The quest for legitimacy

The quest for legitimacy

By Sidesh Kaul

JAKARTA (JP): While President B.J. Habibie was presenting his
accountability speech and defending his 16-month rule inside the
Indonesian legislature, the country was once again in the grip of
a fresh wave of student-led protests. The government responded to
these protests with a heavy hand and the state's Armed Forces
were deployed to crush and mute the protests. A massive use of
force reflects the ineffectiveness of coercion and the weakness
of the government's legitimacy. It also sadly reflects how remote
and isolated the ruling elite is from the masses.

Legitimacy is an important issue and obsession with any
government merits a closer look, especially in the contemporary
Indonesian context. Jean-Jacques Rousseau, the social
philosopher, laid the seeds of the debate on legitimacy when he
wrote his famous work The Social Contract.

"The strongest man is never strong enough to maintain his
mastery at all times unless he transforms his strength into right
and obedience into duty," he wrote.

Legitimacy is the belief in the rightfulness of government, in
its authority to issue commands so that these are not just obeyed
out of fear or coercion, but are perceived as duty by the
subjects.

At the core of the issue of legitimacy lies the belief of the
subjects that the government is morally right and that they, as
subjects, are duty bound to obey.

It is time for President Habibie and his "reform era" Cabinet,
as well as Gen. Wiranto and the Armed Forces, to sit up and
examine the basis of their power and realize that legitimacy can
never flow from the barrel of a gun.

The powers that be must realize that in the absence of such
convictions the relation between the ruler and the ruled will be
one that is based on power and not on authority, and that the
political legitimacy of the government will be contested. This
contest will go on until there is an accommodation on either
side; that is, either the ruler, the ruled or a new government
replaces the old, or there is a birth of a new system of
governance that is able to satisfy the belief systems of ordinary
Indonesians.

At the heart of any form of political organization is the
basic tenet that states that the right to rule is fundamental,
and it is this founding principle that affects all political
activities.

Sociologist Max Weber postulated that in a modern nation state
the government endeavors to regulate the vital interests and
actions of its citizens through a set of binding commands, rules
and laws backed by force, and that the basis on which the
legitimacy is claimed will determine and influence the structure
of domination.

The interesting fallout of this postulation is the fact that
the government will develop appropriate delivery mechanisms for
their domination. Influencing the structure of domination is not
the only facet that the quest for legitimacy influences -- it
also determines the relationship framework between strategic
groups, and between such groups and the public as they endeavor
to control the use of state power.

In addition, the government's language of legitimacy often
defines the boundaries of legitimate political activity that, in
turn, polarizes resistance against the incumbent government.

Every government, even the most despotic, is under moral
pressure to convert relations of power into relations of
authority and to cultivate the perception that their power is
exercised on moral grounds and for the benefit of the general
good of the citizens.

This perception, and its perpetuation, is important for the
governed because it eases the pain of inequality and
subordination and justifies their obedience. If the quest for
legitimacy is based solely on power, either economic or coercive,
then such authority will be challenged through resistance,
rebellion and revolution. In that case, the ruling elite will be
consumed by their efforts at survival and will direct the bulk of
the resources to hang onto power.

A government that hangs onto power and seeks its legitimacy on
the basis of money politics or force cannot be effective or
viable and will soon become a liability for the entire nation
state. Let the Indonesian legislature be warned.

The quest for legitimacy is not confined to Indonesia alone.
Laos and South Vietnam chronically opposed the legitimacy of
their governments between 1954 and 1975. Cambodia's struggle to
question legitimacy started in early 1970 and is not settled yet.

The moral authority of the Malaysian government came under
fire after the race riots of 1969 and in present times after the
recent economic crisis and the imprisonment of dismissed deputy
prime minister Anwar Ibrahim.

Attempts by former president Ferdinand Marcos of the
Philippines to hold onto office in the mid-1980s, despite his
failure at fraudulent polls where he attempted to regain his
domestic and international legitimacy, were derailed by protests
from ordinary Filipinos who bravely took their battle to the
streets.

The legitimacy of military-backed rulers of Myanmar came under
heavy fire in 1985-1986 when stagflation, poverty, hunger and
unemployment culminated in widespread political demonstrations
against the military junta in 1988. This struggle continues until
today.

In an interesting and unique development, the military in
Myanmar launched a coup against itself and has since ruled the
country in the name of the State Law and Order Restoration
Council (SLORC). The quest for legitimacy by the SLORC, driven
this time by international pressure, forced them to hold
elections in May 1990. The SLORC, to their utter disappointment,
lost out to the opposition party, the National League for
Democracy (NLD).

In a determined bid to hold onto power, the SLORC has yet to
transfer power to the NLD and continues to detain the leader of
the opposition, Aung San Suu Kyi, to date. The legitimacy of the
Chinese government was questioned in the wake of the student
protests in June 1989 and the recent crackdown on believers of
the Falun Gong sect.

For the last several decades, the New Order in Indonesia
sought its legitimacy on the dual basis of political stability
and strident economic growth while popular representation and
aspirations were sacrificed at the altar of material gain. The
political instability and the economic chaos that pervaded the
country during Sukarno's brief flirtation with guided democracy,
became the New Order's cherished obstacle to be surmounted in
their quest for legitimacy.

The onset of the economic crisis in late 1997 blew off the
protective cover that growth and wealth provided and destroyed
the very basis of this legitimacy. With the fall from grace of
the New Order, the caretaker government of President Habibie was
faced with the difficult task of captaining a country that was
beset with a plethora of problems on the economic, social and
political fronts.

In the absence of the comfort that strong economic numbers and
wealth provide, the weak and unpopular government under President
Habibie sought its legitimacy on other fronts. While it is easy
to pontificate on legitimacy with the benefit of hindsight, the
debate on legitimacy is important and cannot be ignored as
Indonesia prepares to experiment for a second time with
democracy.

Habibie and most of the members of his "reform Cabinet" are
very much a part of Soeharto's New Order and despite their
frequent public statements of commitment to the cause of reform,
they have failed miserably in convincing the public at large
about their credibility or willingness to reform.

Habibie did his level best at maintaining a healthy distance
from his mentor Soeharto and went to great lengths to project
himself as a responsible patriot who only had the good of the
nation at heart.

Early in his tenure, he released the first batch of political
prisoners and despite his well-known inclination for promoting
indigenous interests, was among one of the first public figures
in Indonesia to lend a shoulder to the grieving Chinese community
in the wake of the May riots.

While comforting the Chinese minority, he did away with the
long practiced and hated racist identification system in a
country that identified the Chinese as an identity that was
separate from the indigenous community.

On many occasions Habibie made strong and bold statements
about the due process of law and about how he would spare no
efforts at bringing the guilty to the docks. Habibie even met
with Joseph Estrada of the Philippines in an act of solidarity to
plead for the release of the jailed proreform activist and former
deputy prime minister of Malaysia, Anwar Ibrahim, all in the name
of reform and democracy.

The media was given a breath of fresh air as journalists
enjoyed their newfound freedom. Elections were announced and a
free and fair election was conducted. Habibie postured publicly
about his dislike for corruption, collusion and nepotism, and
vowed several times to put an end to this scourge.

The rupiah appeared to strengthen. The bank capitalization
program, apart from a few hiccups, appeared to be well on its
way. The international community applauded Habibie's brave stance
on the East Timor independence issue.

Like a man possessed, he spoke about accountability,
transparency, democracy and human rights. Was this a repentant
man who, in the evening of his political career, wanted to
correct the wrongs of the New Order with missionary and patriotic
zeal? Or was this a sinister cover up for perpetuating the
wrongs? Or were these merely the actions of a selfish man,
supreme and confident in his ability and the weaknesses in the
system at correcting the history books at whatever cost?

Only history can truly answer these questions and be in a
position to judge the man and his government. When viewed under
the legitimacy microscope, the perspective that unfolds is of a
man who basically was in a hurry to garner as much legitimacy as
possible, both domestically as well as internationally, in a
brazen attempt to retain power.

The Bank Bali scandal, in essence, has unveiled and laid bare
the facade that was being played out in the name of reform.
Cornered by growing cries for transparency both at home and
abroad, Habibie has chosen to obfuscate the issue by taking a
bureaucratic approach that prevents the PricewaterhouseCoopers
report on the scandal from being made public and the highly
placed culprits being brought to justice.

To make matters worse, the courts fully acquitted former
president Soeharto and his son Hutomo "Tommy" Mandala Putra in
separate charges of grafts, and that, too, just before the
legislature was to convene to hear Habibie's accountability
address and to select the next president. Habibie's quest for
legitimacy has come to an end. The farce is over and it is time
to move on.

The concern here is should this legislature decide to betray
the aspirations of the people, then it would lay the ground for a
crisis of mammoth proportions.

The writer is a commentator on economic and political affairs
based in Jakarta.