It's easy for any casual observer to come up with the laundry list of problems facing Indonesia that Susi Johnston does.
It is easy indeed - - precisely because there are so many problems to list. That's worrying.
What isn't so easy is to make a reasoned analysis of the underlying causes of these problems and make any meaningful contribution to solving them.
I do make meaningful contributions to solving them. And I do a lot of reasoning and analysis, actually, although I could certainly do more, time allowing.
Susi Johnston's garbled and self contradicting diatribe fails miserably on both counts.
Not really.
The tone of Susi Johnston's attack is set by saying that Indonesia is "beset with serious structural, economic and ideological crises many of which are not especially salient in Bali but affect it nevertheless".
It's not an attack, and the above statement is accurate.
She believes that tourism revenue should be used to raise the standard of living of the Balinese to a much higher level and certainly much higher than the rest of Indonesia as though Bali can somehow separate itself from the rest of the country.
I don't believe that.
Well, actually it probably could, but I'm nowhere near suggesting that it should. At any rate, Bali in some ways is, and long has been, separate from the rest of the country.
Indonesia rightly uses tourism revenue to benefit all Indonesians. In return Bali enjoys a special status, infrastructure investment far beyond any similar sized region and a degree of autonomy in its administration.
So I don't think this is accurate.
Bali isn't a Daerah Istimewa and I don't know what special status it has as a province. Does it have a special status? I don't know that it does.
Does it get more infrastructure investment? I'm not aware of that.
Regional autonomy applies throughout the Republic. I don't know of any autonomies Bali has that aren't granted to other provinces as well.
Many areas of Bali are desperately poor like most of Indonesia but Susi Johnston believes that Bali is "prosperous" and has an "abundance of luxury"
Bali is one of the most prosperous provinces in Indonesia. For example, the per capita income of Gianyar Regency in 1999 was the highest in Indonesia. Car and motorbike ownership levels are the highest in Indonesia. And so on and so on.
Where that prosperity goes, and who it benefits are issues that trouble me a great deal.
I discussed in many articles the problems of poverty in Bali and in this piece I was trying to bring attention to the painful irony of economic inequality in Bali. Emotionally, I find it difficult to see abject poverty in such close proximity to tremendous wealth and luxury to the point of excess.
Bali does have an abundance of luxury, perhaps an overabundance. I spent several months two years ago, circling every appearance of the word "luxury" in all of the island's tourism and property magazines I could get my hand on. It was interesting. The feeling I came out with was that "luxury" is like a new mantra. But this is tangential . . .
If you read the "Bali Blurbs" pieces on my blog, you'll see an overabundance of luxury is engulfing south Bali like a tsunami. Jumeirah, Raffles, the rest of the Pecatu development, Bulgari Residences, Alila Tanah Lot, Alila Ulu Watu, The Banyan Tree, The Outrigger, Ferragamo Resort, W Resort & Spa, shopping centers, nightclubs, two new 18 hole golf courses, and more are in the process of being built here. And it goes on and on and on.
I didn't say there is an abundance of luxury for everyone, just an abundance of luxury.
I see large elite commercial construction projects going up at a dizzying rate. We now have the huge Carrefours shopping centre, the new Hypermart, and two new gourmet supermarkets in south Bali. Hotels, restaurants, bars, shops, showrooms and villas are going up on almost every empty patch of land. It's a staggering amount of investment.
What I was trying to express was, "With all this money, all this investment, all of this economic activity, how can it be the the lot of the middle to lower classes is so bad?"
I don't not believe in "trickle down" economics, strictly speaking, and this is proof enough.
the inference being that corruption is syphoning off all of the tourism profits and leaving very little for Bali.
A lot of people say that. I certainly didn't. I think corruption is eroding value in many ways. Where the wages of corruption go is irrelevant, buthat most corruption here is local, and the value it extracts from the economy is local, and the proceeds from it are in local pockets.
Where exactly is all this prosperity and luxury? Perhaps she is referring to the rapidly multiplying high end hotels, the bland cookie cutter villa complexes she spruiks on her blog, or the largely unpatronised fashion boutiques.
That is exactly where almost all of the luxury is, and the prosperity too (but it's actually a little bit more spread around).
I'm not sure the fashion boutiques are largely unpatronised. I don't think they are.
No doubt Susi Johnston is a proponent of "trickle down" economics.
See above.
Well yes it can be argued that a "rising tide floats all boats" and this is already evident in the higher wages enjoyed by the average Balinese relative to other Indonesians.
High-skill, professional, and executive salaries here are lower than in Jakarta and some other urban centres in Indonesia. Construction workers are lower paid here than in Jakarta.
However the effect is always going to be minimal because the only significant and sustainable increase in wealth will come from organic development within the society itself.
I don't understand how this relates to what I've written. If Bambang is trying to say that tourism is "inorganic" as opposed to "organic" developments of other kinds, and therefore a bad thing in general, I'm not sure I can figure that out. And I can't quite see what kind of a model society Bambang is pointing to here, or what is being suggested. It might be that he is opposed to large-scale outside investment, which makes some sense. But it's not very clear.
He seems to think that I'm against "organic development," although I don't know precisely what that includes and excludes.
Bali as part of a developing country has always been a budget holiday destination where the mainly Japanese and Australian tourists go to enjoy the tropical weather and maybe even a cultural experience at a budget price.
That isn't accurate.
Susi Johnston wants to have it both ways.
I don't know which two ways he's thinking of here.
BTW, in almost all problem-solving, the only solution is to have things, in a sense, both ways. All-or-nothing approaches don't work very well, except perhaps in warfare.
I think where Bambang and I differ is that he sees some over-reaching two-sided conflict taking place, while I see a lot of complex and contradictory points of conflict. He seems to think in terms of one point of view being the right one, and in terms of a cohesive dominant point of view that is opposed to it.
I don't see a cohesive dominant point of view anywhere I look in Bali. I see many different points of view, and many different groups with with many different values, which cause a tremendous number of points of conflict and potential conflict.
We're going to have to find ways to "have it both ways" to resolve all of these diverse and complex issues. More than "both ways," I expect. We will probably be better off if we can work out how to have it "many ways." And (sorry for being so abstract), but I think it's not only possible, but essential to learn how to do this.
She believes that Bali has "abandoned its almost automatic claim to quality and gone down-market", that it should be marketing itself "like diamonds", in limited supplying to the wealthy few.
Bhutan did very well with this. From a pragmatic point of view, it is a strategy worth considering. If more revenues can be generated with less environmental impact, and less investment, I think that sounds like something worth looking into.
That would suit Susi Johnston whose interior decorating business is aimed at the upper end of the market.
I don't see the logical connection here. And I don't have an interior decorating business.
How will this benefit the majority of Balinese? Are they all going to open five star hotels or restaurants?
Increased quality and price of the tourism product could create the same amount of economic benefit, with less degradation to the natural and social environment.
There's no logical connection between promoting higher-quality and higher-ticket tourism and Balinese needing to open five star hotels and restaurants. Quite to opposite, if you reason it through all the way.
The quality of the tourism product is not dependent on the hotel, but what is outside of it. If what is outside is polluted, chaotic, dirty, unappealing visually, flooded, jammed with traffic, strewn with rubbish, noisy, crowded, and dangerous, then the tourism product is not a quality one and cannot command a high price.
The benefits of tourism to the general population are largely illusory.
This isn't an accurate statement.
The majority of restaurants and hotels in the tourist areas are struggling to survive.
This is not an accurate statement.
It occurs to me that Bambang thinks I'm a tourism evangelist. I'm not. I haven't got a strong opinion about whether tourism is a "good thing" or a "bad thing." There are plenty of good arguments both ways, and in general, I've tended more to be emotionally anti-tourism rather than the opposite.
For me personally, tourism is neither good nor bad for my wallet, so I'm certainly not influenced by economic self-interest in relation to tourism and what it does.
I'm not sure it makes sense to be "pro-tourism" or "anti-tourism" in Bali today. No more sense that it makes to be "pro-rain" or "anti-rain."
That's because the majority of tourists come for a week, spend their money in the large hotels, sit by the pool, go on a couple of tours and go home.
I'm not sure this is accurate, I doubt that it is.
The vast majority of tourism income received by the Balinese is in the form of wages while they sit around waiting for customers in the hundreds of under patronised hotels, restaurants and retail outlets.
This is not accurate.
At least they have that. In Susi Johnston's world they would be required to make the leap from the agrarian life of the village to opening a Ritz-Carlton.
Quite the opposite. My vision sees stable numbers of rooms in Bali, with a comprehensively better quality tourism product inside and outside the hotels. I am dreaming of clean government, rule of law, a functioning system of taxation and public services, a healthy diversified economy, good short and long-term urban planning, a rehabilitated and protected natural environment, adequate public transportation, improved public health and high-quality free education available equally in all areas. This is not impossible. It might seem so at the moment, but I believe it can be achieved.
I have for at least the past ten years advocated a building moratorium in Bali - - at least until comprehensive island-wide urban and space planning, and the means of enforcing and maintaining these plans, were in place.
The San Juan Islands, where I spent my summers as a child, became a wildly desirable destination for vacationers and for building expensive second homes. Real estate speculation and development started to ramp up. As the type of problems that Bali faces started to loom on the horizon, a building moratorium was declared, that lasted a number of years, until the islands put together an effective and well-thought out set of land use and planning regulations with a long-term view. The interests of many diverse groups were given voice in deliberations and decision making. The result is that now, more than a quarter century later, the San Juan Islands are in good shape, and the quality of the experience, the "magic" that originally drew people there is intact enough to keep them coming. The natural environment is in admirably good condition, as is the social, cultural and architectural environment. The building moratorium allowed for this to be possible.
The revenue from tourism is never going to be enough to make the kind of societal and infrastructure changes that Susi Johnston believes should be made.
Perhaps it could be enough, perhaps not. I don't advocate increased dependence on tourism, quite the opposite. With improved education, training, and other public services, members of this society would have the opportunity to choose from a far wider spectrum of possibilities for making a good living.
While the bulk of the workforce is seduced by the tourist dollar it isn’t developing more sustainable industries. No, Susi Johnston just wants things to be better. She wants better roads, better health care and better education and she believes that if only the Balinese weren’t so lazy and the government so corrupt they would have them.
This isn't accurate, and the logic doesn't scan.
I think the last statistics I read indicated that about 20% of the workforce is employed in tourism, but about 80% of the island's economic activity is related to tourism directly or indirectly.
Susi Johnston’s characterisation of the Balinese as lazy because they import Javanese workers for manual labour is racist.
This isn't accurate.
The Balinese like any large group cannot be characterised with this type of character defect.
They certain have been characterised in this way. But not yet by me. I haven't even thought yet about how you could measure "laziness" and then compare one group of people to another with a "laziness index".
A more sensible explanation is one of economics. The Balinese enjoy a higher standard of living on average than the Javanese because some 70% of Balinese workers are employed in the tourist industry. The Javanese and other outsiders are more desperate for work and will therefore always undercut whatever rates a Balinese would charge in order to secure labouring jobs.
Exactly my point.
And I would like to make another observation here. In the village where I live, and in others I have lived in, and spent time in, there are many parents who complain to me, even to the point of tears, about the fact that their sons don't have jobs, that they don't work, that they just cruise around on their motorbikes, stay out late drinking arak, and come home surly and demand food and care from their parents and their wives. These complaints match my own observations just looking around town.
I often discuss this situation further with the parents, who are usually around my age, with children in their twenties and thirties. Again and again they tell me that they have tried to get their sons to work, even found work for them, or created work. They set up small businesses for them, or bought them cars since the sons said they wanted to be drivers. The sons got bored running a DVD shop or warnet or whatever, and just stopped doing it. The sons crashed their cars, or failed to get any guests, or didn't take care of their cars, and the cars were parted out or sold. The parents found the sons hanging out at bars and cafes at night, and not getting up in the morning. The sons were sent to computer classes and stopped going. The sons were sent to English classes and stopped going. The sons wouldn't help the family on their land, wouldn't help in the fields, wouldn't raise some pigs or cows. This is not just a few families, this is a commonplace household drama in Bali. I suppose Bali isn't any different in this respect than, say, other "developing areas", or than economically-down urban areas in European or American cities.
The simple economic reality in Indonesia explains many of the deficiencies that Susi Johnston sees.
I made that point, too. That's precisely the point of my piece.
For example the expectation that Bali should be emulating Thailand and have a world class medical facility such as Bumrungrad International Hospital in Bangkok is ridiculous.
It's not ridiculous.
Perhaps she means that Jakarta should have a comparable facility.
Certainly it should, as well.
Perhaps the Indonesian government is more concerned with spreading its health budget over its massive archipelago rather than servicing the few elites and expats that “high-tail it to Singapore and Bangkok”.
Exactly. And rightly so.
Private health care is a lucrative industry. And it's not funded by governments, so the Bambang's statement here is irrelevant.
I haven't made up my mind whether large-scale elite private health care facilities are "good" or "bad", but they certainly are part of a lucrative business sector, which also provides incentives for improved medical education, skills transfer, research and training, which are of benefit to the public sector in the long-term, as an added benefit.
The private health-care industry could be one for Bali to develop, in order to make it less dependent on the tourism sector, and to broaden its economic and skills base.
I also underline the fact that lower quality of health care causes money to go offshore, when people go to foreign countries to purchase the care they want because it is not available at home. That is, in a way, a type of "import-dependency".
Either way it is simplistic in the extreme to point at one particular aspect of another country and paint Indonesia as a basket case because it doesn’t measure up on that particular score.
I agree completely.
Like a mother admonishing a child that her friends’ children are performing better at school Susi Johnston likes to make this sort of comparison.
That's not accurate.
The comparison with Singapore and Myanmar is a particular howler and gets to what I suspect is at the heart the recent cacophony of criticism – the tax on imported alcohol. Susi Johnston holds up Singapore and Myanmar as examples for Indonesia to follow. We are supposed to be impressed that “we can purchase fine Australian and French wines in the supermarkets of Yangon for the same price, or less, than they cost at home, and for one-tenth of the price they cost in Bali” even though it is an obvious exaggeration.
First, it's not an exaggeration. (I can dig out the receipts from my last trip to Yangon if I still have them, or email some of my friends there to run down the road and check some prices.)
I have tried to add something to the ongoing discussions about the impacts of the Minister of Trade's implementation of new programs for importing food and beverages. Many aspects of the issue have already been discussed at length. It's not the crux of the matter, but one aspect I think it is still relevant is the aspect of cultural value surrounding wine. Also, the expectations of high-end leisure and business travellers in relation to beer, wine and spirits, and the way that this affects their impressions of a place.
Forget the fact that Singapore is a virtual dictatorship and that Myanmar is a police state that brutally suppresses its citizens with arms traded through Singapore’s ports.
I mentioned wine prices in Burma because it seems so unlikely, so absurd, and yet true, that wine is sold far cheaper there than it is in Bali. I mentioned Singapore, because I read about a carefully-thought-out policy there for promoting enology to add value to the Singapore experience, and to the cultural sophistication of its people. Interesting, I thought. Tax on wine is high in Singapore, but not ridiculous. Revenues gained from these taxes are significant.
Their reasoning was that if people appreciated better wines, and saw value in paying for them, these tax revenues would increase, even without an increase in wine importation or consumption. And if people spend more of their money on highly taxed goods (like wine), rather than lower-taxed goods (like movie tickets), a higher level of total taxation has been achieved, voluntarily, and everyone comes out slightly better off, or so the story goes. I found this subtle, unusual, and well-reasoned approach interesting.
In Susi Johnston’s world, Bali would be reserved as a destination for the so called “moneyed and educated elite”, “people who enjoy quality and expect to find food and beverages of a global standard readily available when they are on holiday” and be better off for it.
That's inaccurate. This would be more accurate:
"In Susi Johnston’s world, Bali could remain a preferred destination for the moneyed and educated elite, and for people who enjoy quality and expect to find food and beverages of a global standard readily available when they are on holiday, and might be better off for it."
If only the Balinese would stop being so lazy, corrupt, better educate themselves, build some decent hospitals and stop being so God damned primitive.
We should all avoid being lazy, or corrupt or ignorant, as a general rule, don't you think? I do. Or at least try not to be
too lazy,
too corrupt, or
too ignorant.