<![CDATA[Community-based approaches to waste management are increasingly positioned as solutions to the governance and fiscal constraints facing local governments in Indonesia. Yet the conditions under which such approaches genuinely transform service relationships rather than merely extending government reach through unpaid community labor remain underexamined. This study analyzes co-production practices in the Si BESUT waste management program in Kaliwungu Village, Jombang Regency, through the six-principle framework of Slay and Robinson (2011). Using a qualitative case study design, data were collected through in-depth interviews with seven purposively selected informants representing government agencies, landfill management, community coordinators, and environmental cadres, supplemented by observation and documentation review. The findings confirm that all six co-production principles are empirically present in Kaliwungu. However, their realization is uneven and structurally ambivalent. Co-production reaches most deeply those who are already organized, while less-connected residents remain peripheral. The relational architecture remains asymmetric: communities co-deliver services but do not co-design them, and the program's sustainability rests on contingent conditions key individual leadership, unpaid volunteer labor predominantly performed by women, and consistent government facilitation none of which are institutionally guaranteed. The study contributes to the co-production literature by moving beyond affirmative accounts of participation to identify the boundary conditions under which community-based co-production falters: when social capital is thin, when key-person dependency substitutes for institutional capacity, when facilitation is driven by austerity rather than governance principle, and when program benefits are concentrated among the already-engaged. These findings offer theoretically grounded guidance for the design of more resilient, equitable, and institutionally sustained co-production arrangements in local waste governance.]]>
