The Jakarta Post, Jakarta
While most Indonesians support democracy, some perceive that it adversely impacts minority groups, economic development, peace and local values, a survey reveals.
A new study from the Indonesian Institute of Sciences (LIPI) shows that 70 percent of respondents believe that democracy is the best political system for this diverse nation.
“The nation’s democracy is preferred by many; however, it should be noted that a significant number of people still perceive it negatively,” a LIPI researcher, Wawan Ichwanuddin, said during a press conference on the survey findings in Jakarta on Thursday.
In the survey conducted between June 25 and July 10, researchers interviewed 1,700 respondents from 33 provinces across the country.
More than half of the respondents believed that democracy tends to put pressure on minorities (53.3 percent) and hinders the country’s economic development (50.4 percent).
The survey also reveals that 49.9 percent of respondents believe that democracy could trigger conflicts, while 35.2 percent of them consider democracy as a system that is not in line with traditional and community values.
Political analyst Nico Harjanto of the Rajawali Foundation applauded people’s confidence in democracy despite their disappointment over social intolerance, horizontal conflicts and rampant corruption in the country.
“Real democracy should be the combination of tolerance and openness to the plurality of ideas,” Nico said.
The survey underlines the growing tolerance among citizens as 87 percent of respondents say they can trust people of different faiths.
The figure reflects a significant improvement from a similar survey conducted early this year by influential think tank, the Centre for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS). The survey revealed that of the 2,220 respondents, only 4 percent were willing to trust people of different faiths.
According to the LIPI survey, religious tolerance has also progressed on the political stage as 58 percent of respondents say they do not mind to vote for a legislator or a regional leader of a different faith.
The survey also discloses the respondents’ disfavor over political parties, with only 23.4 percent of them saying that their political party truly accommodates their aspirations. This is not much difference from the CSIS survey finding where only 22.4 percent of respondents believed that political parties still perform well.
According to LIPI, the public trust towards political parties was below reliance on the President (55.5 percent), the courts (32 percent) and the House of Representatives (29.7 percent).
Nico speculated that the low commitment towards political parties was caused by their inconsistencies in implementing their ideologies.
“This indicates that the country may have a large number of swing voters in the upcoming 2014 general election if political parties don’t start formulating rational and doable programs,” he added.
Most respondents believed that Indonesia should have fewer political parties than the current of 38 national and six local parties.
A staggering 58.3 percent preferred the nation to have five political parties maximum, while the remaining 28.1 percent coveted three parties, a system that the country had from 1977 until the final election under the New Order in 1997.
Only 3.5 percent of respondents said Indonesia needed more than 10 political parties.
The group also said that they were pleased with the government’s performance in most sectors, except in the corruption eradication (46 percent) and economic welfare (22 percent) sectors.
From HERE.
Democracy has forever change the way human beings views on leadership. Rather than a continuous title which passed from parents to children, it has now been transformed into something dynamic. And Indonesia as a country has both benefit and negative side effects of democracy. Democracy requires maturity in mindset, openness, and social awareness from the people which are involves within the system; otherwise, democracy will never work. In most part of Indonesia people still doesn’t understand the consequences and requirement for a democracy to work: they only think about the personal benefit that they are able to gain from it. In the situation where men are only thinking for themself and still upholding personal motivation democracy will never work; it will only benefit those who play their card right. In the past democracy in Indonesia hasn’t ever been implemented correctly. Currently, Indonesia is evolving to the age when democracy is implemented correctly; lets just hope that progress will continues to come.
ReplyDeleteTalking about the implementation of democracy in Indonesia, there is a lot of things to be said. Because of the multitude of effects that an ideology has on the everyday lives of the country. While the country shows varying results regarding the population's point of view of democracy. From my point of view, democracy is the best option that we have now. Because Indonesia is a country that has such unique characteristics, that it cannot be compared to any other country in the world. For example Indonesia is a country that has so many different cultures and traditions. On the other side, Indonesia is also a country made up of many islands and separated by a considerably large body of water. Which adds to the fact that it is hard for the people to connect with each other. With the flexibility of democracy and the pillars of Pancasila. Indonesia should be safe with problems regarding ideals.
ReplyDeleteDemocracy is a broad concept to run a governmental system. In theory, I read that there are 2 main types of democracy; Free democracy and Presidential democracy. A free democracy is a system where the people hold all the power, while presidential democracy is a system that gives citizens the right to vote, while the main power is still in the hand of the president. In my opinion, a developing country like Indonesia cannot be led by democracy, because of our people's mindset. Our people are too demanding for a change but at the same time, they are not taking action for it. The flaw of democracy here in Indonesia is how the citizens are making use of it. They don't realize that we are using a presidential democracy system, where the full decision is from the president. Our citizens now do not understand the system. They think that they hold all the power and the president must obey them, but it is actually wrong. This leads to an anarchist demonstration such as 212. To conclude, the president must emphasize our system of democracy in order to make the situation conducive and to make the people understand that they don't have that full power.
ReplyDeleteDemocracy is not the perfect political system this is certain, however this is one of the best option to run a country for the moment, democracy principle is to let the people, the citizens, decide of the future of the country and give them the power, to give everybody equal chance an opportunity and not let an elitist group run the country; however the reality is more complicated than that, some people don’t want to be part of the political life and for example refuse to vote, and some people working for the government act for their best personal interest instead of the interest of the whole country.
ReplyDeleteEven though there is still a lot of work to achieve the optimal political system, democracy is for me the most inclusive system so far, or at least that I know of, regarding the right of people with religious freedom (instead of an official one working with the government), for minorities like ethnical group or the LGBT community.
In correlation with the article, there are recent debates about the government's response to terrorism, and more generally about the relationship between emergencies and constitutionalism, a prominent argument has been that malfunctions in the political system will cause anti-terror policies to systematically harm the interests of political, ethnic, or ideological minorities. Of course, in a partially majoritarian democracy, minorities will often lose. Yet those who advance this sort of argument have something more specific in mind. They argue that self- interested majorities will cause government policy to provide too much security, relative to an impartial baseline somehow defined, because those majorities do not bear the full costs of increased security. Rather, democratic majorities partially externalise the costs of increased security onto minorities. One proponent of the theory explains, "as almost always happens, the individuals whose rights are sacrificed are not those who make the laws, but minorities, dissidents, and non-citizens. In those circumstances, 'we' are making a decision to sacrifice 'their' rights-not a very prudent way to balance the competing interests."
ReplyDeleteRational and well-motivated governments will provide more security as threats increase. On what grounds might one want constitutional rules to block this shift? One class of arguments focuses on the risk that governments will act irrationally, due to panic or other decision-making pathologies that afflict officials or voters. A different class of arguments, which is our sole focus here, suggests that government will act rationally, but not to maximize the welfare of the whole polity. Instead, these arguments suggest, government will wholly or partially externalise the costs of security onto non-voters or other politically unrepresented groups. The structure of representation will thus cause government to provide too much security from the social point of view. We dub this view and its variants the "democratic failure theory." Democracy is dynamic, and has always been that way. If people were not open to changes that are inevitable, then the use of ‘democracy‘ would be futile, right?
DeleteIn my opinion democracy isn’t the best system that can be imposed to represents citizen’s voice. I say so as the democratic system which is implented in Indonesia isn’t a fuly fair method. I admit that democracy gets most of the citizen’s opinion and complaints heard by the goverment but not for the minority groups. These minor group can be of a smal grop of race or religion. The way the democratic system works is by a large number of people or mass speaking out their demands through an activity called demonstration. Later if the demands are sensible and is for the greater good for the country and its citizens, the goverment will recosider revising their policies. This brings out a greater stadard of living and living condition. However there are lots of demonstartion and demands and the goverment can’t promise all of those to be fullfilled. So those that are heard are those demonstration and the opinion of the mass.
ReplyDeleteThis puts minority groups in a disadvantageous position as they are small in number and is usually overheard or overrun by the majority groups. Aside from that its is rare for the dominant group to think how their demands will effect these minor groups. I believe that the democratic sytem in indonesia is a bit overrated. The demonstartion concept is to free allowing radical groups to appear. These radical groups areusually the cause of conflict as their demands are usually not sensible. They also tend to overrate their rights . they tend to think that all their demands should be fullfilled and that they don’t onsider how others wil be affeted by their ridicolous demands. One example of this if FPI. They think that they can act as judge, executioner and jury. They think that they are above the law as they believe that their demands should be fullfilled eventhough it goes agaisnt our country’s democratic system and Pancasila. So i believe that democracy is good if it is limited to a certain extent.
DeleteI think this effect is happening in Indonesia right now. The passage shows, that it brings negative impact to the minorities, which is true because like the previous governor of Jakarta, he’s minority and he is being complain by his own citizen, and when his citizen wants to pull him off from his position, people are taking issues of his religion and ethnics because both is minority. On the other hand, economics also decreases because there are several shops which is closed because it is being destroyed by the demonstration, as we know democracy is a free opinion world, in which it allows the citizen to complain about the act or regulation of the government which is giving negative impact to the citizen. On this 21st century, democracy is actually good because it can express how the citizen is agree or disagree with the government regulation. And now, democracy is becoming really good to the environment.
ReplyDeleteI would argue that democracy is not the best political system available, many utopian-like systems would welfare the community in theory, although it is too idealistic for Indonesia to implement such system; therefore democracy is the answer for Indonesia as a developing nation. The oppression of minority may be “allowed” by the system if it is used to advocate dislikes towards the unwanted parties, and it is wrong. Indonesia’s community as a collective lack of synergies, inclusivity, and education to accept differences and implement tolerances. I would not blame the system, but the actors who serve and get served by the government. In recent times in Indonesia, the political instability by the opposition caused austere, hector, and belligerent acts towards minorities resulting racism. The political climate encourages extremists and radicals to cause a divergence to stir the governing parties, hence a diametrical society. Some minorities prefer to succumb to the majority parties to prevent possible conflicts that may harden their lives and wellbeingness in the longer run, and it saddens me.
ReplyDeleteMy next comment would be the criticism of Democracy as a political system; its definition itself includes unambiguous purposes, outcomes, and process through inconsistencies and paradoxes. A constitution is based on republicanism, in which it disallows complete control by the “rule of the people”. In the context of Indonesian politics; the political climate of Indonesia is hegemonic, in which the political dominators stir common people. The possibility of uninformed people to participate through disclosure of reputation-damaging material to manipulate them is high; hence it is a question of the feasibility of democratic government. Propagandas arose mainly when a contest is held: election. Mass media would be orchestrated to shape public opinions to gain votes, therefore, giving the orchestrators power in the government.
DeleteA democratic system may evoke the notion of the majority rule as in “uncontested good”, also known as the tyranny of the majority. The imbalance of human capital may lead to such phenomena, with no exception to Indonesia. Uneducated people may oppress informed people because of their number, and their influence is much more significant; causing riots and bully.
As John T. Wenders said in regards to criticism of democracy concerning the oppression of the majority; “Democracy is two coyotes and a lamb voting on what to have for lunch."
All these times, it is said that we have applied democracy in our country. But I think that democracy is not the best method in our political system. I feel that Indonesia cannot be led by democracy, yet, because the mindset of the people. Some people or parties just want to impose their self-will. It is proven by many incidents that is incriminatory acts to minority. For example, the incident regarding the former Governor of DKI Jakarta, who is a minority. He admits that he made a mistake in his words, he even said sorry in public. But people who has bad mindsets would not accept his apology. In the other hand, there is a person who intentionally said something bad regarding other religions. And this person is the leader of a large majority organization. Hence, many people don’t consider his act wrong. This is one example that democracy has not been implemented properly.
ReplyDeleteSpeaking from the economic sociology standpoint, the market is embedded in a social structure, and a democratic government proved to be accomodative to this. In Indonesia, where a mixed economy is adopted as the “economic ideology” of the nation, the market is regulated by the government under the fiscal and monetary policies. As a democratic nation, where theoretically, it is the people that holds the sovereignty of the nation, Indonesian citizens sounded their aspirations through political parties that send their own representatives to run for legislative elections. Ironically, some of these representatives do not understand inherently how a nation’s economy runs in the aggregate, neither do they have the ability to interpret what the people actually meant by their aspirations ; the fact is, not everyone is educated in economics, and politicians should be able to interpret from the aspirations and spot the symptomps of economic difficulties.
ReplyDeleteDemocracy allows people to freely speak up their ideas, either directly, or indirectly, but it is important that people incorporate their rights to think freely before using the right of free speech. If democracy is a constraint to economic growth, it is quite questionable because if we sample one country, say, China, which has only in the recent decade experienced a shift from planned economy to a free market one, the world bear witness to China’s tremendous growth in economy. In my opinion, politicians should be economists as well, at least partly, so in their duty, the aspirations of the people are not misinterpreted and properly taken into account in the making of government policies.
The problem here in Indonesia is that the majorities think that they hold the power, and that everyone not aligned with them is considered wrong. This comment might have some politics in it, but I don’t really care. Here, politicians are free to justify their act in the name of religion as long as it suits their agendas. Moreover,a lot of muslims here suddenly felt more holy than others, so much that they start to condemn other acts that they think contradicts their belief. So called democracy only valid when it is supporting the will of the majorities. The fact that we’re nearing the time of election is making things even worse, due to the fact that a lot more hate speech and hoax are being spread everywhere to ensure the downfall of opposing parties. I do hope that whoever wins, he can turn Indonesia into a tolerant and respectful country that our forefathers envisioned.
ReplyDeleteI believe that democracy is by far the best system we have to ensure the liberty and equality of individuals through the presence of a representative government appointed by free elections with universal suffrage. Despite this however, I agree with the stance that it is harder for developing countries to run democracy hand in hand with economic development as the latter requires stability that cannot always be ensured by a democratic system. This is caused by the fact that the democratic government of a developing country is highly influenced by the choices of its voter base, and since the voter base of a developing economy is often still backwards, what they demand could instead be detrimental for economic development. The lack of strong institutions in a developing country that could protect the principles of democracy could also cause democracy to degenerate into a plutocracy where capital owners collude with the government to advance their own interests instead of the people’s.
ReplyDeleteEach nation has different histories that also made up distinct characteristics on its people. Every type of government could be considered good as long as it suites the citizen inside –we can exclude the authoritarian that promotes human right violations. Democracy is the best form to be implemented in Indonesia. Not as simple as facilitating only the majority, but the core value of democracy lies on ‘government of the people, by the people, for the people’. Indeed, the majority will be the one who possesses the biggest power and voice. But at least, we let the other layers to bring their issue to the government as well as the open public. This enables them to gain recognition from the authority, although at the minimum extent. Democracy gives more space for the heterogeneous Indonesians to be proactive on voicing out needs and opinions compared to the other government types. It depends on the government itself to be rational enough to determine which action to be taken for the sake of the more developed Indonesia in the future.
ReplyDeleteIn history Indonesia has tried multiple ways of government and ideology for its country. From liberalism to communism but Indonesian people still prefer democracy that we use today. People in Indonesia still want to use democracy because they believe people should have the power to decide who the leader they will follow. Although democracy is has a good point, sometimes Indonesian people can be a bit violent and racists when it comes to selecting their leader. For example is Ahok case in Jakarta that related to religion in to the mix. The case is basically people in Jakarta refuse to have non Islam leader to lead Jakarta, so they tried to take him down by many ways. Eventually Ahok get arrested because religion related issues. This is one of many example how divided we are when it comes to politics and how dangerous the will of many people can do in this country.
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ReplyDeleteI believed that there is not perfect government system, democracy included. But some may consider democracy as one of the best political system out-there. First of all, what is Democracy. Democracy is a system of government by the whole population or all the eligible members of a state, typically through elected representatives. So, simply explained, democracy is a government system where power originated from the citizen instead of a sole leader. This government system promotes the idea of voting, equality through voicing out their opinions, and being open to society. But, like any other government systems it is not always sunshine and rainbows. Democracy tends to lead to corrupt officials, disagreements and many more. At the end of the day there is not government systems that is perfect, but, from my point of view, Democracy has the simplest problem to solve which is the people itself. It may not be easy, but once the people of a democratic country can accept equality, different views of others; I believed that such government will run smoothly.
Democracy is defined as a system of government by the whole population or all the eligible members of a state, typically through elected representatives. When we are talking about the democracy of Indonesia, it is very complex since, Indonesia is a huge country filled with people from different backgrounds. I personally think that democracy is the best option in Indonesia as both minorities and majorities can express their opinion and thoughts. Though the minority might have difference in number with majority by quite a huge amount of value but, I believe that if the minority comes up with great ideas, the opinion of the minority will be heard. Lately, radical groups that is on behalf of specific group of people started to rise in Indonesia. They have huge amount of people in it and ask for their demands to be fulfilled. Government should know what decisions are good to make and the other way around. Though they have huge number of voters, but, the government should think twice on the impact that it brings.
ReplyDeleteDemocracy is the main pillar of the Indonesian state. As a country with the Pancasila ideology, Indonesia needs democracy as a means of expressing opinions. But now democracy has been misunderstood by several parties. Many parties use democracy as a weapon to carry out anarchic actions. Now that demonstrations no longer have the right ethics, demonstrations are only filled with many political forces who only want to get a seat in parliament. Democracy should be a tool that can provide opportunities for people to participate in government. Democracy is an important concept for the Indonesian state. The government needs to take several steps to improve the condition of democracy in Indonesia. Democracy is the basis of Pancasila, if the basis of this ideology is unable to act, the Pancasila will become ideology that no longer has power in society. Indeed, basically there are no governments that have perfect democracy, but steps to improve democracy will reflect responsible government.
ReplyDeleteIn my opinion, the reason why there are diverse reasons on why there are people who disagrees and agrees on democracy is because of the diverse communities that are living in our society. Differences are okay in my opinion as long as there are representatives of each that can speak behalf of these minorities. The problem that democracy has is the fact that it depends on the majority in which not every majority is right. But then again democracy should be what everyone wants and even though it sounds like it is hard but it should be what is strived upon using our powers as the people, to respect the coexisting wants and needs of other people and not putting our egos in front of us. And a surprising 42% still surprises me the fact that they cannot segregate between a good leader and a bad one when all they believe in is the faith of their religion. Although I am not saying that following your religion is wrong but, not everyone that resides in our religion is as religious as ourselves and how we expect them to be. I think these are the points that these people might mistake with choosing the better leader although they are in a different religion. But then again, religion is a sensitive topic.
ReplyDeleteFor a developing country like Indonesia, I don’t think that democracy can be applied thoroughly and there will have to be a certain limitations of how the societies use their rights to speak in the public. The kind of democracy that is needed in Indonesia is the presidential democracy, where the citizen have their rights to vote which president they like but the supreme power and the right to make critical decision is held by the president as the head of the state. In the recent days, I think most of Indonesian are too underdeveloped and incompetent to have a free democracy. There have been a lot of movements where they wanted the president to fulfil their demand without explaining what are the sole basis of their movement and who are they fighting for. This kind of movements and democracy are dangerous, especially in the next few months, where an election is going to be held, I think Indonesian citizens must realize that their freedom of speech have their own limitation and they should prioritize the safety and stability of the country rather than doing whatever they want to obtain the position that they wanted.
ReplyDeleteDemocracy is a sign of a developed country, in which people are given the freedom to choose. While democracy is constructed to become the main driver of political growth, it might not work well under the governance of a developing countries such as Indonesia. Even United States did not have a good democratic political system in its early years. Their political system is as good as what it is today due to the great contribution of countless historical figures such as Abraham Lincoln, Theodore Roosevelt, and many more. Hence, to assume that Indonesia to be on the same position as the US in terms of literacy in politics is a complete misconception. As shown by the current and previous governments, efforts are made in an attempt to attain that level of adequacy. Eradicating corruption and an open vote are a few first steps that the government had taken to improve our political system.
ReplyDeleteDemocracy is a government by the people; a form of government in which the supreme power is vested in the people and exercised directly by them or by their elected agents under a free electoral system. a democracy could also have a meaning of a state of society characterized by formal equality of rights and privileges. In general every minority has advantages and disadvantages, but some are much better off than others. Democracy is hard on minorities sometimes, but not worse than other forms of government. By definition , majority rules, minority does not, so minority is at a disadvantage. By definition , majority rules, minority does not, so minority is at a disadvantage. However they should have rights defended against the majority. All in all, democracy is a systemin which the government is meant to upheld some values. This system has all kinds of mechanisms to protect human rights which area part of the democratic values. So in a true democracy the minority is not supposed to be disadvantaged.
ReplyDeleteDemocracy is the government of the people, by the people, and for the people. It can be inferred that the quality of democracy in a country is based on the quality of the people. If the people are well-educated and wise enough to rule then democracy could bring wealth and prosperity to the people. But, if the people are backward and rule based on their self-interest then democracy will ruin the country. In my opinion, Indonesia is somewhere between the former and the latter. There are some good people in the government but there are also bad people in the government.
ReplyDeleteTheoretically, there is a better form of political system known as meritocracy. In meritocracy, people with ‘merit’ rule and govern the people. Merit can be defined as expertise or experience in specific governmental field. For example, someone with expertise in farming should be minister of agriculture. With this political system, the government could achieve its maximum potential in developing the country.
There is one statement that I kind a agree within the article, which is Democracy should be suitable in the country like Indonesia that has a huge diversification among its people. The meaning of word Democracy itself is that any decision made for the country should be from the citizen, by the citizen, and also for the citizen. One of the crucial characteristic of Democracy is that any kinds of leader of the country should be choose directly by its citizen. Suppose, since all the decision made is from the citizen, they should be feel satisfied and able to respect each other opinion but unfortunately the idea of respect does not necessarily being applied for all the citizen. That is why some of them that feel not being respected agree that the concept of Democracy does not really works for Indonesia. But keep in mind that every people has their own voice and perspective; meaning that some people can really see the bright side of Democracy meanwhile the other has not seen one.
ReplyDeleteDemocracy in Indonesia has going pretty well since the reformation era with lots of election has done with only little problem although some of them maybe controversial. I think democracy is currently the best system that we can implement in a country because it allows everyone with their own interest to vote and choose who will take that aspiration and do something about it. I know that democracy tend to benefit the majorities not the minorities because the shire number they had but for now I think the minorities has no real chance to break the circle. So the best thing that a country can do is the majorities should coordinate and unite with the minorities and try to solve their problem together in order to make a peaceful country without any further chaos, and the minorities should bravely asked about their aspiration to the majorities also.
ReplyDeleteIt is true that some people might feel unsatisfied with democracy. But, what else can the government do? What will happen if the government changes the whole system just to satisfy the unsatisfied people? Will it be much better? The radical change of the system may lead into a worse condition because million of people in Indonesia might respond to it differently. Those responds might lead another problem such as uprising, demonstration, or even a public riot. Those aspect has to be considered carefully before blaming the system of a country
ReplyDeleteAnother aspect is the policy made by the leader of the country. Every move and every policy made by the leader will not always cause a satisfaction among the people. Some might agree to it, some might not. The leader has to listen to the people. But, it doesn’t mean that he has to listen to every detail of the voice. A policy to maintain the order of the people in democracy has to be made regardless the respond of the people if it will lead the prosperity and and peace for the country.
As any form of governance, democracy also has its ups and downs too. Many consider it to be the best form for a government because it allows the citizens to have a voice in the political spectrum of the country. However, in my opinion it is not the form of government Indonesia needs at this moment in time, or at least the form of democracy we currently have really needs improvements in almost every sector. Democracy allows for opinions and people to make a difference. However, the world is not only filled with good people and good opinions. Democracy allows for less positive opinions and less positive changes as long as the majority votes for it. Democracy works best when a country is ready. That is when the citizen are educated enough to be able to rationalise decision. When economic is stable and persistently growing. When diplomatic relations with other country is good.
ReplyDeleteWell, I thing that everything seems perfect in the concept. It doesn’t matter whether we use any other types of way to run this country, the matter is that people who live inside it. Too much variable that we’re not expected making some sort of chaos that make our diversity is not as beautiful as we published and promote to any other country. I think, instead of discussing what’s best for us, it would be better if we think how we can achieve the best for all of us. If that’s even mean that we have to separate Indonesia into several parts. Diversity is beautiful but in my opinion Indonesia adopt it in another level. The greediness of our founding father and the too-centralized government system have become a problem. People know that we are diverse but sadly we don’t have an identity that rooted in that diversity. I’ll leave the solution for people who actually try to solve this problem, because in my mind, run for your own goodness to another country!!!
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