Matters of perspective

Martin Jenkins, Editor, Danareksa Sekuritas, Jakarta

As a result of the Bali bombings, many countries, including the United States, Australia and the United Kingdom, have issued travel warnings to their citizens advising against non-essential travel to Indonesia. Foreign nationals of some countries are even being advised to consider leaving Indonesia if their presence is not essential. But how well founded is this advise? Is it really true that Indonesia is so unsafe that foreign nationals should avoid coming here?

Leaders of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) countries, including Indonesian President Megawati Soekarnoputri, have raised objections to the travel warnings. They claim that the travel warnings are unwarranted since there is no firm evidence of further terrorist attacks in the region.

They also claim that ASEAN countries are doing everything possible to prevent and eradicate all forms of terrorist activities. Their objections are perhaps not surprising though, given the important role that tourism plays in many ASEAN economies.

It should be remembered, however, that the travel warnings were issued on the belief that threats to Western interests from terrorism throughout Indonesia remain high. This is understandable since the terrorists have now demonstrated in such horrific fashion their ability to stage a massive attack within Indonesia. As such, further attacks cannot be ruled out.

For this reason alone, it would be foolish for Western nations not to issue a travel warning -- if a further attack were, heaven forbid, to take place they would be open to strong criticism from their citizens if no travel warning had been issued.

But does this mean that foreigners should pay heed to the warnings? Are foreigners exposing themselves to unacceptable risks by visiting Indonesia?

First of all, it is important to realize that we face many other dangers apart from being blown up by a terrorist bomb. Just by going through our daily routines we expose ourselves to risk. We could for example, be killed in a road accident.

According to the U.S. Embassy in Jakarta, accidents on rented motorcycles constitute the largest cause of death and serious accident among foreign visitors to Bali. Nonetheless, Indonesia's roads are still, surprisingly, safer than many other countries in the region (according to an Asian Development Bank commissioned report, Indonesia has six road deaths per 100,000 people vis-a- vis 31 per 100,000 people in Malaysia).

We also expose ourselves to the threat of crime, and even the risk of murder. According to a British Home Office survey, Washington DC has one of the highest murder rates of any developed country city (with a murder rate of 69.3 per 100,000 population), and is an astonishing 170 times more dangerous than the Belgian capital, Brussels. Thus judging by this criteria, should there not be warnings on travel to Malaysia (dangerous roads) and Washington DC (high homicide rate)?

But what makes the Bali bomb blast different from such risks is that we cannot measure the likelihood of such an event occurring again in the future. What we are faced with is uncertainty.

Risk can be quantified, either from common knowledge (a spun coin will come up heads 50 percent of the time), or from empirical data. But because we can quantify risk, we feel more secure. This explains why tourists still decide to visit cities with high crime rates such as Rio de Janeiro, or even choose to drive on dangerous roads late at night in an inebriated state.

Uncertainty, on the other hand, is different. Uncertain events cannot be analyzed since they are too irregular, or too unique. As such, we have no way of knowing where or when or by what means the terrorists will strike again. They may try to use more conventional methods, such as leaving parcel or vehicle bombs in public places, or hijacking passenger aircraft. But they also may try something more grandiose, like the attacks on the World Trade Center in New York.

This uncertainty scares us. We cannot make rational deductions about what is safe and what is dangerous, and have nothing to go on but our own judgment. As such, it is impossible to say that Bali is now safe. But equally, it is also impossible to say that anywhere is safe. Is a future terrorist attack more likely to happen again in either New York or Bali than anywhere else? No one knows.

However, Bali is not famous for being a safe tourist destination without reason. Potential visitors should try to keep matters in perspective -- they are probably far more likely to get killed in a road accident than by a terrorist bomb. At the end of the day, tourists should not put off visiting places such as Bali or New York. Because if they do, they would only be handing victory to the terrorists. And surely that is in no one's interest.