Fostering Open Government Through Budget Transparency in Budgetary Process in Local Government

This thesis is trying to find three major research questions. The first is to search how transparent the local government in Indonesia on their budget process. The result shows that all the cases only have ‘some’ information on the degree of openness in budget process. West Java Province has the highest rank at the point 52, North Sumatera Province at the second at the point 48, Aceh Province at the third rank at the point 45, and South Sumatera the last one at the point 39. The second is to find factors in open government. There are five factors of open government that then classified into the foundation of open government that are data and information, and the pillar of open government that are transparency, collaboration, and government open innovation. The third is to find contents and tools to promote open government in budget process.In budget planning, the content consists of releasing information before the budget discussion to the public sphere; budget discussion between citizens and government; and government mechanism for accountability to guarantee that citizens’ preferences are executed in decision-making. The potential use of information technology is through web-based application and web-based communication technology that combines web-based technology and communication application into single website. In budget approval, the content consists of releasing information to the public sphere that related to the legislative discussion; budget discussion between legislative and citizens; mechanism for accountability to guarantee that the results from public hearing is included in legislative decision; and decision from overall discussions and public hearing. The potential use of information technology is through web-based information system that could be channeled to social media and multimedia application. In budget implementation, the content consists of releasing executive’s budget after it passed the legislative approval; releasing the ongoing report; releasing monthly report; releasing quarterly report; and releasing mid-year report. The potential use of information technology to distribute all those documents and to make public discussions regarding the budget implementation is by using the Transparency 2.0 tool as a transparency web. In budget evaluation, the content consists of releasing year-end budget report and releasing audit budget report. The potential use of information technology is through web-based information system that also channeled with social media application