Abstract

This paper aims to understand the nature of the relationship between bureaucratic reform and community driven development in general, and bureaucracy and community in particular. Within the discourse of public administration and development, the idea that the state and its administrative arms, the bureaucracy, should have a role in promoting development is not new. However, with the inefficiencies and frustrations of ‘red-tape’ being inherent of state and bureaucratic systems, attaining a certain level of functionality and accountability has proven difficult and the call for bureaucratic reform is now a pervasive feature of broader development strategies. By drawing on an Indonesian case study of the implementation of the National Program for Community Empowerment (PNPM)-Urban in Surabaya, this paper focuses on the lessons that emerged from the project, about the potential fusion between development and bureaucratic reform and the extent to which community participation is facilitated through such projects. The findings confirm the complexities and uneasy fit of the relationship between bureaucratic reform and community driven development in general and bureaucracy and community in particular. In the concluding remarks, a direction for further research is suggested.