Strong Citations Performance by BIES July 3, 2009
Posted by Ross McLeod in News from the Indonesia Project.Tags: economy, Indonesia, key performance indicators, politics
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How can we measure the success of an academic journal? There is no simple answer to that question, but one of the most popular performance measures is the Impact Factor. This is a measure of the influence of a journal that is based on the extent to which the articles it publishes are cited subsequently in journals in the same field.
Formally, it is defined as the ratio of total journal citations of articles in the reference year to the number of articles published by the journal in question in the two previous years.
The Thomson Reuters Impact Factors for 2008 were released recently, and our Bulletin of Indonesian Economic Studies has again performed strongly. The BIES IF for 2008 is 1.276, close to its previous peak of 1.360 in 2006. On this basis, BIES is now ranked 52/209 among Economics journals worldwide, and the highest of all Australian Economics journals.
Needless to say, we are delighted with this result. On behalf of my colleagues at the Indonesia Project, I thank all of our authors for their fine contributions. I also thank all of our referees, whose generous assistance helps us to maintain very high academic standards. Finally, I thank our publishers, Routledge, of the Taylor & Francis Group, for their wonderful support over the last nine years.
Forthcoming Indonesia Study Group meeting July 2, 2009
Posted by Ross McLeod in Indonesia Study Group.Tags: elections, Indonesia, politics
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Wednesday 15 July, 12.30 to 2.00 pm, Seminar Room B, Coombs Building, ANU
Hadi Soesastro CSIS, Jakarta
The 2009 Presidential Elections in Indonesia: Interpreting the Outcome
The committee welcomes suggestions for seminar speakers and topics. Please contact any of us: Ed Aspinall x 55915; Greg Fealy x 52302; John McCarthy x 50494; Budy Resosudarmo x 52244; Ditya Nurdianto x 56215, Marcus Mietzner x 57241
If you would like to be added to the ISG mailing list, please send your contact details, including your email address, to indonesia.project@anu.edu.au
Postdoctoral Research Fellowships in Indonesian Economics June 23, 2009
Posted by Budy Resosudarmo in News from the Indonesia Project.Tags: economy, Indonesia, research fellowship
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The Australian Agency for International Development (AusAID) aims to encourage research on the Indonesian economy and, in the longer term, to expand the number of young Australians with a close familiarity with Indonesia and its economy. To this end, it is offering funding to assist with the establishment of two postdoctoral research fellow positions at any Australian university to undertake serious analytical work on any aspect of Indonesia’s economic development, and to collaborate with the Indonesia Project in the Arndt-Corden Division of Economics, Research School of Pacific and Asian Studies, ANU College of Asia and the Pacific, at the Australian National University. The Indonesia Project has received funding from AusAID to administer this program.
Funding is available to the amount of $50,000 per annum per post for up to three years. The holders of the posts will be called Postdoctoral Research Fellows in Indonesian Economics. Continued support of these posts for each successive year will be subject to satisfactory performance, as determined annually by the AusAID–Indonesia Project Research Fellowship Committee.
Applications may be submitted either by individuals or Australian universities. Individual applicants should nominate the Australian university that will host their position and cover the remaining costs. Candidates proposed by universities that apply for these grants must be approved by the AusAID–Indonesia Project Research Fellowship Committee. Candidates need not have previous knowledge of Indonesia and its economy, but should hold a PhD degree in economics or a closely related field.
The Postdoctoral Research Fellows will be expected to visit Indonesia for the purpose of collecting data and other information for their research projects, and to acquire basic fluency in the Indonesian language to assist them in their work. They will be required to produce at least four academic papers on the Indonesian economy, or economic policy or the economics of governance in Indonesia. In addition, they will be required to present one of their papers in an Arndt-Corden Division of Economics seminar in Canberra about one and half years into the fellowship period and another at the end of the third year. Finally, it is expected that the Fellows will author one of the ‘Survey of Recent Developments’ articles for the Bulletin of Indonesian Economic Studies and participate in activities of the Indonesia Project. Successful applicants are required to spend two weeks a year with the Indonesia Project as visiting fellows.
Individuals and universities interested in applying for these grants should send their CV and proposals before 30 September 2009 to the Head of the Indonesia Project as Chairman of the AusAID–Indonesia Project Research Fellowship Committee:
Head, Indonesia Project
The Arndt-Corden Division of Economics
Research School of Pacific and Asian Studies
ANU College of Asia and the Pacific
The Australian National University
Canberra, ACT 0200
Australia
Email: Indonesia.Project@anu.edu.au Fax: +61 2 6125 3700
Website: http://rspas.anu.edu.au/economics/ip/
PhD Scholarships in Indonesian Economics June 23, 2009
Posted by Budy Resosudarmo in News from the Indonesia Project.Tags: economy, Indonesia, PhD research
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The Australian Agency for International Development (AusAID) aims to encourage research at PhD level on the Indonesian economy and, in the longer term, to expand the number of young Australians with a close familiarity with Indonesia and its economy. To this end, it is offering two three-year PhD scholarships to conduct doctoral research on the Indonesian economy and participate in the activities of the Indonesia Project in the Arndt-Corden Division of Economics, Research School of Pacific and Asian Studies, ANU College of Asia and the Pacific, at the Australian National University. The Indonesia Project has received funding from AusAID to administer this program.
Prospective PhD scholars who are interested in undertaking doctoral research on any aspect of the economy, economic policy or economics of governance of Indonesia in a well-established PhD program in Economics at any Australian university with a demonstrated strong commitment to work on the Southeast Asian economies are invited to apply for PhD Scholarships to the value of $25,000 per annum for up to three years. Continuation of the scholarship will be subject to satisfactory performance as determined annually by the AusAID–Indonesia Project PhD Scholarship Committee. This scholarship cannot be held in conjunction with any other full PhD scholarship.
Australian citizens or permanent residents of Australia are eligible to apply. Applicants should have been offered a place in a PhD economics program at any Australian university that has the capacity to support and supervise doctoral research on the Indonesian economy.
Successful applicants will be subject to the normal requirements for completion of a PhD program at the host university. In addition funding will be provided to undertake up to three months of fieldwork in Indonesia for the purpose of collecting data and other information for their doctoral research, and to acquire basic fluency in the Indonesian language to assist them in their work. The successful applicants will be required to present a mid-term research report to the AusAID–Indonesia Project PhD Scholarship Committee in Canberra about a year and a half into the scholarship and to present a seminar on their research in the Arndt-Corden Division of Economics at the end of the third year. Successful applicants are also required to present their research during their candidature in at least one international forum not related to their home university or the Indonesia Project. Finally, it is expected that the successful applicants will participate in activities of the Indonesia Project. This includes presenting their work at an Indonesia Study Group seminar upon completion of fieldwork, and/or attending the ANU’s Annual Indonesia Update conference.
Applicants should send a letter of application, proof of acceptance into a PhD economics program at any Australian university, their CV and transcripts of academic record by 30 October 2009 to the Head of the Indonesia Project as Chairman of the AusAID–Indonesia Project PhD Scholarship Committee:
Head, Indonesia Project
The Arndt-Corden Division of Economics
Research School of Pacific and Asian Studies
ANU College of Asia and the Pacific
The Australian National University
Canberra, ACT 0200
Australia
Email: Indonesia.Project@anu.edu.au Fax: +61 2 6125 3700
Website: http://rspas.anu.edu.au/economics/ip/
Protests About Neoliberalism June 16, 2009
Posted by Peter McCawley in Essays and Comments.Tags: Add new tag, economy, Indonesia, neoliberalism, politics
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The debate about “neoliberalism” in Indonesia is quite puzzling. It is hard to understand exactly what the protesters are demonstrating about. But thinking about it, there seem to be at least two main issues. These are (1) Does what the opponents of “neoliberalism” in Indonesia say make economic sense?, and (2) What are their basic concerns?
ECONOMIC CONSIDERATIONS. The first question can be dealt with quite quickly. To put things simply, what the opponents of neoliberalism in Indonesia seem to be saying does not seem make much economic sense at all. Their main slogans seem focus on opposition to “free markets.”
But “free markets” has very little to do with western economics, or the IMF or the World Bank. There are, actually, very few “free markets” in western OECD countries. In practice, there is a very large degree of government intervention in western OECD economies. Somebody once joked that McDonald’s need to comply with 30,000 regulations just to make a McDonald’s hamburger. It’s an exaggeration, of course, but the point is that if you trace back through all of the markets that lie behind a McDonald’s hamburger (agriculture markets, labour markets, building markets, transport, and so on), the total number of regulations is certainly in the 1,000s, and probably over 10,000. It’s just wrong to call this sort of thing “free markets.”
In addition, of course, there is a great deal of intervention in other ways. We are witnessing huge budgetary and regulatory interventions in financial markets during the current global financial crisis.
In fact, it is quite hard to find a “free market” in most OECD economies! Most markets in most OECD countries are quite closely regulated.
BASIC CONCERNS. So what is the fuss about? Clearly the demonstrators are worried about something. What is it?
It may be that the real issue that they are concerned about is power. Perhaps they are concerned about the political issue of who has power in Indonesia. If this is true, their concerns become easier to understand, even if their opposition to free markets is misplaced.
There are some indications that the real concerns of the protesters closely mirror debates which have been at the heart of political discussion for centuries in many other countries. In other countries, these debates have concerned the distribution of power (a) within a country, and (b) between local centres of power and foreigners.
On (a) the distribution of power within a country, much of the debate in many countries in the past has concerned the way markets work – and in particular, the way markets for capital and labour have worked. In the past, in many countries domestic groups (often workers and small peasants) felt that “big capitalists” were exploiting them. These groups often turned to political methods, including forming political parties in order to win government, to obtain redress. The labour and trade union movement in many western countries in the late 19th century decided to seek political power in order to combat what was seen as the power of capitalists. As a result, there was a very deep division for over 100 years in many western countries between the groups of pro-market capitalists, on one hand, and pro-political labour on the other. This great struggle between capital and labour was a very important part of the politics of western countries for at least a century (Marx, obviously, contributed to it in a major way). It would be hardly surprising if large numbers of the ordinary people in Indonesia (wong cilik) feel that “big capital” is exploiting them, or that the government should be providing more protection against the “rapacious” behaviour of pro-market entrepreneurs (tengkulak such as money-lenders and traders, corruptors, big business, and so on).
In many countries, there has also been an important debate about (b) the influence of foreigners on national affairs. Many people everywhere are opposed to the idea of foreigners having too much influence within their country. (There have been several cases recently in Australia. A Mexican American was a chief executive of the Australian Telstra company between 2005-2009 and this proved to be unpopular with many people. And there has recently been much concern about a proposed large Chinese investment in Rio Tinto.) If part of the real debate in Indonesia about neoliberalism and the IMF is really about the broader issue of foreign control (through finance, and in other ways) in Indonesia then this, too, at least becomes easier to understand.
Book launch: Working With Nature Against Poverty: Development, Resources and the Environment in Eastern Indonesia June 11, 2009
Posted by Ross McLeod in News from the Indonesia Project.Tags: climate change, Indonesia, natural resources, poverty
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The Indonesia Project, Research School of Pacific & Asian Studies, cordially invites you to the launch of Working With Nature Against Poverty: Development, Resources and the Environment in Eastern Indonesia, edited by Budy P Resosudarmo and Frank Jotzo, published by the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies
Friday 19 June, 4.00pm, in the Foyer of the Hedley Bull Centre, ANU
The book will be launched by H.E. Mr. Primo Alui Joelianto, Ambassador of the Republic of Indonesia, and Prof Hal Hill, the Arndt-Corden Division of Economics.
With its low incomes, lagging social indicators and widespread poverty, eastern Indonesia epitomizes the problems of development in Indonesia. The challenge is to advance the economy. But this means more intensive use of natural resources, placing pressure on the region’s unique ecosystems.
This book explores the trade-offs and synergies between development, social concerns and the environment in Papua, Maluku and East Nusa Tenggara. It is written by leading scholars and experts on the region. They investigate the dilemmas of fishing in eastern Indonesia’s seas, the strategies and challenges for mining and forestry, and the efforts to tackle biodiversity conservation and climate change. The book lays out the challenges for development, public administration and public health in Papua. It maps Maluku’s road to recovery from conflict. And it examines ways to alleviate poverty in the desperately poor province of East Nusa Tenggara. The book provides an overview of the economy of each of these provinces.
The Indonesia Project thanks AusAID for its support.
Neoliberalism: what is it? June 11, 2009
Posted by theekw in Essays and Comments.Tags: Indonesia, neoliberalism, politics, thee kian wie
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Thee Kian Wie
Recently, there has been a lot of debate about neoliberalism in the mass media, mostly with a negative connotation. In particular, Dr Boediono was immediately attacked as a neoliberal when selected as running mate of presidential candidate Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono. He was even slandered as a ‘foreign lackey’ (antek asing) who was always ready to do the bidding of the IMF and the World Bank to the detriment of Indonesia’s national interests. Implied in the criticism of being an adherent of neoliberalism is the unfounded accusation that a neoliberal economic technocrat will leave everything to the workings of the free market, without any government intervention.
Unfortunately, most people using the term ‘neoliberalism’ have only the faintest idea, if at all, what the term actually means. Instead of engaging the public in an informed debate about the many economic challenges facing Indonesia, political parties now engage in mud-slinging and bombastic slogans — like fostering a ‘people-based economy’ (ekonomi kerakyatan) — without spelling out what kind of policies this involves. These kinds of political tactics are very harmful for Indonesia’s young democracy, and not conducive to the political education of the Indonesian people.
The debate about economic policy, particularly industrial policy, in developing countries, mostly revolves about the workings of the market mechanism and ‘market failures’—that is, deficiencies in the markets—which lead to economic distortions. If market failures are evident, there may be some justification for government intervention to correct these failures. However, the empirical evidence suggests that well-meaning government intervention often leads to ‘government failures’, resulting in waste and inefficiency that is often worse than that caused by the market failures it tried to address.
Among the many adherents of neoliberalism, two groups can be distinguished in their approach to economic policy. The adherents of ‘pure neoliberalism’ hold that all markets basically function perfectly. Hence, government intervention is not required, since it will only lead to distortions in the allocation of resources in these markets.
The second group emphasise moderate neoliberalism. These moderate neoliberals acknowledge the existence of market failures, particularly in developing countries, which may require active government intervention or policy support. These interventions may be functional (neutral) or selective. Functional (neutral) interventions are those which are supportive of market-based solutions (which Chalmers Johnson called ‘market-enhancing interventions’ or what the World Bank called ‘market-friendly interventions’), such as providing basic education or infrastructure services).
Selective interventions, on the other hand, are those that are aimed at promoting or prioritising certain activities, such as hi-tech industries and particular ‘strategic’ technologies, the financing of ‘mission-oriented’ research, the granting of infant industry protection or subsidies, and the channeling of investment into particular activities. However, these selective interventions require enormous skills, information and discipline on the part of the government. They are also prone to rent-seeking activities and pressure groups.
It is for these reasons that moderate neoliberals in developing countries prefer functional, rather than selective interventions to tackle market failures. They are aware that selective interventions are prone to capture by vested interests, as there has been ample evidence that this has occurred in many developing countries, including Indonesia.
Unlike the adherents of moderate neoliberalism, the adherents of structuralism in developing countries hold that economic policies, notably industrial policy, require both functional and selective government interventions to overcome existing market failures and achieve national objectives. These can include the ‘deepening’ of a country’s industrial structure, and the development of ‘basic’ industries and a number of ‘strategic’ industries’, such as the South Korean and Taiwanese governments have pursued in the recent past.
It is not for me to judge whether the highly competent economic technocrats of the present SBY-JK government (Boediono, Sri Mulyani and Mari Pangestu) are adherents of the moderate or structuralist approaches to economic policy. However, they are certainly not so naive or ignorant of economic realities as to be adherents of the ‘pure neoliberalism’ approach. For this reason it is quite irresponsible to hurl the neoliberal epithet at them without realising that there are basic differences in the approach to economic policy between ‘pure’ neoliberals and the ‘moderate’ neoliberals.
(This is a subtantially revised version of a column which appeared in Indonesian in KOMPAS daily, 26 May 2009, Jakarta).
Obama on Religion and Democracy June 6, 2009
Posted by Ross McLeod in Essays and Comments.Tags: democracy, Indonesia, religious tolerance
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News reporting tends to be dominated by soundbites, so few will get to hear or read all the details of President Obama’s press conference following his landmark speech in Cairo on 4 June. That’s a shame. I think the following passage is well worth reading…
EXCERPT FROM ROUNDTABLE INTERVIEW OF PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA WITH REGIONAL REPORTERS
Cairo University, Cairo, Egypt
June 4, 2009
‘What I tried to communicate in the speech and what I believe very strongly is that in an interdependent world like ours, where the world has shrunk and different peoples with different faiths and different ideas are constantly having to coexist, we have to have a mature faith that says “I believe with all my heart and all my soul in what I believe, but I respect the fact that somebody else believes their beliefs just as strongly.” And so the only way that we are going to live together, or operate in a political system that can work for everybody, is if we have certain rules about how we relate to each other.
‘I can’t force my religion on you. I can’t try to organize a majority to discriminate against you because you’re a religious minority. I can’t simply take what’s in my religious beliefs and say you have to believe and abide by these same things. Now, that doesn’t mean that I can’t make arguments that are based on my belief and my faith — right? If I’m a Christian, I believe in the Ten Commandments. And it says, Thou Shalt Not Kill. If I’m a politician and I say I’m going to pass a law against murdering somebody, that’s not me practicing my religious faith; that’s me practicing morality that may be based in religious faith, but that’s a universal principle — or at least one that can translate into a principle that people of various faiths can agree on.
‘I think it’s very important for Islam to wrestle with these issues. Now, I recognize that not all religious beliefs are going to be exactly the same in how they think about politics. And so in Islam there’s a debate about sharia and how strict an interpretation or how moderate an interpretation of that should be; or should that be something that is not part of the secular law. I don’t presume to make that decision for any country or any group of people. But I do think that if you start having rules that guarantee other faiths and other groups, or in the case of the United States, people with no faith at all, are somehow forced to abide by somebody else’s faith, I think that is a violation of the spirit of democracy and I think that over the long term, that’s going to breed conflict in some way. It will lead to some sort of instability and destructiveness in that society.
‘But, as I said, I think this is a important debate that has to take place inside Islam. I think in the meantime, the one thing I can say for certain is that people who justify killing other people based on faith are misreading their sacred texts. And I think they are out of alignment with God. Now, that’s my belief. And that, I think, is a debate that I think is settled for the vast majority of Muslims. But we have a very small minority that can be very destructive, and that’s part of what I tried to discuss in my speech.’
The Politics of Abortion in Indonesia June 3, 2009
Posted by Ross McLeod in News from the Indonesia Project.Tags: abortion, Add new tag, Indonesia, politics, public health
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Seminar announcement: Australian Demographic & Social Research Institute
Tuesday 9 June, 3.30 – 5.00pm, Seminar room A, HC Coombs Building
Professor Terence Hull
John C. Caldwell Professor of Population, Health and Development
ADSRI and National Centre for Epidemiology and Population Health
Abstract
Abortion presents a confused challenge to the public health and legal systems of Indonesia. In the run-up to the April legislative elections the front pages of Jakarta newspapers were filled with stories about a political issue that no politician wanted to touch: the arrest of ten individuals associated with an illegal abortion clinic. The newspapers stressed the immorality of abortion, but could not explain the nature of the legal charges. There were clearly violations against medical certification, status of clinics, and medical practice rules, but there was little clarity to be found in statues related to abortion. Yet, while the public were enthralled by this story there was irony in the contrast between the reports of this abortion arrest compared to the nature and scale of the actual abortion problem in Indonesia. It is variously argued that one to two million abortions take place each year. Most are unsafe, being carried out by traditional healers or uncertified medical practitioners. There are no representative statistics on the characteristics of women seeking pregnancy termination. Since the mid 1970s, committed activists around the country have pressed to have the legal status of abortion reformed and the clinical setting of procedures improved, but to little avail. This paper will review the recent developments, and some failures, in the task of abortion law reform and the prevention of unsafe abortions.
Neo-liberalism June 3, 2009
Posted by Ross McLeod in Essays and Comments.Tags: elections, Indonesia, Neo-liberalism
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Not only in Indonesia is neoliberalism a hot topic. I just came across an interesting essay on the subject by Oliver Marc Hartwich. The following short passage pretty much sums up the use (or misuse) of the term in the context of the current presidential election in Indonesia:
‘If neoliberalism is hardly ever defined, if it can mean anything you wish to disagree with, then it is understandable that it results not from an attempt to gain theoretical knowledge but from the desire to defame your political opponents. In this way, the neoliberal label has become part of political rhetoric, albeit as an almost meaningless insult.’
Is it too much to ask that people should focus on the substance of policies promised by the various contenders, and on the likelihood they will be able to deliver promised policy outcomes, rather than satisfying themselves by merely attaching this meaningless label to particular candidates?