49. Democracy & Self Perception in Southeast Asia

37. Democracy & Self Perception in Southeast Asia

Democracy in Southeast Asia
Southeast Asian’s Self-Perception
Tragedy to Break the Grip or Down precedes Up

Democracy in Southeast Asia

Why is Indonesia referred to as ‘Southeast Asia’s most democratic state’?

Rather than relying upon isolated examples, analysis and rumor, let us examine the results of yet another global index. Every year since 1973, Freedom House has rated each country according to what it calls ‘Freedom in the World’. To generate this ‘freedom index’, experts rate a country upon 7 subcategories. Three of the sub-categories are averaged to obtain a ‘Political Rights’ index (PR). The other 4 categories are averaged to obtain a ‘Civil Liberties’ index (CL). The PR and CL indexes are then averaged to determine whether a country is ‘Free’, ‘Partially Free, or ‘Not Free’.

The ‘Political Rights’ index could easily be renamed the ‘Democracy’ index. The 3 subcategories that the PR consists of are solely related to how democratic a country is. The 1st category rates a citizen’s ability to vote freely in a legitimate election on a scale of 1 to 16. On the same scale, the 2nd category rates a citizen’s ability to participate freely in the electoral process and the 3rd rates how well the citizens are represented by their elected officials. In other words, legitimate democracies, such as the US, Japan and the European nations, score the highest on the ‘Political Rights’ scale, while dictatorships, theocracies, monarchies, and communist states all get the worst ratings by this index.

After averaging these 3 subcategories, each country is assigned a score from 1 to 7 that essentially rates how legitimate the democracy is. Truly democratic nations get a score of 1, while communist nations get a score of 7 by definition. Indonesia gets the highest score in Southeast Asia – a reputable ‘2’ on the PR/Democracy index. The Philippines and Timor follow with an ambiguous ‘3’, then Thailand, Malaysia, and Singapore with a questionable ‘4’. Brunei, Myanmar, and Cambodia are in the dictatorial range with a ‘6’ rating. And as communist nations, Vietnam and Laos are both given a ‘7’, by definition. In other words, Indonesia is the only Southeast Asian nation that is close to being a legitimate democracy. The rest of the countries range from questionable to dictatorial or communist.

Late breaking news: the conservative Indonesian legislature just voted at the end of 2014 to eliminate local elections. Bummer! Indonesia’s relatively high ranking will certainly drop.

Freedom House Ratings 2014
Political Rights & Civil Liberties
	PR	CL	Average
US	1	1	1
Japan	1	1	1
India	2	3	2.5
Indonesia	2	4	3
Philippines	3	3	3
Timor	3	4	3.5
Singapore	4	4	4
Malaysia	4	4	4
Thailand	4	4	4
Brunei	6	5	5.5
Cambodia	6	5	5.5
Myanmar	6	5	5.5
Russia	6	5	5.5
Vietnam	7	5	6
Laos	7	6	6.5
China	7	6	6.5
Saudi Arabia	7	7	7

PR = Political Rights
1) Vote Freely in Legitimate Elections
2) Participate Freely in Electoral Process
3) Accountable Representation
CL = Civil Liberties
1) Freedom of expression and beliefs
2) Freedom of Assembly
3) Rule of Law
4) Personal Autonomy & Individual Rights
including right to own property

Self-Perception of the Southeast Asians

Note that experts create ‘freedom’ rankings. Anonymous number crunchers generate the other indexes. What does the populace think? What is their self-perception of the state of affairs in their respective countries? Gallup has taken a series of recent international polls that reflect these internal attitudes.

Of course, there are serious limitations upon the interpretations of the results of opinion polls. For instance, does each person throughout the world understand the question the same way? Could there be culturally based misunderstandings? Also, are their external circumstances, such as political suppression, that might exert an effect upon their answers? Was it a truly representative sample?

Despite the many factors that might distort the findings, this is the only data we have that indicates a national temperament. Although hopelessly imprecise, these numbers frequently point in a clear direction. While there might be extenuating circumstances, we are going to take the figures at face value – trying not to read too much into the numerical information. With these qualifications in mind, what do these opinion polls reveal?

First the background: Gallup’s pollsters asked the residents of most countries several questions during the time period from 2007 to 2013. Most questions could be answered with a positive or negative response: i.e. ‘satisfied’ or ‘dissatisfied’, ‘yes’ or ‘no’. The figures in the tables represent the percentage of respondents who were ‘satisfied’ or said ‘yes’. Let’s check the results.

Perceptions of individual well-being
HDI rank	Country	Education quality	Health care	Standard of living
9	Singapore	85	84	80
30	Brunei	..	..	..
62	Malaysia	91	87	75
89	Thailand	91	88	83
108	Indonesia	82	80	63
117	Philippines	83	83	70
121	Vietnam	83	59	68
128	Timor-Leste	..	..	..
136	Cambodia	92	83	49
139	Lao PDR	73	66	73
150	Myanmar	69	54	45
	SEA Average	83	76	67

5	United States	64	73	72
	World	64	57	—
	Very high HDI	63	72	—

83% of Southeast Asians are quite satisfied with their education system. In fact they are 20% more satisfied than Americans (64%), the World average (64%), and even those in countries with a ‘Very High’ Human Development Index (63%). There is some logic behind this finding. Even though many countries in the territory have a low HDI ranking, Southeast Asia has always been a very literate area of the world, in part due to the early Buddhist influence.

76% of Southeast Asians are also quite satisfied with their healthcare system. This is substantially higher than the World average (57%) and about the same as the citizenry of the US (73%) and the very high HDI countries (72%). Despite the low HDI rankings, Southeast Asians perceive their ‘standard of living’ (67%) in about the same light as Americans (72%). Of course the residents of certain countries, such as Cambodia (49%) and Myanmar (45%), are not quite so satisfied in this category for reasons we’ve discussed.

Perceptions of individual well-being
Country	Job Satisfaction	Safety	Freedom of choice	Life Satisfaction
Singapore	88	89	82	6.5
Brunei	..	..	..	..
Malaysia	83	45	82	5.9
Thailand	97	74	83	6.3
Indonesia	77	89	70	5.4
Philippines	83	66	91	5.0
Vietnam	82	67	73	5.5
Timor-Leste	..	..	..	..
Cambodia	84	63	95	3.9
Laos	85	75	87	4.9
Myanmar	71	89	65	4.4
SEA Average	83	73	81	5.3

United States	85	74	82	7.0
World	74	66	68	5.3
Very high HDI	84	72	77	6.6

In the categories of ‘Job Satisfaction’, ‘Safety’ & ‘Freedom of Choice’, Southeast Asians are just as satisfied as US citizens and the residents of countries with a ‘Very high HDI’. Malaysians are the one notable exception in the ‘Safety’ department. As previously mentioned, Malaysia’s high income disparity has contributed to a rise in crime. As a consequence, a majority of their residents (55%) don’t feel safe going out at night.

There was only one question that required more than a binary response. Respondents were asked to give a numerical rating to their life satisfaction on a 1 to 10 scale: with 1 being the worst and 10 being the best. In contrast to the other categories, Southeast Asia’s ‘Life Satisfaction’ category tends to parallel the rankings of the Human Development Index. In other words, the residents in countries with a high HDI ranking tend to be more satisfied with their lives than those in countries with low HDI rankings. Cambodians were particularly dissatisfied at 3.9 out of 10.

Perceptions about community & government
Country	Labor market	Community	Tend Poor	Preserve Environment	Trust in Government
Singapore	63	92	66	84	83
Brunei	..	..	..	..	..
Malaysia	44	83	70	72	76
Thailand	73	95	67	75	70
Indonesia	38	90	28	54	67
Philippines	65	90	82	87	76
Vietnam	35	81	59	50	86
Timor-Leste	..	..	..	..	..
Cambodia	55	92	89	92	83
Laos	66	94	66	90	98
Myanmar	32	90	51	50	..
SEA Average	52	90	64	73	80

United States	28	85	43	59	35
World	—	78	44	51	48
Very high HDI	—	86	41	53	36

The residents of Southeast Asia are generally more satisfied than the rest of the world with their local job market, their community, and how well their governments are dealing with the poor and the environment. In some of these categories, up to 20% of Southeast Asians are happier than their counterparts in America and the countries with a ‘Very High’ HDI. Some details: only 28% of Americans are satisfied with their local job market. This is less than the citizenry in any Southeast Asian country.

The most striking figure concerns ‘Government Trust’. While only a minority 48% of the world population trusts their government, a whopping 80% of the Southeast Asian population has ‘confidence in the national government’. Americans are far below the World Average with only about one third of the people 35% having confidence in their national leaders.

What could be the reason for this peculiar result?

As we saw in the previous chapter, the Human Development Index has been rising steadily in nearly all the Southeast Asian countries since 1980. There could be a few factors behind this steady improvement in living conditions. The Cold War was especially bad for Southeast Asia and gratefully ended with the dissolution of the Soviet Union in the late 1980s. Most of the countries have shed either repressive military dictatorships or dogmatic communist ideologies or both in the ensuing decades. In contrast with the prior European colonial or the US neo-colonial rule, all Southeast Asian nations are now ruled locally.

Perhaps because of this steady rise in living conditions, the residents tend to view their government in a positive light. In contrast, benefits and privileges are being cut in the more well developed nations. This perception of loss could be easily attributed to poor government performance. Indeed the residents of countries with a ‘Very High’ HDI ranking have the least trust in government of any grouping. This could be an indication that humans, in general, tend to be happier when circumstances are improving. Further no matter how good things are, humans tend to begin worrying when they perceive that their present situation is degrading.

In summary: While the Southeast Asian nations tend to rank in the middle bottom of the world’s nations in terms of the Human Development Index, their residents tend to be more satisfied with many features of their lives than are people in most other regions. Could this optimism and satisfaction have to do with steady improvement combined with self rule?

Tragedy to Break the Grip or Down precedes Up

Southeast Asia: “Whatever the reasons for this self-perception, it makes me happy that my people seem to be more satisfied with their circumstances than in the last century, or maybe since the Europeans arrived. To end this tome just a few reflections upon the Way of the Universe - the Tao of Heaven.

My entire geography with the exception of Thailand was under the thumb of Western imperialism entering the 20th century. Some, like Vietnam and Burma, had been subjugated fairly recently - less than a century before. Others, like Malacca, the Philippines and Java, had been dominated for centuries - nearly 400 years in the case of Malacca. However by the beginning of the 21st century, only 100 years later, all of them had thrown off the shackles of imperialism to embrace self-determination, for better or worse.

Like children, who are on their own for the first time, there have been many excesses combined with honest mistakes. Some of the parent countries felt that their freedom was premature and that they should have remained under parent supervision, for a while longer. But the conditions at home were too repressive and the teenager needed to break away. So for better or worse, our teenage countries have ventured out on their own. And just like teenagers or young adults, they are relishing their control over their own personal destiny. Although there have been some mistakes and hardships, each of my cultures prefers their freedom to being under the control of the colonial powers and then eventually the neo-colonial Cartel-controlled US.

So we’ll call the present condition ‘good’ for my cultures and countries of Southeast Asia, despite any present difficulties they might have. Freedom from the oppressors!

Let’s look at their general route towards independence - how it transpired. Despite the infighting between the colonial powers, there had been an unbroken European presence in my territories since the Portuguese arrived in the early 1500s. That’s a long time as far as cultures go. Although the name of the European country changed along with their language and orientation, the exploitation grew, continuing unabated for many long centuries. Some might suggest that it had to do with a superior culture dominating an inferior one. I would suggest the evidence indicates otherwise.

My people belonged to a rich interacting cultural heritage for over a thousand years before the Europeans arrived. We created some architectural masterpieces that are still considered artistic wonders today. We also had a rich literary tradition that preceded that of the Western European countries.

The only way we were lacking was in military experience. The constant fighting between the Bible-based cultures had sharpened their combat skills to the extent that they were able to easily dominate all other cultures on the planet - regardless of the level of their sophistication. These European conquerors were superior militarily but not culturally. They were like big bullies who were dominating the weaker but more sensitive and artistic children on the playground. At least, that’s my biased opinion.

So how were my children able to escape the club of these bullies?

Through misfortune. Things had to go down before they could go up.

The first tragedy to enable our eventual freedom was the Japanese occupation of World War II. This period of extreme hardship broke the colonial trance and made us aware of our power. Although the Japanese were worse than the Europeans despite being from our part of the planet, we bless them because they made us aware that we could be free. Even though the ‘Asian Co-Prosperity Sphere’ was mostly for Japanese profit, their dialogue played to our urges and needs and eventually inspired our growth. ‘Asia for Asians’ was their motto, which we eventually translated into ‘Southeast Asia for Southeast Asians’. Each of my countries craved its own independence - along the lines of language, geography, and colonial influence.

Our second calamity was the neo-colonialism of the US-based International Business Cartel accompanied by their greed-motivated politics of terror. Like the preceding Dutch VOC and British East India Company, they were loosely tied to their country of origin, but acted independently of it. The US President had about as much influence on the overseas behavior of the Cartel, as the King of Spain had on his explorers, or the Kings of England or Holland had on their international companies - not much. Indeed, frequently the US president was the Cartel’s agent.

In neo-colonial fashion, the Cartel assisted us to become independent from the European nations so that they could more easily exploit us. To this end, they established local military dictatorships that answered only to their representatives. The Cartel’s dictators were much more repressive than the European powers that preceded them - murdering and enslaving millions of my people. Perhaps, this had to do with superior firepower or a more ruthless attitude, but it was much more invasive, affecting larger sectors of the population.

However the fact that they encouraged us to rule ourselves, albeit under their strict supervision, gave us the potential for self-control that was lacking under the European powers. At least, the Cartel-dominated US government respected the local people that cooperated with them to exploit the populace. In contrast, the Europeans had retained all power for themselves. While ruthlessly exploiting the poor, the American-led international business community extended respect to the wealthy unscrupulous people of any culture. Perhaps it was their egalitarian heritage extending itself to wealth.

To break free from neo-colonialism, the political and/or economic circumstances had to get bad enough for people to break out of their comfort zone - no matter how miserable they were. Demonetization that eliminated life savings in Burma, the obvious assassination of a popular political rival in the Philippines, and the economic downturn of the 90s in Java, each of these events enraged the population sufficiently to evoke enough collective courage to throw off these long-term dictatorships. Once the people stand together, they can easily topple dictators - as they did with Ferdinand Marcos in the Philippines, Ne Win in Burma, Suharto in Indonesia, the series of puppets in Vietnam, and Lon Nol in Cambodia. The people have the power. Right On!

While many innocent souls were pinched by these difficulties and cultural disasters, these hardships were necessary steps on the path to Freedom.

Ah! The Tao of the Universe is complex and varied.

Going down to go up is a difficult mind-set to cultivate.

While the image that I have presented is one of progress for my people, the same issues as always face each and every one of us everyday. While more of my people are happier with their circumstances than in the mid 1960s, as witnessed by the almost universal cooperation with their governments, there are pockets of very unhappy people who spread their misery when they can. There are even more people who create their own unhappiness every day by constantly comparing themselves with others that are�2��d��78*sx1%��M�E �j�v��q��x�N� i �s�^50 �� n5�zR*��q�5�n��@E�z��F�.�H�g��|��,��m�l��1�G��w��k��R��a��'��F*�!�b<��d��B��4��W��>�I]` � c ��K��J��}�>��X��~��8�7��Y!�M�4��?�J��"��6��Sp� ��k �� +��0O�DE�� 1 ( � � h1�� p � Bv� ��w��.(:��m��5��G��v�D�{�;�%�K�)�h��*�� \�S�c�d�s��b��a�e��h�|��y��|��i�i�tF�V�O��| cM�� ']��q��L�Q�Q�t�y��x�L�s��@��B��o��~��i��%� ��G9�In \ � H � �� j |\�S�x�� 5Wr�g��J| � ��U��\ �� J��/3��P�&��Z��k��"�m��(�K�&��^��8��5�9��&��>��P��7�w��v��:��w�h�^��J��4�H�R��0S4��,��DO��'0�~wl�n�%�4k��)��c��L�p��M��D�$bN��Mm��W��6�:��u��+��0P��L�#�s�� M h;�� [��=��V��Y�I�bj�Or��e��u��H�L�-��I�X��W�� X��y�s�a��:��+�h�� 7�W��8�3��e�5�S�:�+~��i��4�l��6S� ��@�I� o�� # �?�-hut��(�P��~�;��3�R��2�*�y��4��R�;�� u�n�b��a��R��YL�5��(�� |�J �: �Z�JYpz��#�;P�� )#%�� k � "� o �1x��3��o�8�5�c��/��d�r�h�'� �?�2�_��!��]