Guest Post from Dragoman
More than ten years ago, popular agitation in Indonesia, particularly in Jakarta, led to the downfall of post-colonial Southeast Asia’s longest-ruling strongman Soeharto. Since May 1998, Indonesia has moved from soft authoritarianism to being a thriving regional democracy with the experience of three relatively orderly and popularly legitimate general elections. With the results from the past April’s parliamentary elections announced recently in Jakarta, Indonesia is already preparing for the upcoming presidential election in July. Democracy seems to have been consolidated so far and the notorious Indonesian army is back in the barracks and out of politics, although the Islamists, who were suppressed under Soeharto, might become the junior partner in the governing coalition despite a tremendous electoral setback in this election cycle. (But is this particular last point not a sign of democracy maturing in Indonesia?)
These happy developments in Indonesia must come as a jarring shock to those who were advocates of the Asian Values in the 1990s as a historically and socioculturally based justification why Asia does not apply Western liberal values and institutions in its diverse national environments. In the Southeast Asian context specifically, the shock must be particularly unsettling. This is the case, because, while they generally spoke in defense of their respective governments, these advocates of the Asian Values had, consciously or unconsciously, Soeharto’s New Order regime in mind as the longest-lasting and most stable model of an Asian Values-imbued regime.
Although the advocacy petered out in the wake of the Asian Financial Crisis in the late 1990s, the debate about the Asian Values remains as valid today as it was in the heyday of soft authoritarianism in Asia. Just (or precisely) because the archetypal Asian Values state has moved on to embrace liberal democracy, the Asian Values debate is still worth revisiting. After all, Singapore is still led by a Lee, Malaysia’s ruling Barisan Nasional is still generally what it was under Mahathir, the state of democracy in the Philippines is hardly what it was after the People Power Revolution, and liberal democracy still seems hard to take root in mainland Southeast Asia.
But what does Indonesia’s embrace of democracy mean for future debates on the merits of a democratic mode of governance that is both inclusive but raucous versus a non-democratic mode that is firm, steady and pays economic dividends? The first implication is that liberal democracy can thrive in and is compatible with (Southeast) Asia. In the final analysis, Indonesians remain as Asian now as they were under Soeharto, liberal democracy notwithstanding. The second implication is that the embrace of democracy might weaken secessionist sentiments in a (Southeast) Asian state. The menacing whispers circulating around Jakarta in the heady days after Soeharto’s resignation concerned the fear that Indonesia was on the verge of Balkanization with a weak and turbulent center unable to control the outlying, grossly dissatisfied provinces. Giving the politically repressed, be they Islamists, Acehnese, Moluccans, or Papuans, a voice in a democratic Indonesia has meant giving them a stake in the continuance of a unified Indonesia. The third implication concerns the fear of economic instability or deterioration associated with democratization. But must this always be the case? External economic situation permitting, which, it must be noted, was not quite the situation that accompanied Indonesia’s turbulent transition to democracy, a competent and ingenious government, allied with supportive private concerns, could conceivably guide its economy through the tempest of democratization. Would an economy based on a popularly legitimate and thus inherently long-lasting and stable political system not be a better foundation for economic growth in the long run?
The energy and will behind the Asian Values debate in the 1990s may have been sapped by the Asian Financial Crisis and a West increasingly preoccupied with other regions of the world. But global developments have spiraled upward to a similar configuration of situations that accompanied the first round of the Asian Values debate. Asia is enjoying another marked increase in its relative economic stature, this time as a region. The major players, and one giant, in the region might once again pick up the Asian Values argument in defense of their non-democratic mode of governance. The democratic embrace of Indonesia, the initial model Asian Values state in Southeast Asia, can provide lessons and inspirations should the debate be revisited.
The Dragoman welcomes and responds to all civil comments, critiques and feedback.
