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Bridging the gap between academics and policymaking in Indonesia
Today, thanks to democratization, more political parties and coalitions have forced the president to accommodate politicians as ministers and high-ranking officials, sometimes even with minimal professional records and expertise.
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Coordinating Political, Legal and Security Affairs Minister Mahfud MD during the announcement of President Joko "Jokowi" Widodo's cabinet on Oct.23, 2019. (JP/Seto Wardhana)
I
n 2015, Asit Biwas, then a professor at the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy at the National University of Singapore, and Julian Kirchherr, a researcher at the Oxford University, wrote a very thought-provoking and important opinion piece in The Straits Times titled “Prof, no one is reading you”. The article gave a new perspective of how academics should think about themselves and their role in the changing society.
In the article, they argued that many brilliant ideas academics have do not significantly impact public debates and policymaking. That is because academics only share their thoughts in academic journals that are only read by their academic peers.
The two even pointed out that the average scholarly journal article is only read by about 10 people, which hardly changes society. Therefore, to have more of an impact, academics should write more op-eds that policymakers and public audiences will read so they can influence public discourse or even policymakers.
It raised a broader issue on to what extent academics’ works, particularly in social sciences in Indonesia, are relevant for today's real-world problem. Is the long criticism of “ivory-tower” academics who are not well connected to real-world problems in Indonesia still relevant?
There are at least three methods for making the academic world and scholars, especially in social sciences, more relevant in tackling Indonesia’s challenges.
First, as Professor Harold Koh, a Yale Law School professor and former legal advisor for the United States State Department, argued, it is important for an academic to also have a stint of real practical experience as a high-level decision-making official in the government. So, they have some ideas on what topics may be important and relevant to students who later will go into practice. He even gave an example of how many academics in the United States have gone on to become high-ranking government officials. It shapes not only policymaking that is justified academically but also shapes the theory in the academic world.
Indeed, many ministers and high-ranking officials in the US government have a background as academics. Joseph Nye, Ann Marie Slaughter, Janet Yellen and Henry Kissinger are just a few. They served as top government officials with strong academic credentials. After assuming positions in the government, they came back to teach and develop their scholarly works based on their experience as government officials. Those experiences then shaped their academic work, which was relevant for real-world problems and not only based on theory that is difficult to implement.
