'Mixed' electoral system an option

By Ben Reilly

JAKARTA (JP): One of the most significant consequences of former president Soeharto's departure from office is the unprecedented opportunity for reform of Indonesia's political institutions.

President B.J. Habibie's administration has placed a priority on political reform. He has appointed a team of experts within the Ministry of Home Affairs, headed by Ryaas Rasyid, to produce new laws on key aspects of the country's political system, such as political parties, parliaments, elections, and regional autonomy.

Of these, drafting of the new electoral law is the most advanced and is likely to have the most impact on Indonesian politics.

Most commentary in recent months has focussed on the need to produce new laws quickly so that elections can be held as soon as possible. This is understandable, given the turbulent political changes of recent months. More attention, however, needs to be given to the crucial details of how different election laws can dramatically influence the way politics is conducted, and how important it to get these laws right from the start.

The choice of electoral systems is possibly the most important institutional decision that influences the nature of politics in a democracy.

Indonesia's current electoral system clearly betrays its colonial origins. Closely related to the electoral system used in the Netherlands, it elects members by proportional representation from each province, with electors choosing between parties rather than candidates.

There is no system of electoral districts, and thus no local- level representation. Candidates are more dependent on their standing with their party leaders for their electoral success than they are on their record in the eyes of voters.

While this system works well in the small countries of western Europe, it appears increasingly out of step with the real needs of modern Indonesia.

The new electoral system proposed by Ryass' team dramatically changes this system. Instead of members being elected on a provincial basis, the proposed new system creates 420 separate electoral districts, each of which will elect its own members to the house of Representatives.

In contrast to the distant connection between the electorate and politicians under current arrangements, this new system will place a premium on the relationship between a distinct geographic area and its elected representative.

To ensure that dispersed interests are not overlooked, a further 75 seats will continue to be elected on a proportional basis from a national party list. Finally, under the proposed model, 55 seats will continue to be reserved for members of the military.

What are the effects of this new system likely to be? Firstly, the move to individual electoral districts should dramatically increase levels of accountability of politicians to the electorate. Members will have to service the needs of their local districts and not just stay on good terms with their party leaders.

Political issues will become more focussed on local concerns than matters of national ideology, and thus probably more reflective of the real interests of most ordinary voters.

Legislators who fail to address the interests of local communities will find themselves voted out of office. In general, politicians will have to work much harder for their votes than they do now, and be much more responsive to the needs of voters.

Second, the proposed new system will place much more emphasis on electors being represented by one of their own. The current situation where Javanese generals can purportedly represent the voters of East Timor or Irian Jaya will become a thing of the past.

The House will itself become much more representative: districts in West Sumatra are likely to elect local West Sumatrans, Sulawesi to elect Sulawesians and so on. The elected House will be much more reflective of Indonesia's regional diversity than is the case at the moment.

This will itself foster much greater identification of the people with their elected representatives than is the case at the moment, thus helping mightily in the consolidation of democracy.

Such a system does, however, present a danger that localism could become predominant, thus overriding all other issues and turning each election campaign into 420 separate contests.

To counter this possibility, the proposed new law requires that before a party can stand a candidate in an electorate, it must have established a branch network in more than half of the 27 provinces, and must also be able to demonstrate significant public support.

This is intended to stop the flowering of purely local or single-issue parties, and to minimize the fragmentation of parties that was evidenced during Indonesia's last free elections in the 1950s. It should also mean that parties will have to promote broad national issues, rather than becoming prisoner to the specific claims of local regional or ethnic groups. Hopefully, the result will be a small number of broadly based parties who can garner significant support across different regions.

Finally, the combination of district seats with 75 members elected from a national list should ensure a rough overall proportionally of election results, as minor interests who cannot win a district seat will still have the opportunity to be represented in the House via the party list.

The way these list seats are allocated, however, appears to be a uniquely Indonesian innovation: list seats will be allocated on the basis of the votes of the "unelected" parties who stood unsuccessfully in the districts. The combined vote totals of these "losing" parties will be combined to determine who will win seats on the party list.

This means that minority interests should still be able to gain some representation, even if the system is still tilted heavily toward the district level.

While the proposed new electoral law is thus distinctively Indonesian, and has been drafted with local concerns foremost in mind, it is also representative of a wider regional trend in combining elections in both local districts and a national list together into one "mixed" system.

Such systems have become increasingly popular in recent years in many countries, as constitutional drafters have attempted to combine the benefits of geographic accountability, via single- member electoral districts, with party proportionality via a national list.

Moreover, the overall framework of a mixed system which places an emphasis upon district representation is a feature of election system choice in emerging democracies in general, and in the Asia-Pacific in particular.

All of the East Asian states which can legitimately claim to be democracies -- Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, the Philippines, and Thailand -- now use some version of this system (see table). In additional, all of these countries place an emphasis in their systems upon district level representation, with approximately 80 percent of all seats being elected from districts.

Indonesia's proposed new electoral system thus appears to be an example of what may soon be hailed as a distinctive regional model of electoral democracy. The greatest hurdle for the new system is likely to come from the existing House. It will be interesting to see whether House members will be prepared to put the good of the nation foremost when voting on the new law later this year.

Ben Reilly is an adviser on electoral reform at the International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance based in Stockholm. He is currently working in Jakarta.