PIB and its intellectuals seek to take reform to a higher level

Anton Doni, Head of Research and Development Unit, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

The dilemma of idealistic intellectuals ahead of the first election after Soeharto quit the presidency in 1998 was whether or not to get their hands dirty by becoming politicians.

However, if political leadership is about making the best decisions possible for the nation as whole, and changing the narrow-minded culture of accumulation and/or abuse of power, then those with the best minds should enter the political fray.

The economist Sjahrir, once a student activist jailed for his involvement in the huge 1974 protests in the early years of the New Order, is among quite a number of intellectuals who seem to have decided that their jobs as scholars and as staunch critics of the government must now be complemented by actual influence in the making of policy.

Sjahrir has joined forces with a number of respected senior journalists and fellow economists such as Pande Radja Silalahi to form the New Indonesia Alliance Party (PIB), named after an earlier organization.

The political party was born just last year, but since the 1980s, students and intellectual community in general, have long been familiar with the Yayasan Padi dan Kapas that Sjahrir and his colleagues set up, and which hosted many seminars.

The challenge for this high brow circle is to create a broad- based political party, especially if it wants to avoid being considered a group of intellectual elitists, which is what happened with the banned Indonesian Socialist Party (PSI).

New parties always have a novelty value with new ideas -- and PIB's focus is ridding the country of the negative culture and practices that define Indonesian politics, even in the current reform era. One specific problem pointed out in a speech by Sjahrir was what he termed "re-traditionalism", or communal sentiments that continually provoke communal conflicts due mostly to exclusive in-group feelings.

Another is just plain irrational behavior by those in power, and so PIB envisions "the politics of common sense", or "a common social phenomena", which he believes, if people lived by these basic themes, they would not kill each other.

Before the party was set up in September 2002, the PIB organization prepared and sent a draft of a decree on economic recovery to the People's Consultative Assembly (MPR) ahead of the Assembly's annual 2001 session. The nine-chapter draft decree ranged from tackling the country's debts to its internally displaced people. It was not adopted, but it did give the public a very clear picture of the party's stance on economic recovery. The draft decree outlined how recovery should be based on a clear division of responsibilities among state bodies, including law enforcers.

As recorded in Sjahrir's various speeches, injustice and unemployment are two of the party's key concerns and it will be interesting to see if they can translate such great ideas into action, that is, if they manage to secure a bloc of House seats in the election.

Freedom is also a concern of this party. Since the reform movement, freedom of expression and association are mostly accepted nationwide. But in some cases, religious freedoms are not entirely respected.

For this, the party feels that security must be provided under a democratic environment to guard freedom of religion for all people, not just the majority.

One feature that distinguishes this party from the other 23 is its great concern for international affairs, without the baggage of ideology which many of the Islamist parties seem to be prone to. It envisions a well-ordered world that ensures security, peace and prosperity for all. In that context it protested the U.S. war in Iraq.

The party's stress on freedom and social justice, its focus on the role of government, its strength in international affairs and its drive to modernization, brings to mind the above-mentioned PSI, which was banned for its alleged involvement in rebellious movements in the 1950s.

In the classic Indonesian Political Thinking, 1945-1965 in which Herbert Feith and Lance Castles compile translations of speeches and articles by early politicians, one can read the words of the late prominent economist and leading figure of PSI, Sumitro Djojohadikusumo. He also seeks to convince the Indonesian public that freedom, social justice and human dignity should be the substance of nationalism.

Internationalism and modernization were also characteristics of this historical party, grouped in the category of "democratic socialism" by the late Feith. Those themes were articulated more strongly by Soetan Sjahrir and Soedjatmoko, also proponents of PSI.

But again PIB would not like to be likened to PSI, which only got two percent of votes and six seats in parliament following the 1955 elections despite its high profile.

PIB may gain support from among 2.5 million university graduates and 5 million people with higher education degrees. But hopefully PIB members themselves will not follow other idealists who found that many still prefer communalism and irrationality, all that PIB detests.

Excerpts of PIB's vision/mission:

o To strive for a new Indonesia that is democratic, equitable, pluralist and open minded;

o To strive for the creation of a safe, peaceful and prosperous world based on independence, democracy, humanity, justice and plurality.

The party strives to achieve the above ideals with programs including:

* justice -- the state provides jobs, education, health services, a fair tax system and stable economic growth;

* democracy -- the guarantee and protection of security to all citizens in exercising their democratic rights; and the guarantee of protection for human rights; equality of all citizens and the encouragement of their participation in decision-making;

* plurality -- the state must not discriminate against citizens in issuing political policies and in applying the law; the state must ensure freedom of religion and belief; the state must guarantee the free development of local arts and cultures; the state is obliged to ensure a harmonious environment among all religions, ethnic groups, races and classes within the unitary republic.