Do Jakartans actually need more shopping centers?

Do Jakartans actually need more shopping centers?

Iqbal Widastomo, Researcher, South-East Asian Division,
Global Link Business Consultancy, London

They are everywhere now in Jakarta! On every corner of the
city there they are: massive and often overpowering in size, they
are powerful presences in the city. They have changed the way
millions live and they consume on a scale that should concern us
all because it is unsustainable.

In reading the above paragraph, one might think this was a
discussion on some alien takeover of the capital or on some
fantastical creature from one of the Lord of the Rings films that
had chosen to take up residence in the city.

But no, these new giants of the city are the shopping malls
that still seem to be rising, despite the fact that there are
already dozens of shopping centers all over the urban sprawl that
is the nation's capital.

The introduction may seem rather dark and foreboding in its
picture of monstrous entities, the presence of which is
unsustainable. However, the excessive number of malls that have
risen -- and continue to rise -- in Jakarta over the last decade
or so is so great that concerns and even menace can readily be
seen in their growth.

This growth is made all the more perverse when we consider
that, as these vast vestiges of consumerism have been erected,
Indonesia was going through its worst economic crisis.

It is almost as if the economic crisis had only a small
impact, if any, on consumerism. This too is reflected in how
people are clearly flocking to the new shopping malls. However,
it must be questioned whether visitors to these malls actually
have any spending power to sustain the retail turnover for the
shops in these malls.

Jakarta is following a path of consumerism that is by now
familiar all over the world. Consumerism has been taking over and
has changed the way in which millions upon millions of people
live. People have come to see it as reasonable to name shopping
as one of their hobbies.

What an odd idea that the idea of going out and spending
money, most likely on something unnecessary, has become a
reasonable and self-fulfilling thing to do. Sometimes, people
even do not have to go so far as buying something; even window-
shopping, gazing at the latest fashions or the latest electronic
gadgets on offer, is seen as a fruitful and engaging way to spend
leisure time.

Perhaps the concept of "leisure time" is part of the problem
here.

Leisure time is seen as a time during which we do things we
want to, as opposed to doing things that we really have to or
need to. The idea of leisure time as a time to do things that are
constructive and useful is most likely fading from our collective
mind-set; society is becoming superfluous, unnecessary and
wasteful. Instead of being useful and resourceful, we allow
ourselves -- and are even encouraged -- to do things that are
either useless or are not particularly constructive.

This model of leisure time complements the world of
consumerism and shopping malls. People are being encouraged and
are allowing themselves to be fairly mindless consumers of
whatever on offer. From the clothes we wear to the films we watch
in the cinemas that are nearly always part of a shopping complex,
we are being served up with, and are gladly feeding on, things
that are not necessarily good for us nor necessarily beneficial
to us in nourishing or stimulating our intellect.

For example, on a recent trip back to Jakarta, when I asked a
friend what she would be doing at the weekend, her automatic
reply was, "I'll be going to the mall and probably see a film."

Naturally, I followed up with the question, "Oh really? What
film do you plan to see?" To which she replied, "Oh, I don't
know. Anything -- I don't really mind, whatever is on."

Now, this person is not unintelligent. She has a good job at a
bank that requires her to use her brain, but when it came to
thinking about her leisure time and choice of entertainment, she
didn't really to be using it.

This seems to be the general direction in which we are
heading. The world of marketing and product promotion would call
this a no-brainer situation -- that is, the consumer does not
really think, and instead mindlessly buys and consumes what is
offered with little or no consideration of benefits or
consequences.

Jakarta now has an excess of malls that are ready to
capitalize on the potential for mindless consumerism that is on
the rise not just in Indonesia, but all around the world.
Capitalism is based on the twin passions of buying and selling.
When the passion of buying is uninhibited by thoughtfulness and
considerations of the value and usefulness of the purchase, of
course, selling becomes easier.

In Western countries, there is much lamenting of the loss of
values and society's deterioration into valueless consumerism. In
the United Kingdom, for example, it is common knowledge and
experience that people will sooner choose to go to a shopping
mall on Sunday than they would attend a church service. The
encroachment of the consumer society and materialism has led to a
condition in which people feel that they must shop simply to
justify their existence. Perversely, people have even been heard
to say that shopping is a basic human right.

Shops in the UK promote themselves with slogans that appeal to
this odd mentality, such as "I shop therefore I am"; as if human
worth and the moral validity of life is a product of the things
you buy and the material objects that you can claim "mine".

This is not only morally wrong; it is obscene and offensive to
any ideal of a caring and sharing society. Indonesia should not
go in this direction and should not fall into this trap.

Shopping malls have their place in any city and any society,
but they should not come to dominate a city and reduce the moral
values of a society. Shopping malls in Jakarta are consistently
not representative of Indonesian society, with mostly Western
styles and trends on offer and American culture predominant in
movies shown.

The city does not really need any more malls; it is already
well served by malls. Malls do add to the variety and complexity
of our city and are significant contributors to the make-up of
any modern city, but we should consider how many we need and how
much we need them. The "mall-mania" is surely going too far.

The city is in need of so many other things to truly develop
its infrastructure as a world metropolis, such as a public
transportation network, better housing and art and cultural
centers. City planners should explore these needs more and
consider with more scrutiny the social value of malls.

Not least, they should consider how malls accentuate the gap
between the haves and have nots, the rich and the poor.