In fact, the problems are still emerging in the development of Bumdes. In this sense the establishment of Bumdes needs to be reoriented. Bumdes has not been positioned as a business entity devoted to generating benefits and tends to be oriented only to immediately create profits. In the development of Bumdes, many villages have directed Bumdes programs just to create profits immediately without considering the other significant benefits such as the preservation of nature, and the balance of social harmony among citizens. On the other hand, the village has no clear authority in the management of village assets, especially for management by and through Bumdes. The potentials and assets of the villages have not been optimally utilized to overcome economic and social problems that exist in the rural areas. Another obstacle of establishing Bumdes is due to the fact that there is no clarity and certainty in the mechanism and procedures of participation of village capital funds and the participation of funds from other parties. Since Bumdes is not a cooperative, but rather a business entity that is specifically owned legally by the village, it also does not mean a village-owned limited company (in Indonesian sense is CV). This means that the legal status of an entity Bumdes also still does not have a specific clarity that is affirmed in the state regulation. It still opens up vulnerable conflicts and disputes that occasionally may arise in rural communities.  With regard to Bumdes’ reorientation through the application of SID, it should be directed to developing aspects of' economic business' and 'social business' in maintaining a balance of benefits and potential economic benefits in the village with inclusive participation of its citizens through the mechanism of the informational capabilities building.

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