PART II: POLICY MEANINGS: SCENE-SETTING AND STORY LINES IN
Chapter 7: The ‘pro-reform’ story line (ii): new policy directions
7.1 Findings from the field
7.1.1 Views from national government. A theme that emerged from interviews with senior Indonesian Government officials was that panti asuhan were increasingly viewed as inconsistent with post-Asian financial crisis Indonesian social, economic and
administrative policy directions. As will be discussed in Section 7.2 below, the Asian financial crisis caused a rapid increase in rates of poverty and other forms of social dislocation, such as child abandonment and neglect, leading the national government to institute a suite of remedial measures, including social safety net and fuel price
subsidisation programs. One senior official of the Ministry of Social Affairs (GB-13)
reflected that panti asuhan policy reform was influenced by changes to the
government’s overall strategy of improving social protection, especially for the poorest families and households, thus:
[The panti asuhan policy] was really part of a broader context of trying to take affirmative action to get a social protection plan, including health and education, for poor people across the country, and to move from residential programs…
The Ministry of Social Affairs wanted a new paradigm under which there would be universal access to health, education and welfare services to all people…
Beginning in 2002, after the financial crisis, with the support of the Minister for Finance, we created a model of conditional cash transfer to poor families, and budget was allocated for this.
(Interviewee GB-13)
A senior official in the Ministry of National Development Planning (GI-13) also spoke about a growing recognition within national government circles from the early 2000s that raising children in panti asuhan was not only expensive in terms of the financial cost to government but inconsistent with the government’s desire to maximise workforce participation for economic growth:
In the last ten years, we became more aware of the need for more prevention rather than late responses to social problems and we are trying to create a referral system that is more sustainable and which involves NGOs and local governments…
We also learned about the neuroscience that it’s not as good for a child to be in a panti as in their family environment. There are three million children of school age not attending school and we needed to push the demand side to get poor families to send their kids to school. The solution was not to grow the number of panti asuhan but to support families more…
We know that 80 per cent of children in panti asuhan have at least one parent alive so we wanted to put more emphasis on assisting families to access health and education through the conditional cash transfer scheme so they’d not have to send their children to pantis…
Changing the paradigm on panti asuhan was important because if we didn’t prepare our children there would be no productivity bonus in the next ten or so years when the economy will need to be having sustained high growth. For pantis simply to rely on the government budget is not sustainable. Many studies showed that children in pantis have fewer advantages than those outside the pantis.
(Interviewee GI-13)
The decision to decentralise a range of political and administrative decision-making powers from Jakarta to sub-national levels of government in 1999 was also cited by some national government interlocutors as having hastened changes in national government thinking about panti asuhan. As discussed in Section 7.2, below, political and administrative decentralisation from Jakarta to sub-national levels after 1999 represented a momentous change in policy from the highly-centralised State that had developed under Suharto. Faced with this new environment, some national government officials expressed concern that it was becoming more difficult for national government to exercise control over provinces and districts on matters such as child protection. A senior Ministry of Social Affairs official who was directly involved in policymaking on panti asuhan after the Asian financial crisis through to the mid-2000s (GA-13) stated:
Another factor was that after decentralisation, districts were expected to play a greater role in direct service delivery to families and children. This meant that the role of the central government changed from that of delivering services to trying to generate ideas about new practices that the districts could adopt.
As a result of these factors, we had to find a different policy on orphanages.
Starting in 2002, we ran seminars and held discussions within the Ministry of
Social Affairs about increasing family-based support for children. But, we needed research to back up our plans to increase family-based care for children.
(Interviewee GA-13)
The head of a national government child protection authority (GC-12) discussed the dilemmas posed for national government officials in implementing national child protection law in the new era of decentralised administration:
The situation on child protection in Indonesia developed since the 2002 law on child protection…but implementation at the district level was difficult as the districts were not bound by these agreements. In nine provinces KPAI [the Indonesian Commission for Child Protection, Komisi Perlindungan Anak Indonesia] developed agreements and there is provincial law on child protection…
In cooperation with the Ministry of Justice we explained to the provinces how the law worked and discussed with them the meaning of children’s rights and restorative justice…
The next challenge is law harmonisation between Jakarta and the provinces. In national law, for example, the minimum age for marriage is 18 years but the problem is to harmonise this across provinces. But, in some provinces, for example, the marriage age for women [in practice] is 16 years and for men is 18 years. If we are to revise and harmonise [laws across all provinces on matters such as the age of marriage], it will be a huge effort and will be costly…We are also trying to get harmonisation across Indonesia on the age at which a child is subject to adult criminal law.
(Interviewee GC-12)
In the same vein, a social work academic (RD-12) commented on how the problems posed by decentralisation added weight to the case for a strengthened national role on child protection issues:
Decentralisation made it difficult for the provinces and districts to conform with national child protection and welfare laws because they lacked money. The national level has difficulty intervening in local policies. Most provinces and district levels either did not budget for child protection or the budget was not enough. Usually national level advocacy is difficult at local levels…
Decentralisation funds from the national level [provided to provinces and districts] were not always spent on child protection. Districts and provinces are like kingdoms. There is a lack of capacity at district and province levels on child protection. It is difficult to get district and province government staff interested in child protection. International non-government organisations and local NGOs had to get together to lobby local governments…
After decentralisation, we needed a national system [on children’s institutions]
because we feared that the provinces and districts wouldn’t care about child protection. (emphasis added).
(Interviewee RD-12)
7.1.2 Academia and the UN. Reflecting on Indonesia’s political and economic environment in decade after the fall of Suharto and the implications for national government policy on panti asuhan, a senior academic specialising in child protection (RA-13) stated:
During the economic crisis between 1998 and 2000, Indonesia was at its lowest point and there was an eagerness to embrace international norms. For example, in 1999, President Habibie adopted all the International Labour Organisation Conventions, making Indonesia the only country in Asia to adopt all such Conventions just to show that Indonesia was eager to become involved in the international community…
After Suharto, there was a feeling of inferiority in Indonesia as a country, a very low feeling, we felt a bit embarrassed. This reaction happened in all sectors, for example, in giving independence to the central bank which followed
international practice…Also, Indonesia decided to establish an Ombudsman, following the Australian example.
(Interviewee RA-13)
An Indonesian academic (RA-12) discussed how the national government found
decentralisation after 1999 a challenge in terms of implementing national approaches to child protection thus:
Regarding deinstitutionalisation [of panti asuhan], the problem for the national government was disconnection between district and national policy making. The local level was not going to give up on adopting the new standards of care. The problem is the lack of money from Jakarta to the provinces. One of the
challenges is district-level regulation which is not always compatible with the national level…
The vertical system is there but it is difficult because of horizontal regulations and law. These need to converge. The difficulty for the national government is the mixture of laws implemented at the local level.
(Interviewee RA-12)
Interviewee UNA-13, a senior UN official, reflected on changes to bureaucratic arrangements within the national government that provided new and expanded powers to the Ministry of National Development Planning in the early 2000s to coordinate policy across government departments, leading to an expansion in government focus on children’s welfare issues. Interviewee UNA-13 also discussed how, compared with Suharto’s New Order, the early 2000s was a time of increasing public discussion about human rights within Indonesian society, greater openness in discussing domestic social problems, and increased governmental awareness of international thinking on children’s wellbeing and rights:
Leadership [on the new policy on panti asuhan] did not just come from the Ministry of Social Affairs, but also from the Ministry of National Development
Planning. The Ministry of National Development Planning put more pressure on Ministries, became more involved in technical matters, and played a greater coordination role across government, especially in relation to child protection…
In 2004 or 2005 the Ministry of National Development Planning produced a document following the ‘World Fit for Children’ Summit which highlighted child protection [in May 2002, a Special Session of the UN General Assembly adopted a document entitled ‘A World Fit for Children’ which contained 21 specific goals and targets for children for the subsequent decade (United Nations General Assembly Special Session 2002)]. The Ministry of National
Development Planning realised that child protection had to be reflected in the national planning document and there were individuals in the Ministry of National Development Planning who showed leadership on this issue and recognised that Indonesia had to be accountable on this matter.
UNICEF and the Ministry of National Development Planning put in place a child protection coordination mechanism under a five-year country program and this has been in place for less than 10 years…
The Ministry of National Development Planning applied pressure to the Ministry of Social Affairs and the Ministry of Women’s Empowerment and Child
Protection. The Ministry of National Development Planning has the authority through the national budget planning process to question these and other Ministries…
There is now greater awareness in government about the impact of children’s institutions on children. This is not an easy task for government, especially the Ministry of Social Affairs, but gradually they changed. Also, now the world is changing and people are starting to realise that children’s institutions are not the best for children. But, it’s not just about children’s institutions but about a broader approach to prevention part of which is a change to children’s institutions policy. The Indonesian Government recognised that it needed to invest more in prevention and primary supports…
The Indonesian political environment is also conducive now and people are speaking their minds more. Faith-based organisations are trying to transform themselves to address the underlying causes of problems for families and children and also it’s expensive for them and society to run children’s institutions.
(Interviewee UNA-13)
7.1.3 An INGO view. In a similar vein to comments by UNA-13 above, one expatriate INGO manager (INE-13) discussed changes that began to occur during the early 2000s in Indonesian public discussions about children:
Indonesians are very proud of Indonesia’s place in the world and its place in Asia. It’s the fastest growing economy in the region, the sixteenth largest economy in the world, and a middle income economy. Socio-political advances are lagging the economic advances but there’s a certain inevitability to it. People have got more money and they are demanding more things such as better
education and better services. One of those things is taking care of our children better…
There’s a lot of really interesting debate going about the Asian ‘youth bulge’.
Indonesia is no exception. There’s a growing awareness that something needs to be done about how we take care of our youth…and a lot of that revolves around education…and cultural identity.
Some of it is a knee-jerk reaction because, as Indonesia grows, there’s a lot more foreign influence and so people say we need to ensure that our children are educated in Indonesian culture and language.
Part of that very macro-level pride is creating a demand for better lifestyle.
There’s an understanding that whether kids are institutionalised or not there needs to be a certain level of care, education and health and identity.
(Interviewee INE-13)