Civic Engagement in Local Government Renewal in Indonesia · PDF fileCivic Engagement in Local...

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139

Civic Engagement in Local

Government Renewal in

Indonesia

HANS ANTLÖV1

December 2003

After a decade of instant democ-

racy crafting in the wake of the

fall of communism in East Eu-

rope and authoritarianism in

Asia and Africa, it is being recog-

nized that the promotion of the bare minimal democratic institutions

of elections and an open public space does not by itself create social

justice or a substantive feeling of trust in government (Manor 1998,

Carothers 1999, Gaventa 2002, Avritzer 2002, and Ottaway 2003). Effective

and more democratic state management requires improved gover-

nance practices at the local level, encouraging popular participation.

Citizen engagement in governance is a key ingredient in democrati-

zation, as is the creation of strong political forces that can articulate

particular social interests. A substantive democracy must simulta-

neously strengthen new voices, build responsive governance systems,

and promote the interest of the disadvantaged.

Merely involving citizens during large-scale and organized gen-

eral elections every four or five years is not a substantive democracy.

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CitizenParticipationin LocalGovernance:ExperiencesfromThailand,Indonesiaand thePhilippines

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Civic Engagementin Local

GovernmentRenewal inIndonesia HANS ANTLÖV

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This only allows technocrats and bureaucrats to maintain their hold

over power in between elections. Likewise, merely opening up local

spaces through an administrative decentralization is not enough—in

most cases around the world, this has allowed local elites to benefit

by steering benefits to themselves and their clients. Patterns of local

strongmen, even warlords, occur. And citizens end up feeling es-

tranged from government. But on the other hand, where there is a

strong political commitment from above, and strong civil society ca-

pacity, evidence is emerging of the possibilities of more ‘empowered

participatory governance’ that does become more pro-poor and deeply

democratic (Fung and Wright 2003).

Five years into the transition from authoritarianism in Indone-

sia, the formal political spaces opened up by processes of democrati-

zation and decentralization have to a large extent been captured by

elites, both national and local (Hadiz 2003, Törnquist 2002, Antlöv 2003).

Many of these new powerholders thrive under the new democratic

regime and use the language of democracy and regional autonomy,

or at least their version of them, in which the basic relations of power

remain unchallenged. Political reforms in Indonesia have been shal-

low—corruption is unabated, the judiciary is still in a bad shape, and

people have low trust in government.

Blame for this democratic deficit lies primarily with the resilient

political pathologies of the Indonesian political system, which after

more than four decades of authoritarian rule left the country ill-pre-

pared for democratization (on the one hand, a tenacious public ad-

ministration that lived conformably under authoritarian rule and who

are loathe to give up their old privileges, and on the other, a colorful

but fragmented and depoliticized civil society that lacks political skills

and impact and thus cannot challenge the old forces).

But foreign governments also have to share some of the blame.

During the early New Order, Japan, the US, Germany, Australia and

other Western governments needed the anti-communist Suharto to

block the communist domino effect. Later in the late 1980s to the

mid 1990s, Indonesia was one of the emerging Asian tigers, heralded

by the World Bank and others for its fast growth. Democracy was not

on the agenda until the late 1990s. However, after September 11, new

priorities emerged. Eager to keep Indonesia a partner in the war

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CitizenParticipation

in LocalGovernance:Experiences

fromThailand,Indonesia

and thePhilippines

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against terrorism and impelled by the desire for secure access to oil,

mineral and forest resources in Sumatra, Papua and Kalimantan,

Western governments have embraced the government. No matter

how compelling the post-geopolitical interest in democracy may ap-

pear to be, countervailing economic and security interests, especially

natural resources and security cooperation, will pull hard against the

effort to create a truly pro-democratic policy.

Part of this interest is the work done by foreign democracy assis-

tants, most of which follows a generic template model, characterized

by Carothers (1999:91) as ‘get your legislature working right, fix up

your judiciary, increase the strength of the independent media, unions

and advocacy NGOs, develop stronger political parties, and hold free

and fair elections.’

The template approach to democratization generally does not

work. Assistance to civil society (civic education, advocacy NGOs,

media assistance) often disregards power structures—it generally does

not assist pro-democracy activists to engage with political parties or

challenge power structures. Support to reshape political institutions

(electoral aid, political party assistance) is disconnected from the

society in which the institutions are rooted—the structures of power,

authority, interest, hierarchies, loyalties, patronage and traditions

that make up the political weave. Work on civil society takes place in

a non-threatening and apolitical language of building trust, estab-

lishing pacts, promoting social cohesion and creating spaces. Decen-

tralization can be an agenda of depoliticizing society by

divide-and-rule, effectively bypassing interest-based groups such as

labor. Policy reforms are the domain of politicians, technocrats and

bureaucrats, and the solution to dysfunctional institutions are tech-

nical, not political. The results are well-designed technical and ad-

ministrative policies that are difficult to implement and subject to

harsh criticism from civil society.

To support democracy, it is not enough to simply open up spaces:

there need also to be actions that allow new voices to be heard and

give power to people to be involved in governing their communities.

Much effort must go into community and political organizing, into

building the capacity of civil society to engage government—to re-

politicize communities. Local, everyday politics is the foundation for

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other form of politics. Without grassroots democracy, it is impos-

sible to sustain national democracy (the opposite is also true; if the

central government does not protect the right of assembly and ex-

pression, it will be difficult to democratize the grassroots). Politics

needs to be built from below, because this is where the density of

social forces is to be found, where political recruitment and the build-

ing of constituencies take place, where people can translate national

policies into local programs and local issues into national ideology.

Evidence from other parts of the developing world also shows us

that a substantive and strong democratization can only be achieved

when government has the power and willingness to dis-empower

hardliners and old forces. Democratization alone—without includ-

ing the disadvantaged and without greater downward accountability

of government officials and politicians—is insufficient.

What this adds up to are efforts to make sure that people must be

systematically involved in policy formulation, decision-making and

program evaluation. This kind of popular participation shifts the fo-

cus from a concern with beneficiaries or excluded groups (as in much

development work) to a concern with broad forms of engagement by

citizens in key arenas that affect their lives (Cornwall and Gaventa 2001).

Such deliberative processes involve giving new voices to those that

usually are excluded from both social and political participation. It

means new ways to involve as many people as possible in policy for-

mulations, program implementation, and outcome evaluations, to

overcome the distrust in government and the crisis of legitimacy of

the state.

Citizen participation involves the systematic participation in de-

cision formulation and decision making by groups of citizens, of link-

ing those who have developed participatory methods for consultation,

planning and monitoring to the new governance agenda (Manor 1999,

Blair 2000, Pimbert 2001, Fung and Wright 2003). Popular participation can

be driven by innovative and committed citizens demanding their

voices to be heard. It can also be provided by state agencies as a way

to overcome the distrust in government and to empower local com-

munities. What I will do in the remainder of this chapter is to look at

the framework for this emerging civic engagement in post-authori-

tarian Indonesia.

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and thePhilippines

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The Legacy of Authoritarianismin Indonesia

Even though it is more than six years since President Suharto’s

so-called ‘New Order’ crumbled, the legacies are deeply entrenched.

During more than three decades of authoritarian rule (1966-1998),

economic growth integrated the diversity of regions in Indonesia,

managed through a regulated and centralized system of plans and

programs emanating from Jakarta down through provinces to dis-

tricts, sub-districts and villages. Government offices, from central

agencies in Jakarta to village branches, were in control of this pro-

cess and policy blueprints.

Indonesia’s degree of central-

ization (prior to regional au-

tonomy in 2001) cannot be

over-emphasized. A massive pa-

tronage system was created in

which the central government

awarded local governments with

budget allocation in exchange for

loyalty. Budget allocations were

not based on performance or

need, but rather on how close lo-

cal governments were with the

central government, and how well

local elites could lobby decisions-makers in Jakarta. The resulting

rent-seeking system was effective in rapidly building the economy,

but was not transparent or sustainable and created great regional

dissatisfactions (there are demands for independence from all the

above-mentioned resource-rich provinces).

The planning process was also centralized. Priorities and initia-

tives were determined from atop and seldom in line with local de-

mands. The diversity of socio-economic conditions, cultures,

customary rights and modes of decision-making was effectively ig-

nored. The implementation of policies and regulations was deter-

mined from above and took place without questions and without

participation of the people targeted.

ww

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ages/jakarta-eye.jpg

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Local government officials were accountable to central govern-

ment authorities rather than local constituencies and thus had very

little grassroots liability and support. Afraid of repression, citizens

could not demand changes from their government. Public policies

were determined by the state. The centralistic and authoritarian gov-

ernance system also ruptured the social texture of local politics and

community institutions. The crippling uniformity that the Suharto

regime imposed on ordinary people undermined critical thinking and

extracted a heavy price in the form of uniformity, standardization,

co-optation of community leaders, abuse of power, and corruption.

The fall of Suharto has seen massive institutional changes but

little true reforms. There is freedom of expression and association,

and human rights abuses are much fewer than in the past. Impor-

tantly, there has also been a process of decentralization. Two recent

laws on decentralization and fiscal balance set out to reform the cen-

tralized structure and to provide the legal framework for local de-

mocracy (see Hidayat and Antlöv forthcoming, for a full study of the

decentralization process in Indonesia).

Law no. 22 of 1999 on Local Governance gives full autonomy to

the (rural) districts and (urban) municipalities to manage a number

of services and duties. (There are in Indonesia some 400 districts

and cities in 30 provinces.) Similar to a federal system, finances, the

legal system, foreign affairs, defence and religion are retained at the

national level, while the authority over roads, harbors, and other ‘ar-

eas of strategic national interest’ is transferred to the provincial level,

an administrative arm of the central government. Districts and mu-

nicipalities are given authority over remaining functions, including

health care, education, public works, arts, and natural resources

management.

Law no. 25/99 outlines the new fiscal relations between center

and regions and provides new formulas for dividing revenues. Dis-

tricts retain 90 percent of house tax, 80 percent of land tax, 80 per-

cent of forest and fishery revenues, 15 percent of oil, and 20 percent

of gas revenues. The law attempts to stave the rent-seeking behavior

of regional governments lobbying with senior officials in Jakarta.

These two decentralization policies were enacted on 1 January

2001, after 18 months of preparation. There are problems in such a

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and thePhilippines

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radical and rapid decentralization. Law 22 assigns the provision of

virtually all public services to the district administration, without

establishing the appropriateness of devolving these functions to this

particular tier of government, how this might be achieved, the re-

quired sequence of measures, and how funding would be secured.

This has initially led to deterioration in the provision of services, as

state expenditure for social services such as public hospitals and

schools are reduced.

This has also meant an exacerbation of inequalities between dis-

tricts, as localities are asked to pay for more and more of their own

services. Regional autonomy has allowed resource-rich localities to

keep their riches for themselves and has thus augmented existing

interregional disparities. Furthermore, large parts of local budgets

are used for routine spending, such as salaries for civil servants and

elected councilors (who get free housing and generous allotments

for representation and study tours). That a larger share of revenues

now must be raised by local governments has acted as an incentive

for resource-rich districts to make maximum use of their resources—

which in turn has led to a rapid exploitation of natural resources such

as minerals and forests.

The empirical result of decentralization is mixed. Some local gov-

ernments have become more creative and responsive in providing

public services to citizens, but the overall picture is that of continued

state elite primacy in the new political spaces. It should be noted that

there is no formal mechanism for direct citizen participation in In-

donesia, such as the development councils in the Philippines or the

participatory budgeting in Brazil. Citizen participation is rather on a

political level, very much on a rhetorical level but actually introduced

in reality. This, as we shall see, has implications for actual civic en-

gagement.

There is also limited hope for immediate administrative reforms

from within. The Indonesian bureaucracy is so riddled by corruption

that it has almost grown incapable of serving the public interest. Many

of the people who lived comfortably under the New Order are still in

power today, albeit under new political arrangements and often wear-

ing different party shirts. The new (and old) elites that have emerged

since the demise of Suharto have cleverly captured the new demo-

146

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○ ○ ○ ○ ○ ○ ○ ○ ○ ○ ○ ○ ○ ○ ○ ○ ○ ○ ○ ○ ○ ○ ○ ○ ○ ○ ○ ○ ○ ○ ○ ○ ○ ○ ○ ○ ○ ○ ○ ○ ○ ○ ○

cratic spoils. The pro-democracy movement has not been able to pro-

mote any real political alternative to the major parties or the domi-

nant style of pragmatic and elite-based politics. The reason for this is

the continued monopolization of politics by state officials, local power

holders and thugs on the one hand (as discussed above) and the frag-

mented character and weak political interest of civil society actors on

the other hand.

But more importantly, regional autonomy and democratization

have also opened up the political space for citizens to become active in

governing their own communities. The momentum was initially pro-

vided with the reform movement in 1998, with freedom of expression

and assembly. With Law 22, policy making has been pushed down to

cities and districts (in line with the subsidiary principle). In general,

decentralization promises that decision-making will become more

transparent and accountable as it is pushed downwards, closer to

people. Indeed, decentralization policies are often quoted as a prereq-

uisite for the growth of local democracy. Local government has the

potential to democratize because the decentralization process allows

for more responsiveness, representation and thus accountability.

There is an ongoing struggle here, between the potential of local

democratization and decentralization at the grassroots level and the

hard realities of elite capture of the political sphere. Again, this re-

lates to a large extent back to the divisions noted above between civil

society and political institutions—civil society groups are active on

the local level, outside of the formal political realms.

However, there are exceptions to this, namely, groups and insti-

tutions that are working to recapture political spaces and engage with

local governments. These groups, often present at the community

level, are serving to reinvigorate local politics and provide greater

hope for the future of democracy. In providing a voice for the poor

and disadvantaged, they are challenging the legacy of the authoritar-

ian regime. In the main part of this chapter, I will discuss newly emerg-

ing citizen-driven initiatives in Indonesia, responses to the democratic

deficit in Indonesia. The ultimate aim of these efforts is to create bet-

ter local governance structures—and to build confidence and trust

between civil society and state. Let us start with civil society and the

NGO scene in Indonesia.

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and thePhilippines

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A Brief Characterization ofCivil Society Organizations

Civil society organizations under the authoritarian regime existed

only under heavy regulation and repression. Labor and farmers were

not allowed to organize—a legacy still felt today with weak and frac-

tured organized interests (this is very different from, for instance,

Latin America where farmers and laborers were allowed to operate

even during the height of authoritarian regimes, albeit under restric-

tions). This left middle-class and non-membership based nongov-

ernmental organizations (NGOs) as the only organizational form in

Indonesia.

During the height of the New Order, one could

distinguish between at least three main types of

NGOs, each with its particular relationships with

the state: community development, awareness

raising, and advocacy oriented NGOs (Elridge 1995,

Fakih 1996, and Uhlin 1997).

The first group of NGOs worked fairly closely

with the government; some were even created by

state officials and functioned mainly as contractors or consultants

providing services to various government or donor agencies. Their

main orientation was towards small group community formation,

such as micro-credit associations and self-help groups.

The second type of NGOs was those organizations that operated

within the confines of the state but were critical. Popular mobiliza-

tion was done in the form of awareness-raising and economic devel-

opment programs.

The last category was made up of NGOs that avoided state in-

volvement and which rather worked at the grassroots level with em-

powering and local initiatives, advocating for social change on behalf

of grassroots constituencies. These progressive or transformational

NGOs emerged in the late 1980s as a response to what they saw was

the co-optation of the larger and traditional NGOs. They were origi-

nally not organized as NGOs (more often as student groups2 or self-

help committees) but for their survival and funding established

themselves as private foundations.3

AusAID

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As the 1990s proceeded, these radicals became an important back-

bone in the reform and pro-democracy movement. They refused in-

volvement with the state and had as their modus operandi mass

action. They were doing advocacy work, lobbying international pro-

democracy networks and foreign governments to stop supporting

Suharto, and they were crucial in building a critical consciousness

among students and the urban middle class about the corruption,

environmental degradation and unjust policies of government.

However, it is important to note briefly here that the fall of Suharto

was not driven by these NGOs or even by a broad-based civil society

coalition, as for instance “People Power” in the Philippines. Short-

hand and up-front, it was widespread rioting and pressure from

middle-class students that were the catalyst for an elite replacement.4

NGOs were acting behind the scenes, coaching students on the next

moves, helping them, and more importantly, during the final weeks,

supplying logistics to the massive student demonstrations. Other

important groups such as professionals, the urban poor or rural peas-

antry were only peripherally, if at all, involved in the demonstrations

that forced down Suharto.

Nevertheless, civil society groups took an active part in making

sure that the first democratic elections in June 1999 were free and

fair (see the articles in Antlöv and Cederroth 2004). There were election

monitoring groups virtually in all of Indonesia’s more than 600,000

polling stations. They made sure that no one interfered during bal-

loting and cross-tabulated the votes. The results were reported inde-

pendently to their respective institutions (there were some 120

accredited national organizations and 20 international election moni-

toring institutions in Indonesia). They played a very important role

in making sure that the elections were as free and fair as could be

expected, only 13 months after more than 30 years of co-optation.

And since the fall of Suharto, a myriad of new and old civil society

organizations have mobilized to reclaim the public sphere. It is truly

astonishing to travel around the country and encounter the energy

and committed provided by these activists. Even small towns have

their own governance-oriented civil society organizations today, rang-

ing from government watchdogs to multi-stakeholder citizen forums.

Civil society has grown enormously during the past five years, in num-

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and thePhilippines

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bers, in variety and in quality. The reputation of NGOs has also be-

come better. During the Suharto era, they were known among the

public as tukang bikin rebut, “troublemakers”. This was to a large

extent an internalization of the government’s anti-NGO propaganda.

Today, most people would agree that civil society organizations have

a legitimate role to play in Indonesian development and democrati-

zation, and are duly given the space.

So what are the new groups that are emerging today? Before we

begin this short descriptive section, it must be noted that there is

little empirical data available on civil society organizations in con-

temporary Indonesia. There are a few donor reports, but none is com-

prehensive and trustworthy. It is very difficult to draw any clear

conclusions of how many groups are working within the various fields

and what effects they are having. Collecting data for the present re-

port meant that we had to approach every donor and NGO individu-

ally and ask about their program—and what we got were the official,

normative brochure statements. There is to my knowledge no in-

depth study of the operations of NGOs or CSOs in Indonesia today,

nothing like the studies by Eldridge and Uhlin for the late Suharto

period. What I have to say in the following is based on my own exten-

sive travel around the country, meetings with Ford Foundation grant-

ees and other CSOs during seminars and workshops, and the network

of IPGI. To complement this mapping, one would need to spend time

at a single locality to try to map the totality of civil society engage-

ment in that region, but that is another study.

With these reservations, let us continue with the unpacking of

CSOs in contemporary Indonesia. One prominent new category of

civic association is federations of workers and farmers, whether blue-

collar laborers, fisherfolk, agricultural workers, or peasants. There

are a myriad peasant federations and labor unions, which potentially

have important roles to play as Indonesia strives to alleviate poverty

and increase democratic accountability. In many cases, however,

these federations are small and without much political clout. There

are peasant federations in most provinces, and there are labor unions

in most towns. There are thousands of ‘micro-unions’, organizing

agricultural or factory workers within a single district.

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In many cases, these associations are organizationally weak and

often supported by intermediary NGOs which provide them with tech-

nical assistance, training and legal assistance. Examples of such fa-

cilitating institutes are the Indonesian Institute of Legal Aid-based

RACA Institute (providing legal aid and human rights training to dif-

ferent peasant federations), Kelola in North Sulawesi (organizing fish-

ermen in the waters around Menado), and the Institute for Labour

Assistance (LEKSIP) in Samarinda (providing training and legal aid

assistance to micro-unions in East Kalimantan).

Professional associations have not been able to reorganize them-

selves in any politically meaningful way. This is a bit surprising, given

that the political monopoly these organizations previously were forced

into has totally broken down. They are no longer supervised by state

agencies and are free to build their membership and leadership in

ways they decide themselves. Rather, what has happened (just as

within the peasant and labor federations) is fragmentation. The single

associations for lawyers, doctors, business managers, etc., have been

replaced by a myriad of small groups, often competing for member-

ship and public attention. Their political impact is limited: many of

them have been invited to provide input into legal drafting at the

House of Representatives, but it is too early to classify the organiza-

tions as interest-based lobbying groups. Neither have they (at least

in the public eye) been successful in putting pressure on the govern-

ment as interest-based groups, protecting the concerns of their mem-

bers. One notable exception to this is the pressure that the Association

of District Chairmen (APKASI) put on the government in late 2001

to freeze the revision of the law on regional autonomy.

A third category of civil society organizations that is easily identi-

fied is the faith-based organizations. There are some that are huge

and have existed for more than sixty years (such as the Islamic

Nahdlatul Ulama and Sarekat Islam), while others are based around

a mosque, church or religious boarding school. During the New Or-

der, these organizations were kept under strict checks and allowed

only to do welfare such as schooling, health, work with the disabled,

etc. During the past three years, however, they have become more

prominent politically, especially the more fundamentalist groups

which might not be very ‘civil’ in what they promote (violence and

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and thePhilippines

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exclusion) but have had a significant impact on the national discourse.

The exception here is the incredible influence small and very radical

fundamentalist groups could have on popular sentiments in the wake

of Afghanistan. There were strong anti-American feelings, indicated

by discrimination against foreigners in hotels in Surakarta, big dem-

onstrations in front of Western embassies in Jakarta, and ultimately,

the Bali bombing (when sentiments began to swing against the fun-

damentalists).

A few words are also warranted for student groups. As mentioned,

students were the main driving force behind the anti-Suharto dem-

onstrations in 1998. They had a united front and spoke with a single

voice. But this has changed. Because students by definition are a tran-

sitional category, there has been, in the five years since the demon-

strations, a total turnover. Today, students are deeply divided in

various fractions, and most student groups have withdrawn from

activist politics. There were some coalitions built between student

groups and NGOs in 1998/99, but this has floundered today, and the

gap between these two crucial groups is as big as it was until the mid

1990s. We need also to remember that university students in Indo-

nesia are by definition middle class. There has been criticism from

radical NGOs that ‘students never unite with the people. They only

use people’s issues to attract their attention’ (Setiawan 2000:52). Un-

like in South Korea and Thailand, little support can be expected from

students in the ongoing transitions within civil society from elitism

to mass organizations.

But obviously civil society is more than these structured organi-

zations and associations. It also consists of a variety of issue- and

interest-based groups. And here I do believe that we can identify one

important new category: the citizen-based social action group. These

mass-based ad hoc groups are organized around an issue or a locale,

with representatives from various classes and types of people taking

an active interest in the governance of their town or addressing a

particular issue. I will describe one such group in some more detail

below: we can here only mention that most towns in Indonesia today

have citizen’s forum (forum warga, kelompok swadaya masyarakat,

forum kota, etc). This comprises committed and concerned citizens,

often from very different walks of life, who previously were kept out-

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side of politics but now are reclaiming their right to influence public

policy. They often build on the experiences of traditional associations,

such as rotating saving schemes, mutual assistance groups, or reli-

gious classes. In the outer islands, they often take the form of adat

groups, which were long prohibited under the centralization scheme

of the New Order but today are reinventing themselves in many local

forms.

Also emerging are new interest-based membership groups. One

that has received much attention is AMAN, the Alliance of Indigenous

People in the Archipelago (Aliansi Masyarakat Adat Nusantara).

AMAN is a fairly flat organized group of representatives from most

of the major and minor ethnic/tribal groups in Indonesia, including

some marginalized Javanese groups like the Samin. They have in

common a feeling of utter destruction of voice by the Suharto re-

gime. Their natural surroundings were exploited and their way of life

shattered. By establishing AMAN, they have been able to take a num-

ber of steps forward in protecting their lives and living surround-

ings. AMAN has been consulted by the national parliament in laws

related to their land and has been a counterpart in Indonesia for the

Asian Development Bank in its new regulations to consult with in-

digenous people in projects that affect their land.

There are some autonomous community-based organizations

(CBOs) in Indonesia, although not on the scale of Thailand or India.

The authoritarian government promoted CBOs in order to co-opt

them: water associations, women organizations, youth groups. Many

of the more traditional community institutions (such as tribal, cus-

tomary associations) were totally and utterly destroyed by decades

of co-optation and distortion. Today, five years into democratization,

some of these CBOs have been able to become autonomous, but it

has not been easy to revive customary institutions and practices. The

lack of these grassroots community-based groups means that there

is a gap between communities and intermediary groups, a gap that

has made it difficult to mobilize communities for policy changes.

This leaves us with intermediary nongovernmental organiza-

tions as the final major group within civil society, those classified as

LSMs in Indonesia, ‘Community Self-Reliance Institutions.’ Here, too,

I believe we have seen some real meaningful change. Philip Eldridge

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and thePhilippines

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in his book, based on data from the late 1980s, lists a large number of

NGOs. Scanning through the book and comparing with current data

less than one-half of the organization mentioned by him are still ac-

tive today. Given the new categories of civil society organizations

mentioned above, it might be useful to define what I mean by an NGO

in contemporary Indonesia. This would be a private, non-profit in-

termediary organization, typically fairly articulate and educated with

a strong social commitment, whose main role is to amplify the voice

of the disadvantaged and organize communities around a particular

issue such as environment, gender or traditional arts. It is distinct

from the membership citizen group or people’s organization with

elected leadership without intermediaries.

The distinction between community development, community

organizers and advocacy oriented non-governmental organizations

is still valid. The advocates have had the strongest march forward.

This is not very surprising, given the political openings of the past

three years. Already in the early 1990s, most senior NGOs established

advocacy sections within their organizations and received training

from a long string of donors, seeing this as a means to enlarge civil

society and encourage democratization. Most of the issue-based

groups, which in the past mainly was limited to work with various

forms of community development or community organizing such as

environment, human rights or gender, have today become much more

active in advocating and campaigning for policy change. More and

more groups, such as the Indonesian Environmental Network

(WALHI), the Indonesian Centre for Environmental Law (ICEL), the

Indonesian Legal Aid Institute (YLBHI), the Institute for the Free

Flow of Information (ISAI), and the Indonesian Consumer’s Asso-

ciation (YLKI), are frequently invited to public hearings at the na-

tional and regional House of Representatives. Their senior staff

members are on television talk shows, and they are frequently quoted

by the media. Much more than the professional associations or labor

unions, these NGOs have taken an active part in public debates and

quite successfully so.5

The community development groups such as Bina Swadaya and

Bina Desa still exist, but they have had to reform. Bina means ‘to

guide,’ which was a common phrase during the New Order—ordi-

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nary people needed to be shown the direction to take. However, in

the twenty-first century, with all the progress made in rural develop-

ment and furthermore with the demise of the command-driven New

Order regime, such a paradigm is outdated. Yet, we have seen volun-

tary groups that have taken on poverty issues in innovative ways dur-

ing the past few years. For instance, the dedicated non-government

groups that have sprung up during the past three years as responses

to social safety net funds are of this kind.

Many community development groups have graduated into com-

munity organizing, key terms being self-reliance, empowerment,

participatory techniques, and bottom-up planning. There is much

excitement about various forms of grassroots empowerment and civic

education. As will be discussed later, however, many find this ap-

proach (that training in itself would solve Indonesia’s governance

problems: once all people are ‘empowered,’ the government would

immediately become transparent, accountable, and efficient.) some-

what limited. This paradigm, I would argue, is not sustained by ex-

periences in other countries around the world.

There are legacies of the authoritarian regime that reflect on civil

society organizations, which explains our comment above about the

lack of political impact by civil society. One of the most difficult

changes for nongovernmental organization has been to shift to a

‘change basis mode,’ to move from one gear to another. Most of the

civil society organizations that are active in governance today were

born out of a political setting in which they were by design kept out-

side and had very little practical access to the political sphere. One of

the most serious weaknesses of NGOs today is the lack of a critical

consciousness to act politically: to build constituencies, engage the

public in debates, formulate and disseminate alternative public poli-

cies, discuss ideologies, search for broader consensus, find middle

grounds, compromise, innovate, all those impossible things that are

expected of a person, party or organization with an interest in poli-

tics, governance and change. This weakness is easily explained by

the structural conditions under which NGOs had to operate under

the New Order. These included a lack of skills in practical policy re-

search and interaction with government bodies. Most NGOs also

worked in isolation and had limited means and political leverage to

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and thePhilippines

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disseminate their work. They were not allowed to build membership

or organize the communities.

In addition, with many of the radical activists now engaged in the

lively party-political arena, there is a risk that the voice of the non-

partisan NGO will be marginalized. Even though reforms and open-

ness are so close you can almost taste them, the organizational profile

and advocacy capacities of civil society

have not always been fully maximized. The

student protests in 1998 generated a ‘tsu-

nami’-size tidal wave of energy on which

all the sidelined politicos, would-be min-

isters, populists, demagogues, true re-

formers and activists now surf with vigor.

The number of lectures, orations, decla-

rations, manifestos, marches and demon-

strations over this or that burning issue

threatens to overwhelm the ability of

NGOs to comprehend and prioritize and

then to take action. This is not to say that

things are not happening on the ground—

but simply not on a scale to challenge ex-

isting power relations.

A few words about the funding situation for civil society organi-

zations. More and more donors have established civil society pro-

grams in Indonesia. As I am writing this in late 2003, there are civil

society support programs run by such a varied group of donors as:

the National Democratic Institute, International Foundation for Elec-

tion Systems, International Republican Institute, Asia Foundation,

the Civil Society Support and Strengthening Program (all of the above

have their main funding from US sources), AusAID, the Ford Foun-

dation, CIDA, UNDP, UNV, the German private foundations, not to

mention a broad spectrum of international private voluntary asso-

ciations providing technical assistance within particular fields, such

as Birdlife and World Neighbours and PACT. And these are only some

of the donors with offices in Indonesia. Funding is thus plentiful,

encouraging civic engagement in local government.6 So let us now

finally turn to that important topic.

AP Photo

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Forms of Civic Engagementin Local Government

There are a myriad of ways in which civil society organizations

can engage in local governance issues. The NGO classification above—

advocacy and community development—is also valid when we talk

about civic engagement in governance. One major group of civil soci-

ety organizations has decided to monitor what the local government

and parliament are doing. They are standing outside, observing and

taking note. Others have decided either to establish partnerships with

local government officials or to engage in government project as sub-

contractors, hoping to reform from within.

The Institute of Development Studies (IDS) in Brighton has com-

pleted a useful matrix which classifies ways in which civil society and

government interact (Goetz and Gaventa 2001: 15). On a continuum from

civil society voicing to government frameworks, these forms include:

awareness-raising and building capacity to mobilize; research and

information generation for advocacy; lobbying to influence planning

and policy formulations; citizen-based monitoring and evaluation;

partnership and implementation; auditing; joint management of

sectoral program (including co-production schemes); and govern-

ment frameworks for participatory planning.

To prepare the present report, the staff of the Indonesian Part-

nership on Local Governance Initiatives (IPGI) assisted the author

to compile empirical data on 125 civil society organizations in vari-

ous parts of Indonesia which have in common an engagement with

governance issues. This mapping exercise showed that most of the

CSOs in Indonesia are NGOs and that the absolute majority of orga-

nizations in Indonesia are in the left to middle part of the continuum

above, on advocacy. Much of the civic engagement today is thus ad-

vocacy-oriented (albeit, as argued above, it is yet to have its potential

political impact) and less so on direct collaboration with local gov-

ernments. Many organizations are also watchdog-oriented, monitor-

ing, for instance, development projects or local budgets. The lack of

substantive reforms from the government side has allowed anti-state

sentiments to re-emerge (they were gone for the 1999-2000 period).

In the following pages, however, I will in more detail describe the

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and thePhilippines

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variation and highlight some of the more pioneering ways that inno-

vative NGOs are trying to bridge the gap with government.

Let us start the discussion at the right hand end of IDS’s con-

tinuum above, with the more partnership-oriented forms, the joint

management. One of new mechanisms for engagement on local gov-

ernance issues that people in Indonesia are developing is what has

been called citizen-based social action groups, non-partisan popular

councils, deliberative assemblies or stakeholder forums, or simply

citizen forums (forum warga). Briefly mentioned above, these are

citizens in a town or district that mobilize around a common cause,

be it issue or area. One such example is The Forum for a Prosperous

Majalaya (FM2S), founded in 2000 to promote good governance in

the small but crowded industrial town of Majalaya, just outside

Bandung in West Java (for more information, see Antlöv 2004). Estab-

lished under the auspices of Bandung NGOs and university lectur-

ers, FM2S set out to address some of the pressing issues facing

Majalaya, such as communal tensions, pollution and congestion.

Because of strong social and political tensions in Majalaya, commu-

nity leaders decided to invite an outside group to facilitate the pro-

cess, IPGI. This group consists of experienced activists and

bureaucrats: government officials from the Bandung Regional Plan-

ning Board, public planners from the Bandung Institute of Technol-

ogy, and researcher-activists from Akatiga, a prominent

nongovernmental organization in Bandung.

Through a number of evaluations and assessments, FM2S was

formally established in October 2000. Members consist of promi-

nent Majalaya residents. Some members represent only themselves

(being community leaders), while others are elected by interest groups

such as factory workers and street vendors. IGPI and FM2S seek to

include as many stakeholders as possible, and the number is con-

stantly growing. Although not elected, the members of FM2S thus

represent various stakeholders co-existing in the town: pedicab driv-

ers, hawkers, factory workers, entrepreneurs, shopkeepers, teach-

ers, religious leaders and so on.

The track record during the first year was rather impressive. The

most visible achievement was collecting 350 million rupiah (some

USD 30.000) from factories to repave and build a new bridge over

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the main road to Bandung. Beginning in late 2001, FM2S has pre-

pared a new town plan for Majalaya, with work still ongoing as I am

writing this. Both the Bandung Institute of Technology and the Re-

gional Planning Board members of IPGI are playing key roles in pro-

viding technical assistance in how to manage a plan, technically and

politically. FM2S has also helped to defuse some of the political ten-

sions in the town by providing a forum in which sensitive issues could

be deliberated in an unhurried and non-threatening manner.

FM2S is what in the development world is called a “multi-stake-

holder” forum: members come from a variety of backgrounds. There

are government officials in the forum: the Majalaya sub-district head

was the first chair of FM2S, and the Bandung Regional Planning Board

member from IPGI is also a formal member. In fact, both of them

put their careers at stake by participating in FM2S (which until now

is not legally recognized by the Bandung government).

A key to its success is right here: it has been very important dur-

ing meetings at FM2S to have someone answer questions such as—

What does the government plan to do about this? What about the

Regional Planning Board? How are decisions taken at the Bandung

House of Representatives? What is the view of the street vendors?

What can factory owners do to support us? These and many similar,

often technical and practical, questions have been addressed directly

during meetings, rather than having to wait for a formal appoint-

ment with some far away decision-maker. More importantly, this has

also instilled people with a sense of confidence in the government,

something which is in great demand in Majalaya—and in Indonesia

at large.

There are thousands of forum warga like FM2S around Indone-

sia in which concerned citizens come together to solve the problems

affecting their immediate neighborhoods. There is no single pattern:

some work closely with the government, while other are more advo-

cacy-oriented and remain outside the formal political sphere. Most

groups are formed at the village or sub-district level, but there are a

few forum warga at the district and municipal levels (often known

as forum kota, city forum). These groups have in common a desire to

affect policy-making and see public funds reallocated for the benefit

of their constituencies. Even if their members do not wish to become

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and thePhilippines

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formally involved with political parties, there can be no doubt that

they are nevertheless engaging in local politics. The forum warga is

an excellent training ground for wider political involvement, where

people learn to argue a case, compromise, relate to a constituency

and take decisions democratically. In the IDS matrix above, this would

probably be classified as citizen-based monitoring initiatives.

Another example of civic engagement through partnership, but a

bit more advocacy-oriented, comes from the island of Lombok (just

east of Bali) where ethnic Sasak villages have formed the Alliance of

Indigenous People of North Lombok (Perekat Ombara) (cf. Saragi,

Effendi and Suhirman 2002). In July 2000, Perekat Ombara announced

that the villages in the association would no longer use the term kepala

desa for the village head (as had been compulsory under the New

Order) but rather the local term pemusungan. The authoritarian com-

munity-level governing bodies have been replaced by the more demo-

cratic village councils (see below) and traditional customary

institutions. Perekat Ombara has declared that villages in the future

will refuse outside intervention in their affairs; for example, they will

no longer take part in the annual state-sponsored competitions be-

tween villages in a sub-district.

The medium-term goal of Perekat Ombara is to have a separate

district of North Lombok established—at present the northern

Lombok Sasak villages are divided between the districts of East and

West Lombok. Since the members of the alliance are village heads,

they have significant political clout at the local level. But decisions

on new districts are made by the Ministry of Home Affairs in Jakarta,

so their struggle may be a long (and expensive!) one.

Perekat Ombara’s long-term goal is to revive the traditional cul-

ture and religion of northern Lombok, the Wetu Telu, which is a

Sasak-syncretic form of Islam. It has already reinstated some tradi-

tional local institutions. For instance, many petty criminal cases that

were previously handled by the sub-district or district police are now

being tried in traditional village courts consisting of adat leaders and

other prominent individuals in the village. As a popularly supported

citizen forum, Perekat Ombara is a political force to reckon with in

north Lombok. It has expanded and diversified the political arena

and given voice to people that in the past were silent. Since members

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include village heads, Perekat Ombara also promises to deliver bet-

ter public policies and reinstate trust in government.

Moving along the continuum towards more advocacy-oriented

groups, we find a non-government network called Surakarta

Marginalized People’s Solidarity (Sompis), established in 1999 in the

town of Surakarta (also known as Solo). It consists of some 20 asso-

ciations representing disadvantaged groups such as pedicab drivers,

hawkers, sex workers, parking attendants, disabled people, and do-

mestic workers. It claims to have 20,000 supporters.

Sompis has been able to influence the PDI-P-dominated Surakarta

municipal council to produce some progressive pro-poor regulations,

for example the provision of better pay for parking attendants. Its

members were strong supporters of PDI-P in the lead-up to the 1999

general election, and some of its leading activists maintain close re-

lations with the mayor, who is from PDI-P. The short-term advocacy

aim of Sompis is to have separate local regulations passed for each of

its constituent groups. With technical assistance from local NGOs, it

has produced draft regulations and lobbied to have them adopted by

the parliament. It also conducts civic education for its members.

Sompis is still a marginal force in Surakarta politics but nevertheless

represents an interesting experiment in how ordinary, even

marginalized, groups can form alliances and put pressure on the lo-

cal elite through political means.

Clearly on the advocacy side of the governance continuum are

the groups, mainly NGOs, that see as their main function to monitor

local governments, their public services, finances or public policies,

to gather information, and to lobby for better policies. There are many

such groups in Indonesia today: just as each town has a forum warga,

a citizen forum, it also has advocacy governance NGOs, a Parliament

Watch, a Budget Watch, a Government Watch, and the like.

PIAR in Kupang, on the island of Timor in eastern Indonesia, is a

typical example. It is a watchdog organization that does not have close

relations with the local Kupang government—in fact PIAR sued the

local parliament for misallocations in drafting the 2003 budget. Its

main form of advocacy is through a twice-weekly newspaper (UDIK)

that analyzes and exposes corruption, bad local legislation and the

individual behavior of local government officials. PIAR is quite ag-

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and thePhilippines

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gressive and confrontational in style, but interestingly enough, can

thus also demand a certain presence in governing Kupang. Through

PIAR’s accurate reporting and impact, local government agencies can

not afford to dodge it—when invited to a seminar (PIAR’s other main

avenue of advocacy), most government agencies (but NOT the local

parliament!) participate.

The Indonesian Forum for Transparency in Budget (FITRA) has

twelve provincial branches in various parts of Indonesia. Not an NGO

in itself, FITRA is a sectoral-oriented forum of various CSOs in the

different provinces with a joint commitment to encourage transpar-

ency in the use of public funds. FITRA analyzes local budgets and

how funding allocations are prioritized. Local FITRA branches also

try as far as possible to monitor how funds are used (although this

can be difficult, since there is no freedom of information act in Indo-

nesia). Much of this is related to fighting corruption, and also to the

basic notion that public money should be allocated to those that need

them the most.

PIAR and FITRA are typical of many nongovernmental organiza-

tions that have emerged after Suharto. They are engaged in local gov-

ernance issues, but have strategically decided to not work with the

government but rather stay outside. The reason for this is the lack of

deep reforms within government—as already noted, much is the same

within the regional bureaucracies. The advocacy NGOs therefore con-

tinue to work on the demand side, pressuring government to provide

better public policies and services. They do not operate very differ-

ently from ten years ago—the main difference today is that they do so

legally with freedoms of press and expression (although the PIAR

office in Kupang has been threatened by thugs, probably controlled

by the local parliament).

There is another large group of NGOs that only indirectly relates

to local governance issues through work on community empower-

ment and grassroots mobilization. By doing so, and within IDS’ ma-

trix, they work on the preconditions for voicing. Through popular

education and community organizing, peasants, workers, fisherfolk

and others are made conscious and enabled to rally for their own

interests. Often such projects are deliberately oriented in opposition

to government education. By amplifying the voice of the disadvan-

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taged and strengthening their political skills, pro-poor public poli-

cies can be produced.

An example of this is Kesuma Multiguna, an NGO that works in

five poor neighborhoods in Jakarta with community-based organiz-

ing. Kesuma provides a public arena (often literally, in the form of an

assembly hall) and facilitates interaction between government and

citizens. Residents in these areas are encouraged to engage in that

public space. In three of the neighborhoods, a monthly newsletter is

produced (similar groups outside of the larger cities experiment with

community radio), and Kesuma also provides training in civics, hu-

man rights and basic governance for residents. They have been suc-

cessful in mobilizing the population and achieved in a brief period of

time a level of political awareness that two decades of serious Suharto

indoctrination did not achieve.

There are a few collabora-

tive forms within the IDS

classification absent from this

brief presentation. One of the

types that have not really de-

veloped in Indonesia is that of

co-production, i.e., a local

government agency and CSO

(either community-based or-

ganization or NGO) jointly

delivering a public service. In

many parts of the world we

find progressive local govern-

ments providing funds for a

community to provide, for in-

stance, solid waste manage-

ment or youth care. These

forms are by and large absent

in Indonesia. During the New

Order, a Home Affairs decree

in 1990 allowed NGOs to become ‘partners’ (mitra) of the govern-

ment in providing equity in growth with greater community partici-

pation. Starting in the early 1980s, a range of new NGOs emerged

AusA

ID

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and thePhilippines

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that worked as sub-contractors to government agencies. Known lo-

cally as ‘Red-Plate NGOs’ (the registration number of official cars in

Indonesia is red), they should perhaps be classified as consultancy

firms rather than nongovernmental organizations—‘activist’ has be-

came a profession.

Because of this history, many of the new NGOs in Indonesia

emerging after 1998 have hesitated in working too close with NGOs.

And since government officials are yet to radically revise their top-

down approaches, the problems are on both sides. The experiences

from the 1980s still ring true: ‘This top-down approach is alien to

NGO work style, and yet the sub-contractor status demands they

adjust. Attempting to introduce a bottom-up approach into a top-

down programme governed by targets, timetables and regulations,

the problems appear virtually insurmountable.’ (Johnston 1990:88)

Another form missing is the government framework for partici-

patory planning, through which government provides the forum for

citizens to engage in local governance. In the Philippines an example

would be the Local Government Code, mandating public consulta-

tion; in India the People’s Planning Campaign in Kerala or the

Panchayati Raj within the 73 Amendment. Strangely for a democra-

tizing country such as Indonesia with a lot of rhetoric about ‘partici-

pation,’ ‘consultation’ and ‘partnership,’ there is no legal framework

for the substantial inclusion of citizens in deciding, implementing or

evaluating public policies. There is no Law of Popular Participations

as in Bolivia or compulsory Participatory Budget Council as in Bra-

zil. Line officers might try to include ‘stakeholders’ in various ‘con-

sultation’ but this often amounts to little less than sosialisasi, that

word made so infamous in Indonesia, utterly distorted by the au-

thoritarian regime.

In practice, participation, as far as the government goes, is noth-

ing but mobilization, the forced partaking in government programs.

And sosialisasi, sorry consultations, seldom amount to anything more

than presenting, in monologue form, with a brief Q and A session,

the latest government blueprint. Civil society organizations them-

selves also have yet to present a credible alternative to the top-down,

elite-oriented planning of the government.

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Challenges and Issues

The result of citizen engagement in local governance is dependent

on the quality of participation. It is not simply to involve people, but it is

also who is involved and how the involvement is governed. If it is only

members of the elite who find a new forum for their participation, not

much is gained. If the poor and marginal formally are present during

meetings but dare not speak up and only remain passive in the back, not

much is gained. In some of the literature on popular participation, one

sometimes finds an overall enthusiasm with any kind of popular partici-

pation—the smaller the better. We have to be a bit more careful and

actually look at who participates, who controls the agenda, how deci-

sions are reached—all the basic power relations within any type of social

interaction (Legal Frameworks 2003).

The crucial benchmark for all kinds of political activity is whether

they are affecting basic power structures. The aim of politics is to

influence and transform power so that it becomes advantageous for

one’s particular interest group. Have, for instance, citizen forums

changed the basic power structure or political culture? Again, I think

it is too easy to give a definitive answer, but groups like the PIAR in

Kupang and SOMPIS in Surakarta are some more impressive attempts

to take on power relations.

Countries going through democratic decentralization have often

introduced some form of new development council. We have men-

tioned the Local Development Councils in the Philippines, the

Panchayati Raj in India, and the Participatory Budget Councils in

certain states in Brazil. These have been given clearly defined man-

dates and authorities. Many of them have quotas for groups that pre-

viously were not involved in government. In India, a third of the seats

in the village Panchayati Raj are allocated for women; in the Philip-

pines 25 per cent of the seats in the local councils are earmarked for

elected representatives from non-governmental organizations.

Expanding representation allows new groups to be involved. Ini-

tially it will probably still be members of the elite: businesspeople, large

farmers, school teachers, local notables, religious leaders, profession-

als, possibly labor leaders. But as the councils become more functional

and more attractive, they will also be more competitive and new catego-

ries of leaders and representatives might emerge. However, we should

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and thePhilippines

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not expect too much. Actual experiences are not all positive: in his study

of six countries with empowered and democratic local councils, Blair

(2000:24) concludes that ‘even bold affirmative action on representation

does not easily or rapidly empower women.’ Women within the

Panchayati Raj in India, for instance, remain silent while their husbands

manage public affairs. This is slowly changing, but discrimination,

whether against women, ethnic minorities or the working classes, are

deeply embedded in prejudice and not simply revoked by a regulation.

Donor support for pushing civic engagement in local governance

is a double-edged sword. The positive side is that there is funding

available. Much of what is being promoted is the engagement of citi-

zens with local government, often of the partnership type. Only a few

of the donors, especially the nongovernmental ones, are funding ad-

vocacy-oriented work, on the demands side of the governance equa-

tion. The bilateral and multilateral organizations are more on the

supply side, to encourage local government to supply better public

services and policies. This is done by encouraging more engagement

with civil society organizations, such as citizen forums or single-pur-

pose associations like water associations or community forest groups.

The World Bank in Indonesia is presently launching a large-scale

district-level governance reform project, through which low-interest

World Bank loans will be provided to local governments if they use

in their planning various forms of citizen consultation.

Participation has thus become a conditionality: if citizens are not

consulted, funds will not be provided. One of the mechanisms pro-

posed is the citizen forum discussed above, another is to use the par-

ticipatory budgeting technique developed in Brazil.

The main problem with this kind of assistance is that it is donor-

initiated, project-based, and money-motivated: when the project cycle

ends (all donor projects end, sooner or later), the collaboration and

achievement are often annulled. Some donors are addressing this by

building up independent capacity of NGOs and local government

(rather than selling a particular model), but the majority take the

project-approach. This is problematic, since the large amounts of

money involved in bilateral funding can lure NGOs into too fast

upscaling, without doing the necessary grassroots work beforehand.

Short-term impact is more important than long-term commitment

and community organizing.

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What is the Future for Civic Engagement inIndonesia?

How, then, can innovations in civil society work feed into public

sector reforms at the local level and the institutionalization of citi-

zens’ participation and other mechanisms for democratization? This

is indeed the key question and the ultimate test of civic engagement.

If increased participation does not provide better public policies and

a social justice outcome, if only the same people find a new forum for

their vested interests, it is, as just noted, worth very little.

Citizen participation produces better citizens (although this does

not always translate into better public policies). And this is impor-

tant enough, if it means that people learn democratic rules. Amarty

Sen and others have argued that democratic government, elections

and a free press give politicians in democracies much stronger in-

centives to avert famines and to promote social justice. Democracy

helps protect people from economic and political catastrophes such

as famine and descent into chaos. The best sustainable strategies to

fight poverty are thus based on the will of people and a concerted

effort to uproot poverty, rather than on being a means for regime

legitimacy, as in Indonesia, where it worked for a while, but ultimately

failed, because of corruption and distortion of leadership. Sustain-

able poverty alleviation and citizen participation go hand in hand.

Poverty is more than material depredation

(Gaventa 2002). It is also vulnerability and ex-

clusion (quite often, material poverty has its

roots in social exclusion). Participation is thus

not only a means but also a direct way of over-

coming poverty. Civic engagement allows for

the participation of people who previously

were left outside and for opening up local gov-

ernance. Already during its very short time of

existence in Indonesia, decision-making has

become more equitable and democratic:

stakeholders agree upon what is fair rather

than push for their own views. Decision-making is more democratic

and the deliberations have produced better citizens.

Uni

ted

Nat

ions

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and thePhilippines

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But the road towards a substantive democracy is long in Indone-

sia. One of the remaining issues, where civil society organizations

have failed quite miserably, is the status of public administration.

Indonesia remains one of the most corrupt countries in the world.

Just a few weeks ago, executive party member and minister of plan-

ning Kwik Kian Gie said in a newspaper interview that his party, the

ruling PDI-P, is the most corrupt in Indonesia. It is probably an over-

statement, but for a high-ranking official to make such a statement is

nevertheless astonishing.

The main reasons why there is a lack of truly exciting and mas-

sive civic engagement in governance issues in Indonesia is the resil-

ience of public administration. Top-down planning remains a

powerful organizational reflex, and there are a few mechanisms for

transparency and downward accountability. Civil servants in Indo-

nesia still see themselves as serving the regime, not citizens. They get

their authority and power from higher authorities and not through

popular support. Even the local councilors elected in 1999 have turned

out to be just as corrupt as their predecessors.

A secondary factor, however, is the incapacity of civil society or-

ganizations to promote viable political alternatives. We have already

mentioned the lack of political skills of CSOs and the uneasiness with

which CSOs engage with government or political parties. Added to

this should be the fragmentation of civil society organizations. Pro-

democracy actors need to politicize civil society by creating institu-

tional channels for political participation that provide alternatives to

today’s fragmentation and pragmatism. This could be done in the

ways described above: by building strong political foundations at the

local level, by establishing people’s forums, and by fielding candi-

dates for village council elections

The collaborations and partnerships that are being developed are

primarily based on personal relations. One such example is the sec-

ond-in-command in the city of Surakarta, the Municipal Secretary,

Qumarudin. Three years ago in 2000, he went with eight other Indo-

nesians from Surakarta, Bandung and Pekanbaru to the Philippines

and visited several innovative local governments. When the group

came home, they decided the establish IPGI, the Indonesian Part-

nership on Local Governance Initiatives that facilitated the birth of

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FM2S in Majalaya. Now into its third year, IPGI in Surakarta, through

Qumarudin, has been able to launch a process for participatory bud-

geting. Through a series of public consultations, a certain part of the

government budget, that which relates to development projects, is

determined by the public. The weakness of the process, however, is

that it is dependent on the patronage of Qumarudin. It is not sup-

ported by a political party or by a broad coalition of civil society orga-

nizations, nor is the local parliament necessarily thrilled that part of

its power to draft budgets is handed over to citizens. But Qumarudin

has a powerful position, as do all high-ranking civil servants, and has

been able push for citizen participation. Unless this process either is

formalized through local regulations or becomes a party platform, it

will probably disappear if Qumarudin either is promoted or goes out

of favor.

The achievements of many CSOs are in this way weak and vul-

nerable. It might look impressive but is easily manipulated, captured

by vested interests, or simply dismissed when a new administration

comes to power (even the long-term participatory budgeting process

in the Brazilian state of Rio Grande do Sul was discontinued when a

new party was voted into power in 2001). One of the issues for IPGI

today is to attempt to use the 2004 elections as a platform for pro-

moting its version of participatory planning and budgeting, persuade

political parties that it is in their interest to adopt such mechanism,

and provide the technical support and political arguments that par-

ties need to promote citizen participation more broadly.

Innovations in civil society in Indonesia have thus only to a very

limited degree led to public sector reforms. There are many exciting

experiments going on (FM2S in Majalaya has had some notable

achievements), and they should not be underestimated. But by and

large, they have had very little impact beyond the local. The pres-

sures from civil society for a radical renewal of the national public

administration are very low. It might even be concluded that the ex-

citement with local experiments and results has deflected the atten-

tion away from the fundamental political changes that need to be

achieved before democratic local governance can be realized. ‘The

local’ can have many conflicting meanings, used by various ideologi-

cal stakeholders. The push for ‘local participation’ can be part of an

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agenda to undermine the role of the state and underplay transnational

power holders. With the many impressive grassroots experiments

taking place, there is a risk of becoming overly fascinated with the

small and local. We thus need to relate local politics to the political

economy of global-state-local relations and carefully analyze conten-

tious issues of power, class, gender and ethnicity as they are played

out in the local sphere.

While pushing for new legal spaces for citizen participation, civil

society attention might be usefully directed towards developing new

organizational forms that will not only build on citizen forums and

the various watchdog organizations, but also be more focused politi-

cally on questioning the power of the bureaucrats and the military

and building new, more sustainable centers of power. And at the

present, since there is not enough political resources at the national

level to build new national political parties, many pro-democracy

organizations are now eyeing local elected offices—starting in 2005,

heads of provinces, districts and municipalities will be popularly

elected (they are today elected by local parliaments). Another pos-

sible conjunction of interest is that between the new labor and peas-

ant federations and the citizen forums. On the village level, there are

also new democratic village councils that open up the possibility of

grassroots democracy (Antlöv 2003b). In conclusion, enough is hap-

pening to hope for more substantive political change, at least as long

as a new and more established power configuration has not yet stabi-

lized its control.

About the authorHans Antlöv is a program officer of Governance and Civil Society at the Ford Foundationin Jakarta, Indonesia. His recent publications include “Elections in Indonesia” (editedwith Sven Cederroth, RoutledgeCurzon 2004) and “The Java that Never Was” (editedwith Jörgen Hellman, LIT Verlag 2004).

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ENDNOTES

1 I would want to express my gratitude to Djuni Thamrin and his team at the Indone-sian Partnership for Local Governance Reforms in Bandung who have provided mewith background information, including a mapping and assessment of key civil so-ciety groups in Indonesia involved in local governance issues.

2 Legislation in the 1970s prohibited students from being politically active on cam-pus. Political activists had two choices: some (the radicals) went underground withthe activities and established secret cells, while others (the community organizers)followed the path made possible through legislation, to establish an associationand maintain a presence as NGO workers. These groups were sometimes called“Organizations without Form” (Organisasi Tanpa Bentuk).

3 Foundation (yayasan) was the only organizational structure allowed by the au-thoritarian government. Many of these more progressive NGOs received fundingfrom European and US private and government sources, which also meant thatthey had to formalize themselves.

4 It is of course more complex than this. After the rapid economic growth of the late1970s and 1980s, people demanded more than material development. They beganto distrust the authoritarian government and its capacity to deliver and organizesociety. People wanted increased voice. In the campaign around the 1997 nationalelection, hundreds of people were killed. It became clear that there was little hopefor radical change from inside the regime. When the Asian financial crisis one yearlater uncovered massive domestic debts and dubious financial transactions, peopletook to the streets. The ensuing end of authoritarianism followed almost perfectlythe broad theories laid down by people like Larry Diamond and Minxi Pei: internaldemise, middle-class mobilization, external pressure, elite division.

5 Two of the success stories are the laws on Consumer Protection and Radio Broad-casting where inputs from civil society groups were crucial in the final formulation.

6 However, much of the support is for particular projects and approaches and only afew of the donors provide core-support to organizations to manage their own pro-grams.

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and thePhilippines

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