Administrative Communication and Local Budget Policy in Decentralized Asia: A Prototype Model From Ambon City, Indonesia

ABSTRACT This study examines how administrative communication affects the timeliness and consistency of local budget policies within a decentralized governance framework, using the city of Ambon, Indonesia, as a case study. Although fiscal decentralization has been in place for two decades, delays in the approval of the Regional Revenue and Expenditure Budget (APBD) still frequently occur in many local governments in Indonesia, particularly during the stages of the General Budget Policy and Priority Budget Ceiling (KUA–PPAS) and the Draft Regional Revenue and Expenditure Budget (RAPBD). Based on Organizational Communication Theory and the Political Economy of Accounting, this study positions administrative communication as a mediating mechanism linking political bargaining, fiscal dependence, and bureaucratic coordination with budget timeliness. An intrinsic qualitative case study design was employed, utilizing data from 18 semistructured interviews, official budgeting documents, and limited participant observation covering the 2022–2024 budget cycle. Findings indicate that the communication architecture in Ambon City is characterized by one‐way vertical communication, weak horizontal coordination, institutionalization, and highly politicized informal diagonal communication between executive and legislative actors. Timing deviations arise from three‐dimensional interactions: political bargaining and informal negotiations, dependence on fiscal transfers from the central government, and coordination gaps in document synchronization. To address these issues, this study develops a four‐component prototype administrative communication model consisting of an Early‐Sync Room, a Document Consistency Gateway, a Time‐Bound Escalation Ladder, and an Informal Caucus Logbook. The study contributes to public affairs scholarship by showing how administrative communication translates fiscal dependence and political bargaining into concrete delays in the local budget cycle. It also offers a practical institutional design that can be adapted by other decentralized local governments in Indonesia and Asia facing similar challenges.