| Summary | After the fall of Suharto, the Indonesian central government was substantially reorganized, under an elected legislature (since 1999) and president (elected since 2004) & a more effective court system. The importance of the military in government was substantially curtailed. Finally, there was also decentralization of previously centralized patronage networks and the inclusion of new elites that had been excluded from Suharto's regime. |
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| Project | SESMAD |
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| Subtype | Government Agency |
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| Sector | Forests |
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| Interest Heterogeneity | High (3) |
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| Explanation | The new government has been characterized by conflicts about the use of forest resources between different interests in different agencies (e.g. Forest vs. Agriculture), between different levels (central, provincial, and district governments) and between old and new elites within the government. For instance, after a few years of the new Reformasi government, McCarthy (2004) characterized the legal and political structure of the new decentralized governance system as a set of "volatile socio-legal configurations" with multiple contradictory interests concerning resource management. Brockhaus et al. (2012) also conclude in their analysis of forest and land allocation policies that there is a "lack of institutional clarity" and lack of coordination between agencies with different, conflicting objectives and mandates regarding resource management. An internationally-famous example is the conflicting proposals that since the 1990s until 2008 were debated in a region of East Kalimantan: on one hand, a national park i -part of the famous "Heart of Borneo" conservation initiative- promoted by global environmental NGOs and supported by the Ministry of Forestry, and on the other, a proposal for the largest palm oil plantation in the world (approx. 2 million ha) promoted by the Governor of East Kalimantan and supported by the Ministry of Agriculture (Potter, 2009). While these heterogeneities may have existed under Suharto, they were controlled and reduced by his centralized dictatorial system. As described by McLeod (2005): "With Soeharto's demise, Indonesia gained democracy but lost effective government....This franchise (the Suharto government) has disintegrated, its various component parts now working at cross-purposes rather than in mutually reinforcing fashion." |
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| Costs Of Exit | No |
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| Explanation | This is an error, and should be recoded as "missing in case".
It may be that the cost of leaving government employment is not very high, but we really don't have any clear evidence on this point. |
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| Proportionality (Of Costs And Benefits) | |
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| Explanation | Missing in case |
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| Actor Group Coordination | Both formal and informal |
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| Explanation | As a set of government agencies, there is a large amount of formal coordination between agencies and between individuals within agencies. |
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| Leadership | Formal leader |
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| Explanation | The government is led by an elected president. |
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| Leadership Accountability | Medium (2) |
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| Explanation | The president is accountable to the general public (through elections and through the legislative and judicial branches), and the other sections of government make up a part of that group, however they are not the primary people to whom the president is accountable. Furthermore, there have been suggestions that even after the instigation of democracy, the government remains highly oligarchical (Fukuoka 2013) and that the main change has been a decentralization of patronage networks (previously centralized under Suharto) and a redistribution of riches to elites previously excluded from Suharto's group of allies (Fukukoka 2013b). |
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| Leadership Authority | High (3) |
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| Explanation | The President of Indonesia is very powerful, although not as powerful as under Suharto's "new order" regime. His power is now mitigated by the judicial and a legislative branches. See Fukuoka 2013, 2013b for details. |
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| Actor Group Trust | Low (1) |
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| Explanation | Missing in case. We have no evidence about this. |
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| Past Collaboration | Medium (2) |
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| Explanation | Different agencies of the central government have worked closely with each other in the past, and employees have worked closely between them within particular agencies. However, reviews of Indonesian forest governance have noted that agencies have shown "little effective coordination" in actions against illegal logging (Barr, 2001) and overall in the implementation of forest management and land allocation policies (Brockhaus et al. 2012). There have also been recurring conflicts between the central and the district authorities in the implementation of forest laws, including the concession system (e.g. McCarthy 2004, McLeod, 2005) and participatory forestry schemes (e.g. Nomura, . As described by McLeod (2005): "With Soeharto's demise, Indonesia gained democracy but lost effective government....This franchise (the Suharto government) has disintegrated, its various component parts now working at cross-purposes rather than in mutually reinforcing fashion." |
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| Personal Communication | More than once a year (5) |
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| Explanation | Different components of the government are in frequent (daily) communication. While we don't have direct evidence, we assume that at least some of this communication occurs in person (i.e. in govt. office buildings). |
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| Remote Communication | More than once a year (5) |
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| Explanation | Different components of the government are in frequent (daily) communication. While we don't have direct evidence, we assume that at least some of this communication occurs remotely (i.e. through email or telephone). |
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