PROBLEMS OF REGIONAL AUTONOMY
IN CONTEMPORARY INDONESIA
JOHN D. LEGGE
INTERIM REPORTS SERIES
MODERN INDONESIA PROJECT
Southeast Asia Program
Department of Far Eastern Studies
Cornell University
Ithaca, New York
Price — $1.50
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Λ...A Note Concerning the Interim Reports Series
One of the distressing aspects of contemporary scholarship is the substantial interval that often intervenes between
the completion of field research and the first appearance of writings descriptive of its findings. American scholarship
relating to Indonesia has been no exception, and here this delay has been particularly regrettable inasmuch as the
extent of research being undertaken is so limited. With respect to much of the research carried out in post-revolu-
tionary Indonesia there has been a lag of two to three or more years between the termination of field work and the
first publication describing its results. From this situation stem a number of unfortunate consequences. Scholars and
others having a serious interest in the country, Indonesians as well as Americans, are sometimes required to wait so
long before seeing the results of such research that when finally available its importance to> them has appreciably
diminished. Moreover, because they are kept for so long in the dark as to the course and character of this earlier but
as yet unreported work, they frequently are obliged to spend time in unnecessarily laying foundations their predeces-
sors have laid but not yet divulged and in undertaking analysis of data similar to that already collected and analyzed
or largely analyzed. Thus all too often contemporary students of Indonesia waste much precious time and effort in
duplicating or roughly duplicating what has already been done or is in the process of being completed, instead of
utilizing such materials, building on them, and possibly refining them. Parenthetically it might be observed that some
of those perfectionists who insist that their name appear in print only when attached to a body of material wherein
each word has been given its final polish are deprived of what might well have been healthy and useful criticism
by those who would have been interested in reading their work at some earlier stage of its processing. Also this
reluctance to publish findings sooner sometimes puzzles Indonesians, because frequently for several years they look in
vain for some published account of research for which they smoothed the way or in which they actually participated.
Consequently some of them tend to doubt the usefulness of American scholars undertaking research in their country.
The object of the Cornell Modern Indonesia Project’s Interim Reports Series is to avoid insofar as possible the
situation described above. Wherever feasible those undertaking research in connection with our project will prepare
preliminary reports concerning salient aspects of their study well before publication of their relatively finished mono-
graphs or articles. Our object, then, is to make available in provisional form what we believe to be some of the more
important of our findings soon enough to be of maximum usefulness to others engaging in studies relating to Indo-
nesia or having a serious interest in the topics with which our work is concerned. It is our hope that by doing so we
will be of help both to interested Indonesians and to students of Indonesia in the United States and other countries.
In thus submitting Interim Reports for early publication the members of our group will generally be doing so prior
to command of all relevant data or before this data has been completely analyzed. Certainly they will be submitting
them without having had an opportunity to cast them in finished written form. It should therefore be emphasized
that these preliminary reports are to be considered as explicitly tentative and provisional in character. It is our
expectation that most of them will be followed by later publications bearing on the same subject of a less tentative
and more solid character. We hope that our Interim Reports will elicit candid and open criticism from interested
persons reading them. For we believe that thereby we will benefit, and that in many cases such criticisms will point
the way to better analysis of the data in hand and/or further research on facets of the subject so far not adequately
covered. Thus we cordially invite and welcome such criticism. We would appreciate it if those inclined to offer it
would write to the author in question, c/o Cornell Modern Indonesia Project, Southeast Asia Program, Department
of Far Eastern Studies, Cornell University, Ithaca, New York.
George McT. Kahin
DirectorPROBLEMS OF REGIONAL AUTONOMY
IN CONTEMPORARY INDONESIA
John D. Legge
INTERIM REPORTS SERIES
Modern Indonesia Project
Southeast Asia Program
Department of Far Eastern Studies
Cornell University
Ithaca, New York
1957·*
© 1957 by John D. LeggeIll
PREFACE
This Interim Report represents the preliminary phase
of a study by Dr. John Legge of regional problems and de-
centralization in Indonesia. While it concerns the same
general subject dealt with by Gerald Maryanov in his Interim
Report of March 1957 (Decentralization in Indonesia: Legis-
lative Aspects), it is more historical in approach and gives
considerably greater emphasis to functional—in contrast to
legal—aspects of decentralization. In addition, being based
upon later field research, it incorporates more recent data.
A second monograph by Dr. Legge based upon further field
research is scheduled, with the expectation that it will
be published in late 1958 or early 1959. The author of
this report holds a Ph.D. in History from Oxford University
and is a faculty member of the Department of History at the
University of Western Australia.
Ithaca, New York
July 25, 1957
George McT. Kahin
Director4V
TABLE OF CONTENTS
CHAPTER
I.
II.
INTRODUCTORY. ................................
BASIC LEGISLATION FOR THE PROVISIONAL PERIOD.
R. I. Law 22 of 1948..............
Units of Local Government.............. . .
Institutions of Local Government.........
N
Special Regions...............
The Position of Kepala Daerah,
Central Supervision............
I. T. Law 44 of 1950.........
III.
IV.
THE PERIOD OF TRANSITION: FORMAL ARRANGEMENTS
1950-56........................
THE TRANSITIONAL SYSTEM IN OPERATION, 1956,
Councils and Their Composition...........
The Kepala Daerah............
Powers.......................
Organizational Complications,
Finance.....................
Civil Service...............
Assessment......
An East Indonesian Contrast.
Powers....................
Administrative Service....
Kepala Daerah.............
Page
1
4
5
5
7
8
9
12
14
16
26
26
31
34
38
41
42
44
46
47
48
48VI
CHAPTER	Page
V.	THE NEW BASIC LAW. .................................	50
The Problem of Supervision.......................	50	<
The Problem of the Third Level...................	58
VI.	PROVINCIAL AUTONOMY AND REGIONAL FEELING...........	63
APPENDIX. ..................................................	71
A.	Map ................................................	71Vll
FOREWORD
The following essay is based in part upon observations
made during a six months’ visit to Indonesia between August
1956 and January 1957. After an initial period of five weeks
spent in the Autonomy and Decentralization Division, Ministry
of Internal Affairs, visits were made to three provinces—
East Java, Central Sumatra and Sulawesi--where, through the
courtesy of local officials, facilities were provided for
the study of the local government system at all levels.
While it is necessary to draw attention to these geographical
limitations of the enquiry, the three provinces were deliber-
ately selected as samples with a view to enabling the study
of varied and contrasting situations, and the observations
made in the paper are couched in general terms. A further
qualification must be made. The visits to Central Sumatra
and Sulawesi were concluded before the changes of government
in those provinces in December 1956 and March 1957. The
comments referring specifically to the situations in these
provinces have therefore been outstripped by events. It may
be assumed, however, that the more permanent problems of
local government planning will remain, and it has been
thought desirable to describe the situations in the two areas
as they were observed, except that some reference to subse-
quent changes is made in the concluding section of the paper.
As an Interim Report, this paper necessarily raises
more questions than it can attempt to answer. The role of
political parties in the local sphere, for example, is a
subject in itself. In particular, party activities at the
kabupaten level must necessarily be of the greatest importance
m preparing for the establishment of third-level governments.
Again, there is need for more extensive investigation of
the role of the pamong pradja in the provisional local govern-
ment system as it was established under R. I. Law 22 of 1948.
The opinions expressed on this point in the following pages
are tentative and need further testing. Of more fundamental
importance for the whole study is the problem of the innumer-
able variations in the character of the village throughout
the archipelago. The extent to which individual villages
may be ready to participate with their neighbors in the
establishment of the basic level of local government remains
at the moment an open question which can probably be answered
only through gradual experiment. But much light could be
thrown on the problem by comparative studies in different
areas. These questions and others like them can only receive
tentative treatment in the following pages.Vlll
I would like to express my thanks to the Carnegie Cor-
poration of New York, the Cornell Modern Indonesia Project
and the University of Western Australia for their assistance
in making this study possible, and to the officers of the
Indonesian Ministry of Internal Affairs who gave active
assistance and encouragement to the enquiry.
University of Western Australia
May 1957
John D. Legge1
CHAPTER I
INTRODUCTORY
The circumstances of Indonesia's struggle for independence,
and especially the Dutch tactic of attempting to rally support
outside Java by pressing for the establishment of a federal state
to which sovereignty would be transferred, gave the question of
local government in Indonesia a controversial character which it
still possesses. The wide variety of regional differences to be
found in the archipelago provided Holland with a basis for her
claim that only a federal system would meet the needs of the
country. To the de facto Republic which had proclaimed its inde-
pendence from Holland on August 17th, 1945, however, such an
argument appeared as an unconvincing disguise for a determina-
tion on the part of the Dutch to divide and rule—either to
split the nationalist movement apart or, failing that, to retain
as much influence as possible by capitalizing on the regional
feelings of the Outer Provinces. The Republic, claiming to
represent the authentic voice of Indonesia, therefore opposed
a federal solution, at first unsuccessfully. When sovereignty
was transferred to Indonesia in 1949 it was, in fact, transferred
to a federal state—the Republic of the United States of Indonesia--
amongst the constituent members of which were the states (negaras)
and special regions (daerah istemewa) set up hastily by Holland
during the previous years in the areas under her control. The
original "Republic of Indonesia," much truncated, was merely one
member of the federation. But the ideal of a unitary republic
remained an important nationalist aspiration, and within a few
months, partly through the process of merging the individual
negaras into the old Republic and partly through the decision of
the TecTeral parliament itself, the federal state was transformed
into the unitary "Republic of Indonesia."
Though the member states of the federal republic thus volun-
tarily agreed to vote themselves out of existence, the regional
feelings which the Dutch had sought to manipulate during the years
of revolution were genuine enough, and were not eliminated over-
night by the constitutional change. In consequence the new
Republic was forced to profess its intention to concede a large
measure of regional autonomy within the unitary state. (1) Progress
(1) Local autonomy was promised in the provisional constitution of
1950.
Article 131 (1) The Division of Indonesia into large and
small regions possessing the right to control their affairs
(autonomous) together with the form of their governmental
arrangements will be fixed by law having regard to the repre-
sentative and deliberative system of the state.
(2) To each region will be given the greatest
possible degree of autonomy for the management of its own
affairs.2
in making good this profession has been slow, A provisional local
government system was established in Java and parts of Sumatra
and Borneo on the basis of a law passed in 1948 by the original,
pre-federation Republic of Indonesia, and in the remainder of the
archipelago on the basis of a 1950 law of the State of East Indo-
nesia, the largest of the negaras established by the Dutch. The
former law was intended to~provide the pattern eventually for the
whole of Indonesia. As will be seen in the following pages, these
two basic laws were never implemented in full, and pressure continued
for the creation of a permanent system of local, government in
which genuine autonomy would be conceded. It was not until November
1956, however, that a new basic law was accepted by parliament. The
new law represented a third attack on the problem. In 1954 an
earlier draft bill failed to secure parliamentary approval. In
1956 a revised draft was prepared, but this too was the subject of
far-reaching amendment before a final draft was accepted.
Indonesia's plan for extensive local autonomy within the frame-
work of a unitary state has often been discussed as though it
represented the Republic's answer to the Dutch federal proposals of
1946-9—as though, that is to say, the two alternatives were con-
cerned with precisely the same problems of government. This is
misleading. The Dutch case depended on two arguments--that relating
to the obvious supremacy of Java in terms of population concentra-
tion and sophistication, and that relating to the diversity of
ethnic groups and social organization throughout the archipelago.
Though often bracketed together, the two points are quite distinct.
It is true that the Dutch federal proposals and the Indonesian
plan for decentralization were both concerned with the first of
these points—the problem of "Java versus the rest." Javanese
predominance might, theoretically, be balanced either by the forma-
tion of other states and the creation of a federal system, or,
alternatively, by the granting of wide powers of self-government
within the framework of a unitary system, However, the second
problem--that of Indonesian diversity—is a problem of a different
character. While it is true that great diversity does exist from
area to area—a diversity expressed in language differences,
differences in social organization, differences in religious
belief, differences in material culture, etc,--it is also the case
that, outside the cities, the effective political and social units,
based on traditional, groupings , are usually very small in area and
population, extending barely beyond the village or complex of
villages. This problem would not be touched by the creation of a
federation which would have to be composed of units of reasonable
size and competence. It was impossible for the Dutch, in their
attempt to establish such regional states after the war, to find
any basis in customary organization on which to build, and the
results of their efforts remained artificial in character. Even
if it could have been argued that, given time, the new states
would have developed a community of interest, based at the least
upon a broad regional consciousness the problem of local admini-
stration for a diversity of peoples and cultures would still not
have been solved. It would still have been necessary, within each
state, to meet local needs by the concession of further autonomy3
to a more Immediate local level. Thus , though the federal proposals
of the Dutch and the decentralization proposals of the Republic
were each concerned, in a sense, with regional autonomy, they were
not concerned with it in the same sense. While the federal idea
related to the problem of limiting the power of a central govern-
ment and balancing the power of Java by the establishment of other
states, it did not really offer a solution to the more basic
difficulty posed by the existence of a multitude of small and di- .
verse units. By contrast the local government plans of the
Republic, while they have included a recognition of the fears of
Java's dominance, have been directed equally towards the diffi-
culties arising from the smallness and diversity of character of
the local unit.
Following from this it may be argued, in extreme form, that
the task facing the central Government of Indonesia today is that
of extending its authority to the base of society, of securing
"government in general" in a situation where immediate local
consciousness is much stronger than any feeling of national identity
The planning of a local government system reflects the difficulty.
Attempts have been made to combine the surrender of powers to local
authorities with the retention of a considerable measure of central
supervision and guidance, until such time as local governments
themselves may become instruments which can assist in the main-
tenance of central authority. This may prove a contradictory
task. In any case the Republic's plans for local autonomy have,
in consequence, something of a colonial flavor about them. This
is true not merely in form—the system of units and organization
used at the local level today stems from, and bears many detailed
resemblances to, programs of administrative and political decen-
tralization in Indonesia before the war—but also in essence.
Even though Indonesia is now an independent sovereign state its
task at the local level is not altogether different from that of
an alien government attempting to establish and preserve its
authority in the "subject" society, at least regarding those
matters which touch its own interests. And this affects the form
in which local self-government may be developed.
This view, stated somewhat uncompromisingly here, may be
tested by reference to two issues which have proved to be major
ones in the drafting of a local government law--the question of
central Government supervision over autonomous local bodies, and
the question of forming or selecting a basic geographical unit of
local government. It is proposed, in this paper, to outline
briefly the original legislation for local autonomy, to examine
the formal implementation and the actual workings of local govern-
ment during a period of transition, and then to give particular
attention to these two issues, which affect primarily the two
lower levels of autonomy. Finally attention will be given to the
"federal" problem arising from the persistence of broad regional
feelings and of regional resistance to the center. This problem
relates to the first level of autonomy.4
CHAPTER II
BASIC LEGISLATION FOR THE PROVISIONAL PERIOD
In approaching the question of local self-government in
Indonesia it is possible and helpful to make a preliminary dis-
tinction between two broad types of situation to be found in the
archipelago. On the one hand there are the areas such as Java,
Madura, and, to a lesser extent, Sumatra and Borneo, where the
central government, both in colonial times and at present, has
maintained its own centralized administrative system reaching
right down to the basic territorial unit—the village. Secondly
there are the areas such as the greater part of Celebes, the
Moluccas and the Lesser Sundas, where agreements between the
Indies Government and local rulers (Long or Short Contracts)
granted a degree of recognition to self-governing states (swapradja)
within the colonial framework, and where the lower administrative
structure was thus more independent of the center. In the first
type of situation, immediately above the desa, negeri, or other
basic unit of village organization, stood the central government
or at least its lower administrative reaches. In the second
type of situation the meeting place between the government and the
governed was not the village but the self-governing state. Above
the swapradja stood the government. Below it lay its own admini-
strative-organization, maintaining contact with the village. The
ruler of a self-governing state possessed some little measure of
independence but he was required to enforce decisions of the Indies
government. Both geographically and politically this distinction
can only be maintained in very broad terms. In the western part
of the archipelago there were self-governing states—the four
states of Java, for instance--and in the eastern part there were
areas under direct rule. Further, there were wide differences in
size and competence and organization between one self-governing
state and another, just as there were innumerable forms of social
organization for the directly ruled communities. But, in spite of
exceptions, an awareness of the broad distinction between the two
types of situation, and of the fact that the two were, on the whole,
geographically separate also, is important for an understanding
of post-war experiments in local government. It has proved diffi-
cult for the independent Republic of Indonesia to prepare a uniform
system which can be applied to the whole country. The fact that,
in the eastern islands, the State of East Indonesia (Negara
Indonesia Timur) created by the Dutch during the revolutionary
period had already prepared its own local government system before
the formation of the unitary state in 1950, has added further com-
plications. It is proposed here to give attention primarily to
the local government law of the original Republic of Indonesia—
R. I. Law 22 of 1948—as that law, since August 1950, has been
applied to Java, Sumatra and Borneo, and has served as a model for
the drafting of a new basic law for the whole country. The corre-
sponding local government law for the State of East Indonesia—5
N. I. T. Law 44 of 1950--which has continued to operate in the
remainder of the country, will be referred to briefly by way of
comparison and contrast only. These two laws were both "basic
laws" (undang-undang pokok); further legislation was required
actually to establish thesystems of local government for which
they provided.
R.I. Law 22 of 1948
Units of Local Government
In laying down the basic forms which were intended to provide
the pattern for the eventual development of autonomous local
governments in Indonesia, Law 22 of 1948 took, as its point of
departure, the extremely centralized administrative system which
the Republic had carried over in its essentials from the pre-war
Dutch administrative system as it had existed in Java. Now, as
then, the administrative hierarchy consists of six levels by which
authority is passed down from the central Government to the
localities. The island is divided into provinces, each under a
Governor. Provinces in turn are divided into residencies under
Residents. Residencies are divided into kabupatens (regencies)
under Bupatis. Kabupatens are divided into kewedanaan (districts)
under Wedanas. Kewedanaan are divided into ketjamatans (sub-
dis tricts) under”Tjamats. And, finally, each ketjamatan is
composed of a number of desas or village complexes at the head of
each of which is an elected official, the Lurah. At the apex of
the pyramid stands the Ministry of Internal Affairs. With the
exception of the Lurah, who is strictly a village official, the
officers administering this pyramid of territorial divisions form
a distinct administrative service of the central Government—the
pamong pradja. (1) It is an important feature of the post-revolu-
tionary situation that the service, in becoming completely
Indonesian, has inherited something of the paternal traditions of
the European colonial administrator.
Law 22 sought to modify the extreme centralization of this
administrative system by transforming three of the levels of the
(1) In colonial times the regent, formerly a hereditary office, was
the highest level of the service in Java to be staffed by
Indonesians. Above that level administrative officials—
Governors and Residents--were Dutch. The pattern varied out-
side Java. In Sumatra, for instance, the European service
penetrated one stage lower. Sumatra was a "Government" divided
into residencies. Beneath the residents assistant residents
administered a territorial division approximating roughly to
a Javanese regency. Beneath that division in turn a European
controller administered a lower sub-division, below which came
districts and sub-districts under native officials. In areas
where local rulers were recognized by the Indies Government,
European officers advised and guided the internal administration
of the principality.6
hierarchy into levels of local self-government. The levels in
question were the province, the kabupaten and the desa. Provinces,
kabupatens and desas were to become "self-governing regions"
(daerah swatantra) possessing wide powers of autonomy over their
own affairs. Provision was made also for municipal governments at
two levels. Large towns were to be equivalent in status to a
kabupaten and small towns were to be equivalent to a desa. A
distinction was made between two types of power to be exercised
by a swatantra. There was the right to deal with matters described
as the "household affairs" (rumah tangga) of the region. (2) In
these matters the regions were to exercise powers of autonomy.
Secondly there were other fields in which local governments might
perform an auxiliary role, assisting in the execution of central
government tasks delegated to them by law, or of tasks belonging
to and delegated by a higher local government level. (3) Such
"co-operating administration" was termed medebewind. The powers
of autonomy were not enumerated in detail in Law 22, but it was
provided that they were to be elaborated subsequently in the further
establishing legislation which was required actually to establish
each region as a region of local government under the basic law. (4)
Establishing legislation eventually listed such fields as irriga-
tion, maintenance of roads and public buildings, supervision and
development of agricultural programs, control of fisheries, mainte-
nance of health services, maintenance of veterinary services,
matters of social welfare, supervision of marketing and distribu-
tion. (5) (It is not clear from the wording either of Law 22 or of
the several establishing laws setting up autonomous provinces,
kabupatens and municipalities whether this definition of matters
falling within the sphere of autonomy was intended to be exclusive
or whether other matters which were not listed but were nonetheless
clearly of local concern might be held to fall within the term
"household affairs," and be subject to the initiative of local
governments. (6))
(2)	R. Π Law 22, Articles 1 and 23 (1).
(3)	Article 24.
(4)	Article 23 (2).
(5)	See below, p. 34-5, for the complete list of fields to be
surrendered as it was set out in the earlier establishing
legislation.
(6)	Law 22, Article 23, dealing with the legislative powers of
local representative assemblies, spoke in general terms of the
ability of such assemblies to deal with the "interests" of
the region (Art. 28 (1)), but the appended analysis of the law
appears to equate this with the "household affairs" covered by
Art. 23. See below pp. 35 ff. for a further discussion of this
point and of variations in wording in more recent establishing
legislation.7
Institutions of Local Government
The institutions through which original self-government was
to be conducted were to be similar for all three levels. For each
local government region were to be established two councils--a
representative council (Dewan Perwakilan Rakjat Daerah, usually
abbreviated to DPRD), to" be elected in a manner to be determined
by law, (7) and an executive council (Dewan Pemerintah Daerah,
usually abbreviated to DPD) to be elected by and from the members
of the representative council according to the method of propor-
tional representation. (8) The representative council, the DPRD,
was entrusted with legislative powers in the fields falling within
the competence of the region. Legislation was not to deal with
matters which were already dealt with in legislation of the central
parliament or of a higher level of local government, nor was any
level of local government to deal with matters falling within the
defined sphere of action of a lower level. More generally legis-
lation of a local government was not to conflict with legislation
of the central parliament or of a higher level of local govern-
ment. (9) The executive council, the DPD, whose members were
collectively and individually responsible to the DPRD, was en-
trusted with the day-to-day conduct of government, (10) executing
decisions of the DPRD, administering the various fields of activity
belonging to the region, and performing such other functions as
were specifically conferred in the law. (11)
In each region there was to be a Head of the Region (Kepala
Daerah) who was to be the chairman of the DPD as well as general
supervisor of the local government in question. This office was
not to be entirely elective. It was to be filled by appointment
made by a specified authority representing the central Government,
but such appointments were to be made in each case from a list of
at least two and not more than four candidates submitted by the
DPRD of the region concerned. Thus the kepala daerah of a province
was to be appointed by the President from the list of candidates
nominated by the DPRD of the Province, The kepala daerah of a
kabupaten or a large town was to be appointed by the Minister of
Internal Affairs from a similar list proposed by the DPRD concerned
And the kepala daerah of a desa or a small town was to be appointed
T7) Article Ή~ζ4).
(8)	Article 13 (1).
(9)	Article 28,
(10)	Article 34.
(11)	E.g., certain powers of supervision of the conduct of local
governments at a lower level and of the budgets of lower
local governments were given to DPD's also. Powers in
medebewind might be surrendered to either a DPD or a DPRD
(Article 24). If such powers were surrendered to the DPD it
would not be responsible to the DPRD for its handling of that
function.8
in similar fashion by the kepala daerah of the province in which
it was situated. (12) It was provided that a kepala daerah could
be removed by the appropriate authority at the request of the DPRD
concerned, though it was not obligatory for the authority to accede
to such a request. (13) The position of kepala daerah was important
to the whole plan. Besides his chairmanship of the executive
council he was also given certain powers of supervision to be
exercised on behalf of the central Government. His signature was
necessary for ordinances of the DPRD. He was also empowered to
delay the operation of decisions of the DPD or the DPRD of his
region if they appeared to him to conflict with higher legislation
or to be contrary to the general interest. In the event of such
action the matter was to be reported to the President in the case
of provinces, and to the DPD of the next highest level in the case
of other local governments. If no contrary decision was made by
those authorities within three months the original decision would
then come into effect. (14)
Special Regions
In addition to autonomous provinces, kabupatens, desas and
municipalities, provision was made also for the formation of
"special regions" (Daerah Istemewa) composed of units or groups of
units which, becausie of their character or historical traditions,
did not lend themselves to the ordinary classification. The
so-called "self-governing states" which had been brought under
Dutch authority by means of the short or long contracts, and which
had been subject to a species of indirect rule in colonial days,
might be expected to fit into such a category. A special region
might be equivalent in status to a province, a kabupaten or a
desa.	(15) The significant difference between a daerah istemewa
and an ordinary swatantra concerned the method of appointing the
kepala daerah. In a special region appointment to that position
was to be made by the President from the family which had formerly
exercised power in the area, if it still retained that power, pro-
vided that the appointee was suitable in terms of his ability,
justice, and loyalty. (Normally the kepala daerah would be the
traditional ruler.) In making the appointment attention was to
be paid to the customary law of the region. (16) Though the method
(12)	Article IS (1, 2, 3).
(13)	Explanatory appendix para. 24. The power of the central
Government to remove such an officer on its own intiative
without any request from the DPRD is not specifically pro-
vided, but it appears to be assumed by officers of the Ministry
of Internal Affairs.
(14)	Article	36	(1,	2, 3).
(15)	Article	1	(2).	
(16)	Article	18	(5),	. For daerah istemewa provision was also made
for a deputy kepala daerah. Γ8 (6).9
of appointing the regional head was the only formal difference
between a special and an ordinary region, in practice the only
such region which has been established (Jogjakarta) possesses
rather more power than its ordinary counterpart--a province--since
it retained, in large measure, the power it had formerly exercised
as a swapradja in addition to those specifically surrendered by
its establishing law.
The Position of
In some respects this system of regional units and authorities
followed the pattern set, somewhat half-heartedly, by the pre-war
Dutch experiments in political decentralization. Provinces,
regencies and municipalities had been established during the
’twenties and 'thirties, with councils able to exercise a measure
of responsibility over local matters. But there are vital differ-
ences, Election of councils on the basis of universal suffrage
and the disappearance of the European members of councils were
natural changes, A more crucial feature of the new plan concerned
the proposed change in the relationship between the central Govern-
ment’s administrative service and the local government system.
In the pre-war experiments the head of the local government system
at each level was the central Government's chief executive officer
in the region. The Governor of a province was also chairman of
the provincial executive council. In a Kabupaten the regent,
also essentially a central official, possessed a similar dual
function. Thus a close connection was preserved between the
central administrative hierarchy and the system of local autonomy.
Law 22 proposed, in theory though not, as it turned out, in
practice, to dispense with that tie. The office of kepala daerah
and chairman of the DPD was still to be combined with that of
chief administrative officer of the region. But an elective
element was introduced in that appointment was to be made, as has
been noticed, from a list of nominees chosen by the representative
council. Thus the chief executives of regions would no longer
be members of an official service though they would still combine
two types of activity. In theory the full flourishing of the new
local government system was expected to eliminate the need for
a separate administrative service of the central Government. (17)
The local governments themselves were expected to take over, on
behalf of the center, the responsibility for the administration
of lower units within their territory (e.g. kewedanaan and
ketjamatan within a kabupaten) if such administration continued
to be required. Though Law 22 is not clear in defining his posi-
tion and duties it would seem that the kepala daerah was intended
to co-ordinate local and central activities. The explanatory
(17) Article 46 (2) provided that administrative divisions would
continue to exist until they were abolished. The appended
explanation to the Law makes it clear that such abolition
involved also the abolition of the pamong pradja. In particular
the office of resident was expected-to become obsolete in the
very near future. (See note on Article 46, Also explanatory
appendix--para. 35,)ΙΟ
appendix to the law, in fact, described him as a representative of
the central Government, with reference to such administrative
duties, (18) though the same document described him elsewhere as
an organ of the regional government. (19) His power to delay
decisions of the DPD and DPRD were to be exercised, of course, on
behalf of the center.
Briefly, according to Law 22 the kepala daerah was intended to
exercise a dual function. As chairman of the DPD he was to be head
of the local government with some responsibility to the DPRD.
Secondly he was entrusted with the supervisory powers over his
councils under Article 36. But, in addition to these two specific
functions, there were further duties to be performed on behalf of
the center, though these were not defined in the Law. As head
of the region the kepala daerah was to be the representative of the
central Government in the area, supervising the execution of
governmental tasks which did not fall within the competence of the
local government, and exercising the same type of co-ordinating
function as had formerly fallen to the lot of the appropriate
officer of the pamong pradja, or central administrative service,
i.e. the governor in the case of a province, the bupati in the
case of a kabupaten, and the mayor (wali kota) in the case of a
town. It might be said that the new proposal reversed the pre-war
arrangement. Formerly a central administrative official was
appointed as head of the region. Now the incumbent of the office
of regional head was also to perform some of the duties formerly
belonging to a central administrative official.
Obviously the concept of the dual role of the kepala daerah
had its theoretical difficulties. The fact that he was an organ
of the local government, bearing a responsibility together with
his colleagues on the DPD to the representative body on the one
hand, and with responsibility on the other to the higher levels
of administration, left open the possibility of a conflict of
interest between the two capacities—a conflict which was particu-
larly likely to occur in view of his specific power to delay measures
of the local councils which appeared to him to be contrary to the
general interest or to run counter to the measures of higher
governments. The exercise of this temporary veto was not intended
always to be left as a matter of discretion. Since the kepala
daerah did owe a duty to the central Government it could be
assumed (and has been assumed) that he could be instructed by the
Ministry of Internal Affairs to delay any matter which was known
to be pending, and in which the Ministry felt itself to have a
contrary interest to that of the elected authorities of the region.
If used in this way the veto power could become the central element
in the system of supervision which the center felt it necessary to
maintain over local bodies. Obviously the position of kepala daerah,
as provided in the law, called for great qualities of skill and
tact if a clash of interest was to be avoided.
(18)	Law 22, explanatory appendix, para. 35.
(19)	Ibid. , para., 22.11
In actual practice, as will be seen more fully below, the
role of kepala daerah has been rather different from that envisaged
in the basic law, since the normal procedure laid down in the law
for the appointment of these officers was not followed. Law 22
contained an emergency clause which enabled appointments to be made
for the time being directly by the central government without any
reference to the wishes of the representative councils in the
regions concerned. (20) The Government availed itself of this
escape clause. Of major importance was the fact that, in so
doing, it simply appointed the appropriate members of its own
administrative service, the pamong pradja, thus following pre-war
practice. Governors became kepala daerah of provinces, bupatis
became kepala daerah of kabupatens, and mayors became the kepala
daerah of towns.	—
This practice had broad implications for the total plan.
Though Law 22 referred to a dual function for the kepala daerah,
in reality, as has been suggested, it would have been more accurate
to distinguish three functions rather than two:
1.	The chairmanship of the DPD;
2.	Supervision of DPD and DPRD under Article 36; and
3.	Administration to be performed for the central Government
by an official of that Government.
Law 22 placed the first two of these in the hands of the kepala
daerah (his dual function) and assumed that the third function
would gradually become superfluous or, alternatively, become the
duty of the local government. In practice, with the appointment
of officials as kepala daerah, all three functions were retained
and were concentrated in the~hands of a single person in each
area. Strictly speaking, however, the distinction remained
between the duties of governors, bupatis and mayors as pamong
pradja on the one hand, and the dual functions of the kepala
daerah on the other. For example, the general co-ordinating and
administrative duties of the pamong pradja did not pass to the
local governments whose field of activity was to that extent re-
stricted. But in another respect the distinction was blurred.
While, according to Law 22, the supervisory function was to be
exercised as part of the responsibility of the kepala daerah,
not as part of that of the pamong pradja, the appointment of
pamong pradja to that office tended to confuse the separate roles,
and undoubtedly strengthened the element of supervision.
These consequences were deliberate. The decision to appoint
directly to the office, rather than from a list of nominees sub-
mitted by the DPRD, and the accompanying practice of appointing
existing officials, was due partly, no doubt, to the fact that if
the position had been given the semi-responsible character en-
visaged in the law the Government would have been faced with the
necessity of making immediate readjustments in its administrative
(20) Article 46 (4).12
system in order to cope with the considerable body of unemployed
officials which would have been created. The plan was to allow
the pamong pradja to become superfluous gradually, not at one
stroke. But there was also present the conviction that close
official control and supervision of autonomous governments was a
necessity for the time being. While in theory a kepala daerah
appointed from a list of nominees according to the normal procedure
laid down in Law 22 was intended to owe loyalty to the center as
well as to the elected council, and was intended to exercise
supervision over the local government on behalf of the center, the
officials who were actually appointed owed loyalty to the center
by virtue of the structure and traditions of the administrative
service itself, and they were thus far more independent of the
pressures of local politics. (21)
Central Supervision
The power to delay the operation of decisions of the DPD or the
DPRD of a region, conferred upon a kepala daerah by Law 22, and
greatly strengthened in practice by the fact that central officials
were appointed as kepala daerah, represents a major control device
by which the central Government was able to supervise and perhaps
to check the actions of local bodies. This type of supervision
was termed "preventive" supervision. (22) A further control device
embodied in the law was the fact that the three levels of autonomy,
like the six levels of administration, were hierarchically ar-
ranged. Provinces, while concerned with the fields of activity
(21) The fact that the office has, in practice, been filled not
merely by direct appointment but by the direct appointment of
officials needs stressing since it has sometimes been ignored
in treatments of the subject. E.g. L. S. Finkelstein, "The
Indonesian Federal Problem," Pacific Affairs, Vol. XXIV, No. 3,
September 1951, points out that Law 22 envisages the kepala
daerah as having a dual function--that of representative of
the central Government and that of chairman of the DPD. But
in discussing the actual situation he speaks of the role of
existing regional heads as though it was in conformity with the
intentions of the Law. In fact, however, the dual role exer-
cised in practice by, e.g., a bupati is not the same as the
dual role envisaged in Law 22 for a kepala daerah for the
simple reason that "bupati" is an official rank, and a bupati
proper is a member of the pamong pradja. It is instructive to
compare a Bupati/Kepala Daerah in Java with the Kepala Daerah
of, e.g., Minahasa who is appointed from a list of nominees
in the prescribed manner under N. I. T. Law 44 (which has no
escape clause). The Kepala Daerah of Minahasa has a dual func-
tion according to the-”law, but, as is to be expected, he is a
very different type of person, and his loyalties are naturally
very different from those of a Bupati/Kepala Daerah in Java.
(22) Explanatory appendix to Law 22, Article 36.13
specifically assigned to them, possessed a supervisory power over
kabupatens within their boundaries, and so on down the scale. In-
deed it was through this hierarchy of authorities that the preven-
tive supervision of the kepala daerah was made effective. It has
been seen that in the case of a delaying veto imposed by the kepala
daerah the fact was to be reported within seven days to the President
in the case of provinces and to the DPD of the next highest level
in the case of other local governments. Thus the imposition of a
delay immediately brought the question before a higher level. The
higher authorities had three months in which to make a decision,
in the absence of which the original decision would then go into
effect.
Besides considering cases in which a kepala daerah of a lower
level had exercised his preventive veto, DPD’s were themselves
given a power of preventive supervision with regard to eight matters
which were specified in the Law. The matters in question were the
remuneration and travelling expenses to be granted to members of
the DPRD (Article 7), the preparation by a DPRD of a guide for the
conduct of affairs by the DPD (Article 15), the remuneration of
DPD members (Article 16), the terms and conditions for appointment
to and employment in the civil service or a region (Article 21),
regulations enacted jointly by more than one region to cover
matters of common interest (Article 27), regulations concerning
criminal offenses (Article 29), the raising of loans (Article 33),
and the annual budget (Article 39). Regulations governing these
subjects were not to go into effect until they had been approved
by the appropriate higher authority--by the President in the case
of provinces and by the DPD of the next highest level in the case
of other councils. If the higher authority made no decision to the
contrary within three months the regulations so referred could go
into effect, except that the authority concerned had the power to
impose a further three months’ delay if it wished. (23) In the
case of rejection of a regulation, provision was made for an appeal
to the DPD of the next highest level again (or to the President
in the case of regulations of second-level governments which
failed to secure the approval of the provincial DPD).
The hierarchical organization of local governments enabled
provision to be made for a third type of control device. In
addition to their power of preventive supervision and their power
to decide questions referred after the exercise of the preventive
veto of a lower kepala daerah, DPD’s had the power to repeal
decisions already made by the DPD or DPRD of the level below them,
if they conflicted with the general interest or with higher legis-
lation. This type of action was termed "repressive" supervision. (24)
For provinces this power rested with the President.
Finally, provision was made for the direct intervention of
the central Government itself where, in the opinion of the center,
a regional government was neglecting its tasks. In these circum-
(23)	Article 30.
(24)	Article 42.14
stances a central instruction could be issued in the form of a
Government Regulation requiring the local government to act in a
certain manner. (25)
N. I. T. Law 44 of 1950
With the formation of the unitary State in 1950, R. I. Law 22
of 1948 was used as the basic local government law for the whole
western part of the archipelago. For the eastern islands which
had together formed the State of East Indonesia (Negara Indonesia
Timur) a law of that State—N. I T. Law 44 of 1950—hati already
been promulgated before August 1950 and it has continued to serve
as the basic law for local government within the administrative
provinces of Sulawesi (Celebes), Maluku (Moluccas) and Nusa
Tenggara (Lesser Sundas) into which East Indonesia was now divided,
except that the administration of the aw was transferred from
the State of East Indonesia to the central Ministry for Internal
Affairs. In general the main principles of N. I. T. Law 44
resembled those of R. I. Law 22. The same type of hierarchy of
autonomous levels was planned, with the executive council at each
level exercising a general supervision over the local authorities
of the next lowest level. Naturally because of the very different
administrative history of these islands the actual territorial
divisions which were selected to become autonomous units were not
identical with those of Java. East Indonesia had no counterpart
to the kabupaten, for instance. Before the war the area had been
a patchwork of s’elf-governing states of varying size and develop-
ment, together with several directly ruled areas. Many of the
principalities were far too small to be effective as units of
self-government immediately below the provincial level, and, as
a means of securing a greater degree of uniformity, the Dutch, in
setting up the State of East Indonesia, had attempted to fashion a
new territorial form, the "daerah" (the term literally means simply
"region”) based on unions or federations between contiguous commu-
nities which might be ethnically or culturally different, but
which were politically and economically interdependent. In Law 44
the daerah unit was used as the second level of autonomy, below
the province, and it was rated as roughly equivalent to the
kabupaten elsewhere. (In practice, as will be seen, the thirteen
daerahs established by 1950 were further subdivided in subsequent
years, to meet local demands and, in some cases, to make the unit
more internally coherent.) The third level of autonomy was to be
composed of the constituent parts of the daerah unit.
Provisions for the appointment of a regional head was pre-
cisely the same as that laid down as normal procedure in Law 22.
An important difference between the two laws, however, was that
in Law 44 there was no escape clause which enabled the central
Government to make direct appointments to that office during a
transitional period. The rank of kepala daerah in East Indonesia
was thus filled by the center in each case from a list of nominees
'C^-ArtiET^-ZS.15
submitted by the DPRD, except, of course, in the case of "special
regions," where, as in western Indonesia, a member of the former
ruling house was to be appointed,
A further difference between the two major areas, though this
was not written into the basic legislation, related to the method
by which powers were to be conferred on the local bodies. It has
been seen that in the areas where Law 22 operated, powers were to
be surrendered to the local government by the central Government.
In the case of East Indonesia the reverse procedure was followed.
The powers assumed by the central Government were defined, and the
undefined remainder were left to the local government until such
time as this distribution was revised by the center. This method
followed that used by the Indies Government in making its contracts
with swapradja in the past. The net result has been to leave
local governments with a greater range of powers than has been the
case in the rest of the Republic. It will be seen that the method
by which powers are to be distributed has been one of the issues
at stake in the preparation of a new local government law to em-
brace the whole of Indonesia. On this question, as on others,
the central Government has been forced to compromise between its
own desire for a uniform system and its need to recognize local
demands.
Law 22 and Law 44, between them, provided a broad legal basis
for the actual institution of local governments after 1950. How
far they were adequate to meet the twin problems of regional
feeling and efficient administration naturally depended upon the
manner in which they were applied.16
CHAPTER III
THE PERIOD OF TRANSITION:
FORMAL ARRANGEMENTS, 1950-56
Law 22 of the Republic and Law 44 of the State of East Indo-
nesia were both designed to secure, within their respective areas
of operation, a greater degree of standardization in a very varied
situation. As a result of many factors—the methods by which
Dutch authority had been extended over the outer islands in the
first place, the character of Dutch experiments in political de-
centralization in the '20's and '30's, the ad hoc practices of
the Republic during the revolutionary struggle, the creation of
new states to counterbalance the Republic during the same period--
there existed in 1950 a wide range of units possessing autonomy,
if they possessed it at all, on a great variety of legal bases.
There were municipalities possessed of powers which derived from
pre-war Dutch enactment. There were self-governing states
drawing their authority from the old long and short contracts made
by the Dutch with existing rulers. There were new units created
by Holland for tactical reasons during her conflict with the Republic
(e.g. the Daerahs of East Indonesia) and based to a greater or
lesser degree on pre-war forms. (1) There were bodies set up within
the Republic in the course of the struggle (e.g. National Commit-
tees - KNI) which survived into the period of independence and
served as the basis for councils until such time as more uniform
provision could be made. The application of Law 22 in Java.
Sumatra and Borneo, and of Law 44 in the remainder of the country,
gradually reduced the differences as autonomous governments were
established in varying degrees of completeness under the new laws,
or as local governments already established under other enactments
were brought under the new laws and were thus given a new statutory
authority.
(1) Schiller, Ϊ. A., The Formation of Federal Indonesia (The Hague,
1955), pp. 89 ίί.ξ distinguishes eleven types of Tocal govern-
ment form used by Holland during her efforts to lay the founda-
tions for a federal state of Indonesia. Of these six are
described as being based upon, or as resembling, pre-war forms—
self-governing lands (swapradja), neo-lands or neo-swapradja,
federations of swapradja^ neo-group communities” local autono-
mous units of Java and~Sumatra (e.g. Regencies) and municipali-
ties. The remainder are described as governments novel in
origin and structure and include the negaras or states, the
daerahs of East Indonesia (which really break down into
swapradja, neo-swapradja, or federations of swapradja), super-
visory districts of East Indonesia, autonomous constitutional
units (special regions), and the federal district.17
Since Law 22 was a ’’basic law" (undang-undang pokok) two
further steps were required to implement it. (a) Further legisla-
tion was required actually to establish the autonomous areas en-
visaged in the basic law and to fill in the details not covered by
that law—the exact area to be constituted as an autonomous area
in«each case, the number of members of the DPRD and the DPD in each
case, and the exact powers to be conceded to the level in question,
(b) The establishing law, though it defined powers more exactly,
did not actually transfer them, and a further Government Regulation
was required for that step. (2)
Between 1950 and 1953 establishing legislation was passed to
create three provinces in Java (East Java, Central Java and West
Java), to divide the province of Sumatra into three provinces
(North Sumatra, Central Sumatra and South Sumatra), and to estab-
lish the province of Kalimantan (Borneo). In addition, two of
the former self-governing stages of Java, Jogjakarta and Paku Alam,
were constituted as a daerah istemewa with the status of a province.
(The remaining two states in Java, Surakarta and Mankunegaran,
were absorbed into the province of Central Java.) Greater Djakarta
was a special case and was established as a municipality with the
status of a province. In 1956 a number of new provinces were
carved out of existing ones—a Province of Atjeh was separated
from the remainder of North Sumatra, and Kalimantan was divided
into three provinces instead of one—West, South, and East
Kalimantan. Further subdivision was foreshadowed in Central
Sumatra to confer provincial status upon Djambi and Riau, before
the pace was forced by the course of events in that province in
December 1956, (Irian Barat (West New Guinea) has also been
constituted as a province, though the territory remains in Dutch
hands.)
During the same period lower levels of autonomy below the
province—kabupatens and large and small municipalities—were
also established (or re-established) in Java and Borneo. Similar
authorities were established in parts of Sumatra also, but by
Governors’ Decrees, not under the provisions of Law 22, It was
an experimental move. Whereas in Java the kabupaten unit had
existed before the war both as an administrative and as an autono-
mous unit, those set up in Sumatra were new units from both points
of view. Though it was easy enough to create kabupatens on the
Ό0 It is necessary to distinguish between various instruments:
a Basic Law (Undang-undang Pokok); a Law (Undang-undang); an
Emergency Law (Undang-undang Darurat) which could be issued
in certain circumstances by the Government in advance of parlia-
mentary approval; a Governmental Regulation (Peraturan Pemerintah)
issued under the authority of a Law; a Ministerial Regulation
(Peraturan Menteri) issued by a Minister. The establishment
oT autonomous governments required legislation or emergency
legislation. The surrender of particular powers, the provision
of a procedure for selecting DPRD's, etc., were the subjects
of Government Regulation. The provision in detail of a pro-
cedure for selecting DPD’s was the subject of Ministerial
Regulation.18
Javanese pattern as administrative divisions in Sumatra, it was
another matter to confer self-governing powers upon those divi-
sions at the same time. The Councils established under Governors’
Decrees lacked, for some time, the powers of regulation and execu-
tion which belonged to their Javanese counterparts. Their activities
were limited to discussion and advice to bupatis, and assistance *to
the provincial government in the execution of provincial tasks.
In 1956 further legislation under Law 22 at last regularized the
situation in Central Sumatra only ; councils were given a proper
statutory basis and brought into line with kabupaten DPRD’s in
Java.
In eastern Indonesia a similar process of bringing local
authorities under a single law was under way, though it was more
gradual in character. As late as 1956 there were still no autono-
mous provinces in the former State of East Indonesia. The provinces
of Sulawesi (Celebes), Maluku (Moluccas) and Nusa Tenggara (Lesser
Sundas) were administrative provinces only, and consideration was
being given to the desirability of further dividing these regions
before conferring self-governing institutions at the provincial
level. At the lower levels the situation was more complex than
was the case in western Indonesia, partly because the State of
East Indonesia had enjoyed a more substantial existence than had
any of the other negaras established by the Dutch before 1949, and
had proceeded further in the evolution of new types of autonomous
units within the State. In these daerahs composed of federations
of self-governing states, many councils had been formed, even before
Law 44 of 1950 had been passed but, for the most part, these were
of an advisory character only. The substance of power remained
with councils of rulers of states. In Bali, for example, the
existing swapradja were united to form one daerah, with effective
power in the hands of a council of Radjahs (Dewan Radjahs), though
an elective body was also created. Legislation was, theoretically,
the task of both councils jointly, but, in practice, the Council
of Radjahs had power to enact Ordinances alone in cases of dis-
agreement. Broadly similar arrangements were established in
Sumbawa (federation of 3 swapradja), Sangihe-Talaud (federation of
6 swapradja), Central Sulawesi ("federation of 15 swapradja), Sumba
(federation of 16 swapradja) and Flores (federation of 9 swapradja).
As a variation on this pattern the daerahs of South Sulawesi,
North Sulawesi and North Maluku were composed of a mixture of
federations of swapradja and neo-swapradja. (South Sulawesi was
composed of a federation of 30 swapradja and 8 neo-swapradja;
North Maluku was enforced by a federation of 3 swapradja and 1
neo-swapradja; and South Sulawesi—a more complicated example
still—was composed of a federation of 1 swapradja, 1 neo-swapradja,
and four federations of swapradjas.) In addition there were other
areas, such as the formerly directly ruled areas of Minahasa and
Lombok, which were now each constituted as a single neo-swapradja,
with its own council, and there were reconstituted muni c ip a 1 i t i es
such as Makassar and Ambon.
Though these territories had been formally established during
the existence of the State of East Indonesia, the degree to which19
they possessed institutions of self-government in active operation
varied widely. The daerahs had the right to make their own elec-
toral regulations, buT-onTy Minahasa (including, until 1953, the
city of Manado) did so. (Provision was made there for the direct
election of a DPRD, a method which has since been adopted in the
latest local election law for the whole of Indonesia, in contrast
to the system of indirect election laid down in an earlier local
electoral law for the areas operating under Law 22.) Other coun-
cils were elected under Governor's emergency regulation (e.g.
Makassar), or were appointed on a basis of representation of poli-
tical parties. In any case the giving of a final shape to the
local government system of Sulawesi, Maluku and Nusa Tenggara under
N. I. Τ» Law 44 has been delayed pending reconsideration of the pre-
cise areas which are to be established as autonomous units immediately
beneath the provincial level, The daerah units as defined during
the existence of the State of East Indonesia were regarded as being
roughly equivalent to a kabupaten and were intended to take over
the powers exercised formerly by Residents. The object was there-
fore to form territorial units of sufficient size and development
to make that possible, hence the federation of small swapradjas
into larger units. But since the formation of the unitary state
there has been pressure from particular areas for the division of
daerahs, if not into their constituent swapradja parts, at least
into smaller groupings. For example, the large daerah of South
Sulawesi which consisted of 30 swapradja and 8 neo-swapradja has
been divided by Government Regulation of the unitary Republic, 1953,
into seven daerahs still of the same (i.e. kabupaten) status. And
it is likely that some of the seven will again be subdivided further.
In all, the original thirteen daerahs had become twenty-six daerahs
by the end of 1956. A final settlement, when it is made, will not
be under the provisions of the old N, I. T, Law 44 but under the
new comprehensive basic law for the whole country.
While the eastern islands have proved more complex and less
adaptable to a uniform system, it is also the case that even in Java,
Sumatra and Borneo, where Law 22 was regarded as a model capable
of extension in modified form to other areas, the intentions of the
law were only followed in part.
In the first place, though the law provided for three levels
of autonomy, in fact the only third-level local governments to be
established, even in Java where the system could be expected to be
most complete, were small towns (kota ketjil). Nowhere was the
desa or its equivalent made into an autonomous area under the pro-
visions of the new law. From provision made during the colonial
period customary units such as the desa of Java, the negeri of
western Sumatra, or the marga of southern Sumatra, had secured a
measure of formal recognTtion, and customary procedures had been
subjected to some degree of adaptation to the needs of centralized
government. The Javanese desa, for instance, though the details
of its organization vary from~place to place, already elected its
headman, the lurah, and its village assembly was already a functioning20
body with at least some basis in custom. It is difficult to say
how far the institution of village meetings still conformed to
traditional patterns, and how far, under Dutch rule, in its various
phases, the processes of discussion and election in the desa had
assumed an entirely new character. The point is that a working
system of supervised autonomy over immediately local matters did
exist already in the desa, and it would have been a little odd to
have imposed on that system the novel and more formal arrangements
prescribed for kabupatens and provinces by Law 22. For that reason,
and for the reason also that the desa was subsequently judged to be
too small in terms of area and population to serve effectively
as the basic unit of local government, the Ministry of Internal
Affairs began to have second thoughts about the wisdom of Law 22 in
so far as it concerned the desa. The product of the second thoughts
will be described below. Here it is sufficient to point out that,
while representative assemblies and executive councils were estab-
lished at the kabupaten and provincial levels, the village continued
to operate on what had come to be its customary lines—autonomous
up to a point, but autonomous in a manner not prescribed by the
new law.
Secondly, it has already been noticed that, for the time being;
an escape clause of Law 22 was used to enable the kepala daerah
to be appointed directly by the central Government-instead of in-
directly from lists of nominees submitted by the representative
assemblies; and it has been stressed that, in exercising this power,
the government simply appointed appropriate members of its pamong
pradja. Bupatis were thus to serve as kepala daerah in kabupatens,
combining the tasks of chairmen of executive councils and heads
of the autonomous governments on the one hand, and, on the other,
that of central Government official, supervising the autonomous
government on behalf of the center. Since the kabupaten remained
an administrative division for those central Government purposes
falling outside the scope of autonomy, the bupati, of course,
continued also to be the officer to whom the lower administrative
ranks of wedana and tjamat were responsible, and who, in turn, was
responsible to the resident, the governor, and, through them, to
the central Government. The same collection of tasks devolved
upon the governor at the provincial level. In other words, whereas
the law envisaged regional administration eventually being taken
over by the autonomous governments, at whose head would stand a
man who combined the functions of local leader with some of those
formerly possessed by a central administrative official, for the
time being, through the retention of the central administrative
service an even greater integration of autonomous government and
central administration was achieved.
Thirdly, though an electoral act was passed to govern the
election of representative bodies in the autonomous regions (Law 7
of 1950 providing for indirect election of DPRD's), in fact the
councils established in the autonomous provinces, kabupatens and
municipalities were, with one exception, not filled by election
for the time being. The exception was the Daerah Istemewa Jogja-
karta where, in 1951, an indirect election was held for the DPRD21
according to the terms of the electoral, law. (3) Elsewhere the
central Government argued that problems of inadequate administra-
tion in local areas, and the difficulty of securing uniformity in
the surrender of powers to areas of widely differing experience
and capacity, made it impossible to establish fully autonomous bodies
immediately. For these reasons the Government relied on another
escape clause in Law 22 which allowed for the appointment, not
election, of temporary councils (DPRD Sementara) in a manner to be
determined by Government Regulation^ In 1950 the controversial
Government Regulation No, 39 was issued under Law 22,	(4) and pro-
vided for the appointment of representatives on the basis of estab-
lished party and other organizations. Political parties and other
groups such as labor unions or women's organizations were entitled
to representation on kabupaten or municipal councils if they
possessed a central Executive and were established in at least
three kabupatens in a province and with ketjamatan branches in
those kabupatens Members of the provincial DPRD's were to be
chosen by the DPRD's of kabupatens and large towns, which were thus
to act as a kind of electoral college for the representative coun-
cils of the first level of autonomy.
Though Government Regulation 39 allowed for a reasonable solu-
tion to the problems of the transitional period it contained one
feature which brought it under fire in parliament. A procedure was
laid down in the regulation for selecting candidates put forward
by major parties and other organizations up to the full number of
seats provided, in the establishment law, for the DPRD of the pro-
vince, kabupaten or municipality concerned. But it was further
provided that, when the full number of candidates had been selected,
parties and organizations still unrepresented were entitled to one
member, and the size of the councils was to be increased accordingly
beyond the stated figure to enable this extra representation to be
achieved.
This provision for extra council membership was open to easy
abuse. It was possible for recognized parties who had already se-
cured their representation on councils by the normal procedure to
attempt to increase their representation by forming sub-organizations
The sub-organizations, theoretically independent, could then claim
one representative under the provision allowing for the extra mem-
bers. There was, in any case, likely to be some disagreement as
to which parties and groups were parties and groups within the
meaning of the Regulation, and, in practice, it was never easy to
distinguish between organizations of a genuinely independent charac-
(3)	In the eastern part of the archipelago a number of local elec-
tions were held, notably in Minahasa, Makassar and Sangihe-
Talaud.
(4)	Government Regulation No. 39 was the third attempt to make
provision for temporary council membership. Two previous
Regulations (Government Regulation No. 10 of 1950 and "Govern-
ment Regulation in place of a Law" No. 2 of 1950) had not
been approved by the interim parliament of the old Republic.22
ter and those either closely connected with a major party or perhaps
formed solely for the purpose of obtaining a council seat. Doubtful
practices of this kind did occur, and were associated particularly,
though not exclusively, with the Masjumi Party. In the kabupaten
of Blitar (East Java), to give one example, the establishing law
provided for a council of 10. Under the normal procedure laid down
in Government Regulation 39, the Masjumi Party obtained 2 represen-
tatives and 8 other parties and groups obtained 1 each. The council
seats were thus filled. Then, under the extra membership clause,
membership was given to 7 other groups--farmers' organizations,
women's organizations, youth organizations, labor organizations.
AU of these associations had been founded by the Masjumi or were
Islamic in basis and connected, at least indirectly, with the
Masjumi. (5) On a council now swelled to 17, members of Moslem
organizations had thus secured an effective representation of 9
members--an absolute majority.
This consequence of the application of Government Regulation
39 was not be found universally, but it occurred sufficiently often
to give cause for complaint to other parties, and, in particular,
to the P.N.I. which felt that it had been outwitted. The situation
provided the background for the Hadikusumo Motion which, in 1951,
was one of the factors bringing about the fall of the Natsir
Cabinet. The Natsir Government was dominated by the Masjumi, and
supported by the P.S.I. (Socialist Party), P.I.R. (Persatuan Indo-
nesia Raja) and Parindra (Partai Indonesia Raja). The P.N.I. was in
opposition, In January 1951, Hadikusumo (P.N.I.) brought forward
a motion for the disallowance of Government Regulation 39, the
freezing of councils already established under that Regulation, and
the immediate preparation of plans for a fuller and more democratic
regional autonomy. This motion, sponsored by the P.N.I., was also
supported by two of the Government parties—P.I.R. and Parindra—
whose continued backing was necessary for the Government's majority.
The motion was accepted by parliament on January 22, 1951, and, in
consequence, Assaat, the Minister for Internal Affairs, resigned
since he held the view that the motion could not be implemented at
that time. When Cabinet supported the position of the Minister,
and refused to accept the decision of the House, P.I.R. withdrew
its two Ministers from the Cabinet and the Government, recognizing
that it no longer commanded the confidence of parliament, took the
only course open to it and resigned.
The formation of a new Caoinet proved a difficult task, and
it was not until April 1951 that the Sukiman Government, led by
(5) Islamic Farmers' Federation (Sarekat Tani Islam Indonesia),
Islamic Youth Movement (Gerakan Pemuda Islam Indonesia), and
its female branch (G P.lTl. Puteri.)., Masjumi MusTima,"
Muhammad ijah. Islamic Laborers' Association (Sarekat Buruh
Ts 1 am~Indone~sia.) , and the Islamic Teachers’ Union (Persatuan
Guru Islam Indonesia).	.23
Masjumi and P.N.I. and including a number of smaller parties such
as P.I.R., Parkindo and Catholic, was sworn in. On the particular
point which had been at issue—the formation of regional councils
on a more democratic basis—the new Government found itself as
helpless as its predecessor. While promising to find a way of
implementing the January Motion as soon as possible, the Government
pointed to the difficulty arising from the absence of any uniform-
ity in existing local government machinery throughout Indonesia.
In fact no solution was reached, and the Wilopo Government in 1952
was still repeating the same arguments as its predecessors to ex-
plain the lack of progress in the field of local autonomy. Though
the Wilopo Cabinet was not able to secure a permanent settlement of
the problem by establishing councils based on election, it was
responsible for one important advance in the giving of some effective
content to the temporary council system which actually existed.
It was during this administration that substantial powers were
actually transferred for the first time to the kabupatens and
provinces which had been established earlier. (It was then,
too, that the Province of Kalimantan (Borneo) was set up, though
no action was yet taken to regularize the position of the kabupatens
established by Governor’s Decree in Sumatra.) But for the"time
being such councils as did exist were still those which had been
formed under the provisions of Government Regulatiop39. After
Parliament had accepted the Hadikusumo motion no further use was
made of that Regulation, but a compromise agreement was reached
whereby the councils already established were allowed to remain
in being. In fact they continued in office until 1956. The areas
where the Regulation had not already been implemented remained
without any council at all. In the Province of East Java, for
instance, the formation of a temporary council under the Regulation
had been delayed by disagreement as to whether the R.K.K.S. (Rukun
Kampong Kota Surabaja)—a system of community organizations estab-
lished by the Communist Party, and strong enough to compete with
the official local administrative system in Surabaja—was an
organization within the meaning of Regulation 39 and therefore
entitled to representation on the Provincial Council. The question
had not been settled before the disallowance of the Regulation in
January 1951, and the Province therefore lacked a council until
new provision was made in 1956. For cases like this an emergency
law (Undang-undang Darurat 7 of 1954) eventually filled the vacuum
by entrusting council powers to the kepala daerah. The province
of Central Sumatra was another example, though of a slightly
different kind. Its old temporary council had been dissolved in
1950. Pending the formation of a new temporary council under
Regulation 39 another Government Regulation (1/51) provided for
the local government to be in the hands of a small body of four to
six members chosen by the Minister on the recommendation of the
Governor. This body was to exercise the powers of both DPRD and
DPD. Though this was intended to be a temporary stop-gap only,
the new temporary council had still not been established by the
time of the Hadikusumo motion, and the small substitute council
established under Regulation 1/51 remained in existence until 1956.
In 1954, under the first All Sastroadmidjo jo Government, a
new draft basic law to replace both R. I. Law 22 and N. I. T. Law 4424
was considered by parliament, but was withdrawn after an unfavor-
able reception, and the question remained in cold storage. The
successful holding of the long delayed general election in 1955
at last made the possibility of local elections much more of a
practical proposition, and in 1956 the Ministry of Internal Affairs
was making its preparations towards that end. As a first step the
old local electoral law (7/50) which had been used only in elections
for the DPRD in the Daerah Istemewa Jogjakarta was repealed, and
replaced by a new law (19/56) which provided for direct, rather
than indirect elections, based on a system of proportional repre-
sentation. In each case the whole daerah was to form one electoral
district. A second step was the preparation of a new basic law
for the whole country. The provisions of the new draft, which was
based on the draft bill of 1954 but contained some crucial changes,
will be discussed more fully below. It was passed in amended form
in November 1956, after prolonged negotiation between the Minister
and Party leaders, and was promulgated in the following January as
Law 1 of 1957.
Finally, since a settlement of the whole question of local
government at last appeared to be in sight, it was decided to
dissolve the "temporary" councils (DPRD Sementara) where they had
existed under the old Regulation 39, and to create new "transitional"
councils (DPRD Peralihan) in all areas, to bridge the gap between
the operation oT the old law and the eventual introduction of the
new. Law 7 of 1956 provided that members of the DPRD Sementara
would terminate their tenure of office on July 1st, 1956. Law 14
of 1956 then provided for the setting up of the new transitional
councils which were to last for no more than one year, by which
time it was hoped that the new basic law would have been passed,
and councils could be established on a permanent basis in accordance
with that new law and the new electoral law. The transitional
councils were themselves not to be based on election but on the
next best thing--the returns of each area in the general election
of 1955. Parties would be entitled to so many seats on the basis
of their performance in each area in the general election. After
the calculation of their entitlement they would simply nominate
candidates for appointment to the council (appointment being made
by the Minister, for provincial bodies, and by provincial governors
for those of the lower levels). In other respects (e.g. the rela-
tion of DPD to DPRD and the role and method of appointment?of the
kepala daerah) the arrangements which had prevailed hitherto during
the provisional period were to continue.
The new Law applied to all areas except those in which N. I. T.
Law 44 of 1950 was current, and except Daerah Istemewa Jogjakarta,
whose elected council was not due to expire until 24th December,
1956. For these areas the question of whether to establish transi-
tional councils under Law 7 of 1956 was left to the discretion of
the Minister.25
The law was implemented by a series of Ministerial Regula-
tions. (6) Shortly afterwards further legislation provided, some-
what tardily, for the proper regulation of kabupatens and munici-
palities in Central Sumatra (Laws 8, 9 and 10 of 1956). A further
part of the impressive body of legislation concerning autonomy con-
sisted of the two laws already referred to, one dividing Borneo
into three provinces and the other carving out a new province at
Atjeh from part of Northern Sumatra.
The formal implementation of the Ministry’s plans for local
autonomy under the new basic law was still to be achieved at the
time of the general political crisis of February and March, 1957,
but at least by the end of 1956 councils on a much more representa-
tive basis than formerly were established over a much wider area
than formerly, and experience in practical local government was
being gained as a foundation for future plans. The following
section deals with some of the characteristics and some of the
problems of the system as it had developed in practice by the
closing months of 1956.
(6) Ministerial Regulation 4/56 provided for the establishment of
preparatory committees of party members to consider the elec-
tion returns and agree to the distribution of seats as between
parties. Reg. 5/56 fixed the number of members for the DPRD
Peralihan and the DPD Peralihan for Djakarta. Regs. 6, 7 and
H/56 fixed the numbers of members for the provincial, kabupaten
and municipal councils of West, Central and East Java respec-
tively. Ministerial Regulation 9/56 provided for councils in
the divisions of Jogjakarta. Finally, Regulation 17/56 gave
specific instructions for the selection of the DPD Peralihan
by and from the members of the DPRD Peralihan.26
CHAPTER IV
THE TRANSITIONAL SYSTEM IN OPERATION, 1956
By late 1956, though there still remained a bewildering variety
in the character, past history and the legal bases of local units
and local institutions in western Indonesia, the establishment
first of the DPRD’s and DPD's Sementara and then of the DPRD’s and
DPD's Peralihan had introduced a much greater degree of uniformity
into the two higher levels of autonomy in the western part of the
archipelago than had existed six years earlier. The newly estab-
lished kabupatens of Sumatra, for instance, were certainly not yet
equal in maturity to their Javanese prototypes, but they were
coming to possess more than a formal similarity. In the Daerah
Istemewa Jogjakarta, also, there were still important differences
from the general Javanese pattern. At the Daerah Istemewa (province)
level, the region, because of its past history as two swapradja
(Jogjakarta and Paku Alam), possessed rather more complete powers
than did the normal province. For the same historical reason, how-
ever, the kabupatens within the daerah were less developed as
autonomous regions than was the case with kabupatens outside the
daerah. While kabupatens in the provinces of Java had been given
councils du.ring~coloniar~times, the equivalent divisions within
the states of Jogjakarta and Paku Alam had remained merely as
administrative units. But differences such as these were gradually
being reduced, perhaps at the expense of the picturesque. Kabupaten
councils were established in the four kabupatens of the Daerah
Istemewa by the end of 1956.
There remain, of course, differences in degree of development
from area to area and from level to level. The fully fledged
province possesses a large-scale governmental organization to
administer the powers surrendered to that level. In East Java,
for instance, behind the impressive Governor's Office and Secre-
tariat in Surubaja stands a separate administrative complex housing
the offices of the autonomous government of the province—health,
agriculture, public works, veterinary services, etc.—which exist
here on a scale hardly to be matched in the humbler and more homely
circumstances of Bukittinggi, the capital of Central Sumatra. At
the kabupaten level in Java there is also a smoothly running organ-
ization, whether in a large kabupaten such as Malang or a small one
such as Pasuruan, though, as will be seen below, the powers so far
surrendered to the kabupaten level are much fewer in number as well
as more restricted Tn character than those given to the higher level.
Councils and Their Composition
Now that an elective element had been introduced indirectly
by the operation of Law 14 of 1956, whereby DPRD’s are to be com-
posed of party nominees appointed in accordance with each party's27
entitlement, as calculated on the basis of the general election
returns in each area, the main outlines of the representative
system, as it is intended to be under the new electoral law, are
beginning to emerge. The DPRD’s now in existence are composed of
members of the major parties established in the region concerned,
and in approximate proportion to their respective strengths in that
region. They have with due formality elected their chairmen and
vice-chairmen. They have also elected their DPD’s whose members,
though still under the chairmanship of an appointed governor, bupati
or mayor, and still subject in their decisions to his power of
veto, are assuming responsibility for the administration of local
services. The area of responsibility is divided amongst individual
members—health to one, public works to another, and so one. The
frequency of their meetings varies, but a common arrangement is for
monthly DPRD meetings and weekly DPD meetings. The size of councils
at each level varied slightly from area to area. In Java all pro-
vincial DPRD’s were to be composed of 60 members and DPD’s of 6
members including the kepala daerah. DPRD’s varied between 20 and
30 members, with a DPD of 6 in all cases. The DPRD’s of large towns
varied between 15 and 25 with a DPD of 6 in all cases. The DPRD’s
of small towns varied between 10 and 15 with a DPD of 4 in all
cases.
Naturally the system of proportional representation which was
used in the general election, and which is to be used in local
elections also according to the new electoral law (19 of 1956)
makes possible the survival of many parties. Nevertheless it is
worth noting that the introduction of the elective principle for
the transitional period, even though it has been adopted only in a
substitute form, has brought about a drastic reduction in the
number of parties represented. Whereas there were something in
the neighborhood of ten parties represented on the old "temporary"
local councils in Java, there are now usually only from four to
six parties represented on the new "transition" councils. The
major ones in all cases are the N.U. , P.K.I., P.N.I. and Masjumi.
(In East Java, for example, N.U. and P.N.I. are represented on all
councils of kabupatens or towns, P.K.I. is represented on all but
three, and Masjumi on all but one.) The other parties which have
still managed to keep a foot in the door include P.R.I., Katholic
and Parkindo, but there are to be found in far fewer councils and,
where they are represented, in far fewer numbers than the big four.
In general, it may be said that while Government Regulation 39
encouraged the mushroom growth of parties, since all organized
parties could claim representation merely on the grounds of their
existence, the 1955 general election eliminated the less hardy
growths, though proportional voting still allows a multi-party sys-
tem .
A natural result of the application of electoral figures to
regional councils is that it has thrown into sharper relief the
differences in party strengths from area to area. In Central
Sumatra the Masjumi party is much stronger than it is in Indonesia
as a whole, and has been able to obtain, in many areas, an absolute
majority on DPRD’s, despite the difficulty of doing so under a28
proportional system. Similarly in East Java the N.U, and the P.K.I.
have a greater strength than either of them possesses in other
areas, or at the national level, and they have each been able to
win absolute majorities in councils in that province. (1) In a
multi-party system these natural variations in local strength
may lead, in any particular region, to inter-party alignments
and adjustments which run counter to the policies of the parties
concerned at the national level. While party discipline is not
strong and voting may not always follow rigid party lines, it is
broadly true that, in areas where the N.U. predominates, Masjumi
tends to oppose N.U.-P.N.I. coalitions. This often places it in
the position of supporting P.K.I. members on general issues. In
areas where the P.K.I. is strong, on the other hand, the other three
major parties form a united opposition.
A feature of the council system which deserves comment concerns
the relationship between the representative body and the executive
body, and the method of selecting the latter by and from the former.
Though the representative council, the DPRD, is based on propor-
tional representation, it might have been expected that the execu-
tive council, the DPD, would be formed by the usual method of
straight-out election, so that the party or group of parties which
could command a majority of the DPRD would secure executive control
also. That is not the system used. The executive is intended to
reflect the party composition of the DPRD as the latter is intended
to reflect the composition of the electorate, and the proportional
system is therefore used at this stage too. It is used, however, in
a special form. According to a ministerial regulation (17 of 1956)
the party complexion of the DPD is determined automatically in ad-
vance by simply applying the principles of proportional representa-
tion to the party distribution in the DPRD. The calculation, in
other words, is made in the abstract, once the DPRD composition is
known. Then each party whose strength entitles it to membership
of the DPD puts forward two candidates for each seat to which it is
entitled. The DPRD then chooses between the two candidates by a
straight, vote. It is obvious that this procedure may yield a
very different result from that which might be obtained if a ballot
according to the proportional representation system were held in
the normal way. In the latter case the resulting DPD would be in
proportion to the votes actually cast, and those votes might not
necessarily be cast by each party for a nominee from its own ranks.
Briefly, in a normal ballot it would be possible for any prearranged
coalition of parties to be reflected in the final result, and in
fact that method is used in the areas where N. I. T. Law 44 operates
But in the areas covered by R. I. Law 22 the composition of the
DPD automatically reflects the actual party distribution of the DPRD
and makes no allowance for the fact that parties may choose to act
in concert in order perhaps, to outweigh a stronger rival.
The automatic procedure can have odd consequences. Where a
party has an absolute majority in the DPRD there is no problem*
(1) The Communist Party was not represented in the "temporary"
councils, but by 1956 it had made up much of the ground it had
lost as a result of the abortive Madiun Affair of 1948.29
And in other cases, too, the DPD does usually bear a reasonable
relation to the intentions of the parties composing the DPRD. But
it is nevertheless possible in certain circumstances for a DPD, so
far from representing a majority of the DPRD, to be so constituted
as to be at odds with the representative body. If one party just
falls short of an absolute majority in the DPRD it may be opposed
by all other parties, but it may still be in a position to command
a majority of seats on the smaller executive. In one case studied
the P.K.I. possessed 14 out of 30 seats in the DPRD. It was
possible, therefore, for it to be outvoted by a combination of all
other parties. But its strength as the most powerful single party
entitled it to 3 of the 5 DPD seats. Had the selection of the DPD
been made by an ordinary ballot according to proportional repre-
sentation,, the combination of anti-P.K.I. parties would have gained
3 DPD seats and the consequent executive majority,
This type of alignment is, admittedly, rare. A more common
and more serious consequence of the method laid down in the Mini-
sterial Regulation for the selection of DPD members arises from
the provision that, though the entitlement of each party is auto-
matically determined, the actual members in each case must be
chosen by the DPRD from two candidates put forward by the parties.
It has happened in a number of cases that, where the P.K.I. has been
entitled to one seat on the DPD, the anti-communist majority of the
DPRD has refused, through large-scale abstention, to elect either
of the two candidates advanced by the P.K.I. In these cases the
Ministry has been powerless to persuade the councils to obey the
intentions of the Ministerial Regulation, and the DPD's in question
{including the DPD of the Province of West Java) have remained
one member short. (2) This kind of recalcitrance on the part of
local governments forms one of the arguments of the central Govern-
ment in support of the view that central supervision over local
autonomy is still required for the time being. But it must be
noted that it arises from a defect in the voting machinery. It
would not arise if the alternative method of a straight ballot,
still according to P.B., were held.
For that matter it is not easy to see exactly why the propor-
tional system should be used for this particular operation, except
that the idea of decision by general consensus would appear to be
a characteristic of Indonesian political procedure. At the level
of immediate local politics (the second and third levels of autonomy)
where executive tasks are relatively simple, and where the issues
involved are of a "parish pump" variety rather than of a profound
political nature, easy co-operation between members of widely
differing political parties may be not so difficult to achieve.
At the provincial level the disadvantages should be more apparent,
and the creation of unwieldy coalitions might be expected to limit
J2 j E. g. Pasuruan kabupaten, East Java, where the DPRD consisted
of 18 N.U^j 7 P. N. T, , J P.K.I,, and 2 Masjumi members. Accord-
ing to proportional representation the DPD should have been
composed of 3 N.U. members, 1 P.N.l. member, and 1 P.K.I. mem-
ber, But neither of the P.K.I. candidates was able to secure
a majority of votes from the DPRD.30
executive programs to the lowest common denominator. (3) For this
reason it would appear that the desire to ensure that all major
political groups are represented could be adequately satisfied by
providing for such representation on the legislative council,
leaving the DPD as an executive depending for its existence on its
ability to retain the confidence of the legislature.
The quality of local government must depend, of course, upon
the quality of those who are available to serve as members of the
representative and executive councils. Naturally the lower levels
of autonomy must compete with the higher levels, including the na-
tional level, for the services of capable political leaders. With
the election of the new Parliament in 1955 and of the Constituent
Assembly in the same year, there were many cases of DPRD and DPD
members moving from the local to the central arena, (4) However,
in most cases studied there has been a reasonable carryover of
members from the "temporary” councils to the "transitional"
councils, suggesting the gradual growth of a core of professional
or part-time political leaders who can find scope for their ambi-
tions in local government service. The occupational background of
members is not broad. The greatest single occupational group to
be found on councils is composed of civil servants, a fact which is
reminiscent of the local councils established during the colonial
period and which is reflective of the character of the social
elite catered for by the council system. (5) Other groups are
small tradesmen, religious leaders, teachers, labor leaders and
industrial workers. Only isolated exceptions are drawn from the
agricultural population. The latter fact bears closely upon the
general attitude of the Ministry of Internal Affairs towards the
degree of independence which may safely be conferred on local
authorities. It is argued that only when the councils can reflect
the aspirations of the great mass of the agricultural population can
the Government’s own means of controlling that population—its
administrative service—be safely dispensed with.
While representative and executive bodies are now in operation
and have assumed responsibility for the making of regulations in
certain fields of local government, for executing those regulations,
and for administering a number of local services, the fact remains
that it is not yet completely accurate to speak of local "govern-
ment." It is still the case that the new "autonomous" bodies
(3)	This would seem even more likely were the idea of an all-party
executive extended to the national level, as was proposed by
the President in his "Conception" of February 21, 1957.
(4)	E.g. in Malang kabupaten (East Java) all but three members of
the DPRD Sementara were elected to Parliament, the Constituent
Assembly, or the provincial DPRD, leaving only three experienced
members available for the new DPRD Peralihan in 1956.
(5)	This group formed from a third to a half of the membership of
8 second- and third-level councils studied in East Java, and
of 4 in Central Sumatra. In the newly appointed DPRD of the
province of East Java 23 of the 60 members were civil servants.31
can exercise only a severely limited role. Firstly, since the
kepala daerah and chairmen of the DPD is still, at the same time,
the chief executive officer of the central Government in the pro-
vince, kabupaten or municipality, the prestige of the local govern-
ment tends to be overshadowed by that of the center, even where
local, matters are concerned. Secondly, it will be seen that the
character of the powers surrendered to the local level also reflects
the subordinate position of the local authority.
The Kepala Daerah
Since the intentions of Law 22 with regard to the method of
appointing the kepala daerah have never been applied, the local
government system in its "temporary" and its "transitional" form
has been but a pale shadow of the system as envisaged in that
law or as planned for the future. This fact has been a major ground
of complaint by critics of the interim system who have argued that
it has been no more than a device for disguising the continuance of
central Government control.
Certainly it is true that, since the DPRD's have had no say
in the selection of their regional heads, the role of these offi-
cials as central Government servants has been more apparent than
their role as leaders of the local government. Naturally with
the training and tradition of official service behind him a member
of the pamong pradja would be expected to be a different type of
person from a kepala daerah appointed by the prescribed procedure.
Though, in theory, a kepala daerah appointed by the procedure
laid down in the law was still to~be charged with the task of
balancing the desires of his regional council against more general
considerations of national interest, any kepala daerah so appointed
would surely be extremely reluctant to impose any check upon reso-
lutions of his DPRD or his DPD, which would be composed of his
political colleagues, presumably of like mind with himself, In
such circumstances it would be natural for the national interest
to be interpreted in such a say as to make it consistent with local
demands. As it is, the reverse has been the case. The Ministry
has been able to rely with certainty upon the obedience of its
servants in imposing a delay on local ordinances and in subordinating
local wishes to its own interpretation of the national interest.
Given the appointment of officials to the office, the machinery
provided by Law 22 gave an effective means of ensuring central
control. The "preventive" supervision provided under Article 28 (6)
(requiring the signature of the kepala daerah to local ordinances)
and Article 36 (empowering the kepala daerah to delay matters where,
in his opinion, decisions of DPRD or DPD conflicted with higher
legislation or with the general interest) was so much the more
effective when the Ministry was in a position simply to instruct
its own officials to impose their veto with regard to a particular
matter which was known to be pending. It could then ensure that
the matter was raised by stages through the hierarchy of local
governments until it was eventually brought officially to its own
notice. For example, a kabupaten decision vetoed by the kepala32
daerah would be referred to the DPD of the province, as required in
Law 22. If the DPD of the province approved the original decision
of the kabupaten DPRD or DPD, that approval would constitute a deci-
sion of the provincial DPD which might then be the subject of a
similar delaying veto by the kepala daerah of the province, and
the matter would then pass for decision to the Minister acting in
the name of the President. The watch-dog function of the pamong
pradja, of course, was intended to produce the same effect where
the central Government had no prior warning and had issued no
prior instruction. (6)
The character of the system as it has operated is reflected
most clearly, perhaps, in the accepted titles of regional heads.
It is worth noting that, though in strict terminology the term
kepala daerah is supposed to denote a different function or area
of activity from that of a governor, or bupati, or mayor, and
though the official designation of these officers is "Gubernur/
Kepala Daerah, Bupati/Kepala Daerah, Wali Kota/Kepala Daerah, in
practice thepamongpradja rank is invariablyused by itself--
Governor, Bupati, Wali Kola. And this practice is more consistent
with the facts as they have been up to the present.
Yet, in spite of objections raised in principle against the
combination of the two positions in the same hands, it must be
admitted that, in practice, the direct appointment of the appropri-
ate members of the pamong pradja to the office of regional head
has worked surprisingly well. Certainly there have been cases
where governors and bupatis have found themselves at odds with
their councils. But these have been exceptional. For the most
part regional heads have managed to establish a good working
(6) In the cases studied there were a number of examples of both
uses of the preventive veto—by central instruction to the
kepala daerah of provinces and kabupatens, and by the original
initiative of kepala daerah themselves. Where matters on which
the central government has a contrary interest do manage to
slip past the supervision of the kepala daerah it is sometimes
possible for the center to impose a repressive veto under
Article 42, even on levels lower than the province. In one
case studied, an ordinance of the DPRD of Bogor (Kota Besar)
had been approved by the Wali Kota/Kepala Daerah. Since it
concerned the remuneration of DPRD members it was subject,
under Article 7 (2), to the preventive supervision of the DPD
of the next highest level—the province of West Java. The provincial
DPD in fact approved the ordinance, and this decision was, in
turn, approved by the Governor of the province. The Ministry,
however, was opposed to the original measure. Since it was,
by this time, too late to secure the veto of the kepala daerah,
it was forced to resort to a Presidential "repressive" veto,
under Article 42 (1), of the provincial DPD decision approving
the Kota Besar ordinance. In this way an ordinance of a second-
level local government was revoked at two removes, as it were.
Such a procedure, however, would not have been possible had the
original ordinance been that of a third-level government, not
a second-level government.33
understanding with their councils. While party representatives
in Parliament have directed their fire at the retention of a veto
power in the hands of central officers, these attacks do not seem
to have awakened strong echoes in the daerahs themselves, where
the issue of central supervision appears to have been of much less
moment in practice than one would expect in theory. In fadt the
power of veto has rarely been used. The credit for that fact
must lie partly with the political skill of governors and bupatis
who have been able, by personal contact with council members, to
resolve potential differences between councils and center before
they became issues on the councils. In exercising this skill
a governor or a bupati was, of course, aided by the mere fact
that he was in a position to impose a veto if it did come to the
point. But, in addition to this legal power, there has been a
more intangible factor present also—the fact that he was a person
of authority. The mystique of authority still counts for much in
political relations in Indonesia. A governor or a bupati or a
mayor is the more easily able to reach a good understanding with
the members of his council, considered as individuals rather than
as party representatives, because of the mere fact that he embodies
in his person the authority of the central government in the region
This applies particularly to the kabupaten level where the bupati
is regarded in his area less as the head, of an autonomous govern-
ment than as the symbol of a higher power. It is a paternal
authority which he represents. He is the father of his people and
it would be unwise for the student of political, relations in Indo-
nesia to ignore the special flavor expressed, for instance, on the
occasions ,,when a bupati—or for that matter his subordinates, the
wedanas and tjamats--speaks paternally to the lurahs of his region.
Even at the more sophisticated level of kabupaten or provincial
political activity something of the same-relationship survives, and
there is room for careful study of informal as well as formal
methods of decision-making by regional representative and executive
councils.
Naturally this attitude to authority may be expected to
change. There are already signs that the chairman of the DPRD,
a person chosen by the council itself, is coming to be an important
focal point in local affairs, and this in itself must weaken the
traditional position of the bupati or the governor. Again, the
tendency of members of the pamong pradja to acquire a party affili-
ation is bound, to blur the present distinction between official
neutrality and the conflict of political pressures, especially
when some members of the administrative service have sought poli-
tical office. Amongst the civil servants who, as was indicated
above, have become the largest single occupational group on
kabupaten or provincial councils, are many members of the pamong
pradja. It is always possible that a low-ranking officer,-a
wedana or a tjamat, may be chosen as a chairman of a DPRD or a
member of a DPD. This must necessarily affect his relationship
towards his superiors in the service, since it will tend to confer
upon him, in his political capacity, a roughly equal status with
the officer to whom he is responsible in his professional capacity.
It is argued by some that the pamong pradja as a service should34
stand aside from politics. But this is a difficult ideal to achieve,
since, in recent years, many higher appointments in the service
have been made, partly, at least, for political reasons. An ambi-
tious regional officer can hardly be blamed for attempting to safe-
guard his future advancement by acquiring political connections.
But these are long-term elements of change. In the present
situation, though the political affiliations of the administrative
official have laid him open to the charge of using his influence
in matters of national politics, as in the elections of 1955, his
neutrality in local government politics seems not to have been
seriously impaired, and so far his prestige has been such as to
overshadow that of popular representatives. In these circumstances
his special position within the system of autonomy has not, except
in a few difficult cases, constituted the source of friction which
one might have expected from a study of the formal machinery of
local government, or from a consideration of parliamentary criticisms
of the system. The new basic law, however, has radically changed
the character of the kepala daerah. The nature of the alteration
and the problems which the application of the new law will pose
will be separately considered in the next chapter.
Powers
The limited and experimental nature of local government during
the period of transition is further reflected in the method by
which powers have been divided amongst the several levels of
autonomy and in the character of the powers themselves. In general
Law 22 provided that each level of autonomy should manage its own
"household" affairs (rumah tangga). In the establishing legisla-
tion by which provinces, kabupatens and municipalities were
actually set up the concept of household affairs was further
elaborated in a list of subjects. But it is to be noticed that,
instead of allotting different general fields of activity to the
two levels so far created, the same list of fields, with the ex-
ception of one item, is given to each level. The actual responsi-
bility of the province in the specified fields differs, of course,
from that of the kabupaten or the municipality, and a more exact
definition is provided in the appendix to each law. The full list
of headings is as follows;
I.	The maintenance of a DPRD and of the general organization
which goes with it (Urusan Umum)„
II.	The execution of laws and regulations passed by that
council (Urusan Pemerintahan Umum).
III.	Control of public lands (Urusan Agraria).
IV.	Public works—irrigation, roads and public buildings
(Urusan Pengairan, Djala2, dan Gedung2).
V.	Agriculture, Fisheries and Co-operatives (Urusan Pertanian,
Perikanan dan Koperasi).35
VI.	Veterinary services (Urusan Kehewanan).
VII.	Control of handicrafts, internal trade and industry
(Urusan Keradjinan, perdagangan dalam negeri dan
perindustrian).
VIII.	Control of labor (Urusan perburuhan).
IX.	Social welfare (Urusan Sosial).
X.	Marketing, distribution, price control, etc. (Urusan
Pembagian—distribusi).
XI.	Information (Urusan Penerangan).
XII.	Education (Urusan Pendidikan, pengadjaran dan kebudajaan).
XIII.	Health (Urusan Kesehatan).
XIV.	Traffic control (Urusan Lalu-lintas)--for province only.
XV.	Operation of the region's own enterprises (Urusan
Perusahaan).
This imposing array of subject is limited by two factors.
(a)	Though all of the subjects are enumerated in the establishing
legislation for all provinces and kabupatens they have not all been
surrendered in fact. As has been noticed already, the actual
surrender of each power (except I and II) requires a separate
legal instrument. In fact by the end of 1956 only seven powers
had been transferred to provinces—public works, agriculture and
fisheries, veterinary services, control of industry, social wel-
fare, education, and health--and only two powers—public works
and health--to the kabupaten level.
(b)	Even those powers that have been surrendered are not always
quite as extensive as might be assumed from the list of general
headings. The explanatory appendix attached to each establishing
law makes it clear that, in the case of many of the fields listed,
the role of the autonomous government is to be merely that of
assistant to the central Government in the case of provinces, and
to the province or the center in the case of kabupatens. This
limitation is effected partly by the specific classification of
many of the powers as "medebewind" rather than as "otonoom.” For
example, under the heading VIII—Labor--the five activities to be
entrusted to the province are all specifically described as medebe-
wind. For the most part they comprise the provision of statistical
information to the central Ministry of Labor. But even where the
powers to be surrendered are not specifically described as medebewind
their character is often, in effect, not more than that of giving
assistance to the center. The education power surrendered to pro-
vinces is a clear example. The duties surrendered, though not de-
scribed as medebewind, are limited to primary schools only, and
even then are concerned mainly with the erection and care of primary
school buildings and the provision of equipment for those schools.36
All other educational matters--the drafting of curricula for all
schools, the inspection of all schools, the training of teachers,
etc.—remain matters for the central Ministry of Education. It is
not intended to suggest that, in these particular fields, full
provincial autonomy would be more desirable than central control--
that education would be better handled, for instance, on a provincial
rather than a national basis. The examples are chosen because they
do illustrate a general limitation placed on provincial autonomy,
a limitation to be fourid not just in the fields of labor and educa-
tion but in other fields also.
To summarize the situation very briefly: apart from headings
I and II, only two of the fields to be surrendered to the provincial
level can be described as fields of substantial autonomy, with room
for full local initiative and full local control. These are Public
Works and Health. · All of the remainder are, in greater or less
degree, powers of medebewind, whether so described in the explana-
tory appendix to the establishing act or not. The same comment
applies in an even greater degree to the kabupaten, to which level,
in any case, only public works and health have so far been surren-
dered .
However, in spite of these limitations, it may be possible
to interpret the legislation in such a way as to allow a slightly
greater area of operation for the local government. The question
arises from the provision in the basic law which provides that each
autonomous government shall manage its own "household affairs." (7)
It is doubtful whether the list of powers set out in the establish-
ing laws is intended to constitute an exhaustive definition of
"household affairs" and thus to indicate the full scope of activity
of the local government, or whether the term may be held to include
other matters of clearly local interest which fall outside the
list but which may be handled by the local government on its own
initiative, subject only to the general provision that such initia-
tive must not infringe the legislation of a higher level. This
point is not made clear either in the basic law or in the earlier
establishing laws for the provinces in Java and Sumatra, though
the statement in the basic law that matters included in the concept
of rumah tangga would be determined in the establishing legisla-
te on for each region (8) suggests the narrower interpretation. (9)
1?) Έ t i5Ies"I”"and 23.
(8)	Law 22, Article 23 (2).
(9)	Article 1 of Law 22 provides that Indonesia shall be divided
into three levels of autonomy which "have the right to regulate
and arrange their household affairs themselves." Article 23 (1)
provides that the DPRD shall regulate the household affairs of
the region. The next paragraph continues: "Matters which are
included in the rumah tangga mentioned in para. 1 are to be
determined in the establishing law for each region. The question
would appear to turn on the words "are included" (Hal-hal jang
masuk urusan rumah tangga....)." Article 28 dealing with the37
However, changes in wording in more recent establishing legislation
suggest that the wider interpretation was intended, or, at least,
has since come to be favored. The legislation establishing kabupatens
and large and small municipalities in Central Sumatra was substan-
tially different from that establishing autonomous governments in
Java. While a list of subjects was included (the same subjects
as those already listed for Java) it was further provided that the
autonomous governments had the right to deal with matters not dealt
with by the central Government or by the provincial government un-
til higher legislation decided otherwise. (10) A similar pro-
vision was included in the legislation dividing Kalimantan into
three provinces, (11) and in that creating the province of Atjeh. (12)
These later formulations would appear to indicate a trend in the
direction of allowing a greater degree of flexibility in the con-
ferring of powers upon local governments. It will be seen that
the trend is continued in the new basic law of 1957.
In addition to the specific powers surrendered, each level
of autonomy, according to Law 22, has a general supervisory role
to play with regard to the levels below it. Since the third level
up to the present has been established only in towns, this task
has belonged primarily to the province, though, in practice,
kabupaten DPD's do exercise a degree of informal supervision over
the affairs of the desa. (13) Supervision is most important, per-
haps, in financial matters. The provincial DPD considers kabupaten
legislative powers of DPRD’s empowers the DPRD to legislate
for the "interests" of the region, but the general explanation
attached to the law, in elaborating this article, equates
"interests" with the rumah tangga dealt with in Article 23,
and thus does not clear up the ambiguity.
(10)	Law 8/56, Article 8; Law 9/56, Article 8; Law 12/56, Article 8.
These three laws provided for the transfer to the kabupaten
or municipality of some of the listed powers by the province,
not the central government. This was merely because, in the
absence of autonomous governments of the second level, the
powers of such governments had been surrendered to the pro-
vince already.
(11)	Law 25 of 1956, Article 81. A roughly similar provision had
been included in the law establishing the original province
of Kalimantan (Emergency Law 2 of 1953, Article 75).
(12)	Law 24 of 1956, Article 13.
(13)	"Desa affairs" is usually one of the executive tasks which
are parcelled out amongst the members of the kabupaten DPD's,
even though, strictly speaking, this field of activity does
not properly belong to the autonomous kabupaten. The extent
to which the DPD member responsible for desa affairs really
does perform a serious task varies from kabupaten to kabupaten,
and depends upon informal arrangements made with the admini-
strative service in the area.38
and municipal financial estimates and makes an initial determina-
tion of their budgets. It also considers requests from kabupatens
and municipalities for central government loans, and recommends
acceptance of such proposals to the Ministry for Internal Affairs.
In addition, as already noticed, the provincial DPD has power to
set aside regulations and decisions of lower councils.
Organizational Complexities
The role of local governments as assistants to the center and
the consequent interlocking of local government machinery with that
of the several central Government departments concerned has given
rise to certain organizational complications. The field of educa-
tion may again serve as an example. It has been seen that the
province is entrusted with the maintenance of primary schools and
the supply of equipment, while the remaining responsibility rests
with the Ministry of Education. Each province has its own Education
Office for the administration of its allotted responsibility. It
also maintains branches of that office in the kabupatens. But the
Ministry of Education, too, maintains its own provincial offices
and kabupaten offices for the primary school inspectorate, its
separate provincial offices for the supervision and inspection of
lower secondary schools (SMP) in the province, and a separate
office for the administration of mass education programmes. (The
inspectorate for the higher secondary schools—SMA—is established
in Djakarta, not in each province.) Thus the general field of
education in each province is divided between a number of separate
offices (14) though the nature of their work makes close co-opera-
tion imperative. That is particularly true in such kabupatens
as Pasuruan, where compulsory education is the subject of experi-
ment. The experiment is financed by the Ministry but supervised
by the autonomous province.
Even in fields where local control is comparatively full, the
fact that the same power is surrendered to all levels has its
peculiar consequences. The field of health is a case in point.
The province has power to establish and maintain its own hospitals
and it pays and controls its own staff. It also has educational
responsibilities in the training of orderlies and midwives. The
kabupaten has similar powers. The fact that medical services are
in any case inadequate and doctors in appall ingly short supply
removes any danger of overlapping between the two levels. But
the Ministry of Health also operates directly in the local field,
supervising local health services in technical matters, maintaining
its own hospitals, and running a number of national campaigns
against malaria, framboesia and tuberculosis. Any kabupaten doctor
is expected to assist in the execution of the central campaigns
(14) In CentraT Sumatra, for example, there are three offices of
the central Ministry in Padang (Inspectorate of SMP, and of
foreign schools, and the office of Mass Education) and three
in Bukittinggi (Inspectorate of primary schools (SR), of
technical education, and of religious education).39
as well as performing his own duties for the autonomous local
government which employs him. In fact, also, because of the short-
age of doctors, most of those employed by kabupatens and provinces
are supplied by the Ministry and can be transferred by the Ministry,
although they are paid by the local authority. (There are rare
cases where a kabupaten has actually appointed its own doctor,
and in these cases it retains full control over him. The Ministry
of Health is still his ultimate superior for technical matters. But
it cannot transfer him. But these are exceptions. For the most
part official doctors are not merely under the Ministry for techni-
can supervision. They belong to the Ministry and are simply on
supply to the local government.)
In this situation there should be, ideally, in each province
(a)	an Inspectorate of the Ministry of Health (i.e. a branch office
of the Ministry) to control the direct activities of the Ministry
in the province and to exercise technical supervision of the pro-
fessional servants of the local governments; and
(b)	an office of the provincial health service, controlled (except
in technical matters) and financed by the autonomous provincial
government. In fact, the chronic staff shortage has decreed
otherwise. In most cases the two offices are combined in a single
building and under a single head. A description of the organiza-
tion of health services in the province of East Java and in one
kabupaten in the province will illustrate the complexity of the
situation.
The chief health officer in the province of East Java, though
paid by the province, is both provincial Inspector of Health—for
the Ministry of Health--and head of the province's own Health
service. (He also happens to be an Inspector General of the
Ministry of Health—a special advisory position-—and the V<.H.O.
officer in the province.) As Inspector he is responsible for the
conduct in the province of the campaigns conducted by the Ministry
against malaria, framboesia and typhus. He is responsible, too,
for the technical supervision of kabupaten health services. He
is not responsible, however, for a central Government hospital and
a venereal disease institute which happen to be situated in the
province. These are directly under the Ministry of Health.
Secondly, as chief health officer in charge of the provincial health
service, he is responsible for all the strictly provincial activi-
ties in the field, including the operation of two hospitals (at
Malang and Madiun); an anti-malarial campaign run by the province
in addition to the central campaign, and financed from a section
of the provincial budget which allows for measures to combat
"epidemic and endemic diseases": and the training of medical
auxiliaries for the province. In his two capacities he is respon-
sible for two budgets--one relating to his administration of the
central funds which are allotted to the provincial office in its
capacity as provincial branch of the Ministry, and one relating
to his administration of the health services of the autonomous
province.40
Ministry of
Health
'Hospital and V.D.
^Institute, situ-
ated in East Java
but directly con-
trolled by the
Ministry.
Prov .
East
Province of East Java
One Head <■
Inspectorate,
Java
Prov, Health
Service, East
Java
DPD
DPRD
Malaria, etc.,
campaigns
Technical super-
vising of Kabu-
paten and munici-
pal services.
Hospitals, Campaigns
etc., maintained by
the autonomous
Province.
Something of a similar duplication occurs at the kabupaten
level. In the kabupaten of Pasuruan, for example, there is one
hospital maintained by the autonomous kabupaten,and one maintained
by the autonomous municipality (Kota Ketjil) of Pasuruan. The
kabupaten doctor is responsible to the DPD of the kabupaten for all
kabupaten health services, including the hospital and the polyclinics
in the area. He is also technically responsible, through the sub-
inspectorate of Malang Residency, to the provincial inspectorate
in Surabaja, and ultimately, of course, to the Ministry. He is ex-
pected to assist in the conduct of central campaigns in the kabu-
paten. And he is responsible for the supply of statistical in-
Tormation to the Ministry. Further, since he was originally
supplied by the Ministry and is merely on loan to the kabupaten,
he is responsible to the provincial Inspectorate in more than a
technical sense. The provincial inspector can transfer him within
the province. And the Ministry can transfer him beyond the pro-
vince. Finally, as an added complication in Pasuruan, is the fact
that the staff shortage has again forced a combination of position
and one man serves as both kabupaten doctor and municipal doctor.
This duality of character of health services at all levels is
not necessarily a disadvantage. Indeed, at the provincial level
it can be a positive advantage for an administrator who knows what
he wants and who can bend to his purposes whatever organizational
devices happen to exist. Certainly the provincial health officer
in East Java is untroubled by his multiple personality. At least
he always knows what he is doing, even if he might not be clear
at any point in exactly which capacity he is doing it. Ultimately
it might be possible for all of the executive tasks in a province
to be the responsibility of the province considered as an autonomous
region. In the meantime the combination of the offices of provin-
cial inspector and chief of the provincial health service is perhaps
more rational than an organizational plan which attempted to de-
fine the two areas of responsibility more sharply and to divide
those areas between two officials.41
Finance
The subordinate role of local governments, which was apparent
in the character of the powers surrendered to them, is further re-
flected in their financial dependence upon the center. Local
authorities do possess their own sources of revenue, but these are
limited and do not yield nearly enough to meet the costs of main-
taining local services. As a result the grea-ter portion of local
income at all levels is supplied annually in the form of a direct
grant-in-aid from the central Government.
For the lower levels of local government--kabupatens and large
and small municipalities—the main local sources of revenue are:
(a) taxes levied by the local authority itself--bicycle tax,
entertainment tax, dog tax, vehicle tax, etc.; (b) the reversion
of a certain proportion of taxes collected by the central Govern-
ment from the region concerned, e.g. the household tax, 5% of
which is returned to provinces and 15% to kabupatens; (c) returns
from services provided by the local government, e.gT water rates,
hospital charges, charges for the use of space in markets, etc.;
(d) returns from enterprises operated by the local authority,
e.g. swimming baths and, in some instances, cinemas. Of these
sources by far the most important in the case of kabupatens is the
return from the administration of markets. For small and large
towns, water supply and markets together form the: major items of
income. But even so central subsidy still provides the most import
ant share of the annual budget. Though the exact proportion of
central subsidy to local revenue naturally varies from area to
area, the 1956 estimates for the kabupaten of Probolinggo in East
Java may be cited as a fairly representative case for Java. In
that area local sources were expected to provide a revenue of
Rp. 4,200,000 (Rp. 2,100,000 of which was expected from markets).
A subsidy of Rp. 4,150,000 was still required from the central
Government to meet an estimated expenditure of over Rp. 8,000,000.
Provinces are in far worse case since they do not have the
same opportunities for rates and charges as those enjoyed by
kabupatens and municipalities, or rather they do not have these
opportunities in proportion to their greater financial need. The
province of East Java in 1956 required an estimated subsidy of
Rp. 369,000,000 from the central Government in a total budget of
Rp. 412,000,000. Only Rp. 7,000,000 was expected from provincial
taxes and charges.
The fact that all local governments are so dependent upon
the central Government for their revenue means an accompanying
limitation upon their freedom to spend their revenue. Supervision
of financial matters is conducted through the ordinary supervisory
machinery. The budgets of local governments must be approved in
the first instance by the DPD of the next highest level. Kabupaten
budgets, that is to say, must be considered by the DPD of the
province whose task is to compare and balance the demands of
kabupatens of the whole province before making a recommendation to
the Ministry for Internal. Affairs, Provincial budgets must be42
approved by the Ministry itself. A final allocation as between
local authorities is determined by the Ministry which must act, of
course, within the general limits set for it by the Ministry of
Finance. The final allocation for each area includes provision for
the technical departments—health, agriculture, etc.--maintained
by the local authority. These are not financed directly by the cen-
tral Ministry within whose field they fall. A local government may
also receive special assistance for a particular task to be performed
for a central Ministry. The several pilot experiments at present
being conducted in compulsory education offer one example. In cases
such as this the Ministry of Finance makes a special allowance for
the project, but the actual disbursement is still made through the
Ministry for Internal Affairs.
Local governments may also borrow from the central Government
for particular purposes and again the projects must pass the
scrutiny of a higher authority. The object of the loan and the
exact details of its application must first be approved by the
Ministry of Internal Affairs, and the Ministry of Finance, and,
in the case of the lower levels of autonomy, by the province also.
The provincial DPD again acts as an initial filter for Such propo-
sals, considering in detail the nature of the works to be financed
from the loan, the validity of the estimates of costs, etc., and
it must balance each request against others from within the province.
It then passes on the request together with its recommendation
to the Ministry.
The dependent financial relationship has been one of the
major sources of grievance on the part of regional governments.
Taken together with the limited nature of the powers surrendered
and with the retention of close official supervision through the
person of the kepala daerah, it must obviously affect the ability
of the decentralization plan to secure one of its main objects—
the conciliation of regional feeling. In effect that object has
been subordinated to a second major object—the development of the
local government system almost as an auxiliary to the old central
administrative system for the purpose of providing general govern-
ment in Indonesia.
Civil Service
Each autonomous government maintains its own civil service,
organized, of course, on functional, not regional, lines. Regional
administration, as has been seen, remains the function of the cen-
tral Government's own administrative service. The activities of
the civil services of the autonomous provinces, kabupatens and
municipalities are confined to the running of those services which
have been surrendered by the center.
Recruitment and the drawing up of regulations governing pay-
ment, terms of service, pensions, etc., are the responsibility of
the local bodies themselves, except that the Ministry of Internal
Affairs issues a general guide in these matters, and the local
bodies are expected to conform reasonably closely to that guide,43
so that the risk of anomalies as between the services of different
areas, or between all of them and the center, may be reduced to a
minimum.
One serious problem facing local governments, and the central
Government too for that matter, is the shortage of trained person-
nel, whether administrative or technical, which still exists at
the present time. Indeed one of the severest indictments which can
be levelled against Dutch colonial administration is that it left
such an inadequate supply of qualified Indonesian doctors, engineers,
agriculturalists or administrators for the service of the young
Republico As far as technical officers are concerned it is usually
necessary for local authorities to borrow trained men from the cen-
tral Government. As has been noticed already, almost all doctors
employed by the health services of provinces, kabupatens and
municipalities are in fact supplied by the Ministry of Health. In
cases like these the officers remain the servants of the central
Government, though they are paid by the local government. (One
problem which arises here is that often the only persons available
for local services are of senior rank and the local authorities are
not in a position to pay the higher salaries required or, if they
are, they are likely to create anomalies in their own payrolls.)
But the shortage of non-technical personnel is also serious in
many areas and it is necessary for civil servants to be borrowed
by the local government from the central Government. In Central
Sumatra towards the end of 1956 the majority of the senior officers
staffing the several provincial services were central civil servants
on loan. In makeshift circumstances such as these it is not sur-
prising that senior officials should complain of the dubious
ability of their subordinates to make decisions, of their tendency
to pass on decisions which should be made at a lower level, or
alternatively, to make decisions on matters which should <,o to a
higher level, of their slowness in passing on matters which have
to be considered by several sections of an office, and, in general,
of their ignorance of proper procedures and the lack of administra-
tive traditions. In addition, the poor living conditions of public
servants and the low remuneration which compels many of them to
seek other employment, such as teaching in the afternoons and
evenings, are hardly conducive to good service. For reasons such
as these any communications between departments, between lower and
higher levels of local governments, or between local governments
and the Ministry of Internal Affairs are apt to be interminably
slow and productive of great frustration for civil servants and
local governments alike.
A start has been made in the direction of providing a core of
trained officials at least for the provincial level Through the
assistance of the Ministry for Internal Affairs a number of men
from each province has been sent each year for training in public
administration and related fields at the Gadja, Mada University,
Jogjakarta. These men are now beginning to filter back to their
respective provinces, and some are employed in the autonomous side.
But for the lower levels of autonomy the problem continues.
While the several departmental offices of each local govern-
ment are separately established and are staffed by the region’s
own servants, the close connection which is still maintained,
through the persons of governors and bupatis, between central44
Government administration and autonomous affairs, has given a
dualistic character to the central secretariat of both province
and kabupaten, The double function oi the bupati, for instance,
as pegawai (official) and as head of the autonomous kabupaten
government, is reflected in the organization of his office. If
portrayed diagramatically a reasonably clear division of functions
is apparent between those sections of the office which are concerned
with central matters and those which are concerned with local
government matters. In practice the two sides are apt to inter-
lock—a fact which is not without its advantages for general
efficiency. The accompanying chart is based on the organization
of the kabupaten office in Malang, but the organization is typical,
and is duplicated in essential character at the provincial level
also.
Assessment
The experiment of the transitional period has been successful
enough, as far as it has gone, in Java, though the events of December
1956 make it clear that it has been less successful in Sumatra.
Even in Java, however, it is clear that it has been a very limited
experiment. The dual role and divided responsibility of the kepala
daerah and the narrow character of the powers surrendered to pro-
vinces, kabupatens and municipalities, constitute severe restrictions
upon autonomy.~~Whether they are necessary restrictions is another
matter. In these circumstances it is difficult to assess the
potentialities of the transitional system as a means of meeting
either of the problems for which it is designed: the problem posed
by regional resistance to control by Djakarta, and the problem of
government in a society based ultimately upon a multitude of small
customary units. Certainly it may be doubted whether the kabupaten
as a unit of autonomy can contribute very much to either oT these
problems. It is too small in territorial extent to offer a point
of focus to broad regional feeling, but not small enough to fall
within the horizon of the village. From an administrative point of
view, admittedly, the kabupaten is, perhaps, the most important
link in the chain of command. At this level all of the affairs
of the region are effectively centered in the hands of the bupati,
who is the terminal point for the lines of authority passing down
through wedanas and tjamats. The bupati, of course, is responsible
in turn to the resident and the governor, but theirs is a much
more general supervision than that which he exercises over the
officers below him. However, it is doubtful whether the kabupaten
is as effective a unit from the point of view of autonomy as it is
from the point of view of administration. Attention has already
been drawn to the fact that, with some exceptions, the members of
kabupaten councils are not drawn from the rural population. There
are, it is true, identifiable regional interests which can be
handled well enough at the kabupaten level. Water supply in towns
which do not have municipal status” and other public works, are
cases in point. But these are matters which touch the interests of
a small elite. They do not directly affect the village inhabitant.
And it may be argued that, pending the establishment of a lowerΙΛ
ORGANIZATION OF OFFICE OF BUPATI/KEPALA DAERAH, KABUPATEN MALANG
Patih
Community
Development46
and basic level of autonomy, the responsibility for such tasks
might better be redistributed between provinces and municipalities.
Certainly if a third level of autonomy were established the im-
portance of the kabupaten must inevitably be reduced both as an
administrative and an autonomous unit. It is the absence of the
third level which gives some point to the present use of the kabu-
paten as a unit of autonomy. But, because of its basically unre-
presentative character, its use does not really succeed in solving
the problem posed by the absence of a third level.
A somewhat different situation may be observed in the areas
covered by N I. T. Law 44 of 1950 where the daerah unit, though
theoretically of the same status as a kabupaten, appears to provide
a more effective unit for the expression of local aspirations.
One example may be helpful in providing a contrast to the Javanese
scene.
An East Indonesian Contrast
Minahasa is not typical of the local government pattern of
Sulawesi, Maluku and Nusa Tenggara. Economically well-developed
on the basis of copra exports, and unhampered politically by the
survival and recognition of any traditional ruler, it has enjoyed
a more developed experiment in local self-government than has been
the case in the swapradja which comprise the major part of the three
eastern groups of islands. At the same time it does illustrate
the important differences in style between the provisions and oper-
ation of the N. I. T. Law 44 of 1950 and the R. I. Law 22 of 1948.
Before the war Minahasa was one of the four areas in the
eastern islands which were under direct rule. (The other three were
Gorontalo, Ambon and Lombok.) As a result of Dutch experiments in
decentralization both Minahasa and the city of Manado received
their own councils, though the government of the municipality was
subordinate to that of the region. At that stage both the mayor of
Manado and the regional head of Minahasa were appointed officials.
After the war, with the formation of the State of East Indonesia,
Minahasa (including Manado) became in 1948 a "daerah" and provision
was made by a Presidential Regulation for a council composed of
nominated party representatives on roughly the same basis as that
obtaining elsewhere in Indonesia. Law 44, which was passed two
years later, made little change to the situation already created
In 1950 the Minahasa DPRD availed itself of its right to draft
its own electoral Ordinance (Peraturan Pemilihan DPRD Minahasa)
and the first election was held under this Ordinance in June
1951. The elected DPRD in turn elected its DPD and submitted
to the Ministry of Internal Affairs a list of candidates for
the position of kepala daerah. Minahasa thus became the
first region in the Republic to elect its local council, though
it was closely followed by the Daerah Istemewa Jogjakarta,
where elections were held, two months later under the first general47
regional electoral law of the Indonesian Parliament (Law 7 of
1950). The Minahasa electoral ordinance provided for direct
elections, in contrast to Law 7, which prescribed indirect elec-
tion. It has remained in operation up till the present time.
However, when the term of the present council, elected in 1956,
expires in 1959, the next election will be held under the new
all-Indonesian local government electoral law (Law 19 of 1956)
which was passed last year to replace Law 7 of 1950. The new law,
as has been noticed, provides for direct elections on something
approaching the Minahasa pattern rather than the indirect form used
in Jogjakarta.
The present government of the daerah does not include the
city of Manado. In 1953 Manado was separated from daerah Minahasa
and constituted as a separate daerah of equal status^ with its own
DPRD, DPD and kepala daerah.
There are a number of important differences to be noticed
between the system of local government established in Minahasa
and that established in kabupatens in the areas covered by
R. I. Law 22. In particular the post-war status of the daerah
as a "neo-swapradja" (15) has affected the method of defining
the powers to be exercised by the regional government and the
character of the region's administrative service. Further, the
role of the kepala daerah has been a little different in practice,
though not in theory, from that to be found in Java.
Powers
It has been seen that in the western islands of the archipelago
powers have been specifically surrendered to the local governments
by the central Government. This practice had been established
before the war by the Dutch in their creation of local governments
in areas of direct rule. By contrast the swapradja, bound to
Holland by contract, were permitted to retain such powers as were
not specifically claimed by the central Government. When Minahasa
received limited institutions of local self-government before
World War II the normal practice in directly ruled territories
was followed, and a defined list of subjects was surrendered to the
region. After the war, under the State of East Indonesia, Minahasa
was classified as a neo-swapradja, which meant, amongst other
things, that the method to be followed in conferring powers was to
be that used in the case of the former indirectly ruled states,
i.e. central powers (the powers to be exercised by the Government
of East Indonesia) were defined, and the residual powers remained
with the local government. The method appears, on the whole, to
(15) A law of the Indies Government enacted in 1946 provided for
governments in directly ruled territories, which were to be
granted all or part of the powers which, in the indirectly
ruled areas, were vested in the governments of the self-
governing States. Schiller, op. cit., p. 99. These were
termed "neo-swapradja" and were intended to be governments
of the same type as~"a swapradja.48
be preferred by local leaders for the simple reason that the defining
of specific powers, whether for the center or for the region, tends
to have a limiting effect. In this case the limitation was placed
upon the center—the Government of East Indonesia until 1950, and
the Government of the Republic of Indonesia after the formation of
the unitary state in that year. The fact that the limitation is
voluntarily incurred by the central parliament and may be reversed
at the will of the central parliament, distinguishes such a method
from the distribution of powers in a federal system. But, in
practice, there is something of a federal element present when
powers are divided in this way. However, the implementation over
the whole of Indonesia of the new basic local government law passed
in 1956 would have the effect of introducing, even in Minahasa,
the method whereby local powers are defined and specifically
surrendered by the center.
The Administrative Service
In the former self-governing states the responsibility for
the administration of districts and sub-districts was left to the
recognized local ruler, aided, of course, by officers of the
Indies Government. This has continued to be the case since inde-
pendence. Whereas the lower administrative ranks in directly
ruled areas have been subject directly through the chain of command
to the Ministry of Internal Affairs, in swapradja they have been
responsible to the government of the swapradja in the first in-
stance. Minahasa's post-war status as a. neo-swapradja has placed
this area in the latter category. The regional administration of
the area has been a responsibility of the DPD, and District and
Sub-district Officers (Hukum Besar - Wedana, Hukum Kedua z Tjamat)
are appointed by, and are responsible to, the DPD.
Kepala Daerah
It has been seen that N. I. T. Law 44 of 1950, unlike Law 22
of 1948, contained no escape clause allowing for the appointment
of a kepala daerah directly by the Ministry during the interim
periocT When the elected DPRD in 1951 submitted its list of four
candidates to the Minister, therefore, he was bound to make his
choice from that list. This alone would appear to indicate a
greater measure of local independence than was permitted in Java
where the regional head continued to be an appointed official.
But even in Minahasa central control has been exercised over the
activities of the local government in no uncertain manner, and the
freedom of the local representative council to determine, within
limits, the person of the local chief executive has been questioned.
In practice the Minister of Internal Affairs claimed, and claimed
successfully, the power to set aside the choice of the DPRD for
the position of kepala daerah, and even to dispense for a period
with the DPRD itself.49
When a kepala daerah was to be appointed following the local
elections of 1951 it happened that one of the four candidates put
forward by the DPRD was a member of the pamong pradja, a bupati in
rank, and he was chosen by the Minister. Two years Later the
growth of tension between the DPRD and the DPD led to action by
the representative body to replace the old executive and to submit
to the Minister a new list of candidates for the position of kepala
daerah. It was significant that none of the members in the new
list had previously been an officer of the central administration.
The Minister refused to accept this attempt to change the govern-
ment of Minahasa. Instead he dissolved the DPRD and appointed
a new kepala daerah from the pamong pradja. For three years Mina-
hasa wa£ governed cTirectly by an appointed official acting without
either a representative or an executive body, but finally in 1956
a new election was held, a new DPD selected, and a new kepala
daerah chosen by the prescribed procedure. (He was not formerly
an official.)
However, though the center successfully exerted its power in
this way between 1953 and 1956, and though the exact nature of the
relationship intended to exist between the kepala daerah and his
DPRD or between the kepala daerah and the center has never been
satisfactorily defined, he does remain more a political figure, and
more the servant of the local government, than has hitherto been
the case in Java. And in general, in spite of this example of
local acceptance (albeit a reluctant acceptance) of the Minister's
decision, it would be true to say that local autonomy in Minahasa
has been a sturdier growth than that in the areas operating under
Law 22. This has been partly due, as was suggested earlier, to the
region's inheritance of neo-swapradja status from the State of East
Indonesia. But there have been other factors also. The remoteness
of the area from Djakarta, and from Makassar, the capital of
Sulawesi, its economic development on the basis of copra exports,
its high rate of literacy (95%) are important. So is the fact
that, up till the present time, there has been no autonomous pro-
vince of Sulawesi. The province has been an administrative divi-
sion only. Some of the powers, therefore, which have belonged
to provinces elsewhere have devolved upon the daerah. Though
theoretically Minahasa is equal in status to a kabupaten, actually
it has exercised roughly the same powers as belong to a province
in Java: health, education, public works, agriculture and fisher-
ies, forests, veterinary services, and information. There would
be great resistance in Minahasa were any of these fields of activity
to be transferred to an autonomous province either of Sulawesi or
North Sulawesi, though admittedly, if the latter development
occurred, the pill would be coated by the fact that Manado would
almost certainly become the capital. Finally, the problem of copra
exports has provided an issue for a major clash of interest between
central Government and the daerah, which has stimulated local
suspicion of Djakarta. This will be examined below.50
CHAPTER V
THE NEW BASIC LAW
In November 1956 a new basic local government law, designed
to apply throughout all Indonesia, was passed by parliament. This
was achieved only after a long period of preparation under a series
of Governments, and after a number of false starts. In 1954 a
draft bill had failed to win parliamentary approval. A second
draft in 1956 again encountered strong opposition. Only after pro-
longed negotiations between the Minister for Internal Affairs and
party leaders was a drastically amended third draft able to secure
acceptance. The three drafts followed the pattern of Law 22 in
many respects, but they differed from it and from each other on
two major issues which, as may be gathered from the preceding
pages, are crucial to the whole plan—the question of central
Government supervision of local government, and the question of the
lowest unit of autonomy. On a third question at issue—that of
the extent of powers to be enjoyed by local governments at all
levels—the trend noticed above in more recent establishing laws
has been continued. DPRD's are given the power to deal with all
local matters except those assigned by law to another authority.
Without lessening this blanket provision powers may be specifically
conferred upon DPRD's. (1)
The Problem of Supervision
It has been seen that a central feature of the system pre-
scribed in R. I. Law 22 and in N. I. T. Law 44 for the central
supervision of autonomous governments was the provision that the
Head of a Region, though partially chosen by the DPRD of the region
itself, would exercise a dual function--that of chairman of the Execu
tive Council and head of the autonomous government on the one hand,
and, on the other, that of central Government representative, with
a responsibility for supervising the work of the councils and for
acting sometimes against the wishes of the councils, if public in-
terest or the requirements of higher legislation required it. It has
been noted, too, that in the areas where Law 22 applied, the central
control was carried a stage further in that these offices were
filled, not from candidates nominated by the DPRD’s but from
officials appointed directly by the Ministry. Obviously for
Java and other areas formerly under direct rule the system of
appointment proposed by Law 22 was unsatisfactory. So long as
the central Government considered it necessary to maintain some
control it seemed desirable to retain the official character of
these positions. But the compromise whereby nominations would
be made by the representative bodies and appointments made from
those nominations by the central Government would be certain to
attain only the worst of both worlds. On the one had, the element
(1) Law 1 of 1957, Article 31.51
of appointment would be resented by local assemblies. On the
other hand, from the Government’s point of view, the fact that
appointments were to be made from a list of nominees destroyed the
guarantee that the Government would be able to select a man on
whom it could rely. Moreover, the method would also have destroyed
at one blow the stability of the central administrative service by
removing from office the very people whose training and experience
fitted them for just this task. In the indirectly ruled areas
the problem did not appear so acute, since the central administra-
tion had never penetrated so completely to the basis of society.
When attempts were made after 1954 to secure the passage of a
new basic local government law to cover all Indonesia the question
of the degree to which officials of the central Government should
continue to exercise a power of supervision over local bodies
emerged as the major point at issue between Government and parlia-
ment. It was the intention of the Government to retain a greater
measure of supervision than had been envisaged either in Law 22
or Law 44 (this intention reflected closely the departmental view)
and it was the aim of party leaders in parliament to resist such
a plan.
Briefly, the Government’s case for withholding full autonomy
has rested on several considerations. There was a paternal fear
that inexperienced local councils would prove inadequate to the
tasks confronting them. Though the Government regarded full auton-
omy as a desirable goal it found it difficult to believe that the
regions were ready to receive full responsibility immediately.
Naturally it is never difficult to find evidence to support an
assumption of that kind. Nor was it simply inexperience which was
feared. There was also the fear of positive irresponsibility, and
certainly there have been cases enough to lend substance to such a
fear. (2) But perhaps more important than either of these arguments
is the fact that, though provinces and kabupatens may be given
certain powers of self-government, there still remains the problem
of administering the basic unit--the desa, or negeri, or marga, or
whatever other form its organization may take. Pending the estab-
lishment of a third level of autonomy the central Government needs
to retain control over the administration of the affairs of the
village, at least in those areas where it has done so in the past.
It is not clear how far this point entered consciously into the
thinking of the Department. It was not frequently stressed in
conversation of the present writer with officials concerned with
(2) As one instance there may be quoted the situation in West Java
where local councils increased the remuneration of members for
attendance at meetings beyond the prescribed scale. In such
cases as this the Ministry is unable to rely on obedience to
instructions which it may legitimately issue to councils. Of
similar character is the action of many councils with a strong
Moslem majority in refusing to seat a PKI member of the DPD,
even though that party is entitled to a seat. The case of
Pasuruan, which still contains one DPD vacancy, has already
been referred to.52
planning. It is, nonetheless, an important element in the problem.
When a third level, based on villages or collections of villages,
is established the need for a central administrative service should
disappear as envisaged in Law 22, or at least be greatly reduced,
and changed in character. At that point the lower regional admini-
stration, if it was still to be considered to be necessary, could
become the responsibility of the autonomous kabupaten, with wedanas
and tjamats acting as the servants of the kabupaten DPD. This
solution has in fact been mooted by officers of the Ministry of
Internal Affairs as a future interim possibility. In the meantime
there remains the fact that kabupaten councils are not really
representative of the agriculturalist, and their activities do
not directly reflect village needs. Even if fuller autonomy were
to be conceded to the kabupaten level (in the sense of restricting
the veto of the kepala daerah) the central Government cannot really
surrender full responsibility for the care and control of the
village to councils which do not adequately represent the village
population. In the "special regions"—swapradja or federations of
swapradja—the situation is rather different. There local govern-
ments’^ as a matter of history, have already been responsible for the
administration of lower territorial sub-divisions. But for the re-
mainder of the archipelago, where the local administration of the
central Government has always been more detailed and more thorough,
the Government considers it necessary, for the time being, either
to retain this channel of communication in its own hands, or to
institute a very close supervision by appointed officials over
the administration of lower districts by DPRD's and DPD's.
At first the latter alternative was preferred. When the new
legislation for local government was under consideration between
1954 and 1956 two alternative solutions to the problem, quite oppo-
site in character but each designed to establish a firm supervisory
system, were put forward in succession. The draft bill of 1954
suggested a simple and direct solution, namely that the existing
provisional method of direct appointment of an official as the
kepala daerah be made permanent. The kepala daerah of provinces
would be appointed by the President, of kabupatensand large muni-
cipalities by the Minister, and lower officers by the kepala daerah
of the province concerned Naturally it was intended that, in
making these appointments, the Government would continue its prac-
tice of appointing members of the pamong pradja. (3) Emphasis was
laid in the bill not on the dual character of the kepala daerah
but rather on his character simply as an official of the central
Government. "The Kepala Daerah is a national civil servant."
(Article 23.) And-the general-explanation attached to the bill was
more explicit: "In a unitary state the Kepala Daerah has the role
of supervising all the measures of the regional government in the
interests of the State as a whole. Because of this it is provided
that the Kepala Daerah shall be an official who is appointed and
dismissed by the central Government." In this way it was hoped to
(3) Though this has been the general rule up to the present there
have been exceptions in the case of higher appointments. Not
all governors have been appointed from within the service.53
continue the practice of balancing the power of autonomous local
governments by placing at their center the same individual who
was also responsible for the administration and co-ordination of
central Government activities in the region concerned. With his
power of veto over the decisions of both local councils he could
exercise an effective supervision over their actions and policies.
It was, perhaps, not surprising that this feature of the bill
should arouse strong and successful opposition in parliament, and
the new draft, prepared in 1956, went to the opposite extreme in
proposing a solution. Instead of integrating the autonomous hier-
archy with the administrative hierarchy, it was now decided to
make a clearer separation between the two. So far from being an
official of the central Government, the kepala daerah was now to
be made purely a political figure, elected simply by the DPRD's in
the case of provinces and kabupatens, and by the people in the case
of lower units. (4) It was intended that eventually the office
would be filled by direct general election for all levels. (These
provisions were not to apply to "special regions" where the kepala
daerah would continue to be chosen from the traditional ruling
house.) There was thus no longer any question of central Govern-
ment appointment from a list chosen by the DPRD. Certainly appoint-
ment was still subject to higher approval—.that of the President
for provinces, of the Minister of Internal Affairs for second level
governments and of the administrative head of a province for third
level governments. (5) But this approval would be an emergency
safeguard for use in the face of the election of patently un-
suitable persons. It would be a tenuous safeguard, since it
would always be difficult for the center to resist the strongly
expressed wishes of a local assembly.
Though the new provision for election of the kepala daerah
appeared to be a considerable concession to local feeling, it must
be noted that the method of appointment was no longer considered
to be as important from the Government's point of view since, under
the new law, the old concept of the dual role of the kepala daerah
was now discarded. He was to be concerned only with autonomous
affairs or, as the explanation accompanying the draft bill ex-
plained very clearly, he was to be simply an "organ of the regional
government." He had no supervisory powers. His signature was no
longer required for ordinances of the DPRD (that of the chairman
of the DPRD was now substituted) and he was no longer given the
"preventive" power of delaying ordinances which were contrary to
higher legislation or to the general interest, as had been his re-
sponsibility under Article 36 of Law 22. For the administration
of other matters which did not fall within the field of autonomy
(including supervision of village affairs) the pamong pradja was
to be retained, though as a separate.and distinct service. ζ6)
(4)	Article 23 (1 and 2).
(5)	Article 23 (3).
(6)	The retention of the administrative service was not mentioned
in the bill. That it was the intention to retain it was made
clear to the writer by officials of the Ministry.54
In spite of this separation of the personnel of the administra
tive side from that of the autonomous side, the central Government
was determined not to jettison its control machinery. Since the
kepala daerah could no longer form a part of that machinery it was
necessary to formulate a rather more elaborate method. Firstly,
the preventive supervision of a DPD over the level immediately
below it with regard to specified classes of legislation—finance,
conditions of appointment of civil servants, etc.—was retained in
the same form as that laid down in Law 22. Ordinances on these
subjects were not to come into effect without the prior sanction
of the next highest DPD (the President in the case of provinces)
until three months had elapsed. (7) Secondly, the DPD of a pro-
vince had power to cancel the decisions (repressive supervision),
not of second-level councils as formerly but of third-level
councils. This power was to be exercised at the suggestion of,
or on information from, the appropriate second level council. (8)
These supervisory devices lay within the hierarchy of local govern-
ments. There was also to be an external supervision, both preven-
tive and repressive, exercised on behalf of the central Government.
By the new bill the President was empowered to delay or veto deci-
sions of councils at any level if they conflicted with higher
legislation or with the general interest. And, where third-level
governments were concerned, he was permitted to delegate this
power to a new officer—the komisaris. (9) Where first- and second
level governments were concerned, the komisaris was to exercise
a preventive role only, delaying the decisions of provincial
kabupaten or municipal councils.
Though the new bill was silent on the details, providing
merely that the komisaris would be aided by authorities nominated
by law, the new office and the machinery attached to it were in-
tended to be the pamong pradja in a new form. The komisaris was to
exist at the provincial leveiy and would, in effect” be the ”
governor of the province, though with an altered function. Below
the komisaris, bupatis, though no longer themselves empowered to
impose a veto on the councils in their area and though no longer
even directly associated with the local government system, were
intended to keep a quiet eye upon the deliberations of councils.
Their role, as envisaged by the drafters of the new law, was that
of a spy system.
The new proposals of 1956 clearly offered a much watered-down
system of central control as compared with the proposals of two
years earlier. With the combination of the office of kepala daerah
with that of central official the imposition of a check upon coun-—
cil decisions at all levels was a simple matter. Under the terms
of the new draft the clear separation between kepala daerah and
official, and the limitation of the power to delay local legisla-
tion to the komisaris only, meant that a veto could be imposed
(7)	Article 63of draft bill
(8)	Article 65.
(9)	Article 64.55
only indirectly, at two removes, so to speak, for second- and
third-level governments. It would obviously be much more difficult
for the governor in his role of komisaris to delay enactments of
kabupaten councils than it had been, formerly, for the bupati, who
was himself chairman of the DPD, to withhold his consent to
ordinances. Even so the new draft did not go far enough to meet
parliamentary opinion. Debates on the new bill in November 1956
were marked by sharp criticism of the institution of the office
of komisaris, and the Minister of Internal Affairs was unable, in
a conference with party leaders, to convert them to his view.
The outcome was the passage of a severely amended version, which
has now become the new basic law for local government--Law 1 of
1957.
In the amended version the kepala daerah remains a political
figure, as in the earlier draft. He is to be chosen according to
a procedure to be fixed by law, (10) but pending that law he is
to be chosen by the DPRD, having regard to the qualities of ability
and knowledge required for the office. Higher approval is still
necessary before an appointment is actually confirmed—the approval
of the President for the kepala daerah of first-level governments,
and of the Minister for Internal Affairs or other authority nomi-
nated by him for the kepala daerah of second- and third-level
governments. (11) As in the earlier version, the power of pre-
ventive supervision is no longer conferred upon the kepala daerah.
From the point of view of supervision the main feature of the
amended law is the removal of the supervisory power of the
komisaris, and consequently a still more complete separation of
the administrative from the autonomous hierarchy. The former is
not mentioned in the act. The intention is that it shall be
retained, but that it will be concerned with the administration of
central Government affairs only, and not with general co-ordination
or with the supervision of local government activities. No doubt
it will be possible in practice for the pamong pradja to exercise
some of the co-ordinating functions which were formerly their prime
concern, but this will have to be conducted in an informal and
advisory fashion. The pamong pradja will also, no doubt, be able
to play the part of a spy system, reporting to the Ministry of
Internal Affairs on the workings of autonomous governments at the
various levels; but again this must be an informal role, since the
new law confers no such power upon the administrative service.
But, in general, the autonomous governments will be masters in
(10)	Article 23 (1). The explanatory appendix makes it clear that,
in the new law to fix the method of selection, it will still
be based on the idea of the office as a popular one, to be
filled according to the wishes of the region. The idea of
direct popular election is foreshadowed. In the meantime it
is expected that the kepala daerah will be chosen by the DPRD
from amongst its own members, though it may choose from out-
side if it so wishes.
(11)	Article 24 (2). The other authority is intended to be a cen-
tral official or the next highest DPD (Explanatory Appendix to
the Law).56
their own house, with control over the fields allowed to them, sub-
ject only to two restrictions. The decisions of councils at each
level of autonomy will still be subject, as under Law 22 and the
intervening drafts, to the preventive supervision of the DPD of the
next highest level on specified matters, and to the repressive
supervision of the DPD of the next highest level where decisions
conflict with higher legislation or with the general interest.
(For provinces this supervision is now to be performed by the Mini-
ster of Internal Affairs, or other authority nominated by him.) (12)
The Minister is empowered to delay or veto decisions of councils of
the second and third levels if the appropriate authority—the next
highest DPD—does not carry out its duty of supervision. (13) The
Minister apparently has the right to decide when a neglect of duty
has taken place, and, therefore, when a situation requires his
intervention. Secondly, in addition to the possible veto of local
council decisions, provision is made for a direct supervision of
the general workings of autonomy by the central Government, in a
manner to be fixed by Government Regulations, (14) and for the
direction, by the central Government, of the activities of a DPD
which is guilty of neglect of its duties. (15)
Thus, having sought at first a close integration of the local
government system with the administrative machine, and then a
looser supervision of the former by the latter, the Government has
eventually been forced to accept a looser supervision still, exer-
cised not by members of the pamong pradja but by officials of the
Ministry itself. Because of this retreat it is now more than ever
necessary, in the official view, that the administrative service
be not allowed to wither away, or be transferred to the autonomous
side. Instead there must be a sharper distinction between central
tasks and local government tasks than had existed in practice
during the transitional period, and members of the administrative
service will still be placed in each region as chief executive
officers of the central Government with responsibility for the
co-ordination and supervision of central matters. In particular
the administration of the village, in areas where this has pre-
viously been the task of the central Government, and where a third
level of autonomy has still not been established, is intended to
remain within the field of central responsibility, not that of
autonomy. The pamong pradja will continue to serve as the
Government's channel of communication to the basis of society.
Having failed to secure the close control of autonomy that it
desired, the Government has been forced to accept the other alter-
native--that of keeping this channel in its own hands.
The new law does not really meet the demands of either party
to this prolonged controversy. The Government, or rather its
	Article	T4.
(13)	Article	65.
(14)	Article	69.
(15)	Article	50.57
advisers in the Ministry of Internal Affairs, in fighting a rear-
guard action for the maintenance of an effective supervisory
system, were undoubtedly moved by the desire for good government.
The close connection proposed between the autonomous system and
the administrative hierarchy appeared a neat and simple way of
securing the best of all worlds. That method called, of course,
for a spirit of compromise between elected councils on the one hand
and the Ministry, represented by its appointed officials, on the
other. Given a willingness to compromise, the combined functions
of the kepala daerah, far from being a potential source of conflict,
could have been an advantage, since the arrangement would have
enabled guidance and intervention to take an unobtrusive form.
Against this it could be argued that the Ministry was being too
paternal and too cautious, and that, in the interests of good
government, it had been too distrustful of local bodies and too
reluctant to allow them a reasonable scope for experiment and
error. Be that as it may, the system as it was established during
the transitional period did reflect a consistent point of view,
albeit an authoritarian one. The new law represents, by contrast,
an uneasy compromise between political pressures demanding fuller
autonomy and the official approach based on the view that autonomy
must, for the time being, serve the purposes of general govern-
ment, Its implications have yet to be worked out in practice and,
at the time of writing, even officials of the Ministry are not
clear as to the exact relations which will develop between the
autonomous side and the central administrative side. For instance,
one apparently minor question, but basically an important one, has
yet to be settled. Who will live in the official residence at
present occupied by the combined offical/kepala daerah? With the
splitting of the office into its component parts, will this building
become the residence of the elected kepala daerah or of the admini-
strative officer of the region concerned? In Java the standard
architectural arrangement is for the open hall used for kabupaten
DPRD and DPD meetings to stand immediately in front of the bupati's
house, reflecting the connection that has existed hitherto between
the bupati’s two functions. Apart from that, the bupati's house
has been a symbol of government authority. Whoever lives there in
future will have that much advantage in the silent and informal
competition for prestige which must inevitably determine which of
the two is the principal figure of the district.
This issue will not be acute in East Indonesia where the
daerahs based on swapradja will become special regions, with the
kepala daerah drawn from a ruling family. In these areas the
responsibility for lower administration is already in the hands
of the local authority. As has been seen, a similar situation
prevails in, e.g., Daerah Minahasa where, though it is not a
former swapradja or federation of swapradja, the DPD has already
become responsible for the lower administration. The Minahasa
example may indeed provide a pattern for future development in
other areas formerly under direct rule. There the competition
between appointed official and autonomous local government has
been quickly and decisively determined in favor of the latter.
In Manado there is an office of the Resident-co-ordinator for four58
daerahs of North Sulawesi. But it has been overshadowed in pres-
tige by the office of the local government.
A further element in the prestige struggle is the possible
formation of a third and lowest level of autonomy. It has been
argued above that the difficulty in creating the third level has
been a major reason underlying the Government’s demand for an
effective supervisory system. And it has been noticed that with the
collapse of those plans the administration of the village popula-
tion has been retained in central hands pending the establishment
of a third level, except in those areas where it is already in the
hands of swapradja authorities or the DPD. However, where it is
possible to establish a third level the need for the lower ranks of
the administrative hierarchy will presumably be reduced. (The
third level will, of course, be under the immediate supervision by
the DPD of the second level, as laid down in the new law.) However,
the establishment of the third level has not been an easy task,
and that fact is reflected in the second major difference between
the new Law and the old Law 22.
The Problem of the Third Level
One of the defects of Law 22 was that it envisaged the estab-
lishment of a rigidly uniform hierarchy of autonomous units to be
set up in western Indonesia on the Javanese pattern--provinces,
kabupatens, desas— and with only slight regard for local differ-
ences in social organization. Naturally the two higher levels of
autonomy presented little difficulty, since, in any case, the
units at both of these levels were artificial creations, and over-
arched all units of customary organization. As far as the first
level, the province, was concerned there was likely to be, and
there has been, much difference of opinion as to precisely hich
areas should be given provincial status. This question will be
raised in the succeeding section. But the institution of provinces
as a level of autonomy has not been a matter of controversy.
Secondly, the kabupaten, though essentially a Javanese unit, is
capable of export m something at least resembling its Javanese
form. The newly established kabupatens in Sumatra correspond
sufficiently closely to pre-war administrative units to have made
the transfer a comparatively easy matter. Even in the rather
different circumstances of Sulawesi, Maluku and Nusa Tenggara, the
formation of the Daerahs of Negara Indonesia Timur through the
federation of swapradjas has created a division roughly corre-
sponding to the kabupaten. The resemblance has been strengthened
since then by the further" subdivision of these units by the
Republic of Indonesia, The third level, however, has proved to be
a more difficult nut to crack, and, to the present time, apart from
small municipalities, no units of the third level have been estab-
lished .
The difficulties arise from several factors. In the first
place the use of the term "desa" in Law 22 was misleading since the
desa of Java has no exact counterpart elsewhere. It is a territorial
unit very different in character from, say, the negeri of Minangkabau
which is partly based on kinship. Secondly, the creation of a third59
level of autonomy according to the terms of Law 22, with democratic
councils on a modern pattern, would presuppose a fairly "open"
society. Social change is proceeding rapidly enough in Indonesia,
but each of the various forms of village organization, because of
the strength of customary obligations and procedures, is still to
a great extent a closed society of its own. (This is, of course,
a matter of degree. Some villages have already been brought
within the orbit of a wider economy and society and have been the
subjects of a greater breakdown in traditional patterns than is the
case with others.) It is hoped that the third level may be
grounded, as far as possible, in customary organization, but that
would be an extremely difficult goal to achieve, particularly upon
a uniform basis. Thirdly, even if it were easy to transform cus-
tomary procedures in the desired fashion, the village unit which
represents the core of social organization in Indonesia, is con-
sidered by the Government to be, for the most part, too small to
serve as an effective unit of autonomy. The present intention is
to organize autonomous units of the third level by combining several
adat units, but this is naturally an ambitious plan, since it,
too7 would involve nothing less than a substantial modification of
customary organization.
The problem is vital to the whole local government plan for
Indonesia, Briefly, diversity, the strength of custom and the
smallness of the basic unit make it enormously difficult to fashion
new institutions of government for that level, and this fact
affects the character of autonomy which can be enjoyed by the
higher levels of kabupaten or province. So long as the village
remains the effective unit the powers of kabupaten or provincial
governments must necessarily be limited. From another point of
view, as already suggested, if a third level were established the
autonomous kabupaten might well become superfluous. The overnment
of the Daerah Istemewa Jogjakarta tends to argue on these lines,
pointing out that the kabupaten is an artificial unit which has its
uses only so long as a lower level is not in existence. If the
third level were established the needs of the population could be
served adequately by the local council for immediately local
matters and by the provincial government for matters of more
general concern. To this end the Daerah Istemewa has sought ex-
perimentally to combine neighboring desas eitherby union or by
federation into larger units, with their own councils. In the
ketjamatan of Pakem, for instance, sixteen desas comprising sixty
pedukuhan, and representing a population of over 23,000, have
Ueen reduced, through a process of union or federation, into
five desas each with a DPRD and a DPD instead of the traditional
formsof village assembly. Jogjakarta is a special case, however.
The region is composed of two former swapradja, and before the
war the existing rulers possessed the usual powers allowed to
swapradja under the long contract. In this situation kabupatens
during the colonial period remained as administrative units only,
and did not enjoy the preliminary experience in local government
as did kabupatens in the directly ruled parts of Java. Desa
organization was weaker also. For this reason the reorganization
of desas into larger units has been easier than might prove to be
the”case elsewhere, while the newly created autonomous kabupatens60
have less of a vested interest in their own continued existence
than is the case elsewhere.
Outside Jogjakarta the difficulties are likely to prove
greater, though in parts of Java some desas may already be big
enough in population to justify their establishment as third-level
governments. But, in general, responsible officials within the
Ministry have in mind the establishment of third-level autonomous
units approximately equal in size to the ketjamatan. It is argued
that while the ketjamatan has been purely an administrative divi-
sion up to the present time, and has had no existence in custom, it
is still a small enough unit to fall within the horizon of the
desa population. The ketjamatan, both in the colonial period and
at present, has been a-crucial-level of administration in Java
since it is the point at which the adat unit, the desa, comes into
contact with the central. Government' machinery. Regular meetings,
usually weekly or fortnightly, between the tjamat and the lurahs
of his area provide the means whereby central Government require-
ments, explanations and requests are passed down to the desa.
These meetings are not for the purpose of discussion and-decision,
but for the purpose of paternal instruction by the tjamat to the
lurahs. Whether or not this administrative unit could be trans-
formed into an autonomous unit, and, if it were, what would happen
to the "natural" level of autonomy, the desa, is extremely prob-
lematical. It might be possible to establish a representative
council for a whole ketjamatan, either by the process of amalgamating
desas or on the basis of a-federal association of desas. In
either case it is likely that such a council, in its decision-
making, would still have to recognize the existence of a separate,
vigorous, and prior process of decision-making in the individual
desas themselves. The actual execution of ketjamatan council
decisions, for instance, might well be forced to depend upc i the
consent and co-operation of traditional desa leaders, whether the
status of those leaders was still formally recognized or not.
Particularly would this be likely to be the case where the in-
dividuals elected to the central council were different from the
traditional authorities as constituted before the amalgamation or
federation. For reasons such as these the Government, though it
does desire to use, as its basic level of autonomy, the ketjamatan
or something like it in area and population, also recognizes that,
at least in Java, the strength of the customary unit is such as to
make such a transition a remote possibility for the moment. Outside
Java the prospect is brighter, though the variety of types of
organization makes it dangerous to generalize. The negeri of western
Sumatra, though it is approximately equal in size of-popuTatiοn to
the desa, covers a more extensive area, and it has had some ex-
perience in the operation of a local council during the colonial
period. It might well prove to be a suitable subject for experi-
ment as an autonomous unit of the third level. Again, some of the
spialler swapradja in eastern Indonesia might be similarly adapted,
perhaps after an interim period in the form of Daerah Istemewa,
Level No. Ill In larger swapradja, where the administrative
system of local rulers has-already-weakened the identity of the
village as a self-contained unit it may be possible to repeat the
experiments of Jogjakarta. But in all these cases the creation of61
the lowest level of autonomy must be a matter for trial and error,
and for the adaptation of modern procedures to the character of
the society in question.
In general the core of the problem lies in the difficulty of
determining which units in Indonesia have genuine substance. In
Java the desa has substance in a way that higher units do not have
it. As has been noticed earlier, the autonomous kabupaten is
really a product of social change. It serves the interests of the
elite, which has never belonged to, or has escaped from, the desa.
So long as effective social organization continues to be based on
the small unit, the higher levels of local government must be,
to some extent, divorced from the mass of the population. And it
is the existence of the gap between government and the great mass
of the governed which gives local administration in Indonesia
something of a colonial character still.
These are no doubt problems of transition but they must affect
the approach of the Government in the making of formal provision
for the establishment of the basic level of autonomy. For this
reason the draft bills of 1954 and 1956 allowed for a much greater
flexibility for the third level than was envisaged in 1948.
Whereas Law 22 stated flatly that there were to be three levels
of autonomy--the province, the kabupaten and the desa--the later
drafts allowed for variation from place to place. Provision was
made, certainly, for three levels, now called, more vaguely, Level I,
Level II and Level III, (16) thus avoiding any suggestion of ex-
porting Javanese terminology. But the establishment of the third
level was now optional. It was to be set up only where circum-
stances made it convenient: where, that is to say, there already
existed in traditional organization units of suitable size and
coherence to be adapted to the tasks of modern local government.
Where traditional organization provided no such unit, as in most
of Java, for instance, only the two higher levels were to be estab-
lished for the time being as levels of autonomy. Below that the
existing system of village government and administration will
continue to function, but outside the provisions of the local govern-
ment law, and subject, as at present, to the control exercised by
the central Government through the chain of authority extending
down through bupatis, wedanas and tjamats. This remains one of
the major tasks of theMinistry of Internal Affairs. It is not
without significance that the building which today houses the
Ministry in Djakarta is the same as that which once housed the
central administration of the Indies (Binnenlands Bestuur) before
the war. There has necessarily been less change than might have
been expected in the types of functions performed within its walls
While the new basic law thus leaves it as a matter of discretion
whether or not to establish Level III in any particular area,
there was still provision, as formerly, for the establishment of a
half-way house to full autonomy in the form of the special regions.
"(16) Article 2. The distinction between Kota Besar (2nd level)
and Kota Ketjil (3rd level) is now discarded. All municipali-
ties are to be~of 2nd level status.62
Special regions could be established at any of the three levels of
autonomy, and given the powers appropriate to the level in question.
Special regions were to possess the two councils, DPRD and DPD,
prescribed for local governments in ordinary areas. The main
difference between the special regions and the ordinary regions
lay in the mode of appointing the kepala daerah. Whereas the
kepala daerah was normally to be elected by the DPRD in the case
of the local governments of the two higher levels, and by the people
in the case of local governments of the third level, in the case
of special regions of all three levels he was to be appointed by
the central Government from a descendant of the ruling family which
had exercised power in the region before the establishment of
the Republic of Indonesia, A special region could be converted at
any time into an ordinary region at the request of the population.
The provision for the institution of special region, Level III,
however does not solve the basic problem. Such a local government
can only be established in a situation where there already exist
the conditions of size and sophistication required for the estab-
lishment of an ordinary local government unit. The "special"
government is merely one in which the form of an "ordinary" govern-
ment is adjusted slightly to meet particular cases of local
loyalty to a hereditary ruler. Thus, in fact, the new basic law
provides for local governments, either "ordinary" or "special,"
to be established at the third level only in rather special
circumstances. The establishment of such governments will have
to be a matter of gradual experiment. The main purpose of the new
Act is to enable the postponement of a final solution so far as
the basis of society is concerned, and the maintenance in the
meantime of the present system of centralized control in those
areas where it already operates.63
CHAPTER VI
PROVINCIAL AUTONOMY AND REGIONAL FEELING
It was remarked earlier that the planning of a local govern-
ment system in Indonesia has been directed simultaneously at two
distinct types of problem. There was first the problem of securing
"government in general"--the need to fashion new instruments of
government for a society in process of transition and to find a sub
stitute for a "colonial type” of rule by the central administrative
hierarchy. Secondly, there was the need to recognize and to cater
for the facts of broad regional resistance to the center and of
the fears of Javanese predominance within the unitary state. So
far, in this paper, the evolution of institutions of local govern-
ment has been discussed primarily in relation to the first of
these problems. Attention has been given to the form and content
of local authorities at all levels during the transitional period,
to the relationship between central administration and local
government, to the question of supervision, and to the question
of administering the affairs of the village. The second type of
problem--that arising out of regional feeling--is of a different
character, though, in the long run, it could be of more fundamental
importance for the political stability of the country as a whole.
Federal feeling is not dead. At the same time the concept of
regionalism needs careful analysis. It may be suggested that
many apparent expressions of local consciousness would be more
correctly described as opposition of special groups to national
policies. Such opposition might happen to find strong expression
in a particular area but it would not follow that it sprai g from
the general circumstances of the area as a definite region.
According to the general plan, the problem of regionalism was
to be met by the institution of autonomy at the provincial level.
Areas which had been, or might have become, states in the federal
system were to be constituted as provinces, and the exercise of
reasonable powers of autonomy at this level would, so it was hoped,
allay the suspicions of Java to be found in areas outside, and the
suspicions of the center to be found even within Java, and would
provide an adequate outlet for local patriotism, local ambitions
and local initiative,
The actual application of the plan has been faced with a
number of practical difficulties. In the first place there is
the difficulty of deciding upon the precise areas to be estab-
lished as provinces. It is worth noting that the establishment
of states and special regions by the Dutch, before the transfer of
sovereignty, was dictated more by the accidents of military for-
tunes than by any consideration of the suitability of particular
areas to be so constituted. The Dutch were able to set up these
governments only in the areas which they could control. And the
independent Republic has been slow to find a more coherent solution
for the problem. Indeed, the actual delimitation of the boundaries64
of particular provinces is a task which has not yet been finally
settled Following the transformation of the federal Republic of
Indonesia into a unitary republic in 1950, eleven provincial divi-
sions were laid down (not counting Djakarta and West Irian), though
as noticed earlier these were not all autonomous provinces. Even
by the end of 1956 Sulawesi, Maluku and Nusa Tenggara were still
administrative provinces only. These provincial divisions were,
in some cases, arbitrary. They did not always coincide with ethnic
groupings or with earlier administrative divisions. Certainly they
did not always meet with full acceptance on the part of the inhabi-
tants of each division. In Central Sumatra, for instance, the
lumping together of Minangkabau, Djambi and Riau as one province
was followed by the growth of a separatist movement in Djambi and
Riau. Since communications from the west coast to the eastern
parts of the province left much to be desired, there was some
ground for the feeling that the two latter areas were not essen-
tially part of the same natural geographical division as Minangkabau.
Nor were there cultural affinities strong enough to offset the
geographical differences. Indeed, it would not be entirely untrue
to say that the Government of Central Sumatra has really been the
old West Coast Residency in a new guise. Communications and uneven
population distribution are again important factors to be considered
in determining whether Sulawesi should be one, two or three pro-
vinces. An example of regional discontent on a larger scale--the
Atjeh revolt which has been in progress since 1953—led the Govern-
ment in 1956 to carve a new province of Atjeh out of the old pro-
vince of Northern Sumatra. At the same time, considerable attention
was being given to the question of rearranging other provincial
boundaries. In addition to the division of Northern Sumatra into
two parts, the province of Kalimantan was divided into three
provinces, with a promise of a fourth to come. The division of
Central Sumatra into two or three parts was postponed, but the
taking over of the government of that province by military veterans
in December 1956 brought the question once more into prominence.
In January 1957 the new military government acted to establish
new provinces of Djambi and Riau, while the central Government
was simultaneously moving to prepare emergency legislation to
achieve the same end. Finally the division of Sulawesi into two
or three provinces has also been receiving attention. The general
political crisis of February 1957, and the formation of a military
government in Sulawesi, Maluku and Nusa Tenggara, has cut across
existing consideration of the question.
Since it proclaims its willingness to meet legitimate local
demands, the central Government, in determining the actual delimita-
tion of particular provinces, must consider not merely what divi-
sions are convenient It must also consider what divisions, if they
are desired, are reasonable, and, perhaps, what divisions are ex-
pedient. Where a demand exists for the creation of a new province
the question must be examined in terms of the size, population,
background and competence of the area concerned. But it may some-
times be necessary, on grounds of expediency, to concede provincial
status to an area which does not measure up to a list of criteria
of that kind. Recent local demands for a province of Central
Sulawesi will no doubt be considered on that basis. In January 195765
a committee established in Makassar, taking note of the Government's
probable intention to divide Sulawesi into two provinces, announced
its intention of proclaiming by direct action a third province
of Central Sulawesi. Though in particular cases it may be quite
possible to ignore such threats of direct action, they must at
least be noted as ingredients of the problem.
There is no rule of thumb which can be used in solving the
question of demarcation of provincial areas, It is a matter for
negotiation and experiment One suggestion which has been made is
that of creating a greater number of smaller provinces, coinciding
with suku bangsa. Such a solution would, of course, tend to ignore
the presence oT-ethnic minorities in a particular province, and,
in some cases, it would create divisions too small to exercise
effective powers of self-government at the first level, (1)
The effective demarcation of provinces is only one element in
the satisfying of regional feeling. As important is the character
and extent of the powers to be conceded to the provincial level.
Naturally any surrender of power is intended to fall short of the
creation of constituent, states in a federal system, but the problem
will remain whether anything less can meet separatist demands in
more extreme cases. The mere creation of a new province of Atjeh,
for instance, is not likely to restore peace to the area overnight,
if it is not accompanied by an effective surrender of control over
local matters and by reasonable financial provision,, Unfortunately
even such an effective surrender of power would be insufficient in
some cases where what is demanded is not a greater responsibility
for local matters but a release from central Government require-
ments in matters (e.g currency control) which are clearly of
national concern. This fact brings up the problem of regionalism
as such.
The size and actual delimitation of the boundaries of particu-
lar provinces, the nature and extent of the powers surrendered, the
reality of financial independence--these are questions of organiza-
tion which certainly present their own special difficulties, but
which, at least in principle, should be capable of solution. If
regional feeling were merely a desire for greater powers of self-
government arising from local pride or local traditions or a broad
feeling of regional identity it should be possible to satisfy
it through the gradual settlement of such organizational questions
as these. In fact regionalism is a more complex phenomenon.
While an exhaustive analysis cannot be given here, a brief treat-
(1) The proposal has been put forward in a somewhat different form
in discussions of the shape of the constitution to be drafted
by the present Constituent Assembly. Masjumi and PSI, while
each accepting the idea of a unitary rather than a federal state
have suggested that regional interests might nonetheless be
safeguarded by the creation of a bicameral legislature, the
upper house of which would represent regions. According to
the Masjumi proposal the representation would be based upon
provinces According to the PSI suggestion suku bangsa rather
than provinces would form the electorates for the upper house.66
ment may tentatively suggest that some aspects of regional feeling
might be better described as sectional feeling which has happened
to acquire a regional coloring, while other aspects reflect a broad
regional dislike of central Government policies. Where that is so
the remedy would be not more autonomy but changes in central Govern-
ment policies where they touched sectional or regional interests.
Certainly in some areas where there is a strong sense of identity,
based upon a common language, cultural tradition and system of adat
law, as in Minangkabau and Atjeh, local pride may prompt a genuine
desire for local self-determination. (2) In other areas, as in
Minahasa and Manado, suspicion of the center may arise in part from
the fact that comparatively extensive local autonomy is already
enjoyed. But not all examples fall into these categories. Recently
variation from place to place in the strength of national political
parties has artificially lent something of a regional character to
political rivalry at the national level. Masjumi’s strength in
Sumatra and in southern Sulawesi and the Javanese base of the PNI
have constituted important ingredients in the separatist movements
in both areas before and after the announcement, in February 1957,
of the President’s plan for "guided democracy." Against the
background of mounting opposition to the second Ali Sastroamidjojo
Government the military coup in Central Sumatra in December 1956,
followed closely as it was by the withdrawal of Masjumi’s five
ministers from the cabinet , might be interpreted partly as a tactical,
device designed to bring about the fall of the Government as well
as the product of the peculiar disabilities of the province. Simi-
larly the formation of a military government in Sulawesi in February
1957 may be seen as springing immediately from opposition to the
proposed inclusion of the PKI in the Government and the National
Council, and also from the long-standing resentment on the part of
particular groups in the province against certain aspects of the
Government’s economic policies. The fact that the crisis assumed
a regional character does not point necessarily to a desire of
the region as such for greater independence from the center. That
element was present. But perhaps more important was the dissatis-
faction with the Government as a Government.
Economic grievances provide a major element in the dissatis-
faction of the areas outside Java, particularly in Sumatra and
Sulawesi, and a brief treatment of this dissatisfaction may help to
test this view.
(2) Pride of this kind may go along with resentment over such
apparently trivial matters as the respect paid to local heroes
in the naming of streets or of public institutions. It is apt
to be associated, too, with beliefs, sometimes erroneous,
about the extent to which a local civil service is staffed by
Javanese. Where such a belief is not erroneous, of course, a
feeling of grievance is quite natural, but in several areas
the writer heard complaints of "Javanese imperialism" taking
this form, where on investigation it proved that the popular
belief as to the proportion of Javanese in the local government
service or in the local branches of central Government depart-
ments was not always well founded. The question needs further
and more detailed investigation.67
The outer islands are export-producing areas and thus earn
valuable foreign currency for the Republic as a whole. It is
their universal complaint that they do not receive attention from
the central Government in proportion to their economic importance
and that, on the contrary, they are battened on by Java. The
argument takes a number of forms, though none of them are ever very
precisely presented It is often claimed that, because of their
importance as exporters, these areas are entitled to a greater
share of expenditure on public works than would be justified on a
population basis. Again, it is argued that they should be entitled
to control, a proportion of the foreign currency they earn, or at
least that their needs should be reflected in the allocation of
foreign exchange, A further complaint concerns the return paid
to the individual producer of export items. Producers are paid in
rupiahs calculated at the official exchange rate, which is roughly
a third of the unofficial free market rate, and producers are unable
to resist the belief that the difference is, in some way, pocketed
by a rapacious central Government for its own purposes. In fact,
of course, the artificially fixed official rate is merely a part
of the Government’s general exchange control policy, and not a means
of securing an extra rake-off which passes into general revenue.
But the disparity between the two rates lies at the root of the
problem, and gives rise not merely to the resentment of the producer
but even to the general complaints of neglect in the matter of
public works Those complaints are rarely presented clearly on
the basis of an analysis of figures of central Government expenditure
Rather they spring from a direct awareness of bad roads and bridges
combined with a somewhat confused image of a central Government
"profit,” made from the difference in the two exchange rates.
Finally, in addition to the other grievances, there has been
widespread corruption as well as maladministration on the part of
officials of government marketing agencies, which have lee to
long delays in the making of payments to producers. The gap be-
tween the artificial and the "natural” exchange rates led inevitably
to smuggling, carried on with the more or less open connivance of
civil and military authorities, and, in view of the grievances
mentioned, with the backing of a general public approval. The
problems surrounding the marketing of copra in Sulawesi provide
an example.
The marketing of copra in Sulawesi was conducted through an
official marketing agency, the Copra Foundation (Jajasan Kopra),
established during the existence of the State of East Indonesia.
The Foundation bought copra from the producer at a fixed price
and disposed of it either within Indonesia or on the external
market. Profits from both internal and external sales, after
deduction of administration costs, were paid into a special fund.
Foreign exchange earned through external sales remained under the
control of the central Government. The operation of the Copra
Foundation gave rise to growing resentment in Sulawesi, for
several reasons. There was first the fact that profits were not
devoted to developmental works in the province, but were invested
elsewhere (e.g. in housing projects in Kebajoran, Djakarta).
Secondly, there were charges of corrupt administration of the68
Foundation itself. The accusation was made that only a proportion
of the copra handled by the Foundation was entered in its books,
the remainder being illegally disposed of for private gain.
Thirdly, it was felt that the price paid to the producer, though
it bore a reasonable relation to the world market price if the
latter was converted at the official rate, was far too low in com-
parison to the world price as calculated at the illegal rate of
exchange. The disparity between the two rates made the risk in-
volved in smuggling a worth-while one in the light of the possible
profits to be secured.
Where smuggling took place it would seem to have been conducted
at a semi-official level, with at least the tacit consent of local
civil authorities and the army, and in some cases with the active
participation of the latter. The failure of the Copra Foundation
to pay producers provided one justification for the practice. At
least producers did receive payment for copra illegally disposed of,
though whether at a more favorable rate is not clear. The old
complaint that the central Government was neglecting the needs of
copra-producing areas formed another justification. It is said
that those engaged in the illegal export of copra were not concerned
to make a vast profit, but that returns from the transactions were
devoted to legitimate public or military purposes. In the absence
of any open accounting or of any clear evidence other than hearsay
it is impossible to decide on this point. Certainly in some areas
equipment for army purposes or for civil use was imported in
return for copra exported. (Daerah Minahasa is reported to have
acquired a fleet of jeeps in this manner for the use of the local
government.) But it is equally certain that some private fortunes
were also made by individuals.
In 1956 the central Government was compelled to intervene. A
committee (Panitia Persiapan Induk Koperasi Kopra - PPIKK) was
appointed by the Deputy Minister for Economic Affairs to prepare
for the establishment of a co-operative agency in the copra in-
dustry, which was intended to take over the functions of the Copra
Foundation within a year. Before this could be organized, however,
more drastic action became necessary and, in the face of local
complaints, the Ministry ordered the arrest of the Deputy Director
of the Foundation, and decided to liquidate the organization itself.
In the absence of alternative marketing machinery, however, the
Foundation under a new directorate has remained temporarily in
existence, and has continued to discharge its functions under the
more direct supervision of the Ministry.
Before these latter developments had occurred strong local
opposition to the workings of the Copra Foundation in Minahasa had
led to the adoption, in 1955, of an alternative interim solution
in the form of a local marketing agency, the Jajasan Kelapa Minahasa,
which was eventually given official permission to operate. The "
new organization bought compulsorily from the grower at a fixed
price, and disposed of the produce either within Indonesia or on
the external market, just as the Copra Foundation had done. But
from the point of view of local feeling the JKM offered a means of
overcoming some, though not all, of the objections raised against69
the earlier system» Of prime importance was the fact that honesty
and efficiency of administration meant that the grower was paid
for his copra. Secondly, the profits derived from the operation
of the agency were permitted to be retained for local government
<	and other purposes within the region, instead of being available
for investment elsewhere The JKM pays to the Government of
Daerah Minahasa a subvention of 60 rupiahs per ton of copra handled
.	by it, and this goes into the general revenue of the region,
forming, in fact, the largest single item of local revenue. Over
and above this contribution the Government of the Daerah might request
special assistance (bantuan) for particular projects, e"?g. reaf-
forestation. This form of~ass i s t- anc e is not included in the annual
budget of the Daerah, Besides these two forms of expenditure the
JKM may itself give direct aid to worthy causes within the daerah.
Through these methods the complaint directed against the Copra
Foundation that the profits from its operations were not used
within the area was avoided. However, other important grievances
remained. Trading profits were one thing, foreign exchange was
another, and there was still the complaint that the region did not
get the benefit, in the form of import licenses or of works de-
pending upon imported capital goods to which its capacity for
earning foreign currency entitled it. (3) And from the producer's
point of view there is still the complaint that the price was too
low. (4)
The latter complaint is a sectional rather than a regional
complaint. It is a complaint common to all producers of export
crops wherever they might be, It happens that their voice is
particularly strong in the outer islands. But even the more general
dissatisfactions, the complaints of neglect or of inequalities in
the allocation of import licenses, arise from matters of central
policy in fields where the center must retain control. To meet
such dissatisfaction changes in policy are demanded rather than
the concession of more autonomy.
To some extent modifications in central policy--the extended
public works program promised by Djuanda, for example--might be
possible. But it is doubtful whether these could offer a permanent
"(3) The military government established in Makassar in March 1957,
and. claiming authority over Sulawesi, Maluku and Nusa Tenggara,
put forward as one of its conditions for a return to the fold
the proposal that regional governments should have control of
70% of the foreign exchange which they earn, leaving the re-
maining 30% to be controlled by the central Government. The
Djuanda Government, formed in April, countered that suggestion
with a promise to introduce an intensified public works program.
t	(4) Though smuggling from Minahasa appears to have been checked for
the time being, the incentive to smuggle arising from the
variation between the official and unofficial exchange rates
is still present, with the attendant possibility of corruption
on the part of officials who must be persuaded to wink at
illegal exporting.70
solution while the disparity continues to exist between the official
and unofficial exchange rates. As has been argued above, the exis-
tence in practice of a dual rate is not merely a continuing source
of grievance to the producer of export crops. It also sharpens the
feeling of the outer regions.as a whole that they receive less than
just treatment having regard to their economic importance. But on
this point a change of policy is hardly possible. Even to fix a
higher price for copra, for example, would be tantamount to giving
up a major part of a general system of economic controls. It would
be inflationary in tendency, and it would threaten the already un-
stable financial position of the country.
Briefly, the preservation of an official exchange rate is an
integral feature of central economic policy dictated by hard
realities. The falling value of the rupiah is, after all, a re-
flection of a more basic economic crisis, and the disabilities of
which the regions complain arise from that crisis. There is no
way of redressing those grievances without a fundamental improve-
ment in the country's total financial position. On the other hand,
the regions are affected by, and are likely to offer strong resis-
tance to, any course of action aimed at improving that position.
The problem is an intransigent one, reflecting what seems to
be a permanent dilemma in Indonesian political life. To improve
the financial position would appear to require action by a Govern-
ment possessed of adequate political strength to enforce rigorous
controls. But it is difficult for any Government to remain in
power if it offends a major interest or a major region. The pro-
vincial separatism of December 1956 and the early months of 1957
emphasize this point. Permanent improvement in the position of
exporting groups requires control measures which touch the immediate
interests of those groups, Such measures are bound to be unpopular
and effective resistance to them is easily mobilized. In a sense
the regions do hold the whip hand. They are in a position to
frustrate measures which might relieve the national crisis from
which their grievances ultimately arise.
National economic problems naturally fall outside the purview
of the Ministry of Internal Affairs whose task it has been to pre-
pare plans to meet regional demands for self-government. But any
local government plan can only provide machinery which must operate
within the setting of those problems. Whether or not the machinery
can be worked must depend upon the general confidence which any
central Government can inspire in the country as a whole by the
quality of its administration and by the policies it implements.
4r-S
[>
Indonesia, Showing Provincial Divisions as at December 1956
Note:	For the area subject to N. I. T. Law 44
of 1950—Sulawesi, Maluku and Nusa Tenggara--the
provinces are administrative only. In the remainder
of the archipelago, which is subject to R. I. Law
22 of 1948, the provinces are autonomous regions.
APPENDIX A>
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