West needs to understand, embrace former colonies’ imperfections
Churchill once described Russia as a riddle, wrapped in a mystery, inside an enigma. In our regional context, that may well apply to today’s Indonesia, as contemporary rival powers China and the United States compete for its affection.
Post-Suharto, a democratic Indonesia is usually lumped into the Western camp of fellow democracies, especially after it elected as president someone outside the traditional power elites in the person of Joko Widodo in 2014.
But, in a short and concise biography by former Financial Times correspondent Ben Bland, entitled Man of Contradictions ,a portrait almost in equal parts attractive and repulsive emerges.
Attractive because of what a humble Solo furniture maker rising within a decade in politics to become president says about the political strides Indonesia has attained in just over two decades of democracy.
At the same time, the swiftness of Joko’s ascendancy is equally matched by how rapidly he has become part of the very establishment he is supposed to represent a break from.
In Bland’s almost remorseful telling, Joko has, among other things, built his own political dynasty, co-opted his political foes, including those from political Islam who tormented Basuki Tjahaja Purnama (Ahok), his partner and successor as Jakarta governor, was complicit in the emasculation of a once fiercely independent anti-corruption agency, and showed scant interest in structural economic reforms to make the country truly open for private enterprise and foreign investors alike.
The other lament about Joko appears to be how he is almost consumed by the nitty-gritty of retail politics, to find solutions to everyday concerns of ordinary Indonesians like what he himself confronted when running his own business, almost to the total exclusion of any attention paid to the larger question of how to make Indonesia and Indonesians realise their full potentials as a nation and a people.
The saving grace, in Bland’s telling, has been an obsessive presidential preoccupation with building infrastructure, which of course, Indonesia really needs in abundance but which also can lead to ill-advised grandiose ideas, such as the now shelved plan to build a new national capital outside Java, in Kalimantan.
Bland details how Joko also shows little interest in foreign policy unless it has to do with directly promoting Indonesia as a destination for foreign investments. This is perhaps brought into sharp relief by Asean’s handling of possibly its most nettlesome challenge: the February coup in Myanmar.
The early promise shown by Joko in calling for Asean to take the lead in helping resolve the Myanmar crisis, culminating in the April Asean summit meeting in Jakarta, has not led to forceful follow-through, which probably only Indonesia has the wherewithal to foster, such as the immediate appointment of an Asean special envoy on Myanmar.
Instead, Indonesia has now called for China to assist, likely passing up a concrete opportunity to realise Asean centrality on a matter of great geopolitical interest.
To be sure, as the only full Asean member of the G20, a putative regional power such as Indonesia, like India, is never going to be fully allied either to the US or China. There will inevitably be common interests between Indonesia and one or the other major power.
Too often, Western analysts, including Bland, take blinkered views of the world. These analysts invariably adopt the politically liberal ideal which, quite frankly, even today’s Western countries failed to live up to in their earlier evolution as countries. Colonial histories coloured and scarred many of today’s developing countries.
The generally protectionist instincts of Indonesia and the Philippines (to say nothing of India) probably have their roots tied to their respective colonial experience.
Such instincts, unfortunately, also tend to keep too many of their peoples poor for longer than need be.
Economic deliverance, not political pre-conditioning, is what will truly liberate such countries. Hence, elected leaders like Joko and the Philippines’ Rodrigo Duterte will have served their countries much better if only Western governments and analysts are more forthcoming and understanding in embracing them, warts and all.