Tom Pepinsky

Category: Politics

  • Last Day in Jakarta

    This is my last day in Jakarta, and I must admit that I have nothing new to report, as my co-authors and I have been crushed to try to put our survey instrument together before we leave.  I’ll sign off again from Doha.  I’m sure that after 11 hours on a plane, I’ll have thought of something more substantial to say.
    UPDATE:  I had forgotten how silly Jakarta’s Soekarno-Hatta International Airport is. First off, they do not open counters until 2 hours before your flight leaves, so if you mindlessly assume that you need to be there three hours before your flight, you’re in for a long wait in the lobby.  But, the lobby has free wifi.

    It occurs to me that there is a very Indolaysia themed bit of new going around these parts, and that is that the President of Indonesia and the Prime Minister of Malaysia have agreed to form a standing committee to investigate cases of cultural theft.  Some background: Malaysia is more developed than Indonesia, and for that reason is nicer to visit.  However, the creeping Arabization of Malaysian society means that much of the local "Malay" culture has been lost.  So, the Malaysian government has been borrowing aspects of Indonesian culture, like folk songs and old stories and the like, for itself.  Well, the Indonesian people are none too happy about that.  Many of my friends say things along the lines of "they don’t have their own culture so they steal ours" or "it’s not our fault that they all want to be Arabs."

    Now.  At a basic level this is a dumb argument, because the borders between Indonesia and Malaysia are artificial.  It would make more sense probably to group Sumatra with Malaya, and Kalimantan with Sabah and Sarawak, and Java by itself, as this is how the old kingdoms used to be.  So when Malaysia borrows stories and histories, these are all Sumatran stories and histories (until the founding of Malacca by a Sumatran king in the 14th century, all the kingdoms of any note were Sumatra-based).  Nevertheless, people do have nationalist feelings associated with colonial borders.  If you were really forced to choose, just about all of the old stories like the Kisah Kelana Sakti are originally Sumatran, and therefore Indonesian.  Too bad there’s nothing that Indonesia can do about it.  The only thing left for Indonesia, really, is to trade on the fact that most of the really interesting stuff in the two countries that is of any historical significance is in Indonesia (Bali, Borobudur, and so on), most of the beautiful scenery and nature is in Indonesia (Lake Toba, Manado, Papua, etc.), and all Malaysia really excels in is the architecture in Kuala Lumpur and the history in Malacca.

  • Yes, I Admit, It's Getting Better

    I’ve been talking to a lot of people since I’ve been here, and a conclusion that a lot of people have been making about Indonesia is that things are getting better.  The economy is growing at a healthy rate (the question is, is it growing unhealthily fast?), democracy is stable and consolidating (no one will overthrow SBY, the army is formally out of politics, elections are free and fair), corruption is under attack (no great results yet, but the effort is clearly there and it’s taken seriously), and radicalism is being contained (no major terrorist attacks lately, civil conflicts are mostly over, Islamic parties realize that they have to offer substantive good governance rather than pleas to sharia if they are to get votes).  This is really interesting stuff, and as a pessimist, I wasn’t quite prepared for this.

    One way to notice this is by looking around you.  Having not been here in about 20 months, I was unprepared to see that for the first time since I’ve been coming to Jakarta, people are actually developing new property in the city.  I was talking about this with some friends in a mall over lunch today, and it struck me that the mall wasn’t there last time I was here!   The Transjakarta Busway and "traffic-free" days seem to be making a difference with the crowded streets and perhaps the smog a bit too.  I think that the streets I’m most familiar with (Wahid Hasyim, Sabang, Thamrin, Sudirman, Yusuf Adiwinata, and Cokroaminoto) are noticeably cleaner in the beginning of 2008 than they were in 2004.  I see fewer beggars.  These are all good things, and make me feel proud of Indonesia.  I wouldn’t pretend that I’m satisfied or that everything is fixed now, because there are still huge problems with corruption, illegal economies, pollution, and income opportunities for all Indonesians.  But, it’s getting better all the time.

    My plan before dinner is to take my American cell phone with me down the street, where I believe I might find the madrasah that Barack HUSSEIN Obama attended back when he was Indonesian, and try to take a picture of it.