Max Lane – The relationship been Australia and Indonesia has always been complex. One of the main reason's for this has been, as Mark Otter explained in his article in Jakarta Post on October 29, the difference between governmental (i.e. elite) and public opinion.
The Australian political elite, as represented by the political leaderships of the two major party groupings as well as the bureaucratic and military elite, has always been sympathetic to the policies and interests of the Indonesian political elite, including during the period of the Soeharto-GOLKAR dictatorship.
Public opinion has been more sympathetic with the plight of the victims of political repression, both in Indonesia proper and East Timor. Over the last two decades, there has also developed a wide range of relationships between what is now referred to as "civil society", i.e. the spectrum of liberal and humanitarian community, trade union, intellectual, cultural and educational organizations and institutions. This spectrum also tended to prioritize human rights and democracy above "economic development" and company profits.
A clich in the discussion about Australian Indonesian relations is that there is a large cultural gap between the two "cultures". Australia, although increasingly multicultural, is a European based culture; Indonesia is "Asian" with a different value system. Ironically, however, in the field of politics, where tensions are often greatest, there is the greatest overlap in cultural perspectives. The struggle for Independence drew on a wide range of international political thinking. Indonesia's first President, Sukarno, popularized ideas taken from Islam, from Asian thinkers, such as Sun Yat Sen, but also from the French Revolution, Thomas Jefferson, Abraham Lincoln as well as Karl Marx.
The period of Soeharto-GOLKAR rule created a vacuum in political culture. Militarist, bureaucratic and consumerist values grew as the basis of the political outlook of the elite. In the wake of the 1997 economic crisis, this politically bankrupt elite is incapable of dealing with all the consequences of an socio-economic crisis that threatens both social and national disintegration.
Australia is not much different in the ideological field. As the Australian Labour Party has grown more and more similar in ideology to John Howard's Liberal Party, ideological debate has also virtually disappeared. The Australian political elite is also bankrupt.
The aftermath of the Bali bombing points to some of the deeper issues that these bankrupt elites cannot handle. John Howard has been milking the sympathy and fear of the Australian community for all it is worth.
Of course, much of the Australian community is shocked and frightened by the bombing to death of almost 200 people and the injury and maiming of another 200. Many Indonesians have reacted in the same way. But Howard has not reacted with a serious search for the reasons why such a thing could happen nor a serious discussion of the implications of the event.
Australian narrow nationalism has surfaced, for example, in some of the coverage in Australia of the Bali attack. There is a constant criticism that Indonesia hasn't done enough and should "take action now!" against "terrorists". In a situation where no specific person has been proven as a perpetrator of a terrorist act, "take action now" can only be taken to mean to detain somebody before there is any or sufficient evidence. "Innocent until proven guilty" as a legal principle is abandoned. Neither elite has ever cared about this principle (except when they are the accused), but it would be a backward step if Australia public opinion also decided it was OK for Australia to press for the abandonment of this principle in Indonesia.
Another example is some disparaging comment on the level of health services in the hospitals in Bali. More intelligent commentators have pointed out that this is to be expected due to the fact that Indonesia is a poorer country. It is true, of course, that another difference between Australia and Indonesia is that Australia's economy, despite a much smaller population, is much bigger than Indonesia's economy.
But it is not just a rich poor gap. It is an exploiter – exploited gap. The Australian economy has prospered as a result of Australia being part of the Western world, which has exploited the Third World, including most of Asia, for more than three centuries. There are many Australian businessmen who are now are extremely wealthy because of their operations in Indonesia during the Soeharto-GOLKAR dictatorship.
These companies benefited from the absence of trade unions, of no environmental laws and so on. Australia now actively supports the International Monetary Fund policy towards Indonesia, which is resulting in the transfer of Indonesian productive assets into foreign hands and dumping into Indonesian of cheap goods from the rich Western countries.
Even Australian tourism to Bali has an aspect if this distorted relationship. Many Australian tourists who visit Bali do make genuine friends with Indonesians in Bali. However we must also ask the question as to why is it possible for tens of thousands of mostly working class Australians to holiday overseas in Bali? The reason is that the cost of living, of accommodation, food, drink, entertainment and so on, is so cheap. Many Australians enjoy a level of accommodation and comfort that they could not afford in Australia. Why is the cost of living so cheap? Because the material standard of living is also low.
Why is it low? Because economic development in Indonesia has been held back by three centuries of Western colonialism, followed by five decades of Western interference in Indonesia's economic development aimed at maximizing exploitation for foreign profit, with only the tiniest regard for developing a rounded, developed Indonesian economy.
The Australian people need to think more about this exploitative nature of Australia's economic and political relations with Indonesia and work to bring an end to it.
The bankrupt elite in Australia is not interested in this but only making more money and whipping up more narrow nationalism. The bankrupt Indonesian elite, even if it makes some anti-Western commentary, is also not interested: They are the business partners of the West.
In the end the task of changing the peoples' thinking on these issues will fall to the liberal democratic, green and progressive political spectrum in both countries. If this spectrum cannot provide a solution to the deep crisis in the region, then the atmosphere will become even more conducive to people adopting desperate measures; more conducive to all kinds of maneuvers and machinations from within the elites and more conducive to the rise of narrow nationalism in the exploiter countries.
[Max Lane is a Visiting Fellow, Center for Asia Pacific Social Transformation Studies, University of Wollongong, New South Wales, Australia.]