Individual empowerment a must for democratization

Individual empowerment a must for democratization

By Donatus K. Marut

JAKARTA (JP): Debates about the nature of democracy have been
long lasting in political science: between the supporters of
democracy as government by all adult citizens and supporters of
government by elites, or the rule by citizens and the rule by the
experts (Robert Dahl, Democracy and Its Critics, 1989). In most
democratic countries, the rule by citizens through various
democratic machines has become the final choice.

The presence of formal forms of political machines as
indicated by the multiparty system and free election
superficially shows that Indonesia is moving toward democratic
politics. But these formal indicators are not sufficient.

Indonesian politics is still an elitist game -- the prominent
political actors are those from urban and central elites. The
political parties were founded and are chaired by those who are
living in the centers and have minimum access to their
constituents in rural areas and outer islands.

If democracy is perceived as the rule by all adult citizens,
then democracy is still far away from reality in Indonesia
because the citizens are in fact still substantially excluded
from the real political process. This is caused by at least two
factors -- first, because of the strong paternalistic culture in
which citizens are still bound to patrons and urban elites, and
second, because of a long repressive-authoritarian regime that
had succeeded in creating floating and politically apathetic
masses. These factors have hindered citizens from becoming
competent political actors.

If they participated in the last general election and
registered as members of political parties, it is mostly because
of sentimental drives (political euphoria) rather than rational
and critical judgment. So the main challenge for developing
democracy in Indonesia will be to strengthen the capacities or to
improve the competence of its citizens.

The presence of many political parties has indeed provided
more chances and channels for people to participate with more
choices in the political process. So are also the free operations
of organizations that are functioning as semipressure groups,
such as non-governmental organizations and students'
organizations. These social and political organizations are
macro-foundations of democracy. Through these organizations,
political interests, short-term and long-term, are articulated.
The dynamics of interests articulation will determine the whole
democratic political processes.

But these macro-foundations are not sufficient for developing
a democracy. Organizations established in Indonesian cultural
settings cannot automatically contribute to the development of
democracy. It is inevitable that the paternalistic culture in
society is still strong, and this can paralyze the
democratization process.

The social and political organizations are various and spread
throughout the country, but if the organizations are established
on patron-client relations, the organizations could hinder the
democratization process. What emerges in society is patronage and
total obedience to the patrons and to the traditional "consensus"
which are accepted without debate as the tying factors of the
organizations.

These tendencies will not only become seeds of oligarchy but
also instruments for establishing parochial and sentimental
obedience and bondage. Who appears in politics are not the
citizens but patrons who are able to mobilize supporting masses
using sentimental symbols which do not liberate the citizens but
instead repress them. The symbols can be rooted in religion,
ethnicity, class and historical romanticism. These engagement
symbols are the main hindering factors of real democracy.

The last elections showed this tendency. Many political
observers divided the political parties into two main categories:
Religion-based parties and nationalist-oriented parties.
Meanwhile, the main references for voters to choose parties can
be grouped into three: party leaders, traditional (religious)
sentiments, and historical romanticism or nationalism.

The first group elected parties such as the National Mandate
Party (PAN); the second group elected the National Awakening
Party (PKB), the United Development Party (PPP), and other small
religious parties; and the third group elected the Indonesian
Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI Perjuangan).

Even PAN itself, which was assumed to be an open party, is
still dominated by religious groups, particularly members of the
second largest Muslim organization Muhamadiyah.

Sentiments toward romantic nationalism, Sukarnoism and
antipathy to the ruling government became driving factors for
people to vote for PDI Perjuangan, although most of them are
unfamiliar with the party's representatives.

Citizens' choices were still dominated by sentimental drives
rather than rational judgment. This is dangerous because the
public can be fragmented into these in-group sentiments that in
turn may create both latent and open conflict in society.
Therefore, it is necessary to start developing other crucial
foundations of democracy.

The basic units of political process in a nation-state are
actually individual citizens. Democracy is a struggle for the
interests of individual citizens. That the individuals then use
organizations, social and political organizations, to further
their interests, is part of the democratization process. But the
main key is the individual citizen. Every individual has his/her
own preference in the political process. The presence of
democratic organizations has to be a consensus or an affinity of
the preferences of all individuals associated with the
organizations.

Macro-foundations -- such as a multiparty system, free
elections, a free press and free association -- are weak if they
are not supported by strong micro-foundations, namely the
individual citizen in society, whether an ordinary citizen,
leader or ruler.

Strong democracy requires strong micro-foundations --
individual citizens who are capable of making free choices
through mature and critical judgment without being influenced by
binding and nonliberating symbols. Critical judgment is
encouraged if individuals have the capacity to think
independently in determining their life goals, preferences and
orientation in their lives. Individuals are not intimidated by
sentimental symbols that have eliminated their freedom as
individuals.

To enable the emergence of critical citizens, who are capable
of making critical and free choices and decisions, requires
continuous individual empowerment. Only empowered citizens are
conscious of or are able to materialize their free will and are
able to make free decisions. The empowerment process is important
to break up all false democratic symbols, such as obedience and
bondage to organizations and associations that have long bound
and enslaved individual citizens.

To support the individual empowerment process requires
continuous political education or political dissemination for
citizens. Political education is intended to achieve at least
some preconditions for individual citizens' empowerment.

First, the development of evaluative capacities of every
individual citizen, that is the capacity to make priorities of
their involvement in both political and sentimental collective
actions. Critical individuals will be able to make judgments on
the achievement of exclusive group objectives and obligations as
well as justice for society at large. Individuals with evaluative
capacities will be able to ascertain criteria before making
decisions on whether to participate in political problems or in
other collective actions.

Second, to make sure that individuals have adequate knowledge.
Knowledge is the most important component that influences the
roles of individual citizens. Citizens, in order to be able to
play appropriate roles, have to have sufficient knowledge about
their social and political environments, such as information
relating to policy choices and their impacts or information
concerning group activities or other collective actions and their
impacts.

Individuals also are encouraged to analyze the knowledge they
have in order to really understand the preferences they chose,
and therefore be convinced that their choices are the preferences
that have been critically judged.

Third, because political action is part of collective actions,
while collective actions are part of the actions of the
individual citizen, individual citizens have to also be equipped
with a cognitive map that will help them decide whether a problem
or an issue is really political that needs mass collective action
or only an individual action or action of an organization or
group within society for exclusive aims of the groups.

This empowerment process of individual citizens is important
to empower people in making their own political choices and to
prevent the development of a democracy that merely prioritizes
mass mobilization. People are supposed to participate in politics
not because of strong obedience or bondage to organizations'
symbols or organizations' patrons, but because they have their
critical and free choices according to their own preferences.
With these capacities, each citizen will be able to make free
decisions in determining their involvement in political roles.
The roles will be adequate and competent as well as conducive to
the achievement of stability and the effectiveness of democratic
institutions.

This is the arena where social and political organizations
should play in order to strengthen the democratization process,
namely the empowerment of individual citizens through continuous
political education, not binding the citizens to obedience or
bondage to the organizations that in turn paralyze their freedom.
Without empowerment of individual citizens, a free political
process will become only a struggle between one mass group
against the others, that in turn would ruin democracy.

The writer is a development observer, active in political
education in grassroots communities, who lives in Jakarta.