ANU Indonesia Project
News and Commentary



Next INDONESIA STUDY GROUP Meeting (Nov 20)
Meetings are held from 12.30 to 2.00 pm in Seminar Room B, Coombs Building, Fellows Road, ANU (unless otherwise specified). 26 November Ken Setiawan (Van Vollenhoven Institute, Leiden University) The Relevance of the Indonesian National Commission on Human Rights (Komnas HAM) When in 1993 the Indonesian government announced the establishment of Komnas HAM, it was met with scepticism and [...]


Working with Government Agencies in Indonesia (Nov 15)
Links between the Indonesian government and the ANU are strong. Every year there are many exchange visits between Indonesian government agencies and the University. The latest area of cooperation involving the Crawford School and the Indonesia Project involved a four-week capacity-building program for 12 executive staff from the Menko Perekonomian (Coordinating Ministry of Economic Affairs) [...]


Review of Governance Issues (Nov 12)
Ross McLeod made a presentation to a group of senior officials from the Coordinating Ministry for Economic Affairs on 12 November 2008. The team was nearing the end of a four week visit to Australia on a program intended to provide capacity-building activities in the overall coordination of economic policies and programs in Indonesia. [...]


What’s New in the Latest Issue of BIES? (Nov 7)
The December 2008 issue of the Bulletin of Indonesian Economic Studies is now available online. Here’s a summary of the contents: As was the case exactly 11 years ago, the ‘Survey of recent developments’ in this issue, contributed by Vincent Ashcroft and David Cavanough, was being finalised just at the time that Indonesia appeared to be [...]


The Herd Instinct (Nov 3)
Unbelievers in capitalism and markets have been quick to pour scorn on both as the global financial crisis rapidly worsens, often focusing on the tendency of the private sector to operate according to herd instinct. If there are signs of a possible collapse in asset prices—whether this refers to shares, real estate, or foreign exchange—then [...]


What level for the rupiah? (Oct 26)
The rupiah has been drifting downwards in recent days and even dipped below the 10,000 level (against the USD) on Friday 25 October. Is this a problem? Some observers suggest that there are good arguments for action by Indonesian monetary authorities to try to hold the rupiah below the 10,000 level. The arguments in [...]


Funding Education (Oct 23)
In a previous posting I reported on a finding by the Constitutional Court that the government’s budget for 2008 (as well as previous budgets) infringed a recent amendment of the Constitution by failing to allocate at least 20% of government spending to the education sector. I also suggested that current and future governments would continue [...]


Monetary Policy Running off the Rails (Oct 16)
Along with the monetary authorities in many other countries, Bank Indonesia and the government are now acting to increase liquidity in the Indonesian economy, in the hope that this will protect against the possibility of a recession. It would be possible to increase liquidity simply by reducing the quantity of SBIs (central bank certificates) outstanding. Although [...]


Cribb on Managing the Archipelagic State: Scoop Preview! (Sep 18)
The following is the draft text of the opening address by Robert Cribb, organiser of this year’s Indonesia Update Conference, which gets underway at 9am on Friday 19th September. This conference focuses on the special problems of governance that arise in an archipelagic state. One clear lesson of history is that failing to govern the [...]