<![CDATA[Indonesia's formal commitment to educational decentralization, institutionalized through Law No. 22/1999 on Regional Governance and subsequently reinforced by Law No. 32/2004, transferred significant administrative authority to district governments and individual schools. Despite more than two decades of reform, the gap between legislated decentralization mandates and actual governance practices at the school level remains inadequately examined in empirical literature, particularly within the complex administrative landscape of Indonesian public education. This study investigates how educational decentralization is enacted in local school management practices, how district-level governance structures influence school decision-making, and what challenges emerge when formal autonomy provisions meet entrenched bureaucratic cultures. Grounded in an interpretivist qualitative case study design (Yin, 2014; Creswell, 2013), the research was conducted across four public secondary schools in a district of West Java Province over eight months of sustained fieldwork. Participants (n = 17) included school principals, classroom teachers, local education officers, and school committee members, selected through purposive sampling. Data were generated through in-depth semi-structured interviews, policy document analysis, administrative observation, and reflective field notes. Thematic analysis following Braun and Clarke (2006) and interpretive coding guided by Miles, Huberman, and Saldana (2014) were applied systematically. Findings identify a pattern of "layered decentralization" wherein formal school autonomy coexists with persistent dependence on district-level bureaucratic endorsement. School leaders navigate this tension through strategic compliance and selective adaptation, while community participation in governance structures remains largely ceremonial. These findings offer critical implications for the redesign of educational governance frameworks in decentralized developing-country contexts.]]>
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