Party Rooting, Political Operators, and Instability in Indonesia:

A Consideration of Party System Institutionalization in a

Communally Charged Society

by

Paige Johnson Tan

University of North Carolina-Wilmington

A Paper Presented to the Southern Political Science Association

New Orleans, Louisiana

January 10, 2004

Author’s Contact Information:

Paige Johnson Tan

Assistant Professor

Department of Political Science

268 Leutze Hall

601 S. College Road

University of North Carolina-Wilmington

Wilmington, North Carolina 28403-5607

Phone: 910-962-3221

E-mail: tanp@uncw.edu

Homepage: http://people.uncw.edu/tanp/

Party Rooting, Political Operators, and Instability in Indonesia:

A Consideration of Party System Institutionalization in a Communally Charged Society

Abstract

Strongly influencing recent work on political parties has been the framework of party system institutionalization developed by Scott Mainwaring and Timothy Scully in their 1995 book Building Democratic Institutions: Party Systems in Latin America.  This paper addresses an important anomaly arising from Mainwaring and Scully’s work on party system institutionalization when the approach travels from its home base in Latin America to a communally-charged or ethnically-segmented environment such as exists in many countries of Asia and Africa.

Using the case of post-Suharto Indonesia and drawing on the author’s dissertation research, the paper discusses institutionalization in the contemporary Indonesian party system and shows how party rooting, one of Mainwaring and Scully’s four key areas of party system institutionalization, can serve as a negative force in the consolidation of democracy, rather than the positive one highlighted by the authors.  Particularly, in the Indonesian case, party rooting in communal groups and the existence of historic and programmatic tensions among those groups have contributed to high levels of instability, as could be seen in the tumultuous process surrounding the impeachment of President Abdurrahman Wahid in 2001.

In the Indonesian case, the negative effects of party rooting have been brought about by the exploitation of party roots by cost-conscious potential political leaders in the development of their political power bases.  As rational actors, Indonesia’s party leaders have perpetually used the least costly means available to reach their political goals.  The existence of ready-made groups waiting to be captured by an enterprising leader has allowed inter-communal tension to be escalated, bringing the country almost to the brink of civil war in 2000 and 2001.  In addition to the threats to Indonesia’s stability, the exploitation of inter-communal tensions for political gain has had important effects (all negative) on the nature of inter-party competition, the nature of the parties themselves, and the degree to which the party system feels heavily polarized, despite the absence of strong policy-related disagreements among those at the highest levels.

The paper addresses the reasons for the failure of the party system institutionalization approach to consider the dangers in party rooting, so readily observable in the Indonesian case.  Finally, the paper considers how a heightened awareness of both the positive and negative effects of party rooting can inform party system theory. 

Party Rooting, Political Operators, and Instability in Indonesia:

A Consideration of Party System Institutionalization in a Communally Charged Society

Introduction

In May 1998, after long-serving President Suharto was ousted in Indonesia, protesting students were cleared from the parliament grounds and the nation watched as President Habibie’s Reform Development Cabinet dictated a transition that would proceed according to constitutionally prescribed rules.  Elections were scheduled for the middle of 1999.  This turned the focus of reform efforts, previously driven by the words of political notables and the muscle of student protesters, to the development of political parties through which to take part in the elections.  Like the reformers, pro-status quo groups also joined in the frenzy of party organization and party renewal.  By June 1999, at least 181[1] political parties had been formed, 48 of which were deemed sufficiently national to take part in elections.  Today, Indonesia’s leadership is largely drawn from the political parties.  Twenty-four parties have qualified to compete in follow-on elections in April 2004. 

However, despite the euphoria among democratization advocates over the transition from authoritarian rule, many Indonesians continue to perceive the country as being in crisis (Indonesians have called this the “multi-dimensional crisis” or kristal [krisis total-total crisis]).  The country has been haunted by instability as rebellious provinces have sought independence.  East Timor gained its freedom, and the Gerakan Aceh Merdeka (Free Aceh Movement) fights on.  The economy has returned to growth, but its decline from its “miracle” or “tiger” status has been pronounced.  Optimism seems a thing of the past.  Only now, five years on, will Indonesia finally emerge from International Monetary Fund tutelage.  Politics, too, have been a roller coaster.  Indonesia has experienced four presidents (Suharto, Habibie, Abdurrahman Wahid, and Megawati Sukarnoputri) in as many years.  Justice for past crimes has been virtually non-existent.  Roiling battles and more general sniping have pitted president against legislature.  These battles eventually brought down Abdurrahman Wahid’s presidency and have threatened Megawati Sukarnoputri as well.  Occasional outbursts of inter-party violence have sparked concerns that the 2004 elections will bring more tumult to the country, rather than providing governing solutions.  Indonesia’s new leaders are derided as corrupt, machinating, and power-hungry.  A “National Movement Against Electing Rotten Politicians” was launched with much fanfare in December 2003 (According to one of the movement’s founders, about 70% of 2004 legislative candidates are expected to be black-listed by the group).[2]  At the same time, a wave of nostalgia for the stability of the Suharto era is growing (Indonesians call this SARS, Sindrom Aku Rindu Suharto [I Miss Suharto Syndrome]). 

Turbulence, such as Indonesia has experienced, has been a common feature of transitions from authoritarian rule around the world.  Strongly influencing recent work on political parties has been the framework of party system institutionalization developed by Scott Mainwaring and Timothy Scully in their 1995 book Building Democratic Institutions: Party Systems in Latin America.[3]  This paper addresses an important anomaly arising from Mainwaring and Scully’s work on party system institutionalization when the approach travels from its home base in Latin America to a communally-charged or ethnically-segmented environment such as exists in many countries of Asia and Africa.  Using the case of post-Suharto Indonesia and drawing on the author’s dissertation research,[4] the paper discusses institutionalization in the contemporary Indonesian party system and shows how party rooting, one of Mainwaring and Scully’s four key areas of party system institutionalization, can serve as a negative force in the consolidation of democracy, rather than the positive one highlighted by the authors.  Particularly, in the Indonesian case, party rooting in communal groups and the existence of historic and programmatic tensions among those groups have contributed to high levels of instability, as could be seen in the tumultuous process surrounding the impeachment of President Abdurrahman Wahid in 2001.

In the Indonesian case, the negative effects of party rooting have been brought about by the exploitation of party roots by cost-conscious potential political leaders in the development of their political power bases.  As rational actors, Indonesia’s party leaders have perpetually used the least costly means available to reach their political goals.  The existence of ready-made groups waiting to be captured by an enterprising leader has allowed inter-communal tension to be escalated, bringing the country almost to the brink of civil war in 2000 and 2001.  In addition to the threats to Indonesia’s stability, the exploitation of inter-communal tensions for political gain has had important effects (all negative) on the nature of inter-party competition, the nature of the parties themselves, and the degree to which the party system feels heavily polarized, despite the absence of strong policy-related disagreements among those at the highest levels.

The paper addresses the reasons for the failure of the party system institutionalization approach to consider the dangers in party rooting, so readily observable in the Indonesian case.  Finally, the paper considers how a heightened awareness of both the positive and negative effects of party rooting can inform party system theory. 

The Importance of Parties in Transitions to Democracy

In much of the literature on transitions from authoritarian rule, the role of parties is seen to be key.  To Linz and Stepan, the development of political parties is part of the development of “political society,” by which they mean, “that arena in which the polity specifically arranges itself to contest the legitimate right to exercise control over public power and the state apparatus.”[5]  For it is in political society that a transition can be turned into a consolidation of democracy.  As Linz and Stepan as well as O’Donnell and Schmitter recognize, often it is not the political parties which bring down the old regime (this is typically brought about on the backs of human rights campaigners and students, among others), but it is to the political parties that one must look to observe the kernel of consolidation apparent in the transition.  Consolidation requires political parties to build a new system of competition for political office.[6]  O’Donnell and Schmitter see the founding election as “provoking parties” into action for the “party is the modern institution for structuring and aggregating individual preferences.”[7]   Observers of areas as diverse as Russia, Portugal, and Chile have seen the role of parties as key to understanding the progress (or lack thereof) of the transition.[8]  For Mair, “the twentieth century is not only the century of democratization, and hence of democracy, but it is also the century of party democracy.”[9]

Considering Party Systems

Having established that parties are necessary for modern democracy to function, this study also subscribes to the ideas first put forth by Mainwaring and Scully in their volume on Building Democratic Institutions: Party Systems in Latin America and later by Mainwaring working alone in his study, Rethinking Party Systems in the Third Wave of Democratization: The Case of Brazil,[10] that the institutionalization of the party system is the proper way to examine parties and their impact on the political systems in more recent democracies.  Mainwaring and Scully offer an important critique of previous party system theory.  These theories were developed often using Western European (and sometimes American) parties and party systems as a basis. In these advanced industrial democracies, the theories were most often developed and tested.  The authors make an important point, though, that in newer democracies in which the sequencing of democratization, industrialization, and technological development is different, parties will develop differently, and party systems will operate differently.

Indonesia is one of these more recent democratizers, and its contemporary party system serves as the case focus of this study.  Like many former colonies, Indonesia began its independent history attempting to operate a democratic system on the Western parliamentary model (1945-1958).  Challenges issued by national and territorial consolidation, revolution, Communism, and the military served to kill the first democratic experiment and allow the rise of almost forty years of authoritarian rule under Sukarno’s Guided Democracy (1959-1965) and then Suharto’s New Order (1966-1998).  When Suharto was pushed from power in 1998, Indonesia embarked again on a course of democratization, that is a broadening of participation in the political system to a greater extent than had been the case previously.[11]  Whether this democratization ends as a consolidated democracy, the party system has much to tell us.

Before Mainwaring and Scully, party system theory, which focused on advanced democracies, often modeled the experience of those countries as typical of the process of party formation in democracies generally.  These theories often left party system scholars working in developing areas befuddled, as often there was no labor party to accompany mass democratization, no Greens emphasizing quality-of-life issues, and no Christian Democrats, legacies of previous conflicts between Church and state.  Giovanni Sartori presented a theory of party systems which highlighted the number of parties and the ideological distance in the party system as the most telling indicators of party systems and their impacts on politics.  For Mainwaring and Scully, and I agree, these criteria are less meaningful when analyzing politics outside of Europe.  In the newer democracies, many systems have many parties; on its own, this criterion does not guarantee that party systems will operate similarly.  In addition, with the demise of Communism, polarization has often been drastically reduced.  Why, then, in some party systems does party competition still seem like a death match?

Mainwaring and Scully’s answer to the problem is that the number of parties and the degree of polarization provide only a starting point in exploring party systems.  Working on his own, Mainwaring argues that Sartori’s criteria offer only a dichotomous choice when evaluating party systems.  One either has a party system or one does not.  Systems that change too rapidly are described by Sartori as “non-systems.” [12]  But, these supposed “non-systems” occur far too often in newer democracies to be simply “non”-versions of their European counterparts.  Therefore, Mainwaring finds, something important was missing from party system theory, especially as regarded the analysis of party systems in new democracies.[13]

Mainwaring and Scully look to the degree of institutionalization of the party system to fill the void in understanding party systems in newer democracies.  To the authors, it is the degree of institutionalization that separates the operation of politics in newer democracies from their West European counterparts.  Both systems might be heavily populated by parties, but the difference in their operation can be as stark as night and day.  Institutionalized party systems, such as those in the advanced industrial democracies and some of the newer democracies, provide a stability to politics which makes the system operate with greater predictability.  Institutionalized systems also indicate more moderate, rule-based competition.  In institutionalized systems, parties can fulfill their democratic functions.  They enable voters to hold government accountable.  Party competition through elections is considered the legitimate means of forming a government.  To Mainwaring, “[i]nstitutionalized party systems structure the political process to a high degree.  In fluid [relatively uninstitutionalized] systems, parties are important actors in some ways, but they do not have the same structuring effect.”[14]  So, it is the structuring provided by institutionalized party systems that Mainwaring and Scully identify as the most informative difference among party systems. 

Criteria of Party System Institutionalization

In order to discern the level of institutionalization in a given system, Mainwaring and Scully suggest four criteria.   The first is stability in inter-party competition.  This criterion is important in evaluating institutionalization because it suggests stability over time in the number of parties in the system, their relative strengths, and their relationships with the electorate (stability does not mean lack of change, only change that is not wild and unpredictable).  The second criterion deals with the parties’ roots in society.  Institutionalized systems have parties with strong roots in the population.  This is related to stability in inter-party competition above.  If parties have strong roots in society, swings in support from election to election will be kept to a minimum because parties have stable support bases on which to call.  This can help to moderate competition and offer predictability in electoral outcomes;  both of these factors can contribute to ease in governing.  The third criterion is the legitimacy of the parties and elections in determining the right to rule.  If party competition through elections is viewed as the only legitimate means of forming a government, behavior will be structured on that basis.  This can have the effect of moderating competition among the parties because the rules of competition are themselves perceived as important.  It can also have the effect of preventing the rise to power of anti-system politicians (civilian or military) because alternative political and party systems are considered beyond the pale.  In many developing countries, democracy’s legitimacy has been eroded precisely because party competition through elections was seen as divisive, damaging, and ineffective in solving a country’s problems.  The fourth criterion examines the parties as organizations.  In order to provide structure to the system, the parties must develop some solidity as organizations.  Only with this can it be guaranteed that the party will still be around come the next election and that the party will develop the organizational capacities to fulfill the functions demanded of parties in a democratic system.

The Effects of the Degree of Party System Institutionalization

The four criteria offered by Mainwaring and Scully have the effect of enabling accurate and detailed description of an individual party system as well as evaluation of the degree of institutionalization in the system.  The authors also suggest the effects of lack of institutionalization of the party system on politics and governance.[15]  Institutionalized systems operate much as we are used to in the West.  The same parties exist from one election to the next and have specific roots in the population;  therefore, swings in support are not so dramatic as to be destabilizing.  Party organizations are developed and valued in and of themselves;  personalistic parties, while still existing in some cases, do not dominate politics.  Professionalism is relatively higher in institutionalized systems.  Parties have the ability to develop and offer concrete policy options in the highly complex business of modern government. 

On the other hand, inchoate or fluid party systems do not provide an underlying structuration to the operation of politics the way that institutionalized party systems do.  Parties come and go from one election to the next.  Parties’ social roots are weak, leading to instability as voters float from one party to another, or one individual to another, from one election to the next.  Parties in relatively uninstitutionalized systems are often weak as organizations, displaying perhaps personalistic characteristics and lack of internal discipline and professionalization.  Weak parties make governance difficult in a number of ways.  Parties’ rapid rises and falls make it difficult to hold politicians accountable because of a lack of connection between a party and specific policies enacted.  Without social roots, parties are often ill attuned to constituents’ interests, developing policies and governing in a way that is divorced from the popular will.  Weak party organizations, especially lack of discipline, make developing and passing a legislative program a severe challenge, resulting potentially in gridlock and, thus, a perception that democratic government is ineffective in offering solutions to the problems besetting the nation.  In weakly institutionalized systems, legitimacy is also often called into question, raising the possibility of anti-system figures shaking or even overturning the system.  Lack of legitimacy often becomes a vicious circle.  Because parties are not seen to be legitimate, everything they do is viewed as reflective of their particular self-interest;  this is set against and in opposition to the national interest.  In this climate, it becomes harder to develop social support for policies that would address national issues/problems.  Without this feedback of support and ability to develop solutions, the legitimacy of parties and democracy is further eroded.  Without a belief in the legitimacy of the democratic system and the parties’ right to participate in that system, every day for the party system could be the last, undermining the degree to which parties can plan and act with a lengthy time horizon that facilitates accountability to the public will.

This study takes as its focus the case of Indonesia’s post-Suharto party system.[16]  Neither Mainwaring working alone, nor Mainwaring and Scully working together suggest the party system institutionalization framework as particularly appropriate for examining cases in the immediate transition from authoritarian rule. This is a shame because Mainwaring hints several times at the importance of the party system at the time of transition as setting the stage for the evolving system.  According to Mainwaring, “democracy is likely to have shortcomings if a moderately institutionalized party system does not emerge after democratic government has been in place for some time.”[17]  Further, examining Brazil’s transition from authoritarian rule, Mainwaring observes,”[f]rom the perspective of party building, the first seven or eight years of democracy could hardly have been worse.”[18]  If it could hardly have been worse, then it certainly could have been better.

Examining Party System Institutionalization in Contemporary Indonesia

Inter-party Competition

Inter-party competition is, of course, still a work-in-progress in Indonesia.  A detailed study of the criterion does show, however, that the system is in some ways more stable than it appears at first glance.  Almost five years since the political opening have left Indonesians embittered with “democracy.”  The parties, in particular, have been singled out for uniform derision.  Why is this so? 

From May 1998 until the time of the June 1999 national elections, perhaps hundreds of new political parties formed.  Of these, only 48 were judged to meet the criteria set down in the election law to permit participation in the elections.  Unfortunately, these are the only elections we have in the current period, so examining volatility through a succession of elections is not yet an option.  Follow-on elections will be held in April 2004.

Forty-eight parties seemed to remind many of the “chaotic” democracy of the 1950s.  In fact, the new parties seemed to echo the parties of the 1950s directly.  Parties could generally be grouped into the same aliran, or stream, categories as the parties of the earlier period of democracy.  Nationalist and Christian parties formed, so did Islamic parties, both traditionalist and modernist.[19]  The party seen to be the legacy of the Partai Nasional Indonesia (PNI) was the Partai Demokrasi Indonesia—Perjuangan (PDI-P), led by Sukarno’s daughter Megawati Sukarnoputri (PDI-P scored 33% in the 1999 elections).  The direct descendent of the Partai Nahdlatul Ulama was the Partai Kebangkitan Bangsa (PKB) formed by Abdurrahman Wahid, the Nahdlatul Ulama[20] head (PKB scored 12.6% in the 1999 elections).  Filling the Masyumi slot in the political system, representing modernist Muslims, was the Partai Amanat Nasional (PAN) (PAN scored 7.1% in the 1999 elections).  PAN did attempt in the early part of the transition to present itself as a new type of “post-stream” political party.  However, the stream logic, the need to find supporters from some defined group in the population, pushed the party from 1999 more strongly into the Muslim camp.  Party head Amien Rais was the former head of Muhammadiyah, the nation’s largest modernist Muslim organization.  Another candidate specifically seeking to be the new Masyumi was the Crescent Star Party, Partai Bulan Bintang (echoing Masyumi’s crescent moon and star symbol).  PBB, while distinguishing itself from the rest of the field, did not score highly enough to assume the Masyumi mantle.  In contrast to Masyumi’s more than 20% of the vote in 1955, PBB scored just under 2%.

In addition to the nationalist, traditionalist and modernist Islamic parties, two important types of parties were largely missing from the new system, however.  Because of Indonesia’s historic battle to ensure a unitary state, regional parties were not permitted to form as they had been during the 1950s (the electoral law required parties to be spread across more than one of the big islands).  This meant that regional and minority parties could not participate.  Also missing were strong parties from the Communist, socialist, and workers’ party stream, the strongest of the pack, the Indonesian Communist Party (PKI), having been decimated at the beginning of the New Order.  Communism as an ideology was outlawed under Suharto’s rule (and continues to be to this day).  The People’s Democratic Party (Partai Rakyat Demokratik—PRD), a competitor in 1999 but not contesting the 2004 elections, was a genuine party of the left, its 78,000 votes in 1999 (out of 105 million) speaking volumes to the degree to which Marxism has been discredited over the New Order years.  Several workers’ parties did form, only one of which, the Partai Buruh Nasional (re-organized as the Partai Buruh Sosial Demokrat for 2004), appears genuinely to have been formed to advance workers’ interests.  Cynics observe that the three other workers’ parties formed for the 1999 elections were created solely for the purpose of confusing workers and channeling their activism in ways controlled by New Order civilian and military figures.

Further, two anomalous types of parties, legacies of the Suharto years, remain strong in the new system of inter-party competition.  Golkar, the state party of the Suharto years, remained a major force (finishing second in the 1999 vote, with 22%), however, this time, with the exception of the advantages that accrued from its control of much of the state bureaucracy during the 1998-1999 period, the party did have to content itself to being one of many political parties, a significant difference in the party’s role and function in the party system.  The Partai Persatuan Pembangunan (United Development Party) was also a legacy of the Suharto years (PPP scored 10.6% in the 1999 elections).  Many expected that the party would disappear in 1998-1999 as new parties building from the ideals (and even the organizations) of PPP component parties were formed.  The PPP, however, had a number of advantages that enabled it to survive its predicted demise.  The party had been the most dynamic party of the latter part of the New Order.  It also had a nationwide (if not deep) network of party supporters, as well as twenty to twenty-five percent of the electorate that was accustomed to choosing PPP come election time.

Of the 48 political parties, 21 achieved some representation in parliament.  The overwhelming bulk of representation, however, went to the top six parties, PDI-P, Golkar, PKB, PPP, PAN, and PBB.  Between them, these six parties earned 88% of the 1999 vote and 92% of the seats up for election, a result even more concentrated than that of 1955.[21]  The effective number of parties in the system, weighting the number of parties with the share of the vote received, is just 5.1 (this can be compared to 6.3 in 1955).  Calculating the effective number of parties in terms of seats in the parliament gives a figure of just 4.7.  This is a party system that is far more concentrated than the ‘hundreds” of parties formed, 48 parties contesting the elections, or 21 parties in parliament might suggest.  Of course, first elections are often funny, and results may shift in the future.  Twenty-four parties have qualified to compete in the April 2004 parliamentary elections. These elections will be followed in July 2004 by presidential/vice-presidential elections, Indonesia’s first ever direct elections of the president and vice president (the elections are designed as two-round elections, beginning in July and seeing the top two finishing teams [since no single team is expected to command 50% + 1 in the first round[ slug it out in the second-round elections in September 2004).

Clearly, the 1955 vote would have been a poor predictor of the vote in 1999.  Between the two elections, volatility (calculated by stream, or party family) was 32.5.[22]  The main cause of this shift is the demise of the Communist stream (20% in 1955 and only .4% in 1999) and the addition of Golkar to the system, thus strengthening the nationalist part of the equation (the nationalist vote rose from 27% in 1955 to 55% in 1999).[23]  Islamic parties dropped just slightly from 44% in 1955 to 38% in 1999.[24]

Ideological distance in the new system is difficult to determine.  Many parties were deliberately vague in their policy pronouncements in 1999; this was in part to cast a wide net for potential supporters but also to avoid bringing down a military backlash by making “radical” demands.  Even a simple reform-status quo dichotomy breaks down under analysis.  One could say that of the large parties, PDI-P, PAN, and PKB were pro-reform, while Golkar, PPP, and PBB were pro-status quo.  However, PDI-P relations with the military, the presence of former New Order figures in the party, and Megawati’s record in office all suggest that the party has a strongly conservative bent (or at least circumstances have bent it that way).  PBB, too, could be seen as status quo for its support of Habibie’s presidential candidacy in 1999.[25]  However, the party is strongly reformist in its support for constitutional changes.  Golkar, too, the quintessential status quo party, offered numerous reforms to the system in 1999.  Clearly, the situation is far too opaque to present an easy reform-status quo dichotomy. 

Ideological conflict in the system, despite a confused left-right spectrum, seems firmly ensconced.  During the 1999 elections, a number of symbolic issues were up for grabs, indeed setting reformists against those favoring the status quo (though it was difficult to identify who was who).  Since 1999, perpetual attempts by Islamic parties, particularly PPP, PBB, and Partai Keadilan[26] (PK—the Justice Party, number seven in the election returns) to support the introduction of the Jakarta Charter into the Constitution (the Charter would oblige the state to ensure the observance of Islamic law by Muslims), are polarizing.  While moderate Islamic parties, like PKB and PAN, can see state support of Islam without the need for recognizing Indonesia as an Islamic state, the Jakarta Charter (and the imposition of syariah law more generally) sets parties like PPP, PK, and PBB in opposition to nationalist parties like PDI-P and to a lesser extent Golkar.

Constant threats of mob violence over the course of the transition have also made competition feel as if it is out of control.  Megawati’s supporters threatened to riot (and this threat was repeated by members of the PDI-P’s top leadership) if she were denied the presidency in October 1999, after PDI-P had come out plurality winner in the general elections.  Dueling demonstrations plagued Abdurrahman Wahid’s administration for months on end prior to the President’s impeachment, creating a sense of utter chaos in the country, paralyzing the government, and rocking the already shaky economy.  Anti-Wahid demonstrators charged the president with being corrupt and ineffective.  Pro-Wahid demonstrators promising they were “ready-to-die” to defend him, threatened to bring millions on to the streets.  Further, terror attacks, bombings, and attacks on political party figures and democracy activists have all suggested that the nature of inter-party competition is not yet confined to an orderly process within the country’s institutions.  However, as Chadda observes, different kinds of violence have different impacts on the democratization process.[27]  Violence by blackguard forces attempting to forestall reform is, I would argue, less damaging over the long term than violence that would erupt between the new parties; this latter type of violence, while it has occurred and is severely troubling, has been more restrained.

At the same time, Indonesia has done perhaps better than many expected looking forward in 1998.  Elections were held in 1999 that were for the most part entirely peaceful, in fact less deadly than the “controlled” elections of the Suharto years.  The party-dominated General Elections Commission (KPU) was widely considered to have performed poorly during and after the elections.  It was revamped in 2001 and replaced by a smaller board, composed entirely of non-partisan intellectuals and activists.  President Habibie handed over power peacefully to his successor Abdurrahman Wahid, as the latter begrudgingly did to his successor Megawati Sukarnoputri.  The impeachment of Wahid was prolonged and destabilizing, but it did finally succeed in eliminating a president who had come to be considered a joke and an obstacle to national development. [28]  Despite confronting the damage and continued threat of terrorism, Indonesia under Megawati seems a more regularized nation.

No firm conclusion can yet be drawn as to the nature of inter-party competition.  Deborah Norden critiques classical party system theory’s emphasis on the number of parties and ideological polarization and says that what is important to examine in newer democracies is the nature of inter-party competition, whether that competition is collusive, combative, or moderate.[29]  Moderate competition, according to Norden, is the most promising for democracy, as it prevents the rise of extra-system movements attendant to collusive competition (because significant interests may be unrepresented) and the chaos of combative competition (in which defeating one’s rival is more important than the survival of democracy itself). 

Indonesia’s system shows a confusing mix of collusive, combative, and moderate features.  In the legislature, party leaders seem to collude to shepherd the business of parliament without transparency (votes are rarely taken, and decisions are arrived at by faction leader-driven consensus).  Party relations are also combative, as the painful presidential impeachment process showed.  But, party competition is also moderate.  The rules of the system, while still in a process of development, are followed in broad outline.  The election was free and fair, the MPR vote which put Wahid in office followed parliamentary procedure, Wahid’s impeachment was by the book as well.[30]  Perhaps it is the case, as O’Donnell and Schmitter observed likening transitions to a multi-layer chess game: “with people challenging the rules on every move, pushing and shoving to get to the board, shouting out advice and threats from the sidelines, trying to cheat whenever they can—but, nevertheless, becoming progressively mesmerized by the drama they are participating in or watching and gradually becoming committed to playing more decorously and loyally to the rules they themselves have elaborated.”[31]

The party system is still in a process of change.  Polling which preceded the 1999 election showed that by the end of 1998, alignments were already quite close to those that would emerge after the elections.[32]  Further, vote results broken down by province at the national and provincial level suggest that, for the top seven parties at least,[33] straight party line voting was quite strong.  For the top seven parties, in all of Indonesia’s then-27 provinces, the average difference between province-level votes for the national- and provincial-level parliaments was only .195%, less than one fifth of one percent.  Despite the consistency shown in pre-election polls and the strong tendency of Indonesians to cast a party-line vote, it would be naïve to assume that the party system did not still have important changes to undergo in the coming years.  Disaffection with many of the parties has become quite high.  Will this translate into dramatic shifts in support or lower election turnout in future?  No one can say for sure.

Clearly, though, all indicators now suggest that there will be a party like the Partai Demokrasi Indonesia—Perjuangan for nationalists.  PDI-P should expect to see a lessening of support in the 2004 elections (perhaps a significant drop, discussed in more detail below).  Like PDI-P, there will be a Partai Kebangkitan Bangsa (despite name changes and party splits) for traditionalist Muslims.  There will be a Partai Amanat Nasional for modernist Muslims.  Golkar appears strong; however, for 2004, it is being challenged from the right by the Concern for the Nation Functional Party (PKPB—Partai Karya Peduli Bangsa), calling itself the “real Golkar.”  PPP also fills its role as the primary Islamic party, pushing issues like the Jakarta Charter and the institution of Islamic law, issues that the other large Muslim parties do not aggressively market (PPP’s splinter party, Partai Bintang Reformasi [Reform Star Party], does not plan to challenge PPP in this regard, setting itself closer to PAN and PKB on these issues).  Despite the wide swings in numbers of parties from 1999 to 2004, the core parties of the system are already easily seen.

Stable Roots

It is clear from the discussion above that several of Indonesia’s parties are rooted in important traditional schisms in the population.  This is important.  For Mainwaring and Scully, without these roots in the population, party support cannot be counted on to be stable from one election to the next.  Pridham and Lewis agree, calling party rootedness in the population the “ultimate test” in evaluating new democracies.[34] 

In the contemporary party system, the broad caricature has been that PDI-P represents nationalists/secularists, PKB traditionalist Muslims, and PAN modernist Muslims.[35]  Golkar and PPP seem anomalous in this regard;  however, the support that these parties received in 1999 suggests some rooting in the population.   Both parties scored better outside of Java.  While scoring in the low tens in Jakarta, East Java, Central Java, and Yogyakarta, Golkar scored 30%, 40%, even 60% in the provinces of Eastern Indonesia.  Golkar appears to have been less discredited in Eastern Indonesia (where the economic crisis was less deep), and the party has long served as a voice for pluralism at the center (off-Java shenanigans may have been greater as well).  This holds the party in good stead in terms of maintaining this important support base in the future.  Golkar is also considerably more “green” than the secular-nationalist PDI-P; this has enabled it to attract more votes from devout Muslims.  Like Golkar, PPP also did well off-Java, earning fully half its seats in Sumatra and the Outer Islands.  PPP was the plurality winner in strongly Muslim Aceh with 29% of the vote and took 20% of the vote in heavily Muslim West Sumatra. 

Mainwaring suggests that one should “not assume that social cleavages structure party systems, but rather examine the extent to which they do.”[36]  Dwight King attempted to do just that by testing scientifically the proposition that Indonesia’s parties today are the direct descendents of those that existed in the 1950s and thus fall within Indonesia’s traditional cleavage structures.[37]  His conclusions offer strong support for the idea that Indonesia’s parties are, in effect, older than they appear to be.  Comparing election results at the kabupaten (regency, sub-province) level in 1955 with those of 1999, King wanted to know if “voters with certain characteristics (preferences, attitudes, religious beliefs, and practices) supported certain parties in each election, revealing or articulating socio-cultural divisions in the electorate.”[38]  King found high levels of correlation between areas of PDI-P support in 1999 with PNI (correlation coefficient .59) and PKI (.38) support in 1955 (the Communist Party, PKI, was the other major secular party in 1955).  King also discovered unsurprising correlations of support between the Partai Nahdlatul Ulama in 1955 with the Partai Kebangkitan Bangsa in 1999 (.84) (we observed above that PKB grew out of the mass organization Nahdlatul Ulama, as did the earlier Partai Nahdlatul Ulama).  In 1999, PAN (.53) and PBB (.39), too, enjoyed support in areas that had previously supported Masyumi in 1955 (Masyumi was the chief Muslim party in the 1950s until the Partai Nahdlatul Ulama split away).  Similarly, Masyumi support was correlated with support for Golkar in 1999 (.26) and PPP (.42),[39] likely because all four parties to an extent serve to represent Outer Island interests at the center.[40]

Despite King’s impressive results, the issue is far from settled.  As suggested above, PDI-P’s level of support may not have reached a natural level, as, in 1999, the party may have received a number of sympathy/pro-reform votes that it will not see again.  Further, the party has now been “in power.”  Anecdotal and polling evidence suggest that many former PDI-P voters are dismayed with the party’s lack of progress in carrying out reform.  Tempo magazine suggests that perceived corruption, Megawati’s personality traits, and party infighting will also hurt the party in the future.[41]  Support levels for other parties can be expected to fluctuate as well.  Polling by both the International Foundation for Election Systems and the Asia Foundation in 2003 showed high levels of uncertainty by respondents over vote choice for 2004.[42]  The Asia Foundation estimates roughly 66% of the electorate as “swing voters.”[43]

Legitimacy

At the time of a transition from authoritarian rule, support for parties, elections, and democracy is often high among the population.  Over time, though, the challenges of governance often weaken support for democratic government.  In many cases, weakened legitimacy leads to popular acceptance of a military coup or popular enthusiasm for an anti-system politician.  That is why legitimacy figures prominently among Mainwaring and Scully’s criteria of institutionalization.  It is only when the system of parties and elections is accepted as legitimate that the system can be said to be secured. 

In Indonesia, a 1999 post-election poll conducted by the International Foundation for Election Systems (IFES) showed support for the idea that Indonesia should become a democracy at 84%.[44]  Satisfaction with the 1999 elections was also high, the IFES post-election poll showing that 90% of respondents said the elections were administered very well or fairly well, with only 4% saying the elections had been administered fairly poorly.[45]  Turnout in the 1999 elections was high, too, at over 90%.  This is typical of first democratic elections and is also typical of Indonesian elections (turnout across six New Order elections averaged 92%).  Respondents in public opinion polls report strongly that voting was considered a duty;  therefore, high levels of participation might be anticipated for the future.[46]  Turnout levels of 90% are considerably higher than turnout in some long-established democracies such as the United States (turnout average 52% over the period 1961 to 1999 in lower house elections) and France (75%), for example.[47]  The results are also higher than results in other new democracies like the Czech Republic (83%), Poland (51%), and Lithuania (50%).[48]

Trust in parties is low in comparison to trust expressed for other institutions or groups.  The Voice of the People poll, conducted immediately after the elections in June 1999, rated parties last among those trusted as capable or strongly capable in leading the country through change.[49]  Parties ranked behind students (87% ranking as capable or strongly capable), citizen groups (77%), the media (77%), the president (at that time, Habibie—75%), and the parliament (72%).  With a level of trust of 62.8%, Indonesia’s parties are more trusted than parties in other countries experiencing transitions from authoritarian rule.  Linz and Stepan point out that “45 years of party state rule in Eastern Europe and more than 70 years in the Soviet Union have given the word party a negative connotation.”[50]  In Indonesia, too, long years of authoritarian rule under integralist and corporatist ideologies successfully inculcated the idea that parties are divisive and at variance with the promotion of the national interest.  Despite an overall high level of support, it is the relative ranking of parties that should catch our eye.  Of major institutions and groups, parties were the least trusted. 

Since the 1999 elections, the parties’ esteem, always ambiguous, has fallen.  In the IFES pre-election poll, asked whether parties make things better, worse, or do not have much effect, Indonesians answered as follows:  make things better 34%, make things worse 28%, do not have much effect 9%, do not know/no response 28%.[51]   The 2003 six-province Polling Center survey showed that less than half of respondents expressed satisfaction with the party they had chosen in the 1999 elections.[52]  According to the Polling Center, only 34% of respondents could be considered “loyal voters.”[53]  This has two implications.  First, the legitimacy of the parties is in some doubt in Indonesia.  And, second, considerable fluidity can be expected for the 2004 general elections.

The failure of Indonesia’s new governments to solve the fundamental problems plaguing the country (such as economic difficulties, corruption, and regional challenges) and the ways the parties have conducted themselves since the elections (particularly with regard to the impeachment of Abdurrahman Wahid) have led to the development of a deep sense of unease among many Indonesians.  It is particularly the parties that bear the brunt of popular dissatisfaction.  On an almost daily basis, the parties are lambasted in the national press.  The country is said to be undergoing a “moral crisis.”  The parties are seen to be machinating, self-interested, corrupt, immature, polarizing, bankrupt, and ineffective.  Student organizations, prominent in Suharto’s fall, have remained aloof from the parties, preferring to remain a pure, moral force for reform.

A 2002 urban poll suggests strong levels of dissatisfaction with the parties.  The LP3ES/CESDA survey, released in February 2002, asked respondents which party put the people’s interests first. [54]  While no overall breakdown was given on the responses to this question, the responses as broken down by party affiliation are telling.  Among those affiliated with PDI-P, 44% said no party puts the people’s interest first.  Among those affiliated with Golkar, 62% said no party puts the people’s first and so on down the line: PPP 67%, PKB 37%, PAN 57%, PBB 31%, PK 35%.  Those that chose the party to which they were affiliated as most representing the people’s interest were relatively few: PDI-P 39%, Golkar 11%, PPP 17%, PKB 48%, PAN 22%, PBB 38%, and PK 35%.  The 2003 IFES poll, a national survey, showed declines in the trust with which individual parties were regarded.  From 2002-2003, PDI-P dropped from a trust figure of 72% to 50%, PPP from 67% to 52%.  The other parties also experienced declines: PAN 61% to 47%, PKB 61% to 50%, PBB 56% to 50%, and Golkar 50% to 48%.[55]  Fatigue with democracy’s inability to provide governing solutions appears to have set in.

Absent any dramatic improvement in the parties’ behavior, we might expect this dissatisfaction at some point to be converted into a loss of legitimacy by the parties.  But, as Przeworski makes clear, legitimacy is a relative concept.  “What matters for the stability of any regime is not the legitimacy of this particular system of domination but the presence or absence of acceptable alternatives.”[56]  The legitimacy of the parties may be declining in an overall sense, but the parties are strongly embedded in the current system of government, and there are currently no legitimate alternatives.

The Parties as Organizations

“So far not one of the political parties has been able to establish an institution.”[57]  That was the verdict of political scientist and lecturer in the School of Social and Political Sciences at the University of Indonesia Adrinof Chaniago.  Using Mainwaring and Scully’s institutionalization framework, one finds this statement supported.  The parties as organizations are weak.    Funding is irregular.  Party overlap with supporting organizations is in some cases sufficient to raise concerns about party autonomy.  Personalistic parties are rife.  Major parties have been ripped by factions, leading to splits in at least five of the top six parties.  On the plus side, parties control processes of candidate selection, thus assuring a degree of party discipline.  Also, party switching has been infrequent.  Party organizations in the localities are weak, relying often on informal, extra-party processes, and inactive outside of the election cycle.  With the exception of perhaps the two largest parties, no parties are truly national in scope.  These organizational criteria matter because in order for parties to provide stability to the political system over the long term, the parties as organizations must be “infused with value.” [58]

To look at the parties’ organizations in more detail, among the larger parties, funding sources are irregular.  Businesses tended to spread money among those parties expected to be the largest in 1999.  Thus, there is no guarantee that money will be there for some parties in subsequent elections, nor that money will arrive sufficiently regularly to ensure stable party operations.  Smaller parties relied on their leaders, friends, businesses, and loans for their funds, leaving the finances of many extremely precarious.  Golkar was in the best position as a result of the party’s long overlap with the state which guaranteed it access to funds for the 1999 elections.[59]  However, there are suggestions that a bandwagon effect has drawn the bulk of new resources to PDI-P (In addition, Megawati’s control of the presidency is believed to allow PDI-P access to state resources).  Gillespie points out that improvised funding was extremely common in Spain’s first elections after authoritarian rule, as was borrowing, a phenomenon discovered to be prevalent in Indonesia, especially among the smaller parties.[60]  Spain’s experience suggests turbulent financing in the first years is not a permanent barrier to institutionalization.  Equal state support for party building in the early period also guaranteed at least some flush to party funding.  Since 2001 in Indonesia, that funding has been made contingent on vote performance, resulting in large sums being transferred to the largest parties and miserly sums to the smallest.[61] 

As part of examining whether the parties themselves are “infused with value,” one must look to see if parties are overly dependent on sponsoring organizations.  Excessive dependence on sponsoring organizations, like unions and religious groups, means that party autonomy is reduced.  Party scholars have found that relations with sponsoring organizations can help parties to build roots rapidly (particularly important in a situation of a transfer from authoritarian rule during which time autonomous political organization was likely not possible).  But, these same relations can act to keep parties weak and dependent on the sponsoring organizations if the latter exert too much control over party operations. 

Golkar’s overlap with the state is a primary concern here, though not the one that would have been immediately identified by party system scholars.  Particularly in the off-Java areas, Golkar’s monopoly of government seemed to play a vital role in the party’s performance.  The other New Order legacy parties, PDI-P and PPP, can be seen to be quite independent of sponsoring organizations;  this is a result of the fact that links to social organizations were cut during the Suharto years.  The finding is also positive for institutionalization.  Partai Amanat Nasional relies heavily on the nation’s second largest Muslim group, Muhammadiyah, for support, and there is evidence that the party relied overwhelmingly on Muhammadiyah structures to build the party at lower levels.  Partai Kebangkitan Bangsa is perhaps the greatest concern as far as overlap.  Growing out of the Nahdlatul Ulama, the overlap in leadership between PKB and NU in 1998 to 1999 was substantial.  When Abdurrahman Wahid, the NU head, became president, however, new NU chief Hasyim Muzadi worked hard to separate the two organizations’ leadership structures cleanly (after his presidency, Abdurrahman Wahid returned to NU as head of the organization’s body of Islamic scholars).  This is a positive development for PKB’s autonomy.  If the party becomes too divorced from NU, however, one would have to question the degree to which it could maintain its roots.  This shows the inter-relationship and non-supporting nature of some of the criteria for institutionalization, at least in the Indonesian case.

That Indonesia’s parties are personalistic is among the most common complaints against them.  Personalistic parties challenge institutionalization because they rarely survive their charismatic founders, threatening the degree to which these types of parties can serve as durable players in the political system.  Because there is no objective way of measuring the degree to which a party is personalistic, in my dissertation I offered a placement of Indonesia’s political parties along a spectrum, which stretched from a hypothetically perfectly personalistic party to a hypothetically perfectly organization- or ideology-based party.  Major parties like PDI-P, PAN, and PKB veered toward the personalistic side of the spectrum.  PPP, PBB, and Golkar can be seen as organization- or ideology-based parties.  Of the 48 parties from 1999, twenty-nine fell on the personalistic side, eight in the middle, and eleven on the organization/ideology side.  Fully more than half of Indonesia’s parties could be characterized personalistic.

Factions are prevalent in situations of transition from authoritarian rule.  Parties are often built quickly, masking severe differences of opinion or ambition within.  This was certainly the case in Indonesia.  Factions are detrimental to institutionalization because they hamper the party’s ability to act as a unified whole.  They also threaten party splits which might cause parties to rise and fall in the system, increasing volatility and thus instability in inter-party competition. 

PDI-P is heavily factionalized, with groups representing Megawati’s husband, the party’s executive board, newcomers to the party (arrivistes formerly associated with the New Order regime), and the old-time democrats (old members of the Suharto-era PDI).[62]  While the newcomer/old-timer split appears to endure, other factions appear more shifting, and thus less challenging to institutionalization over the long term.  Several splinter parties have emerged from PDI-P since 1999.  Other splinter parties have formed from PKB, PBB, and PPP.  They present little threat to the parent organizations.  Factionalization within PAN was extremely serious, leading to a split in early 2001.  The liberals who exited the party, opposed to the party’s Muslim tilt and patently opportunistic anti-Abdurrahman Wahid maneuvers, did not form a splinter party, however.  While some might argue the PAN-liberal split was detrimental to the party in the long run (particularly those who favored the party’s attempt to be post-stream), the rupture has left PAN more internally cohesive and unified (and firmly ensconced in the modernist Muslim stream and more personalistically committed to Amien Rais).  Golkar, too, has seen its share of factions.  The longest-term faction of consequence seems to be that between the party center and disgruntled party leaders from Eastern Indonesia.  Less affected by the disdain with which the party is held in Java, Eastern Indonesian Golkar representatives have been decidedly more aggressive in asserting Golkar’s power in the political system.  Fearing a violent backlash which could see Golkar banned from the political system, Golkar head Akbar Tandjung has been more circumspect.  Qualifying for the 2004 elections and presenting Suharto’s daughter as its presidential candidates is Raden Hartono’s Partai Karya Peduli Bangsa (PKPB—Concern for the Nation Functional Party).  This party claims to be the “true” Golkar and seems to have the support of the Cendana faction (Suharto, his family, and cronies).  It is not yet clear how much of Golkar’s support this new party may take.

Factions and splits paint a picture of Indonesia’s parties as weak and divided.  The parties seem much stronger, however, when the phenomenon of party switching is examined.  Unlike rampant party switching in Brazil and Russia (two dramatically uninstitutionalized party systems), the phenomenon of party switching is seldom seen in Indonesia.  The proportional representation (PR)/party list system explains much.  It is parties that place candidates for election and party symbols which are chosen by voters, not candidate names; this enforces discipline on party members as their position is seen to stem from the party center rather than from their constituents.[63]  The ability of parties to discipline wayward members has also been reinforced by the reintroduction of recall of members of parliament.  This practice was originally disallowed in the immediate transition period, as democrats feared that it had been a tool of Suharto’s dominance during the New Order.  However, new party leaders discovered, as was recognized by the old, that keeping control of parliamentarians enhanced their own power.  Thus, recall was reintroduced.  Still, a few cases of party switching, mostly party leaving have been seen in the post-1999 period. 

Voting, another way of examining party unity, is relatively unrevealing in the Indonesian context.  Votes in the national legislature are rarely held (business is conducted more often by consensus among party faction leaders).  When votes have been held, they have been closed; thus, party discipline cannot be calculated with accuracy.  There have been numerous failures of the parties in the regions to adhere to the national party line. These cases have often involved the national party center choosing to back a candidate for a regional political position as part of its national political strategy and ignoring the aspirations and wishes of local party members.  In many cases, local party members have not supported the national line in these cases.  Indiscipline has met a stern response from the party centers.

Some parties have taken steps to professionalize their organizations.  For the most part, though, the conduct of party business is based on informal and extra-party mechanisms (especially as one leaves Jakarta).  Participation in party training programs run by the International Republican Institute (IRI) and the National Democratic Institute for International Affairs (NDI) suggests interest in professionalization by some parties.  Interviews with IRI and NDI staffers, as well as training program records, show that some parties have been more actively engaged in professionalization than others; among the avid professionalizers are PKB, PK, and PBB (three Muslim parties).  PPP also attended the party training programs in force.  However, PPP members are less often cited in interviews with NDI and IRI members as eager professionalizers.  More often, especially in the regions, PPP activists are cited as exceedingly suspicious of the motivations of these international do-gooders.  For a variety of reasons, Golkar and PDI-P have been less eager to participate in the internationally sponsored party training programs.  Some speculate that the parties do not wish to be seen to accept too much assistance from the United States.  As with PPP in the regions, some in Golkar and PDI-P were known to suspect NDI and IRI as perhaps fronts for the CIA.  Golkar is known to conduct its own training programs.  The training situation inside PDI-P remains unclear.

A look into the parties’ embrace of the internet also attempted to analyze the parties’ intentions to become “modern” political parties.  PBB, PK, and PPP all run sophisticated websites.  The Partai Keadilan Sejahtera , a party associated particularly with young college-educated Muslims, in particular, has embraced the internet at all levels (from the national to party branches) as a means of communication among and organization of party members.  Partai Kebangkitan Bangsa long ran an excellent website.  It is suspected that the site’s disappearance had to do with a split that occurred in the party in 2001.  Golkar and PDI-P both maintained a web presence during the 1999 elections;  however, neither party has endeavored to keep a site going since.

Lastly, the parties’ territorial comprehensiveness must be considered in evaluating the parties as organizations.  In a country of Indonesia’s diversity and archipelagic nature, with a history of forty years of authoritarian rule, it would be most surprising if, within the one year between the downfall of Suharto and the 1999 elections, parties had been able to establish nation-wide organizations.  Needless to say, Indonesia’s parties do not surprise.  In 1999, many parties claimed to be present in most of Indonesia’s then-27 provinces.[64]  Party registration in that year was decidedly lax, however, and many “paper parties” slipped through.  Party verification for the 2004 elections is more strict.   Parties are compelled to demonstrate the presence of leadership committees in two-thirds of the country’s now-32 provinces and the same in two-thirds of the regencies or municipalities in those provinces. Additionally, parties must demonstrate at least one thousand registered members in each of the regencies or municipalities in which they claimed a leadership board.

Institutionalization and Governance

Having examined the institutionalization of Indonesia’s party system in detail, we are left to consider a number of big questions.  In sum, how can we evaluate the institutionalization of Indonesia’s party system?  What effects does the observed level of institutionalization have on governance?  And what impact does institutionalization have on prospects for democratic consolidation?  Finally, what contributions can this study make to party system theory more broadly?  I answer the latter while considering the former questions.

To begin to develop answers, Figure 1 below sums up findings on Indonesia’s contemporary party system, using Mainwaring and Scully’s criteria of party system institutionalization.

Figure 1  Institutionalization of Indonesia’s Contemporary Party System