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.