Community Development in Indonesia: Contemporary Aspects of Culture

The paper analyzes the superiority of collectivist and cultural values in nowadays Indonesia, the impact of a cultural factor on society's success, the possibility, and results of community development projects based on the cultural ground. To conduct the research, two parts of the country were compared: Java Island as a centre of Indonesia's life and growth, economy epicentre, and the Moluccas archipelago, located in Eastern Indonesia, commonly considered as less developed but rich in natural resources. Both are sharing some common cultural values like gotong royong (mutual assistance) and having more specific, endemic customs (sasi). Findings of the study proved that despite the difference in the level of the economy, electronic communication, education development cultural aspect is still significant in community life. Moreover, implementing modernity and introducing bureaucracy reform with social-cultural norms as a basis of it is showing a better result in community development and economic progress. From a perspective to keep the country's unity in diversity, reaching the economic balance between provinces, improving the life of society, and maintaining a smooth transition into modern and new technologies time cultural-value-based community development projects can become a solution.