"Audit on Globalization":
Strengthen the Voice of Indonesia in the Governanceof of International Financial Institutions

May 2007 - July 2008

Duration of the project : May 2007 - July 2008
Suporting Donor : VECO-NOVIB and Trocaire

The primary objective of this program is to produce a report that includes the problems and solutions in the governance of International Financial Institutions. This report is intended for the negotiators of Indonesia in various international forums, especially the World Bank, IMF, and WTO, and to institutions concerned with this issue, such as, G24, UN bodies, international and national NGOs.

The focus of Audit on Globalization is to record and conduct a documentation on: (a) the problems confronted by Indonesia in economic diplomacy; (b) proposals of Indonesia in improving and reforming the governance of IFIs to intensify the voice and influence of Indonesia and other developing countries in general; (c) proposals and suggestions of Indonesia in strengthening economic diplomacy in the forums of IFIs, especially the World Bank, IMF, and WTO. The activities that were carried out in order to attain this objective are: (i) Establishment of Prominent Person Groups; (ii) Production of knowledge, through the working papers of the members of PPG and stakeholder survey; (III) Series of PPG meetings; (iv) National Seminar; and (v) Publication.

The objectives of the whole program

1. Identify the context and challenge of Indonesia in the altered international era, particularly in international financial institutions,
   
2. Get the active involvement of the prominent persons in Indonesia from different backgrounds to formulate the proposal of Indonesia in the reformation of the governance of IFIs,
   
3. Formulate the steps that will strengthen the economic diplomacy of Indonesia, 
4. Produce the Audit on Globalization Report that will include the concrete proposal and operational reformation of the governance of International Financial Institutions, such as, the IMF, World Bank, and WTO.

Resume of Project's Activities

:: Establishment of Prominent Persons Group (PPG)

This Prominent Persons Group serves as the Steering Committee of the activities of Audit on Globalization. The willingness of these prominent persons in Indonesia to become a member of this Prominent Persons Group (PPG) is the preliminary step of the whole activity. As SC, the PPG has been directing the process and substance of this program until it attains its objective of producing the Audit Globalization Report. The PPG provides guidance and direction in preparing the framework and they examine inputs to the working papers to ensure that they are in accordance with the objective and intention of the Audit on Globalization program.

The core PPG consists of Nana Sutresna (Senior Diplomat), Moeslim Abdurrahman (Muhammadiyah Member Board, the second biggest muslim organization), and Aleksius Jemadu (academician from Universitas Parahyangan), and in addition also Ali Alatas (former Minister of Foreign Affairs), Chairperson of the Presidential Advisory Body of the government of President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono. They expressed his appreciation on the proposed Audit on Globalization and provided several inputs, among others, to sharpen the issue of economic diplomacy and to get the involvement of the prominent persons in the Department of Foreign Affairs who are competent in the field of economic diplomacy, like, Sumadi Brotodiningrat.

The the core Prominent Persons Group (PPG) had sucsessfully identifies the challenge of Indonesia in the governance of IFIs, and formulate of the suggestions and proposals for the improvement in the governance of IFIs. These result reflected by the Prominent Persons who were appointed to write working paper among others: Aleksius Jemadu (from Universitas Parahyangan), Prabowo (from Strategic Asia), Arrmanatha Nasir (from the Department of Foreign Affairs), Dian Ediana Rae (from Bank Indonesia), and Panca Pramudya (from InRise). In this step, program had also successfully established the formation of Prominent Persons of Indonesia in globalization that is composed 15 persons from different backgrounds.

The Working Papers which Topics and Appointed Writers are :

1. Trend of global political economy and its implication to Indonesia
   Aleksius Jemadu - Universitas Parahyangan
   
2. Assessing the proposed reformation formula of the IMF
   Panca Pramudya - InRISE
3. Vision and strategy of Indonesia in confronting globalization
   Imam Cahyono - Perkumpulan Prakarsa
   
4. Challenge of the actors and institutions who conduct diplomacy
   Arrmanatha Nasir - Department of Foreign Affairs
5. Improve the performance of the strategy and performance of economic diplomacy
   Dian Ediana Rae - The Indonesian Central Bank

In general, the objectives of the production of working papers by the members of PPG were attained. i.e :

• Identification the detail problems to strengthen Indonesian economic diplomacy,
• Formulation new proposals reforming the International Financial Institutions
• New resources and materials for the writing of the synthesis Audit on Globalization Report.

:: Stakeholder survey on the governance of globalization

The stakeholder survey on the governance of globalization serves as a supplementary material besides the working papers to strengthen the material for the writing of the Audit on Globalization Report.

The objectives of this activity are:

1. Identify the opportunities and challenges of Indonesia in the international economic diplomacy.
2. Explore perceptions on the urgency of the reformation in the governance of International Financial Institutions from the point of view of different parties, namely; the government, parliament, academicians, mass media, and CSOs.
3. Formulate opinions and proposals to strengthen the role and position of Indonesia in the governance of International Financial Institutions like the IMF, World Bank, and WTO.

This survey uses the qualitative approach by using the method of in-depth interviews. The interview was conducted by directly interviewing the resource persons in Indonesia and providing written questions to overseas resource persons. The result of these interviews has been compiled according to the categorization of the interviews from each respondent. The result of the analysis is written in a narrative form. Likewise, the Survey Report is also in the form of a narrative report.

The respondents consist of 30 persons from Indonesia and abroad. The names of the persons who are interviewed was arranged according to the following criteria: (i) institutions or individuals who have been directly involved in international economic negotiations (WTO, IMF, World Bank, and UN forums); (ii) have been actively involved in the preparation and implementation of international economic negotiations; and (iii) have monitored international economic negotiations.

:: Prominent Persons Group (PPG) - 2nd Meeting

The Second Prominent Persons Group Meeting had conducted, and in this Prominent Persons Group Meeting, Prakarsa invited David Woodward, former Program Director of New Economics Foundation, London, who wrote many proposals for the reformation of the governance of International Financial Institutions. This Prominent Persons Group (PPG) Meeting aims to review the result of the research on the working papers and the survey.

:: Prominent Persons Group (PPG) - 3rd Meeting

The 3rd Prominent Persons Group Meeting aims to criticise the writing of the draft synthesis Audit on Globalization Report based on the five working paper. Yanuar Nugroho, a researcher and lecturer from Manchester Institute of Innovation Research, University of Manchester was invited to writing the report.

The important point from this activity is that strengthening the Indonesia voice in the governance of International Financial Institutions especially IMF, World Bank and WTO is a must and hand in hand with others developing countries. Even the effort to reform the IFIs not easy thing but it must be continue.

Download: English Version

:: National Seminar

The national seminar aims to invite public inputs on the Audit on Globalization research. Besides, this activity also aimed to inform the public about the Indonesia's position in the governance of globalization. The result of the research published in selected paper (in Bahasa) include "Reforming the Governance of Globalization" by Imam Cahyono and the result of synthesis document "Reshaping Globalization, Strengthening Participation of Indonesia in Global Governance " by Yanuar Nugroho. (this synthesis paper is now available in English version)

:: Local Seminar

The local seminar as part of launching Audit on Globalization research was taken place at local level. The local seminar was held on 29 April 2009 at The Sunan Hotel, Solo. Acting as speaker in this seminar are Imam Cahyono (Perkumpulan Prakarsa) Hamong Santono (Indonesian Coalition on Water Sovereingty), Tri Widiarto (Christian University of Satya Wacana, Salatiga) and Dani H. Soe'oed (Solo Pos Dialy). The 50 participants attended in this activity comes from government agencies, academia, media, parliament and CSOs.

:: Book publishing

The result of Audit on Globalization research contains working papers and synthesis paper was compiled to publish in a book. It aims to enrich the knowledge of Indonesian and to criticise problems in governance of globalization especially proposals reform in the governance of International Financial Institutions (IFIs). This book - in bahasa Indonesia - was published by LP3ES publisher titled "Menjinakkan Metakuasa Global" ("Taming Global Meta Power: The voice of Indonesia toward an equal globalization"). Unluckily, the English version of this book is still in waiting to publish because most of Indonesian publishers could not accept the ideas on this research. The publisher of University of Atmajaya in the end was receiving the draft of English version of this book to publish. The Indonesia version of this book was distributed by Perkumpulan Prakasa to its network and any stakeholders.

Lessons Learned

1. This program was success to reach its goal to identify, explore and presents updated information on recent condition and situation on international world that always change dynamic, especially in the governance of the International Financial Institutions (IFIs). This program meet its momentum to respond global financial crisis that still far from finish. On the other side, there are suggestions to reform and democratizing the IMF, World Bank and WTO. The result of Audit on Globalization research could be placed as entry point for Indonesia to respond global crisis. So for, the research focussed on the Indonesia challenges in global contex is still limited.
2. The participation of senior figurs from government agencies especially Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Coordination of Economic Ministry, and Indonesian Central Bank in the Prominent Persons Group (PPG) was strengthen support the importance the role and position of Indonesia in reforming and democraticizing the International Financial Institutions. The enthusiasm and contribution of the Prominent Persons Group in Audit on Globalization is a manifestation of their concern morally and materially they give information and critical inputs to strengthen the voice of Indonesia in the global economic governance.
3. The opportunity and challenge of Indonesia in the governance of International Financial Institutions could be mapped out in detail mainly in the way to produce ideas and proposals of any stakeholders in Indonesia to support reformation and democratization. The position and strategy of Indonesia to strengthen its position and proposal to reforms need to be focuss and continued by the government of Indonesia to create "the Indonesian White Paper" as the foremost reference of Indonesian economic diplomacy.
   
4. The research of Audit on Globalization was documented challanges, opportunities and ideas of Indonesian people in facing the fragile of globalization. The result of knowledge production in this document can be used by the government of Indonesia as reference to made decision on economic diplomacy of Indonesia. For academia, media, CSOs and public at large, the result of this research give insight of education process, enrich knowledge in term of people constientization the importance to respond the impact of economic globalization.
   
5. The knowledge of the most Indonesian, in general, such as government and public on the governance of economic globalization, especially the opportunities, challenges and the implication of International Financial Institutions is still limited. It is very difficult to find an expert -academia or CSOs- who have expertise on economic globalization caused the activities of knowledge production cannot run smoothly. This condition have impact to this program. The core of this program cannot finished at the first schedule.
   
6. Coordination between the government institutions to respond global issues is still far from reality so there is no focus to take action. As its impacts, the respon of Indonesian society, especially the policy of the government of Indonesia in answer the global economic crisis is always too late. This is an important problem for this program and in relation to take action further for the better of Indonesian economic diplomacy.
   
7. The participation of Prominent Persons Group that have concern in the governance of globalization is still not run maximally. There are senior figures invited to give inputs and involved with this program but they are very busy. If more senior figues participates with Prominent Persons Group to respond this issue could strengthen the ideas and proposal to support the government of Indonesia to strengthen its voice in the governance of the International Financial Institutions.