ABSTRACT
This chapter takes the findings of previous chapters (in Parts II and III) and situates them within a discussion of the relationship between the World Bank and the Government of Indonesia (GOI). This re-situation of findings problematizes the notion that the World Bank has been unilaterally—or even significantly—influential and encourages a complete rethinking of how the World Bank’s engagement with borrowing governments is understood, both within and beyond Indonesia. The discussion moves through various sections. First, it addresses World Bank influence seen through a wide lens, that is over time and without reference to specific sectors. Then, it turns to the World Bank’s various forms of engagement and influence with regard to community-driven development and school-based management. As with Chapters 4–6, this discussion evinces the operation of the following mechanisms: technical assistance, provision and management of financial aid (including pilot projects), loan conditionalities, and aid coordination. (Recall that the analytic framework in Chapter 2 elaborated on numerous mechanisms of influence that have been identified by previous research.) Third, the chapter turns to a reconsideration of World Bank influence and addresses the factors that have constrained it. Put differently, this chapter not only discusses the ways that the World Bank has been influential but also underscores reasons for which we should temper claims of influence from the World Bank to the GOI. The final sections of the chapter then introduce and discuss the concept of the ritual aid dance in order to explain not only the relationship between the World Bank and the GOI but also to explain the role that the ritual aid dance plays in the reproduction of global capitalism more generally.
