Tony Hotland, Jakarta – Decades of development of injustices and resurging sense of ethnicity may serve as indications that Indonesian unity as a nation was still far-fetched or even losing its ground, a group of social observers said Friday.
They were having a discussion after a book launch by Riwanto Tirtosudarmo, an Indonesian Institute of Sciences (LIPI) researcher, titled Looking for Indonesia: The Demography of Politics post-Soeharto.
The observers cited the way former president Soeharto forged his idea of nationalism by establishing a "host culture" in a very centralized approach of development, leaving others outside Java with an outsider feeling.
"A gap in development and the powerful prevalence of a host culture made everyone outside Java feel they weren't Indonesians. They came to Java and learned the local culture just to get that supposed feeling of being Indonesian," anthropologist Moeslim Abdurrahman said.
He said Soeharto's authoritarian regime and his way of making Javanese culture as the face of Indonesia had left non-Javanese no imaginations of what Indonesia could be.
University of Indonesia sociologist Francisca "Ery" Seda said the country was steered by a sole authority during the regime and the state was too dominant in defining Indonesia – a nation of thousands of islands and hundreds of ethnics and languages.
"Did the Acehnese know who (woman hero) Kartini was?" she said.
"Did the Papuans know what Majapahit was?
"They got this only in what they saw as Indonesian school."
Otto Syamsuddin from rights group Imparsial said Indonesia belonged only to those "within the asphalted yards", referring to those living in major cities that enjoyed the most of decades of development.
"We've begun deserting our unity and going for our diversity," he said. "It's time we start building (the nation) based on our unity again."
LIPI political analyst Hermawan Sulistyo said such a view was evident in the fact that many new regions were created based on the ethnic identity. "It's deplorable that while we're still trying to unify this nation after the fall of Soeharto, we're seeing new regions created simply based on ethnicity," he said.
The current repercussions of such ethnic consciousness, they said, included the resurging calls for natives as the leader to-be in local election campaigns.
"The issue of being a region's native has become a real issue in politics," Moeslim said. "When one can't stand under the house of nationalism, they go back to their ethnic house."
Otto cited an example when transmigration to other regions used to be smooth and conflict-free, but now the local people immediately were possessed by fear newcomers would take over the economy and politics resources there.
An exit from the situation was an issue of even and just development across the country, they said.
"The approach to all conflicts isn't cultural, but economic fairness. Culture is given in Indonesia, and any conflicts now is basically an issue of economic and social injustices," Ery said.
Moeslim added "only when the government can supply and meet the basic needs of the citizens will the feeling of belonging to Indonesia flourish".