Elections are no longer a manifestation of respect for the people's voice, but a period that opens the widest possible bazaar of compromise, rearranging the position of each political force.
By
RENDY PAHRUN WADIPALAPA
·6 minutes read
The discourse about the dominative relationship of a political party with its members, who are also officials and candidates for public office, requires serious discussion to find common ground for an ideal relationship between the two.
Discussing this has never been more crucial than now, when Indonesia is entering a critical phase ahead of the registration of presumptive candidates for the 2024 presidential election. Tensions resulting from a political party's violent intervention in elected candidates should be resolved without having to wait for repeated mistakes like continually fluctuating relationships, such as President Joko Widodo's experience with his party, the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P). In both cases, the public witnessed the party’s superiority of over the President, a demonstration of an unequal a relationship and, at the same time, an odd one within the parameters of the values of a democratic state.
A competitive atmosphere between the President and his party was felt. However, this is not merely a symptom of sentimentality among political individuals fighting for a spot on the stage.
This writing looks at a major trend that has been recognized but rarely discussed openly: the growing strength of a party’s influence over other political entities as a direct result of the logic of political cartels.
This diagnosis was first made by Slater (2004) in his astonishing observation of the 1999 elections. After the frenzy of sharp competition, the post-election situation actually showed a strong trend among parties to approach each other and trade their interests, however different their ideological values and preferences. A grand compromise was not an ordinary or natural reaction; the same pattern continued until the 2019 elections, with several variations.
Clear demarcation between parties and presidential candidates is a starting point for reducing the power of political cartels. But in what way?
This tendency remains the same, namely that a party is always in a much stronger and decisive position in the post-election political process.
Elections are no longer a manifestation of respect for the people's voice, but a period that opens the widest possible bazaar of compromise, rearranging the position of each political force. A cartel, in this sense, is a collusive network that is bound by common interests and always runs on negotiation, compromise and cooptation between groups.
Therefore, clear demarcation between parties and presidential candidates is a starting point for reducing the power of political cartels. But in what way?
Independence
Observers of Indonesian and Southeast Asian politics, such as Ambardi (2008), Slater (2014), and Muhtadi (2015), have explained the pattern of political cartelization as something that has become increasingly natural in the post-New Order context. One of its important features is the dramatic expansion of power through alliances with gigantic postures and the cooptation of opposition forces. This trend evidently emerged gradually after the 1999 election and has continued until now, culminating in the continued weakening of the opposition’s power in the legislature, clearly evident in the passage of various controversial policies and regulations.
One serious consequence is political actors submitting to the power and agendas of political parties and their cartel coalitions, as one leader of a House of Representatives (DPR) faction stated openly some time ago.
There are at least two factors that determine a candidate's immunity from party intervention. First, the strength and unity of people supporting the candidate. A candidate’s spectacular popularity and electability proving the public’s absolute support naturally strengthens their bargaining position over the party cartel. Firmly rooted support of this kind is of course born gradually and consistently, a quality that is very difficult to achieve in a political system that is oriented towards instant image polishing and sophisticated industrial political marketing. A strong and anchored reputation will help a selected candidate act independently, although it cannot guarantee the quality of that attitude in an objective assessment.
Second, the size of a coalition's posture. Size is important here because it is directly related to how much demands must be met and compromised. The more diverse and larger a coalition's posture does promise stability that is not easily shaken, but it demands the sacrifice of endless and tiring negotiations. A governmental term will be filled with a dense conflict of interests between party members, including over the distribution of strategic positions and the struggle for internal resources, which must be resolved with new compromises.
The problem is, apart from these two factors, candidates are held hostage in the very early stages of the process by a "forced" political system: prospective presidential nominees must have the support of a party within a predetermined threshold. In this way, the candidate becomes absolutely dependent on a party, and remains in an inferior position in the five-year cycle. Imagining a strong and independent an elected president means having the courage to revise the elements that form a candidate’s dependency on their party. This must be dismantled in many aspects, starting with revising the presidential nomination threshold and up to opening opportunities for independent candidates.
Impact on government
The anticorruption vision helps elected leaders to clear policy paths laden with the interests of elite factions.
Challenging a party’s power might also lead to an unstable and ineffective government. According to Muhtadi (2015), this was a dilemma for President Jokowi in the first years of his administration, which were full of uncertainty. His nonparty background and being outside the New Order fence actually became negative credit that distanced the elected President from the powerful assets controlled by political cartels, thus prompting him to seek ways of compromise to gain the support of oligarchs and patrons.
Many countries have taken one simple initial step in the recipe against political cartels, namely a strong and sweeping anticorruption policy across all circles. Strong leadership in the face of oligarchic coalitions and party cartelization must be supported by firm anticorruption measures that prevent collusive and nepotistic maneuvers that have all kinds of compromises at hand. The anticorruption vision helps elected leaders to clear policy paths laden with the interests of elite factions.
This principle of independence will determine whether Indonesia will continue on its democratic regression trajectory or not; whether we will remain on and return to the trajectory of the game of political cartels or whether we will be free from it.
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Rendy Pahrun Wadipalapa
Rendy Pahrun Wadipalapa, Political Researcher with a doctoral from University of Leeds, UK
