Spatial Planning for Sustainable Development: An Action Planning Approach for Jakarta

Spatial planning in Indonesian cities has become an increasingly political process since the implementation of decentralization after 2001. This has elevated the expectation of public groups to demand the government-led planning and implementation to specifically address their concerns. The bottom-up plan making process is in itself insufficient to address the challenges of a politicized process, especially when the focus of the planning is largely on mega-projects that have little impact on everyday life. As demonstrated in the area of water management in Jakarta, an action planning process that melds short term and long term interventions is more likely to gain political backing, especially if its enables the government processes to become more resilient in the face of continuous problems, and if it takes concrete steps to realize a more sustainable environment.