It's multiparty time

The birth of Islamic political parties, Chinese parties and labor parties in recent weeks has raised fears of a return to a political system divided along sectarian, ethnic, ideological or even class lines. Many fear that this could upset relations among the diverse religious, ethnic, race and cultural groups that make up our society. They fear that this trend could lead to the breaking up of the Indonesian nation as we know it today.

This view, while sounding too alarmist, is founded on our experience with the multiparty system in the first decade or so after Indonesia's independence in 1945. Then, political parties were founded along religious, ethnic and ideological lines. The first general election in 1955, under a democratic parliamentary system, was inconclusive, and led to one coalition government replacing another in sequence, before then president Sukarno decided to take over and return the country to a presidential, and authoritarian, government.

The traumatic experience of the 1950s was then used as a pretext to limit the number of political parties when Soeharto came to power in 1966. After the first general election in 1971, the Army general restricted the number of political parties to three and ideological divisions were subsequently eliminated by requiring all three to adhere to Pancasila as their ideology.

While Soeharto effectively eliminated sectarian and ideological politics in his 32-year rule, it is debatable whether this was a good thing or not. Even without sectarian politics, sectarian conflicts have continued to haunt us and reared their ugly heads in recent weeks. We know that judging by the mess Soeharto left behind, the three-party system cannot be defended. It has failed us, and now we are paying a heavy price for it.

The birth of Islamic, Chinese and labor parties in recent weeks is a symptom that many people, whether part of the majority or a minority group, do not feel that their interests have been truly represented by the existing political bodies. After living in deprivation for decades, they now crave for representation, and so these new parties have emerged to meet that demand.

A return of sectarian politics is potentially divisive or even explosive, but banning them would be an even graver mistake. Our Constitution guarantees freedom of association and that means that people have the right to form or join political parties of their own choosing. Besides, sectarian politics is a consequence of the diverse nature of our society, so banning their political parties would be tantamount to denying that diversity itself.

Since sectarian politics is a phenomenon found in other countries, developed and developing countries, Indonesia could learn a thing or two on how they have dealt with the issue. If their experiences are anything to go by, we may have overstated our fears and concerns of the consequences of sectarian politics.

One or two things could emerge if Indonesia pursues a multiparty system in which sectarian parties are permitted to contest general elections. The first is that elections may be inconclusive and we may have a coalition of parties, including sectarian ones, running government.

The second is that one or two powerful parties could emerge to dominate the political arena. The two-party system that has evolved in the United States, Britain and Australia did so because the dominant political parties attracted the votes of the majority in the middle of the political spectrum. They are not so much driven by ideology as by their desire to represent the increasingly homogeneous and growing ranks of the middle class. Any political party that can rise to this stature will dominate the political scene in Indonesia, and these are not likely to be sectarian parties.

Time will tell which of the two alternative courses Indonesia will follow. Indonesia is still in a learning process with democracy. The multiparty system in the 1955 election may have been chaotic and bordering on anarchy, but that was a small price to pay for learning and adopting democracy.

In retrospect, the multiparty system did not fail us. It was never given the time and chance to work in the first place. We have tried, and miserably failed, to impose a restrictive ideology-free three-party system for 32 years. Now it's time to give the multiparty system, with all the risks that sectarian politics pose, another chance to work. In democracy, nothing ventured, nothing gained.