(Yogyakarta case)ª

By Laila Kholid Alfirdaus

Introduction

Many people are aware of the impacts of disaster, but focuses are mostly on physical destruction, i. e. government offices, economic and health infrastructure, as well as school buildings. Yet, there is a need for reconstructing social aspect, since disaster has potential in destroying social cohesion. It is partly because people are competing for aid to survive and to rebuild their shelters. Dealing with the disaster case in Yogyakarta, the Yogyakarta’s government efforts to involve people in the grass root level through the formation of Pokmas (Kelompok Masyarakat) in aid distribution mechanism, of course, should be appreciated.  However, some deficits are found in some villages, i. e. in Sleman and Bantul.

The destruction of social cohesion does not always appear in the physical battle. It sometimes appears in the feelings of being treated unequally, discriminated, or disengaged. This elicits the decrease of trust amongst members of society, local elites, and local government, causing the weakening of social capital. Therefore, there is a need for a deep thinking of designing the post-disaster reconstruction management that would restore, maintain or rebuild social capital. The significance is clear that social capital would become the substantial basis of socio-economic reconstruction, since it keeps people to cooperate, support people for building network and trustworthiness, as well as being inclusive.

Theoretical framework toward social capital and adversity in the crisis/disaster

Coleman and Putnam have different views in analysing the relations between crisis, disaster, adversity, government’s assistance and social capital. The main difference is toward the government’s involvement in handling reconstruction in post-disaster situation. Although Brouwer and Nhassengo argue that Coleman and Putnam are too exaggerated in individualism for eliminating the analysis of social structure, i. e. class and gender, their views are useful for analyzing the relations between adversity, aid, the government’s assistance, and social capital. Brouwer and Nhassengo, however, contribute much in deeper social context analysis, as well as in setting up the alternative of disaster reconstruction. 

Coleman argues that the presence of government in the crisis would only decrease the social capital, since it would weaken the solidarity amongst the community members. He believes that individual and community with their resources would be able to ‘get things done’ easily and cheaply (Coleman, in Chamlee-Wright, 2006, p. 7). The reliance on the government would not result in a more effective resolution of crisis in the post-disaster context since it would only crowd out the community’s cohesiveness. For him, adversity would restore the social capital, as community members would be encouraged to help each other, i. e. providing foods, security, and health treatment. Therefore, the need for non-government institutions is asserted.

Chamlee-Wright is in line with Coleman in terms of the disagreement toward government’s involvement in coping with adversity of which in this case is caused by disasters. Yet, there is a slight difference in the design of post-disaster reconstruction. If Coleman emphasizes the role of community, Chamlee-Wright asserts the role of private sector. Her argument mainly is based on the Katrina risk management experience in New Orleans, USA. Her first idea is that the government should resist the calls of imposing order in handling disasters, otherwise there should be a decentralised process of community, economic, and philanthropic discovery. Government’s order would only strip civil society’s ability to adjust quickly to the local needs, which would be unlikely to create a more effective long-term response (2006, p. 32). Government should avoid disaster response and recovery initiatives that distort or drown out signals emerging from local communities (p. 33).

However, for some people, the role of government in the crisis rectification cannot be undermined.  Amongst them are Furukawa and Putnam. Furukawa argues that crisis management is not private sector management (2000, p. 5), but a function of political authority. This is mainly because, crisis as policy agenda needs much stronger authority of the state to tackle, due to the time and resources limit, as well as higher social demand and pressure, than other policy in a business-as-usual situation.

In addition, Putnam argues that the assertion of the government’s involvement is still crucial, thus, we cannot rely solely on private institutions as Chamlee-Wright argues. Both state and civil society in any situation is seamless. For him, autonomous civil society is precondition for economic development as well as effective government, and social capital is embodied in norms and networks of civic engagement (cited in Jalali, 2002, p. 122). While civic engagement, which is based on social capital, provides support for good governance creation, government’s social policy is set to serve public in order to facilitate the improvement of social capital. Thus, the synergy between the two is asserted.  

However, there is prerequisite for involving government’s role in disaster reconstruction. As Woolcock and Narayan argue, that ‘the very social capacity of social groups to act in their collective interest depends on the quality of the formal institutions under which they reside’ (2000, p. 234). Thus, the ability of the government to organise their resources is necessary to build robust cooperation with donors, NGOS, and other private institution, as well as partnership with community. Hence, the key is the effective governance, consists of ability to build network on the one hand, and ability to regulate the institutions involved within, on the other hand. The public-non profit partnership is explained by the moving forward of management style in the organizations toward a more horizontal one, that is where the leadership is shared and decisions are often made on the basis of competencies (Kapucu, 2006, p. 206), with the existence of social exchange of commitment knowledge, skills, and emotions .

Post-disaster management and its influence on social capital in Yogyakarta

            This section describes how the level of social capital is changing from the first phase of post disaster, when the policy of Pokmas formation had not been exerted, and the second phase, when the government published the policy of Pokmas formation as its main aspect of construction management. The first phase illuminates the great level of bonding and bridging social capital amongst neighbours and outsiders. It is when the government had not exerted its reconstruction policy, yet. The second phase, which is seen since the Pokmas formation, describes the time when level of social capital was stable on the one hand, but also decreasing due to the problem of aid distribution, on the other hand.          When disaster attacked Yogyakarta on May 27, 2006, the social institution showed the portrait of highly integrated society in which people helped each other. They conducted self-coordination to distribute jobs amongst them in order to be able to survive. Social jobs were divided amongst themselves into groups, male and female, who were responsible for food supply, protecting security, taking care of the ill-persons and infants, and clean the mess of ruined buildings. The culture of “gotong royong” or working together, as the soul of Yogyakarta social culture and structure, was very apparent, illuminating the functioning of social capital in adversity.

            The phenomenon of people helping each other in the early phases of post disaster is not only bonding, but also bridging. It is because, besides helping their own neighbours, people were also helping the others, did not regard who and where they were from. Bridging ties were also shown in the high participation of people outside destroyed areas in helping the victims voluntarily –unpaid. People from outside Yogyakarta, like Magelang, Purworejo, and Kebumen mobilised themselves to supply the needs of the victims as providing staple food, health treatment, shelters (tents), medicine, and so forth. This shows us how adversity contributes to the strengthening of social capital, as people are encouraged to survive by helping each other.

            The very different portrait is found in the second phase of recovery, since the government issued the policy of Pokmas formation, or Kelompok Masyarakat. Pokmas is a social group, consists of 8-15 earthquake victims, of the purpose is to enable them organize the shelter recovery process. Thus, it is like a small organization where they have to decide their leader that would organize the aid, conducting the reconstruction, and gathering aid report.

 On the one hand, there is positive outcome of the Pokmas formation policy, that is on the strengthening the culture of consensus – democracy. People have to trust each other in order to build a well coordinated group. This could strengthen bonding social capital; it is a feeling of solidarity and sense of belonging amongst one another in a group. In a village in Bantul, for example, people were satisfied with their Pokmas. People, through consensus amongst them, create a community’s saving for community’s future necessities. The saving money would be used for the common purpose once the government stops their aid. Another case is in a village in Sleman. People, who gained aid in the first period because of being categorised as severely damaged, leaved some amount of money in order to be distributed for the others who were categorised as moderately and lowly damaged. The consensus is based on consideration that there is no guarantee that people whose houses are categorised as moderately and lowly damaged would gain the aid in the second and third period, thus, it is better to anticipate by allocating some amount of money for the others.

On the other hand, some drawbacks still can be found. Although the policy seems to provide a more participatory reconstruction process, some people feel that the mechanism elicits the decrease of “gotong royong” culture. An interview with people in a village in Bantul tells us that before they are grouped into Pokmas, they help each other without regarding the origins of the people. Self-coordination worked properly and people helped each other voluntarily. However, something different occurred as the people were differentiated into the groups, causing them only prioritised the needs of their own group. Thus, Pokmas formation is seen to strengthen bonding social capital but decrease the level of bridging social capital. People started to think their own selves, interests and groups.

In addition, problem also arises amongst the Pokmas members themselves due to the differentiation of aid distribution period into the first, second, and third. This triggers unhappy feelings for people who are not prioritised or not in the first queue, although the aid distribution regulation has clearly stated the criteria of prioritising people. The example is in a village in Bantul where the level of damage is almost the same for all victims. People in the second and third period worried about the certainty of the time the aid they were going to receive.  This makes the task of the Pokmas leader becomes more difficult since the suspicion of subjectivity is difficult to avoid. 

Further, a problem also can be found in a village in Sleman where people were dissatisfied with the local elites who were responsible in categorizing the level of the damage for each victim. They felt that the local elites were selective by prioritising the members who are in the same bonding ties, but left the others behind, creating the feelings of being disengaged. This causes the decrease of respect to the elite, and, thus, triggers the downsizing of trust. The problem becomes more severe when the aid discrepancy was rising, committed by some local elites, causing the social turmoil amongst the people in the village like in some villages in Bantul and Sleman.

In addition, Pokmas responsibility of arranging aid report, describing the use of money and the compatibility of the rebuilding process with the government reconstruction standard, has caused contra productive outcomes. Although the main purpose of the policy is for encouraging accountability, the policy is seen to be too strict and indicating the low level of trust of the government to the people. For people, it is seen as lack flexibility and disgusting, moreover, it is accompanied by the threat of sanction should the people do not able to fulfil the criteria. This policy forced the Pokmas leader being in a hard position, that is between fulfilling the government inquiry but is very difficult, or accommodating their members’ wants but is contradicting with the government’s want.

Such problems illuminate how the policy creates contradiction. On the one hand, it could strengthen the level of social capital through people consensus; on the other hand, it creates complicated problems of trust amongst people within, people within and without, people and local elites, the government to the people, and the people to the government. In addition, although the aid distribution period has finished, such drawbacks seem not to finish immediately, triggering the pessimism of returning the social cohesion into its original as before the earthquake. This is what people very worry about, and needs a deep thinking of the resolution.

The need for maintaining social capital in the post disaster society

Having reviewed the experience, it is clear that the thinking for maintaining and reconstructing social capital is crucial. Although many people criticize the policy of Pokmas formation as decreasing the level of social capital, the role of the government is still needed in resolution. It is because, as Putnam views, the process still needs a formal authority to regulate. Thus, Chamlee-Wright’s argument of decreasing government’s role and rely mostly the reconstruction on the entrepreneurs does not match with the Indonesian context. Beside because the scheme of private involvement in disaster management has not been well established, experience in Aceh and Central Java Province tells us that it needs longer time to undergo. The only thing has to be considered is to empower government’s role in order to be effective with strong linking to grass-root and civil society.

Jalali idea is useful since she clearly figures out the synergy role of government, NGO, media, and civil society in disaster reconstruction in Turkey. This can be an inspiration for us in Yogyakarta to set up the policy design. Her argument is in line with Woolcock and Narayan who describe the four approaches of development and social capital: communitarian, network, institutionalism, and synergy (2000, p. 228-239). Synergy combines network and institutionalism (p. 235), in which, in development policy and maintaining social capital, a need for synergy between state (government), civil society, market, and other actors are crucial, and thus becomes the best alternative. Synergy approach considers the balance role of formal and informal institution and across gender. It is not only about the presence of the government, civil society, media, market, and grass-root in the field of policy, but, more substantively, building and maintaining their interrelation and interconnection of each other through cooperation and control. Therefore, the presence of various institutions is not enough unless the link and effective cooperation exist between them.

Experience in Turkey, as Jalali asserts, is good as an example. Since in the first phase of post disaster the government’s response seemed to be not effective, media and NGOs exerted the strong lobby, negotiation, and pressure. NGOs and media action was successful, therefore, in the second phase; the government tried to improve their policy and became more responsive in taking appropriate resolution. Thus, it is clear that in Turkey, the government’s role is crucial. Although there are problems of lacking capacity and resources in government institution, non government’s pressure has successfully forced the efforts of empowering government’s capacity through spreading information and need assessment.

Regarding to the Indonesian context, one of crucial things for empowering government’s institution is by converting the mindset of how to look and look after disaster in public policy from treating the disaster as crisis-driven agenda setting, where the pressure of time and emergency needs become the main consideration, into disaster as business-as-usual. The consequence of the conversion is indeed on the government budget, government institution and management. Thus, as Putnamian, government still has large proportion in recovery process, but, requires a deep thinking of strengthening institutional capability and ability of contextualizing the policy with local wisdom to avoid the decrease of social capital due to inappropriate approach, i. e. aid competition.

The well established government institution would enable actors and institutions other than government like NGOs, media, local elites and community to cooperate. NGOs activities are useful for assessing people’s needs, as well as encouraging government’s accountability, imposing control and monitoring, and distributing aid. Whilst, media could act for up dating information toward the number of the victims, the areas suffer from the disaster, and the reporting of discrepancy. There is also need for empowering local elites. Their position is crucial since they are accountable for the strategic position between community and partners (Pelling, ,1998, p. 474) like NGOs, government, researchers, and funding. As the representative of local people, local elites should be able to promote public interests and concerns (p. 483). Finally, empowering community’s organisation like improving their inclusion in participatory decision-making, including women and youth, is unavoidable to gain the more comprehensive design of reconstruction.

The synergic role amongst them would enable social capital to survive although people are in an emergency situation where they usually tend to be selfish. Social capital in disaster situation is based on neighbourhood, friendship, and kinship, which offers local supports to community members (Brouwer and Nhassengo, 2006, p. 251). By understanding some of the strategies the private citizens use to overcome the collective action, policy makers would be able to design disaster response and recovery policy that would not unduly hinder society’s ability to respond to catastrophic disasters (Chamlee-Wright, 2006, p. 3). The social capital regrouping is manifested in mutual assistance; charitable action, social-commercial cooperation, and redeveloping a key resource to ease the transition back (p. 7). Mutual assistance not only for people amongst the community, but even for assisting the unknown ones, as in Vietnamese-Americans in New Orleans East after Katrina (p. 8) as an effective efforts of maintaining and building bridging social capital. Charitable action by private philanthropic and religious organizations is as important as the synergy policy design since the government’s resources are limited and cannot do it all (p.9).

Although the government’s involvement in disaster recovery is crucial, there are still some potential drawbacks that should be considered (Freeman, 433-436). First, the capture of government funding by the elite, elicits the inability of government to target assistance specifically to the poor. Second, the moral hazard of changing behaviour so that those exposed to risk do not implement proper self-help measures. Thus, it is difficult for the government to reduce assistance even if those affected failed to take appropriate action. This is particularly in the middle class-housing where they lack incentive to incur their own costs to reduce their risk due to the government assistance (Samaritan Dilemma). Third, ad hoc budgetary allocation, in which the reserve funds for housing reconstruction purposes are not included in the standard budgetary process (Kreimer, in Freeman, p. 434).

            To avoid the discrepancy, a need for collaborative and adversarial state-civil society is unavoidable (Jalali, 2002, p. 120) with the well established institution. Trust by government to the people is as important as trust by people to the government. Decreasing complex bureaucratic procedure, changing it into the more effective one, is one of the alternatives, accompanied by NGOs and media roles of scrutinizing, need assessment, information dissemination, and advocacy. All of these interrelations reflect the synergy of reconstruction and social capital maintenance.

Conclusion

            Although the Pokmas formation as the core solution for community-based recovery policy is widely criticized for creating self-interest group –strengthening bonding social capital but weakening bridging social capital-, the government’s role in recovery is still needed. Relating to this, Putnam and Woolcock’s view about good governance and synergy approach in development and building social capital is useful. Dealing with the government, the only thing needed is to empower government’s role by improving its institutional capability. Converting mindset of looking disaster as crisis-driven agenda setting in public policy into business-as-usual with consequence in budget, institution and government management could be one of the alternatives.

To maintain social capital, synergy is the best way as it tries to balance the role between government, media, NGOs, and civil society, with strong emphasis on interrelation and interconnection through cooperation and monitoring. Of course, the consequence is the obligation to change the mindset of zero-sum-game amongst them into the positive-sum-game. Actors outside the government, thus, could be used as partners. The things that cannot be left in designing the recovery is contextualising the policy with local wisdom, as well as balancing the role of formal and informal institution and across gender. This is to avoid the contradiction between the policy and local tradition.

Acknowledgement

The author thanks to research staffs in RIVER – Research Institute for Governance, Yogyakarta. Special thanks are for Rudi Apriyanto, Dedi Maradona Sihombing and Dhanang Arief Sasmarta who have provided a deep discussion with the author toward the findings in the fieldwork. Many thanks are people who have enabled the author in gathering the data; the interviewees, the community members in the fieldwork areas, and everybody who the author can’t mention one by one.

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