Concern for good of the public needed to justify politics

Ignas Kleden, The Center for East, Indonesian Affairs (CEIA), Jakarta

It is an age-old truism that politics has something to do with power; but this is only half the truth. The fact that someone -- the president for example -- is entitled to such great power over others can only be understood and justified if the power given to him or her is used for the common good of as many citizens as possible.

This is why a concern for public interest and the common good is another constituent element of politics. Without the entitlement and the wielding of power, politics cannot be exercised; and without a serious concern for public interest and the common good, politics cannot be justified.

Similarly, the state feels entitled to monopolize the use of force. It is believed that the forces at the state's disposal will be used to compel law enforcement, and that force will be used to protect the state and the citizens from possible violence by a third party or another state.

Yet, while power is so enchanting and overwhelming, the public interest and the common good are usually ignored.

The army and the police, who are also more aware of their right to use force and to use weapons, are also forgetful of their duty to protect people and to provide them with security.

This asymmetric perception of politics is all the more true for Indonesia. The agenda and actions of politicians here show that their main business -- and their most important preoccupation -- is nothing but an exercise in the attainment, the distribution and the maximization of their power.

All political parties, big and small, are engaged in their preparations for the general elections, the electoral threshold, the financing of political campaigns, the possible formation of party coalitions, and the nomination of prospective candidates for the presidency and the House of Representatives.

No mention has been made by any political party as to how it envisages the realization of the common good and the public interest and how this will be achieved. Major parties, such as the Indonesian Party of Struggle (PDI Perjuangan), the Golkar Party and the United Development Party (PPP), say very little or not even a single word about their determination, strategies and methods to fight the proliferation of corruption and other malpractices within the bureaucracy, their ideas on what should be done to solve the problem of increasing unemployment, and their ideas and plans regarding economic recovery.

Despite the very obvious and threatening environmental destruction, there is a lack of imagination among those politically interested people to found a political party comparable to the Green Party in more developed countries.

Surprisingly, although there are a great number of people living below the poverty line -- at least 47.9 million according to the 2002 report of the Ministry of Health -- and despite so many minority groups, there has been no serious initiative to establish a political party which concentrates on social- democratic programs.

Yet, every political party repeatedly talks about the aspirations and the development of the people, without the smallest hint as to their willingness or ability to translate the people's interests into distinct priorities in various sectors.

How is the public interest reflected and represented in housing, public transportation, education, industry, trade, business and economy, or political education? Is it in the interest of the people that private luxury cars dominate the city's main streets instead of public transportation vehicles? How is public interest incorporated into national education if fees are so high that education is affordable only to limited societal groups?

Why are golf courses everywhere, while there is hardly space for playgrounds or public parks? Are small-scale industries and various handicraft cottage industries given priorities and incentives? Why are the prices for agricultural products fixed, while those for industrial goods are not?

Currently, there are more than 200 registered political parties in Indonesia, but this does not necessarily imply that there are more than 200 or more groupings interested in the common good.

This figure only indicates an increasing number of people participating in power politics. Substantial debates are rarely heard among political parties about their plans and programs for poverty alleviation, their priorities in regional autonomy, or their ideas for the improvement and reform of national education.

In more developed democratic countries, the competition among contending political parties is carried out through the introduction and the promotion of their political programs. People vote for parties with political programs that correspond best to the needs of the voters.

In Indonesia, it is a sociological enigma as to why and on what basis people vote for one party instead of another, despite the fact that political programs are not the main priority of most parties. What has become the means of political persuasion and political appeal in such a case?

The absence of substantial programs from political parties is one of the main reasons the tendency toward internal divisions within parties is far greater than their ability to establish an internal consolidation. What is now happening within the PDI Perjuangan is also occurring within the PKB, the PPP and within the former ruling party, Golkar.

Party members' lack of concern about the public interest has created a political vacuum that has been filled by opportunity: an opportunity that anyone who has some political influence is tempted to use -- to take advantage of their party as a means to pursue individual interests or the interest of a particular faction.

It can certainly be fruitful if contending arguments and discourses are pursued within the scope of a party's mission and within the framework of their programs. However, each faction within a party generally endeavors to pursue its own agenda, instead of participating in the party's efforts to find the best possible way to realize their programs.

Thus, political parties here do not yet represent institution building in the political sector. There are no common programs nor ideals that function as a cohesive binding force to unite party members, and there are no common values that define a party.

The official number of registered political parties in Indonesia is now 234, of which 30 are supposedly eligible to contend in the general elections. We have to wait and see whether the smaller parties that do not pass the electoral threshold are willing and ready to sacrifice their own interests in order to encourage political institution building in Indonesia by joining the bigger ones.

Yet, this is very unlikely, because the absence of substantial programs in many of the bigger parties would make it very difficult for the smaller ones to assess their political goals in relation to one party or another. The tragedy is that the people are inclined to believe that pursuing one's own interest is safer and longer-lasting than trying to push for a common good that would benefit all, without exception.

By this point, though, the miserable tragedy has turned into a bad comedy.