Alexander Raymond Arifianto

Governance and Poverty Reduction: Evidence from Newly Decentralized Indonesia.

This study is the first attempt to systematically examine the impact of bad governance practices in Indonesia on poverty reduction. Indonesia is a country that has endured bad governance for a long period, but also has sustained significant poverty reduction. Prior to the onset of the economic crisis in mid 1997, the problem of bad governance in Indonesia was apparent but mostly ignored because it was compensated by high economic growth. The advent of the economic crisis, however, has highlighted the seriousness of the problem. This study focuses on the impact of bad governance on the poor, the people who are most vulnerable to the impact of bad governance. By assembling scattered anecdotal evidence on how past and current practices of bad governance in Indonesia have hurt the poor, this study shows that the adverse impact of bad governance on the poor is real, systematically affects many people, and undermines the efforts to reduce poverty in the country. More systematic evidence on how bad governance affects poverty reduction indicates that indeed regions that practice better governance experience faster poverty reduction and vice versa.

Explaining the Cause of Muslim-Christian Conflicts in Indonesia: Tracing the Origins of Kristenisasi and Islamisasi

Within the last decade, Indonesia has experienced numerous incidents of communal violence between conservative Muslims, who are the religious majority in the country, and the Christian minority. This has been caused by mutual prejudices and suspicions that have gradually developed between the two groups. This article will explain the origins of such sentiments by looking at the history of Muslim–Christian relations in Indonesia. It argues that the origins of tensions between the two religions date from the Dutch colonial period in Indonesia and persisted throughout Indonesias post-independence history. First, the article will survey the roots of Kristenisasi suspicions among Indonesian Muslims, from the Dutch colonial period until the New Order regime under Suharto. Next, it will examine government policies designed to appease conservative Muslims and restrict the religious freedom of Indonesian Christians. Finally, it will discuss how these policies helped to create the fear of Islamisasi among Indonesian Christians.

Public Policy Towards the Elderly in Indonesia: Current Policy and Future Directions

In the past few years, public policy towards the elderly has become an emerging policy issue for Indonesia. With one-third of all Indonesians predicted to be elderly (i.e. aged 60 years or older) in the year 2050, millions of citizens are vulnerable to old age poverty, since many of them will have little extra income (e.g. from savings or pension) to finance their livelihood in old age. At the same time, they will no longer be able to depend exclusively on assistance from their children/other family members as in the past, since the birthrate is declining and family relations are becoming more strained due to continued modernization and social change occuring in the country. Thus, it is increasingly recognized that a more formal and comprehensive old age security policy is needed in Indonesia. This paper will review the development of such a policy, looking at both past and current policies, and will critically analyze their impact in providing adequate old age security for Indonesians. Finally, the paper will conclude with some recommendations on what Indonesia could do to create a comprehensive aging policy that would protect its elderly population from old age insecurity in the coming decades.

Social Security Reform in Indonesia: A Critical Analysis

The Indonesian national social security program is currently undergoing a major overhaul designed to make the existing system works better for the beneficiaries and to extend social security coverage to more workers, both in the formal and informal sector. The government has proposed a plan to convert the current Jamsostek social security scheme, based on a provident fund system, into a compulsory social insurance system. The feasibility of this plan is critically analyzed in this paper. From this analysis, we concluded that there are several serious flaws in the government proposal as outlined in the proposed legislation, such as: Worsening Indonesias labor market and investment climate, negatively impacted the state budget, is of little help for current poor elderly Indonesians, and does not provide room for the private sector to provide social security benefits to Indonesians. Cross-country evidence shows that publicly provided social security scheme is no longer a viable model for workers today and instead, privately provided social security scheme is better suited for their retirement needs. Given the many problems facing the Indonesian social security system today, Indonesia should seriously consider adopting a social security scheme based on the widely used multipillar approach to replace the current publicly-provided scheme.