Lessons from U.S. presidential primary
Lessons from U.S. presidential primary
The Republican presidential primary in New Hampshire, the United States, was won by Pat Buchanan who may go on to challenge Bill Clinton for the White House. Mochtar Buchori looks at this presidential race and reflects on the upcoming general elections in Indonesia in 1997.
JAKARTA (JP): The difference between political campaigning in the United States and in Indonesia is quite obvious. Nevertheless, CNN coverage of the Republican primary in New Hampshire can serve to boost our political maturity.
Two results of this primary are especially significant. One is that billionaire Steve Forbes was in effect knocked out of the race for the Republican presidential candidacy. He received only 12 percent of the vote. The second is that negative campaigning which is designed to vilify rival candidates backfired, not only on those who practiced it, but also against the spirit of campaigning in general.
As I understand it, Steve Forbes was eliminated from the race because the Republican grassroots simply refused to believe that he is "one of them". Those in the grassroots perceive Forbes as an "outsider", a person who cannot possibly represent their interests and aspirations. How can such a wealthy person be one of the grassroots? His huge expenditure to buy advertisements failed to convince the Republican rank and files that he is a person who understands their concerns and is willing to fight for them.
The fact that Pat Buchanan has come out as the winner -- albeit with a very slim margin -- was a big surprise to most parties. Before the New Hampshire primary, most observers thought that senator Bob Dole would come out from this political contest as the winner, and with a convincing majority. As it turned out he got only 27 percent of the votes against 28 percent for Buchanan.
This outcome means, according to some political analysts, that the Republican votes in new Hampshire were very badly fragmented. And some consider this one of the results of negative campaigning by some candidates.
It was also suggested that the very high turnout among Republican registered voters in this primary -- 76 percent if I remember correctly -- was another result of this negative campaigning. This type of campaigning caused so much concern among voters that they decided to go to the polls to stop politicians they considered unfit to become presidential candidates.
Is there something in this that is useful to us?
There are two things which can be learned from this foreign experience. One is that it is very important for every political contender to be viewed by the electorate as being "one of us" and two, that it is equally important for every contender to conduct his or her campaign in a positive way, that is by informing the people how the contender perceives problems that affect the future of the entire nation, and how in the contender's view these problems should best be solved.
This means that each contender must try to avoid campaign practices aimed at discrediting rival contenders.
Let us examine carefully each of these two premises.
The "he is not one of us" sentiment manifests itself in a different way here. What we will find among our grassroots is a perception concerning who each of our three political contenders stands for.
I know it is not nice to say this, but most people in our society still consider PPP "a party for Moslems", Golkar for "government officials", and PDI for "nationalists and non- Moslems". We can argue -- and indeed we must argue -- that this is not true. But I think this is the unpleasant reality we will find, if we are willing to see the truth.
This has been made worse by the fact that a significant portion of our electorate does not feel represented by our political contenders. There are many Moslems who do not feel represented by the PPP, and there are many nominal nationalists who do not feel represented by PDI. These people do not feel morally obliged to vote for PPP or PDI. And apart from government officials there are not many people who feel represented by Golkar either.
The question that has to be pondered now is how to develop a campaigning strategy to generate this "one of us" feeling among the electorate.
Only if we can do this will we be able to generate real enthusiasm for the coming general election. Only if we can do this will each of our political contenders be able to get votes without resorting to "forceful persuasion". Only if we can do this will each of our political contenders be able not only to get votes, but to get real a real mandate from the electorate.
Laws and regulations will be honored only if there is a mandate from the electorate, from the people. A political victory in a general election without being followed and backed up by firm commitment in implementing national programs does not signify much.
Has there been negative campaigning in the past? I think it is very hard to answer this question honestly and truthfully. Thus perhaps it is wiser to ask the equivalent of this question: did we behave positively enough in our past political campaigns?
The signs of positive campaigning is that the electorate has become fully aware of the urgent problems that have to be solved, and that it lends support willingly to national programs aimed at solving those problems.
The Indonesian electorate is different from the American electorate. That cannot be disputed. But it is also an indisputable fact that the Indonesian electorate in 1997 will be different from the Indonesian electorate in 1992 and 1987.
Are we ready to treat the Indonesian electorate in a new and more democratic way?
The writer is an observer of social and political affairs.