Could 'Asian flu' of Soeharto's fall be catching?
Could 'Asian flu' of Soeharto's fall be catching?
By John Gittings
LONDON: Will a new epidemic of Asian flu -- political as well
as economic -- send the region into convulsion? From Beijing to
Yangon, the toppling of Soeharto's regime has a resonance.
Even in new democracies such as South Korea, the Indonesian
example could rekindle militancy among students and workers.
Might not the toppling of one paternalist leader make Malaysia's
Mahathir Mohamad more vulnerable, and even weaken Lee Kuan Yew's
political legacy in Singapore?
Chinese wariness of revolutionary contagion has been evident
in its coverage of the Indonesian crisis. Communist Party advice
to its media seems to have been: "Don't mention the students."
Only brief images have appeared on Chinese television of the
cheering Indonesian students occupying the grounds of parliament
who could easily evoke the nine-year-old ghosts of Tiananmen
Square.
Thursday's official statement from Beijing was in cautionary
code. China would not comment, it said, on Soeharto's
resignation, but hoped -- as a friendly neighbor -- that
Indonesia could "maintain social stability".
Stability is the mantra with which China has always justified
the suppression of its own student revolution. Last week the
China Daily broke editorial silence to deplore the "violence" in
Jakarta -- whatever its causes. It said: "Indonesia's turbulence
also (has) a bad impact on other countries in the region."
Yet the impact of Indonesia's crisis on the region's politics
will not be so widespread as it continues to be on its economies.
This is not eastern Europe in 1989-90, when political change in
Poland and policy shifts in Hungary (with unintended help from
Mikhail Gorbachev) triggered mass protests and swiftly toppled
regimes in East Germany, Czechoslovakia and Romania.
Their common targets were the deformed political structures of
Soviet-led communist rule. Asia's common denominator is less
tangible. Most of the region has already broken free from the
distortions of the cold war. Politics has moved on -- although
differently -- in Thailand, the Philippines and South Korea.
Soeharto, propped up by the West after he "defeated communism"
in the 1960s (and condoned the murder of hundreds of thousands of
Indonesians), was almost the last survivor. North Korea -- where
student protest is almost unimaginable -- is the only other
living dinosaur.
But globalization, which along with rapid economic growth has
brought unemployment and wider disparities in income, is a
harder, hydra-headed monster for any mass movement to tackle.
Indeed for China, still able to pick and choose which aspects
of the world market to admit within its borders, the benefits of
globalization have so far served to lull political protest.
Vietnam, where the equation is less favorable, could be more
vulnerable to unrest -- already simmering in parts of its
countryside.
Asia's discontented workers and farmers, as well as students,
will be watching Jakarta to see how the struggle unfolds. The
biggest question is whether the Indonesian revolution will
substitute real democracy for the "guided" version under military
tutelage? And, when the real might of the Indonesian armed forces
is finally confronted, will the tanks roll in as they did in
Beijing?
If Indonesia's army power can be defeated or won over, it
could encourage even Myanmar's battered opposition. Thailand's
army has already seen the wisdom of accommodation with civil
power, but it will feel all the more obliged to tread carefully.
(Military regimes outside Asia -- such as Nigeria -- could also
shiver.)
The habit of democracy, Hong Kong's leading democrat Martin
Lee (about to contest the first post-handover elections on
Sunday) said Thursday, is infectious. Many would add that the
example of repression is equally potent. The ultimate outcome in
Indonesia may not cause immediate change elsewhere, but it will
color the political climate one way or another.
-- Guardian News Service