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Disclosing the 'international' to Indonesian minds
Almost a year ago, international relations (IR) academics from various universities across the country gathered at the University of Indonesia campus in Depok, West Java, to discuss the standard learning outcomes of the IR undergraduate program in response to the Research and Technology and Higher Education Ministryâs demand for a national qualification framework for IR graduates in the country
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lmost a year ago, international relations (IR) academics from various universities across the country gathered at the University of Indonesia campus in Depok, West Java, to discuss the standard learning outcomes of the IR undergraduate program in response to the Research and Technology and Higher Education Ministry's demand for a national qualification framework for IR graduates in the country.
One of the results of the gathering was an agreement that studying the IR undergraduate program should allow students to acquire the ability to identify Indonesian 'national interests' and to understand the country's position in analyzing 'international' phenomena.
As universities differentiate themselves to find niches to attract both national and overseas students, they seem to agree that the teaching should have a more nationalistic feature. Meanwhile, IR has become good business in the academic 'industry' in Indonesia. Many universities open IR programs with an aim of producing good-quality diplomats who can not only apply negotiating skills well but also various theories and paradigms.
IR students might benefit from the images of the discipline as 'multiparadigm' because it allows them to see various arguments that could make them more apt in dealing with day-to-day political debates.
In such a context, it is particularly interesting that it has been agreed to set the qualification in terms of Indonesian 'national interests' to find how 'international' is being framed among IR academics in Indonesia.
Such a particular standard was juxtaposed by other terms like 'Indonesian foreign policy' and 'diplomacy,' 'level of analysis (local, national, regional, and global),' and 'negotiation.' It is then arguable that there is a strong sense of 'official' in the way the study of IR is being conducted in Indonesia.
Many students initially think that, as they apply for an IR program, the 'international' is pretty much fascinating and it can allow them to be closer to becoming part of the global cosmopolitan elite, to speak foreign languages frequently and to be able to travel around the world more legitimately.
As students are being trained in such programs, many students ' albeit not all of them ' find that the main practicality of the study will someday ultimately be realized if they become diplomats, officials, international agency workers, consultants and in various positions including returning to the university as lecturers.
Observing how IR is studied in Indonesia thus brings us to the question of how 'international' is being discussed in Indonesia. A recent publication in the Review of International Studies journal by Gerard van der Ree (2015) offers a very fascinating insight into IR study in Indonesia.
For van der Ree, the knowledge of IR is pretty much influenced by the way the 'international' is being disclosed to us. Some people will be buzzed by 'international' if someday they find that the fuel price is hiking and they will immediately link their experience with what is going on in the Middle East.
Other people with some religious outlook might say that living a decent life in Indonesia is not enough without thinking deeply about the fate of Palestinians.
In IR there are long debates about how we should study the 'international.' American scholars tend to study the 'international,' by investigating how a liberal polity could have a stable and prosperous life in a dangerous world consisting of both liberal and non-liberal regimes. Some European scholars might go further to problematize the nature of 'power' and the politics behind defining 'security,' 'domestic,' and 'international' to justify change and to show that transformation in world politics is indeed possible.
Some scholars would like to see 'international' as consisting of given entities and thus allow them to provide 'scientific recommendations' for policy-making, while others are more interested in pushing ideals and visions forward to introduce more subtle and abstract elements of international phenomena such as norms, principles and narratives.
However for people living in developed countries it is easy to see that the world is their playground as their countries possess the capability to afford such mobility, outlook and indeed knowledge.
Understanding the philosophical roots of the discipline, Indonesian IR scholars who are active in disclosing 'international' should pay more attention to devising IR studies in their academic programs.
Reflecting the case of setting nationalistic standards for national qualifications as mentioned above, Indonesian academics bring together more local nuances with official objectives usually associated with the 'state,' 'corporations,' 'institutes' and 'organizations.' However, there are at least two potential problems with regard to combining two ways of discussing IR to Indonesian minds.
First is to present 'international' as a given with objective 'realities.' In order to provide reliable technocratic solutions for actual policy issues as well as to engage in both theoretical and empirical debate within academia, students should be equipped with both strong numeric and verbal abilities.
The tendency to stay away from statistics and game theoretical modeling as well as the parochial need to differentiate IR from other disciplines like economics, sociology, anthropology, literature, or even political science could cause more harm to the study. 'Policy' is a complex issue and seeing IR only as a 'multiparadigmatic' science could provide little reliable insight for students and practitioners.
Second is to present 'international' as a part of, using van der Ree's own words, 'for-the-sake-of-which': to allow us to see and imagine ourselves. The tendency to privilege 'official' over 'everyday' experience, i.e. to focus only on 'policy' and 'diplomacy' as well as 'international' over 'domestic' could hamper our potential to project our intrinsic domestic and national experience as 'international.'
Many IR academics overseas indeed project their 'domestic analogy' in analyzing IR. It permeates into both academic and practical discourse in a way that ensures their ultimate position in many global affairs. Indonesian experiences, both problems and wisdom, are indeed rich enough to substantiate terms like 'order,' 'authority,' 'power' and 'responsibility' that often become unquestioned terms that build IR building blocks.
Many Indonesians tend to think that we are a different and unique nation with particular experiences that could not be captured by 'Western' thinking tools.
However, by doing so, we often fail to 'de-world' IR to our own experience or to offer a viable 'recommendation' because we simply fail to identify the proper thinking tools and the way to experience the 'international.'
By acknowledging various ways of how 'international' is being disclosed, we may start to move away from seeing 'domestic' and 'international' as 'us' and 'other' and start to qualify what is 'us' by presenting what indeed us really is, not by what is 'not-us.'
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The writer is a lecturer and secretary of Department of International Relations, University of Indonesia.
