Gender, collective action and participatory development in Indonesia

This article critically examines women's and men's participation in community development efforts in Indonesia. Towards this end, it develops a theoretical framework based on contributions from work that addresses the social construction of gender; citizen participation in community-level planning, governance and development; and collective action, social dilemmas and social capital in Indonesia. Drawing on this framework, some hypotheses are developed and tested. Based on analyses of the third wave of the Indonesian Family Life Survey, the findings reveal that female-heaclecl households are not as socially excluded as expected. However, participatory community development is found to reinforce patterns of gender exclusion, particularly among women with lower educational attainment.