seminar on gov

7/28/2019 Seminar on Gov

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E-Democracy in Indonesia:Internet for Implementing Democracy

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


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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 (e-

mail), 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 decision-

making 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 inwhich boundaries between and within public and private sectorshas become blurred. The essence of governance is its focus on

mechanisms that do not rest on resource to the authority andsanctions of government. Governance for (some) is about thepotential for contracting, franchising and new forms of regulation.In short, it is about what (some) refers to as the new publicmanagement. However, governance is more than a new set ofmanagerial tools. It is also more than achieving greater efficiencyin 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.

(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

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


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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

A 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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Disadvantages Advantages

The main disadvantages concerning e-government 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

E-government allows for governmenttransparency 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.

Hyper-surveillance. Increased contact

between government and its citizens

goes both ways.(could lead to a lack of privacy for

civilians)

Democratization. By e-government,

especially through internet, people from

all over the country could participate or

interact with their representative ingovernment and make their voices

heard.

Cost. The development of e-

government may cost amount of

money but it is often difficult to be

measured

Environmental bonuses. The online

government services would lessen the

need of hard copy and support the

green campaign.

Inaccessibility. Not all citizens will be

able to access the information, such as

those who live in remote areas, havelow literacy levels, and exist on poverty

line incomes.

Speed, efficiency, and convenience. E-

government allows citizens t o

computer and do not need to mobile inorder to interact with government. They

could do it from their own home

False sense of transparency and

accountability. E-government is

maintained by government itself, so

that information can be added or

remove from public.

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.

(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

Table of Disadvantages and Advantages of E-Government

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


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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:

Moreover, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development

(in Slamet, Abdul Razak bin Hamdan, and Aziz Deraman 2009) has defined e-

democracy 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

Source: Nurhadyani, 2009


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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

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

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

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

Influence

Relevance


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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 e-

democracy implementation in Indonesia with its one to manycommunication into

many to manyinformation. 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, e-

democracy 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, e-

democracy 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

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