2013

E-Democracy in Indonesia:
Internet for Implementing Democracy

Submitted by: Kiestiko Sri Saptasari SN: 126030112111

DOUBLE DEGREE PROGRAM FACULTY OF ADMINISTRATIVE SCIENCE BRAWIJAYA UNIVERSITY

E-Democracy in Indonesia: Internet for Implementing Democracy 1 / 19

E-Democracy in Indonesia: Internet for Implementing Democracy

Summary The role of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) has been known as the tools to be more efficient, effective and transparent. This can also be said as new instrument for political reformation in Indonesia. The use of internet has strengthened the democratic in some areas which citizens could easily get information about policies or programs from government institutions and/or political organizations. This e-democracy form also encourages citizens to participate in online discussion with government to deliver their voice and make sure that their opinion was heard. However, the implementation of e-democracy needs broad internet access available in all areas in Indonesia also special training for all citizens to be able to operate it.

Introduction Indonesia is one of developing countries in the world indicated as a country implementing basic principles of democracy in its government organization. Based on a survey in 2007/2008, Indonesia is one of 25 countries categorized as highly freedom in democracy. One of the measuring standards of successful democracy in Indonesia is achievement in executing 5-year general election for presidential vote. The Information and Communication Technology (ICT), particularly the internet, has been spread in Indonesia since 1990 and it becomes the pioneer of political changes in this country. Fundamental development of this information technology is the invention of World Wide Web which is famously called as WWW. Through this so called www, all information could be disseminated by government institutions or other organizations to the citizens.

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In Indonesia, internet makes possibility for government, business group, and educational institutions in making internal communication, distributing information immediately, as well as delivering public service such as tax reporting, passport registration, internet banking, admission process in university, and many more. At individual level, internet becomes a part of daily life especially in urban life. The internet used for communication through electronic mail (email), browsing information news, online shopping, paying bills and banking. Furthermore, the use of internet is mainly because of its efficient, effective, quality and transparency that could reduce the unwanted actions in organization.

Theoretical Review E- Government and democracy when fused together will form the term of e-democracy where democracy can be supported by the existence of internet in which all citizens could participate or even control the implementation of democracy. Thus, in this part the concept of good government, New Public Management, e-government, democracy, and e-democracy have to be detailed as the following discussion. 1. Good Government The term government based on World Bank definition on the World Development Report is to denote the use of political authority and exercise of control in a society in relation to the management of its resources for social and economic development. This definition means the rule of public authorities concerning on how to manage every resources in one country for its social and economic development efforts. It is also useful to distinguish between three aspects of governance: (1) the form of political regime, (2) the process of authority in managing countrys economic and social resources, and (3) the

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capacity of government to formulate and implement policy as well as discharge its functions. Based on United Nation Economic and Social Commission for the Asia and the Pacific (UNESCAP), the term governance simply means the process of decision-making and the process by which decisions are implemented (not implemented). According to the definition, governance focuses on the formal and informal actors as the decision-makers and those who are implementing the decisions. Besides, governance will also relate to any structures to arrive at and implement the decisions. The figure from UNESCAP below provides the interconnections between actors involved in urban governance.

Source: http://www.unescap.org/pdd/prs/ProjectActivities/Ongoing/gg/governance.asp

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From the above figures, when we put fisheries sector as the case for example, other factors may include vessel owners, association of fishermen, cooperatives, NGOs, research institutes, political parties, the military, etc. At the national level, central government may become the decision makers that have to be implemented in the lower societies. However, at national level, the informal decision-making structures may exist that influencing the process of decisionmaking such as local powerful person/ family, mafia (organized crime), or other factors. This informal decision-making is often the result of corrupt or leads to corrupt practices. Hence, good governance practices must be the basic concepts in any governmental activities to meet the objectives of development. Another expert, Stoker (1998) in Rendra (2010: 28), describes governance as follows: Governance refers to the development of governing styles in which boundaries between and within public and private sectors has become blurred. The essence of governance is its focus on mechanisms that do not rest on resource to the authority and sanctions of government. Governance for (some) is about the potential for contracting, franchising and new forms of regulation. In short, it is about what (some) refers to as the new public management. However, governance is more than a new set of managerial tools. It is also more than achieving greater efficiency in the production of public services From this description of governance, it can be said that governance succeeds in delivering efficient, effective, and transparent bureaucracy / services to the society is called good governance. Furthermore, good governance is a government that has been able to make good relationship among stakeholders in a country (government, private sectors, and civil sectors). It means, those three stakeholders can give active contribution / opinion on the work activities of government since their positions are equal one and others.

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From general perspective, good governance has four main aspects: accountability, rule of law, information, and transparency. While according to Bappenas there are 14 (fourteen) indicators of good governance: 1. Visionary (government has to decide the vision and strategy also policies and programs to concrete the objectives) 2. Openness and transparency (providing information regarding plan and implementation of their policies to all stakeholders) 3. Participation (community participation in deciding certain policies and programs) 4. Accountability 5. Rule of law 6. Democracy 7. Professionalism and competency 8. Responsiveness 9. Efficiency and effectiveness 10. Decentralization 11. Private sector and civil society partnership 12. Commitment to reduce inequality 13. Commitment to environmental protection 14. Commitment to fair market From the aforementioned concept of good governance, there are a lot of indicators for government in one country to increase their performance to reach good accountability, efficiency, effectiveness, transparent, good coordination with all stakeholders, and of course good public service to society. In addition, there are also 8 major characteristics of good governance as depicted in the following figures. This concept assures that corruption is

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minimized, the views of minorities are taken into account and the voices of the most vulnerable in society are heard in decision-making. It is also responsive to the present and future needs of society.

Sources: http://www.unescap.org/pdd/prs/ProjectActivities/Ongoing/gg/governance.asp

(1) Participation The key concern of good governance is participation, however, it has to be informed and organized so that responsible participation rises to the top. Responsible participation means freedom of association and expression that may become certain consideration in decision-making process. (2) Rule of law Good governance requires legal frameworks that control and manage the governance activities and protect human rights, particularly the minorities. It will also reduce the influence of majority or local powerful group in deciding certain policy. (3) Transparency Transparency means involving all parts of society in decision-making process and social society become the major control of every decision made by the

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government. It is also mean that enough information is provided in understandable forms and media. (4) Responsiveness Good governance always tries to serve all stakeholders within a time. (5) Consensus oriented Good government collects different interest in society to reach broad consensus for the best interest of the whole community. (6) Equity and inclusiveness A society tries to endure that its entire member feels that they have a stake in it and do not feel excluded from the mainstream of society. This condition leads to the raising of nationalism approach together develop the nations. (7) Effectiveness and efficiency Good government means cutting off the bureaucratic processes and make it more effective and efficient focus on the community services. The concept of efficiency in its context also covers the sustainable use of natural resources and the protection of the environment. (8) Accountability An organization or an institution is accountable to those who will be affected by its decisions or actions. Thus, good governance have to accountable to the society, those who got direct affect to the decision made by national government. This accountability cannot be enforced without transparency and the rule of law, so that all characteristics are depending on each other to form good governance.

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Good governance is an ideal system which is difficult to be totally achieved. However, to ensure sustainable human development, actions must be taken to work towards this ideal with the aim of making it a reality. 2. New Public Management (NPM) Concept of NPM is a new paradigm in public sector management which is commonly said as an opponent of old public management (OPM). The concept of NPM emerged in 1980s and used to describe the public reformation in England and New Zealand. NPM focus on output control of government policy, decentralization management authority, market acknowledgement and customer oriented services. NPM approaches of public management arose as a critique of bureaucracy that is blamed for the obstacle of development, hierarchy complex, and top-down decision mechanism. NPM focuses on private sector technical management adopted in public sector administration. While government are stereotype as inefficient, private are develop in a flexible ways because of new chances, competitions, innovations, and management principles. NPM emphasizes on some focuses. First focus is professional management that suggested top-manager to control all public organizations more freely and flexible. Top manager should have professional skill manager and have ability to control its organization. Next focus is orientation aspect. NPM expect that administrators work based on their target different from OPM that is more rule-governed. The last, NPM focuses on output of certain activities with clear purposes, target and success indicator. The key elements of the NPM as stated by Osborne are: An attention to lessons from private-sector management

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The growth between both of hands-on management in its own right and not as an offshoot of professionalism, and of arms length organizations where policy implementation was organizationally distanced from the policy-makers

focus

upon

entrepreneurial

leadership

within

public

service

organizations An emphasis on inputs and output control and evaluation, and upon performance management and audit The disaggregation of public services to their most basic units and a focus on their cost management Within the Anglo-American and Australian / New Zealand, the markets, competition and contracts for resource allocation and service delivery is held within public service. 3. E Government, Democracy, and E- Democracy (1) E - Government E-government, based on Wikipedia, is digital interactions between a government and citizens (G2C), government and business / commerce (G2B), government to employees (G2E), and government to government / agencies (G2G). Furthermore, as defined by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), e-government is as the use of ICTs and particularly the internet as a tool to achieve better government. At present, e-government may refer to narrower or broader areas: in one, it is defined as online service delivery: and in the other hand, it entails the capacity to transform public administration using ICTs to introduce the concept of e-governance.

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E-government essentially refers to the utilization of information technology (IT), information and Communication Technologies (ICTs), and other web-based telecommunication technologies to improve and/or enhance the efficiency and effectiveness of service delivery in the public sector (Jeong, 2007 in Wikipedia). All government institutions, recently, are influenced by the development of e-government. There are 4 (four) categories of e-government: (1) Government publicize information through website (2) Interaction between government and society through email (3) Users / society could have transaction to governments offices (4) Integrated system of all governmental offices that society could have transactions in all offices with national single database From those categories, Indonesia is still in the third phase in which generally government deliver information to the society in their website. However, some governments have reach level two and three, like the program of One Stop Management System that has been developed in some local government. Furthermore, there are some controversies of e-government with two sides of disadvantages and advantages as summarized in the following table.

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Table of Disadvantages and Advantages of E-Government Disadvantages The main disadvantages concerning egovernment is the lack of equity in public access to the internet, reliability of information on the web, and hidden agendas of government groups that could influence and bias public opinions Hyper-surveillance. Increased contact between government and its citizens goes both ways. (could lead to a lack of privacy for civilians) Cost. The development of egovernment may cost amount of money but it is often difficult to be measured Inaccessibility. Not all citizens will be able to access the information, such as those who live in remote areas, have low literacy levels, and exist on poverty line incomes. False sense of transparency and accountability. E-government is maintained by government itself, so that information can be added or remove from public. Advantages E-government allows for government transparency which public could be informed about what the government is working on as well as the policies they are trying to implement. It also promote efficiency, improved services, better access of public service for all citizens. Democratization. By e-government, especially through internet, people from all over the country could participate or interact with their representative in government and make their voices heard. Environmental bonuses. The online government services would lessen the need of hard copy and support the green campaign. Speed, efficiency, and convenience. Egovernment allows citizens t o computer and do not need to mobile in order to interact with government. They could do it from their own home Public approval. Citizens could participate in online discussion of political issues and drawn e-voting for government program or policies prior they could implement it to the society.

Adapted from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E-Government

(2) E - Democracy E-democracy is a combination of the words electronics and democracy. E-democracy is the use of information and communications technologies and strategies by democratic sectors within the political processes of local communities, state/regions, nations and on the global stage. The democratic

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actors

from

the

aforementioned

meaning

are

citizens/voters,

political

organizations, media, elected officials, and governments. E-government and e-democracy are two entities that could not be separated each other. E-democracy will run well if e-government has been established since e-government is the first step to strengthen social unity and democracy institutions through ICTs. Based on Keng Siau and Yuan Long, e-democracy is the long term objective of e-government development. The relationship between e-governance, e-government, and e-democracy can be seen in this figure:

Source: Nurhadyani, 2009

Moreover, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (in Slamet, Abdul Razak bin Hamdan, and Aziz Deraman 2009) has defined edemocracy model in three phases as follows: a. Information. This is single way information, in which government institutions (executive, judicative, legislative) and political organizations deliver

information to citizens so that they have knowledge to participate with democratic system in the country. b. Consultation. This is a two ways communication that citizens could give feedback to government institutions and political organizations in line with

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political problems, policy formulations or decisions. The aim of this second phase is to invite citizens participation in the process of democracy. c. Active participation. In this phase, partnership between government institutions and political organizations are build and citizens are expected to be actively involve / participate in the process of policy making. In addition, the above model of e-democracy is further developed by Janet Caldow (Director of Institute for Electronic Government) in 2004 and introduced the form of below quadrants. 2nd Quadrant Two ways, asynchronous, tactic Government institutions (executive, legislative, and judicative) and political organizations create big steps to open two ways communication with society. Government institutions, political organizations and society could: Communication through e-mail Deliver opinion through online Online survey Online campaign, etc 4th Quadrant Interactive, Strategic This is the highest and perfect e-democracy level in the future. Every citizen is actively involved in public policy formulations. The indicators are: E-petition E-consultation E-policy E-diplomacy Transparency E-voting Digital era, etc 3rd Quadrant Cooperation and Interactive In this phase, there are interaction between politicians and constituents. Mostly the actors of this quadrant are political actors and communication happen to build cooperation or partnership, such as Online recruitment Online funding Online campaign Online forum Online application, etc

Relevance

1st Quadrant Passive, one way, asynchronous Government institutions (executive, legislative, and judicative) and political organizations provide online information. This is the phase of e-democracy principles. Citizens could: Search information from government institutions or political organizations Search legislative policies or laws Get information about government programs Online campaign, etc

Influence
Source: Janed Caldow (2004) in Slamet, Abdul Razak bin Hamdan, and Aziz Deraman (2009)

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Internet and E-democracy Implementation in Indonesia

As mentioned earlier in the introduction part, the emergence of ICT especially internet in Indonesia has been spread in 1990 and already widely used during the 5-year presidential election. Nowadays, every election in regional level also uses internet for calculating or mapping the prediction result in more quick, effective and almost accurate compare with the manual result. From this condition, we could say that the internet is actually has democratizing aspect. The most democratizing of internet is the possibility of people to organize or communicate with others within groups in the context that citizens are able to participate in every activities and channeled their voice in politics, governance and society so that their aspiration will be the main considerations for government in formulating and implementing public policy. However, it does not mean that suddenly we say e-democracy have functioned properly in Indonesia although information from government or other governmental actors is available in the internet / websites. Everyone access information disseminated by government, NGOs, political organization,

universities to get information related to what they wanted to know. In education sector, for example, recently the university admission in Indonesia has utilized internet for national selection of students in order to get the more qualified one for those apply in certain university. With this procedures in which all process and application done through internet, it is expected that the number of corruption or other distortion activities could be eliminated for better generations. In addition, government of Indonesia also builds an information system, called Government Online which applying information technology that is based on internet. This system, as posted in http:www.inn.bppt.go.id, not only used as a

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medium of information but also as a medium of communication between one government agencies / institutions and others (Government to Government), Government to citizens, and between government and business sector. Taking into further observation, some government institutions have actively provide their website with information and publication about their policies and programs aimed to acknowledge citizens about their activities. Nevertheless, only small amount of government institutions website that provide two way communications services. It means citizens not only be able to gain information about the institutions, but also participate through internet by giving comment, opinion, or suggestions to the institution regarding the program that will be implemented since the main performer of public policy is the citizens itself. By giving two ways communication, government could take consideration from public comments and formulate better policy accepted by all aspects of the country which hopefully could reduce the public unsatisfied with government programs. According to Suyatno (2007), there are many factors that obstruct the development of e-democracy in Indonesia: (1) the concentration of internet users are in urban areas; (2) a lack of communication infrastructure such as the absence of telecommunication network in rural areas; (3) the high cost of internet access; (4) a lack of hi-tech knowledge and language barrier. From those factors, the development of broad internet will be the best solution to overcome the low internet access. Besides, even distribution of internet access in all areas in Indonesia especially those living outside the Java island that probably known internet as the new technology could encourage people to participate actively in e-democracy practice. Indonesia as an archipelagic country which has long distance between one to other places could consider e-democracy practices to its

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citizens as well as central and local government for more effective and efficient programs both in cost and time spending. In line with it, the use of internet could support government reformation efficiently and support the implementation of e-democracy. New type of coordinating, controlling, monitoring, and communication could be established within their own location without need to be presence in certain meeting venue or office. By internet, communication can be done without having direct contact between stakeholder and administrator that can reduce any misconception as always happen in manual democracy. For election process, the citizens who are living in other countries can use their vote with internet and it will present the result with more transparent and faster. It means that e-democracy can still be done without considering distance. Communication media also has big influence in the successfulness of edemocracy implementation in Indonesia with its one to many communication into many to many information. With the facility of communication media, government and political organizations can announce / promote their program. Besides, political parties can campaign their programs to citizens easier instead of using traditional media. The main problem of e-democracy implementation in Indonesia is related to internet availability and citizen skills. E-democracy can be easily implemented if the internet access has widely spread in all areas in Indonesia and citizens have ability to use the facility. It will be useless when the government has posted their programs or policies in website, but the citizens did not pay attention to it because of lack of knowledge on how to use the internet. For this, government has to establish such program like RT-RW Net or other internet for community program to introduce the use of internet in every level of people. Besides, special

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training and education on how to operate the internet as well as use it to participating online discussion with government institutions or other organization in deliver their aspiration is needed to be taken as consideration. Government could not only implement e-democracy for cost saving or other purpose without further consideration about citizens knowledge on internet. Therefore, Indonesia government in the first step of this e-democracy implementation especially regarding the 5-year election has to train / education citizens about how to use internet and give further knowledge of internet calculation through mass media or other communication media. To be concluded, the use of internet in the e-democracy implementation in Indonesia has not influence the power of certain stakeholders (government, business, or society) but it only change / reform the voting system from manual / traditional into computerize calculation. Internet also make possible for society to participate and actively involved in political process in the country. Besides, it provide important information or communication facilities that can give certain insight to the citizens on how is the working of their government or political organization that will or has been chosen in the election process. In addition, edemocracy implementation in Indonesia needs some aspects of education, training, laws conformity and game rule of it so that no stakeholders that will make use of internet negatively on the name of e-democracy. Furthermore, edemocracy will increase the quality of democracy in Indonesia because citizens could involve in government issues or activities from their own home.

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REFERENCE

Bappenas. 2007. Indicators of Good Governance to Implement on Indonesia. [Available at] www.Bappenas.Go.Id/homepage4 Calista, Donald. J, James Mellitski. 2007. E-GOVERNMENT AND EGOVERNANCE: CONVERGING CONSTRUCTS OF PUBLIC SECTOR INFORMATION AND COMMUNICATIONS TECHNOLOGIES. Marist College Christou, George and Seamus Simpson. 2006. The Internet and PublicPrivate Governance in the European Union. United Kingdom: Cambridge University Press Clift. Steven L. 2004. E-Government and Democracy. www.publicus.net Hartlyn, Jonathan, Jennifer McCoy and Thomas M. Mustillo. 2007. Electoral Governance Matters: Explaining the Quality of Elections in Contemporary Latin America. [Available at] http://cps.sagepub.com/cgi/content/abstract/411/173 Mitra, Amit. 2005. Direction of electronic governance Initiatives within two worlds: case for a shift in emphasis. Electronic Government, Vol. 2, No. 1.Salford University Nurhandrayani, Yuni. 2009. Memahami Konsepe-Governance serta Hubungannya dengan e-government dan e-demokrasi. Seminar Nasional Informatika 2009 (semnasIF 2009). UPN Veteran Yogyakarta Riley, Thomas.B. 2003. E-GOVERNMENT vs. E-GOVERNANCE: EXAMINING THE DIFFERENCES IN A CHANGING PUBLIC SECTOR CLIMATE. Canada: University of Glasgow Slamet, Abdul Razak bin Hamdan, Aziz Deraman. 2009.E-Demokrasi di Indonesia, Antara Peluang dan Hambatan Pendekatan Fenoenologis. Seminar Nasional Informatika 2009 (semnasIF 2009). UPN Veteran Yogyakarta Suyatno. 2007. RT-RW Net and E-Democracy in Indonesia. Global and Strategies Th. 1 No. 2 Juli-Desember 108-109 Tjahjono, Budi. 2009. Peran Teknologi Komunikasi dan Informasi terhadap Kekuatan Stakeolder dalam Mewujudkan E-democracy di Indonesia. Seminar Nasional Informatika 2009 (semnasIF 2009). UPN Veteran Yogyakarta Torres, Laurdes et all. 2007. E-Governance Developments in European Union Cities: Reshaping Governments Relationship with Citizens. Blackwell Publishing Wikipedia. 2013. E-Democracy. [Available at] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edemocracy Wikipedia. 2013. E-Government. [Available at] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EGovernment World Bank. 2003. World http://wordbank.org/data/2003 Development Indicators. [Available at]

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