Understanding Rural Empowerment

KOMPAS/VIDELIS JEMALI

The Villages, Disadvantaged Regions and Transmigration Ministry’s rural area development director general, Ahmad Erani Yustika (wearing batik), checks out the products of a joint business group sold at Pajang House in Sigi, Central Sulawesi, Wednesday (10/1/2018). Since the disbursement of village funds in 2015, residents have been facilitated to develop businesses by utilizing local products.

For a long time, the country’s villages have received a variety of assistance programs that aimed to improve public welfare. These include infrastructure development projects, such as the rural electrification program, and community empowerment programs, such as the TNI Manunggal Masuk Desa (Indonesian Military Entering the Village), which was formerly called the ABRI Masuk Desa program, and the compulsory community work (KKN) program for university students, as well as various corporate social responsibility (CSR) programs conducted by big companies.

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Partnerships between villagers and outsiders are also found in the management of the village funds program, which involves facilitators in village administrations. The participation of village assistants is expected to increase the effective use of financial capital in realizing “more empowered and prosperous villagers”.

Here are several notes I have made after observing the village empowerment programs of various parties.

Village partners as facilitators

In the past, these empowerment programs often positioned rural communities as objects. Today, there is growing awareness over positioning rural communities as the subjects, and this approach has enabled empowerment programs to be carried out more effectively.

The main task of a facilitator is to encourage villagers to explore and identify their own goals and needs at the planning stage and become partners at the implementation stage.

If such programs used a top-down approach in the past, they are now more participatory, with villagers and their partners, namely nonresidents assisting the village such as students in the KKN program, representatives of CSR programs, and village facilitators, on an equal footing. Village facilitators are no longer dominant and no longer act as teachers or leaders, but more as facilitators. The main task of a facilitator is to encourage villagers to explore and identify their own goals and needs at the planning stage and become partners at the implementation stage.

In determining goals and how to achieve them, villagers can do this independently or together with the facilitators, so the community becomes willing to participate actively in implementing the program. Establishing togetherness and common views at the planning stage also helps to reduce the potential for conflict at a later stage.

In addition, the process of identifying goals and developing activities usually takes longer than the top-down method, so villagers and facilitators meet often. In addition, facilitators must keep in mind that their main role is to be a mentor, not a decision-maker, and that this requires patience.

Giving hooks, not fish

One of the challenges of the village empowerment program is to put into practice the saying, "give a hook, not a fish". Everyone understands its meaning, but putting it into practice is not easy.

This includes practicing it not only when cash is involved, but also when the village partner provides physical assistance, such as agricultural machinery or equipment for home industries, ensuring the tools’ suitability and sustainability so they really do help the recipients.

This “project approach” referred to, in the expression of the late Prof. Mubyarto, as “Iki Duwit en Tekno” (here’s the money and spend it all) in a play on the IDT program for disadvantaged villages, which provided capital assistance without clear accountability.

In the past, village empowerment programs were often approached on a project basis, which was another challenge. This “project approach” referred to, in the expression of the late Prof. Mubyarto, as “Iki Duwit en Tekno” (here’s the money and spend it all) in a play on the IDT program for disadvantaged villages, which provided capital assistance without clear accountability.

Not infrequently, villagers who are familiar with such “projects” from the past, expect the same thing when meeting a new partner, especially if the partner comes from a company or institution perceived to have a “big name”. The approach that "we are partners who work with the people" needs to be emphasized from the beginning.

Empowering partners

Village empowerment activities are not actually just about improving the welfare of rural communities, but also empowering partners. Community service fosters a spirit of caring and sharing for all participants. This is important social capital to lead a social life.

In addition to the spirit of caring and sharing, much local wisdom can be learned from living in a village. I remember that 35 years ago, as a student about to start a KKN program, one of the messages then-rector Prof. Koesnadi Hardjasoemantri left us with was to seek to gain knowledge from the villagers, because they possessed local wisdoms that were not found in universities and which would be very useful in our lives.

The rector even placed more emphasis on “seeking knowledge from the villagers” and not the other way around. His message also highlighted, "You students are not smarter than the villagers, so don't be arrogant," and that a village held valuable knowledge to be explored.

That message remains relevant today. Empowering rural communities is about not only empowering the villagers, but also about gaining life knowledge from the villagers.

FE UNPAR

Siwi Nugraheni

SIWI NUGRAHENI,lecturer at the School of Economics, Parahyangan Catholic University

(This article was translated by Hendarsyah Tarmizi)