Conditions in Indonesia put SE Asia at stake

Conditions in Indonesia put SE Asia at stake

By Marvin Ott

SINGAPORE: Since the fall of Soeharto's New Order regime, a
question has been heavy in the air: Can Indonesia survive as a
viable, coherent nation?

The bloody secession of East Timor, followed by communal
warfare in Maluku and elsewhere, put the issue into high relief.

Now comes the murder of four United Nations relief workers in
West Timor by a militia gang while Indonesian security forces
stood by -- virtually advertising the collapse of Jakarta's
authority in that province.

The concerns over Indonesia's future are shared by its
neighbors, and for good reason. The future of Southeast Asia is
at stake.

Imagine the region over the next decade with a cohesive,
politically stable and economically successful Indonesia.
Contrast that with an Indonesia that continues to exhibit the
current systemic disarray.

The unease in capitals from Bangkok to Washington comes from
the realization that the latter scenario cannot be ruled out and
has become realistic enough to warrant serious analysis.

What forces have held independent Indonesia together and what
is the state of those critical variables?

The fact that Indonesia exists at all is something of a
miracle. This sprawling archipelago with 17,000 islands and
several hundred distinct ethnic groups is an unlikely country.

Providing all this complex diversity with a distinct national
identity would be a daunting challenge.

The consolidation that Indonesia has achieved can be traced to
a number of factors.

Colonialism: The Netherlands bequeathed Indonesia's
independence generation the concept, and the reality, of a single
archipelagic state ruled from Java.

Nationalism: The great achievement of Indonesia's first
president, Sukarno, was the creation and nurturing of
nationalism. He understood that a common nationality could not be
built around the Javanese language. Nor could it be built among
non-Muslims around a formula that enshrined Islam as a state
religion.

He persuaded his colleagues in the independence movement to
adopt a market language from the small Riau Archipelago as the
national language and to embrace an essentially secular formula
(Pancasila) that honored religion without giving sectarian
preference.

This process has left a consensus among elite opinion that
Indonesia must remain one, undivided whole.

Political acumen: In 1965, Sukarno had to relinquish power to
Soeharto who also proved to be a master of the political game.
Indonesian unity came to be embodied in one man.

The army: With the defeat of the Indonesian Communist Party,
the Indonesian army became the strongest, most influential
institution in the country.

The army was Soeharto's primary instrument for the exercise of
government authority and protection of the regime. The army
repressed armed secessionist movements in the "outer islands"in
the 1950s, as well as a militantly Islamic insurrection (Darul
Islam), and established what was effectively a parallel structure
of authority alongside the civilian government.

Economic development: For the first two decades of his rule,
Soeharto used a formula of military control combined with
technocratic, Western-oriented economic policies to put Indonesia
on the road to modernization.

By the mid-1980s Indonesia was on everyone's list as one of
the Third World's economic success stories. Soeharto struck an
implicit bargain with the Indonesian populace -- unchallenged
regime authority in return for improved economic circumstances.

International support: A key part of the New Order formula was
generous economic assistance from national aid providers like
Japan and the United States, as well as international financial
institutions. The Soeharto regime enjoyed genuine goodwill -- and
deference -- from its Southeast Asian neighbors.

Communal tolerance: There was a pervasive climate of "live and
let live" when it came to sectarian and ethnic differences. Key
to this was the character of Javanese Islam which produced a
syncretic, absorptive culture very different from the Islam
prevailing in much of the Middle East with its sharp distinctions
between believers and infidels.

It was this Javanese ethos that enabled Sukarno to implement
Pancasila.

Anyone who assessed Indonesia in the mid-1980s by these
criteria would have found little to criticize.

But arbitrary centralized power is ultimately subject to Lord
Acton's dictum: "All power corrupts and absolute power corrupts
absolutely."

By the mid-1990s, the cancer of corruption had penetrated to
the heart of the Soeharto regime. The Asian financial crisis
provided the spark that set the whole rotten edifice aflame.

So where do things stand today? If we apply the same criteria,
most of the key indicators are negative. Since 1997, the army has
demonstrated repeatedly a toxic combination of brutality and
ineptitude. A once-respected national institution has been
discredited.

Since 1997, the economy has not only stopped growing, but also
contracted dramatically.

The dreams and aspirations of millions of Indonesians have
evaporated. Communal tolerance has been eviscerated. Many of the
key pillars that have supported Indonesian unity have been
weakened severely.

What is there left?

International and regional support remains solid. Indonesia
benefits from the fact that none of its neighbors is interested
in fomenting disunity in the archipelago. But private foreign
investment has been a major casualty of the tumult of the last
three years.

What about nationalism -- the pervasive consensus among most
of the 210 million inhabitants that they are in fact Indonesians?
No one knows how strong that sentiment still is. A great deal
rests on the answer.

That leaves one final element -- the political factor.

In a fragile, but highly centralized polity like Indonesia,
the political skills of the President are a key to national
cohesion and stability. When President Abdurrahman Wahid was
selected, no one thought Indonesia was getting a leader expert in
economic policy or military affairs. It was hoped that he would
demonstrate political skills of a high order.

But the predominant image has been of a leader who is erratic
and arbitrary. The picture is complicated by the fact that
Indonesia has been thrown into the deep waters of democracy.
After 35 years of authoritarian rule, instituting democracy is
like removing the lid on a pressure cooker -- explosive.

The factors that support Indonesian national unity are far
weaker today. At the same time, Indonesia has made the painful
and necessary transition towards democracy. Whether this
transition will produce a stable, unified Indonesia or not
depends heavily at this juncture on the political performance of
President Abdurrahman.

The writer is professor of National Security Policy at the
National War College. The views expressed are personal.

The Strait Times/ Asia News Network