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nother series of alarming events occurred in Papua on July 31, when 19 people were killed in a community clash caused by a disagreement over the registration of election candidates in Puncak Jaya. This was followed by the murder of four people in Abepura by an unknown perpetrator. Finally, mass rallies were organized in Jayapura and Mimika to demand a referendum and Papuan independence.

These rallies also demanded international mediation, through support for the International Lawyers for West Papua (ILWP) conference in Oxford. Specifically, they wanted the ILWP conference to pursue a referendum for Papuan independence (The Jakarta Post, Aug. 3).

These events were indeed a heavy blow for the central government. However, similar to its reaction toward previous events in Papua, the central government has not shown any “new prospective formula” to overcoming these recurring issues. It is still behaving reactively, defensively and repeating claims that Papua is part of NKRI and that special autonomy is the panacea to solve its problems.

The complexity of the Papua problem has indeed caused frustration for everybody. After these recurring unfortunate and alarming events, what hope is actually left for the betterment in Papua, when there is deepening distrust between the Papuans and the central governments and dialogue, is no longer seen as a viable solution by most people.

Papua’s problems are not only Jakarta’s concern as such, but more effort should now be made to promote good governance as a prerequisite to achieving and effectively implementing special autonomy. In other words, there is no point continuously blaming Jakarta for underdevelopment and stagnation in Papua without giving proper attention to the “internal” condition of governance in Papua.

Despite various interventions to promote good governance in Papua, it seems Papua is lacking best practices or even progress indicators of good governance.

The corrupted and embezzled special autonomy fund reported by the Supreme Audit Agency (BPK) is a clear indication of bad governance. The national media also reports that there were indications of corruption by 44 members of the West Papua legislature. Moreover, Partnership (Kemitraan) through the Partnership Governance Index also showed low scores for fairness, transparency, efficiency and effectivity of government in both Papua and West Papua. The latter two cases are another form of bad governance.

Why is there stagnation in the promotion of good governance? And not only in Papua is good governance problematic. The discourse on promoting good governance worldwide has also received criticism. The concept has been seen as facing “inflation in its meaning” (Grindle, 2010) and being too generic, imitative and ambitious (Jabeen, 2007). The application of good governance in the third world has also been criticized for neglecting its sociocultural and political context. That certainly seems to be the case with Papua.

There needs to be a thorough investigation of societal changes in Papua as an impact of globalization and modernization, so that we can understand what is impeding good governance there. All societies are ideally transformed from feudalism to capitalism, religion to knowledge, peasantry to industrial society and aristocracy to democracy (Jabeen, 2007).

Papuans are experiencing a slow rate of change because of isolation and underdevelopment. Most Papuans are still living from subsistence farming, are economically marginalized and lack a proper education. In isolated areas, traditional beliefs are still strongly in practice.

Finally, traditional leadership in the form of the “big man” is dominant even in the modern government system. The politicization of bureaucracy, authoritarianism, elitism, paternalism and feudalism are incompatible with values of good governance. In general, this kind of level of societal changes tends to be a weak foundation to promote good governance and thus clearly shows the linkages between governance and culture as far as Papua is concerned.

Despite the above factors, there are also other constraints to promoting good governance in Papua. First, there are problems in enforcing the law in Papua. Law is easily bought and there is a dichotomy between positive and traditional law. Second, Papua has one of the highest poverty rates in Indonesia, as indicated by poor health and education services, and death from disease and malnutrition. The implication of poverty on good governance is society’s distrust toward its mechanisms. The poor tend to exclude themselves from the social and political process and therefore limit their participation and representation in the governance system.

Third, as mentioned earlier, corruption and nepotism impede good governance. Corruption “can be seen in every fabric of social life in the form of increasing poverty, reduced efficiency, setting wrong priorities, social isolation, disorder and distrust between governing bodies and the general public contributing to the vicious cycle of poor governance” (Khan and Islam in Jabeen, 2007).

Fourth, Papua is a divided society. The society in Papua is known to be prone to conflict, both vertically and horizontally. With such a divided society, cohesion is weak and does not support good governance. Fifth, it is widely known that there is problem of the weak capacity of the government and civil society in efforts to promote good governance. The low education levels and low managerial skills of government staff and fragmented civil society are concrete examples of the constraints.

Sixth, there are no clear and consistent regulations in which to measure the progress and implementation of (good) governance. Seventh, it could be argued in an extreme way that there is no political will from the government to promote good governance. Good governance is seen as a threat to those “in power”.

From the above explanation, there needs to be a speedy move to resolve the problems. We could start by adapting to the constraints to promote and contextualize good governance into modalities for the betterment of Papua.

Without good governance, Special Autonomy can not be implemented effectively. The three alarming cases explained earlier serve as “red lights” — both for the central government and the provincial and district administrations in Papua — that there is no other option than to promptly make special autonomy work. This is the only way to avoid further damage and disruption in Papua.

The writer is a researcher at the Department of Politics and International Relations, Centre for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), Jakarta.