Bridging Global Vision And Local Action: Bureaucratic Challenges In Integrating The Sustainable Development Goals Into Regional Development Planning In Lamongan Regency

Abstract

The success of achieving the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) is largely determined by the capacity of local governments to translate the global agenda into contextualized local development practices. This paper examines the bureaucratic challenges in bridging the global vision of the SDGs with their implementation in development policies in Lamongan Regency. The study employs a literature-based research method using a critical synthesis approach to academic literature, policy documents, and relevant official reports.

The findings indicate that SDG integration in Lamongan Regency remains partial and hierarchical, characterized by three levels of implementation maturity. First is the symbolic stage, marked by ceremonial adoption without substantive change. Second is the instrumental stage, in which SDG indicators are utilized as tools for measuring sectoral performance. Third is the transformative stage, characterized by a paradigm shift toward a holistic and integrative development approach. In this process, the bureaucracy functions as an active translation actor through mechanisms of priority selection, target adaptation, translation into concrete programs, resource allocation, and negotiation with stakeholders.

However, this translation process faces multidimensional challenges, including structural, cultural, capacity-related, and political constraints. Institutional fragmentation, data limitations, procedural work culture, limited understanding among civil servants, and dependence on the personal commitment of local leaders emerge as major obstacles. This study emphasizes that SDG localization is not merely a technical adaptation process but a complex socio political negotiation, thereby requiring institutional strengthening, reform of planning and performance based budgeting systems, systematic capacity building for civil servants, and a fundamental shift in bureaucratic paradigms toward collaborative and long-term sustainable development.