Good governance

Good governance

State Minister of National Development Planning Ginandjar
Kartasasmita's oration after receiving his honorary doctoral
degree from the Gadjah Mada University in Yogyakarta last
Saturday reminded us of the basic requirements for good,
effective governance in today's world.

Ginandjar noted that a good, efficient state bureaucracy
should develop transparency and accountability and should guide,
instead of controlling, and empower instead of providing to the
public. He also stressed the importance of enhancing grassroots
initiatives in development and the need for the government to
always take sides with the economically, politically weak segment
of society.

Every major policy that affects the interests of the general
public should be debated openly first, before it is enforced, he
said in citing an example of how transparency and accountability
should be translated into the daily conduct of governance.

There is actually nothing completely new in Ginandjar's
observations. But there are, we think, at least two factors that
made his observations newsworthy.

The first was the mere fact that those principles that are so
basic to good, effective governance, were pointed so bluntly by a
member of the core of policy makers within Indonesia's
bureaucracy.

The second is the stark reality that those principles are
still in the early process of being applied to the daily conduct
of governance in this country. And the process seems much slower
than required by the changing environment.

After more than 25 years of steadily high economic growth, 10
years of accelerated economic and bureaucratic reforms and
privatization, which have transformed the private sector into the
locomotive of the economy, the state bureaucracy still tends to
think and act as if it remains the most knowledgeable about
everything.

That attitude often hinders meaningful dialogs with the
people. Policy making and decision making are often done without
a dialectic social process because most bureaucrats think they
know best and, therefore, see policy debates as a waste of time.
The consequences, though, as we have often noted over the past
few years, are that the government sometimes makes unnecessary
mistakes that could be avoided through open, reasonable policy
communication.

Such an attitude seemed to have been tolerable between the
mid-1960s and the mid-1980s, when the government was in such a
hurry to catch up in the development of the economy, which was at
that time in such a devastated condition.

But now because the economic base has broadened, economic
activities are governed mostly by market forces and the private
sector has assumed the role of the engine of growth. Therefore,
the state bureaucracy is required to transform itself
structurally, functionally and orientation-wise.

We understand such a transformation is not easy because it
means sharing more power with the people. But in today's world,
openness and transparency are crucial for efficient market
operations. And, efficient markets depend on good information, as
does the exercise of freedom to participate in economic and
political decision making.

Moreover, openness is essential for a soundly based public
debate of the performance of a government and its agencies. And
informed policy discussions are at the heart of a healthy
political process, which is required to enhance sustainable
development.