Struggling with Power

KOMPAS/ ANTONY LEE

Arief Budiman

Arief Budiman, as far as I know, ever since his student years in the 1970s dealt with social protests in any field that could be categorized as social affairs.

Even when he was no longer a student, he was always involved with the student movement in matters of corruption, in protests against the killing of students in Bandung (1971), against the construction of Taman Mini Indonesia (1973) and agains the demolition of a village for the construction of the Kedung Ombo dam (1985). After returning from his studies at Harvard, he was involved again in a protest at the university where he worked and taught until he had to choose to leave the university and move to universities outside the country.

Who exactly was Arief Budiman? This question is widely discussed in the community, especially the younger generation that is certainly "confused" as to why the older people are making so much noise about this "one person". All this has stimulated the writer of this text to study the role of Arief Budiman in the Indonesian nation and political society.

The political man

Of course, it is not easy to write about Arief Budiman in one article to discuss the complex personality, not as simple as always physically described. This includes various paradoxes inherent in his personality, as a human being, an art creature, a man of literature and a scientist, specifically, a sociologist.

Picking up the body of his younger brother, Soe Hok Gie, at the foot of Mount Semeru was an extraordinary experience that reminded Arief about Gie, who had complained to him: "What\'s the purpose of everything I do? As more enemies appear ... my criticism does not change the condition. ... so what exactly am I doing?" These memories were increasingly tense when he was faced with the pale yellow body of his brother, who forced him to say in his heart: "Surely it is quiet and cold to be wrapped in that plastic".

Everyone expressed loneliness, being alone, the lonesomeness of a scholar\'s life, Verlassenheitsgefühl, the feeling of being abandoned by the Heideggerian version, the feeling of being useless; and that feeling of "affecting my life," Arief said.

Also read : Arief Budiman, Activism and Public Discourse

Kompas

Photo of Arief Budiman (bottom left) and the founders of another Horizon literary magazine displayed when the writer Taufik Ismail explained the history of the Horizon\'s founding up to the age of 50 during the 50-year Horizon celebration in Jakarta, Tuesday (26/7/2016)

However, when there was a stopover in Malang to bathe the body, a friend asked him whether Arief had any family in Malang. Arief said no, but he was puzzled at the question. His friend said that, when ordering the coffin, the seller asked who the coffin was for: "... I answered, for Soe Hok Gie." The coffin seller was startled and cried and only said: "He was a brave man. It is unfortunate that he died. "

When stopping off in Yogyakarta, the pilot sitting with Arief asked whether the body he flew was really that of Soe Hok Gie? The answer was, yes. The pilot said: "I know his name, I like to read his articles. How unfortunate that he died. He might have been able to do more if had lived on.”

Hence, two unexpected things happened on one trip. The feeling of coldness, loneliness and abandonment suddenly turned into a sense of connectedness, Verbundenheitsgefühl, that intellectual work in the form of writings, books, articles, sermons, speeches, etc. turned out to have "its own mouth, feet and hands", that was able to proclaim itself, defended itself and stop wherever it wanted. With this, the work connects the unconnected between the intellectual, the coffin man, and the airplane pilot.

Also read : The Last Station for the Maestro

The second, connecting two different social classes in two different places -- a proletarian coffin man, and one of the middle class, namely an Air Force. With that Arief said, he got an answer that the intellectual work was not useless, and for that he was ready. With this too did Arief\'s intellectual life begin to unfold, because for years earlier, since the Guided Democracy era Soe Hok Djin had been in this realm, which was inevitable from relations and collisions with the power. However, this experience was a strong trigger, and a great motivation for further activities.

Challenging psychology

Kompas

A book about Arief Budiman by KH Mustofa Bisri

Unlike Soe Hok Gie, Arief did not work in silence. In relation to public life at one time, indeed Arief became a linchpin, an axle, a shaft for the turning of a wheel, between Jakarta and us in Yogyakarta. Because Arief was present both as a good auctor intellectualis of many student movements, if not a demonstrator himself, movements originating from Jakarta were always or often associated with him as a mobilizer. What happened in Jakarta very often would be echoed in Yogya.

Therefore, Yogya, in the New Order era, occupied a special position for its students -- in the sense of being in the middle between "arrogance" as the center of the Mataram Kingdom, the capital of the republic during the revolutionary period, Gadjah Mada University as the university of the Indonesian revolution, and minderwaardigheidsgevoel, the feeling of inferiority, which was further struck down by minderwaardigheids complex, the mental illness of inferiority complex, as students of the "village".

In such a situation, I and a group of "independent" students, namely those who did not bind themselves too tightly with big extra-universal organizations, such as the National Indonesian Students Movement (GMNI), the Association of Islamic Students (HMI), the Indonesian Christian Students Movement (GMKI) or the Association of Catholic Students (PMKRI), felt attached to Arief.

Also read : Politics Without Empathy

There are three main reasons for making the connection possible. First, by leaning on independence, Arief never relied on political power, the massa actie of Bung Karno\'s version, because he did not have the masses. Second, because he had no masses, every movement against the New Order was categorized as a "moral movement", which Arief maintained with great consequence, although as time went by, the terminology left many questions, both theoretical and practical, such as whether it was not solely due to helplessness, that would exceed the scope of this article.

Third, because of being categorically defined as a "moral movement", the strength lay in the linkage, spatial continuity, Jakarta-Bandung, Jakarta-Yogya or Bandung-Yogya and so on, with Jakarta or Bandung exchanging places for these linchpins. Therefore, student movements against the New Order rarely took place without Arief.

Eternal Golput?

Kompas

ilust

There were many movements, too many to mention here, but among the many, the following is very much imprinted in the writer’s mind, both for the movement itself and for the intellectual-academic life, and professional work long thereafter. The movement on general elections is the most phenomenal and, in a sense, so paradoxical that its echo still sounds today.

Phenomenal, because it "collided" with the political core of the New Order regime, namely politics without politics, which in practical translation means politics without permission to engage in politics. Political observer Bill Liddle formulated well that the decision to run the first general election was a decision with a fundamental antiparty spirit, "the fundamentally antiparty motivation" behind it. It was paradoxical, because the moral movement was truly political in any sense and had political power in its true meaning. Possibly it was also not because the movements were so strong but because they were dealing with regimes that had an absolute compulsion for rust en-orde, calmness and order, so that the slightest ripple became a nuisance that had to be eradicated.

This paradox made the following movements phenomenal. In its turn, what was paradoxical became phenomenal, and vice versa. In May 1971, Arief et al. in Jakarta proclaimed the so-called "White Group", more recognized through the acronym Golput, which did not associate itself with any party by announcing the basis "...This group is not a political grouping but a cultural grouping in the sense that, what is to be upheld, is a cultural tradition of a healthy way of society”, with the aim of protecting the rights of those who want to vote, also protecting "the freedom not to vote".

This was also a strength, but its strength was located in the moral force. All movements that gathered in a cultural grouping, with moral strength, were met with a heavy political response in the form of arrests, detention by the police and military, including Arief himself, who was detained by Laksusda, the regional special executive.

For most of his life, from adulthood to old age, Arief never escaped fighting with power of all kinds, almost a Foucaultian experience in the sense that the element of power was everywhere in all social fields and social hierarchy, so that the power in one way or another contacted, shifted and crashed into Arief.

I try to bring one side to the surface, although it is also impossible for a short essay based on rudimentary observation to be able to formulate something that is not only incomplete and unsatisfactory but could be wrong. To close this impossible effort, it can be said that, as a human, he was primarily a political man, who always questioned the power.

The changes brought about by digital technology enable "decentralization" and the multiplication of the number of such figures, known and unknown to the public. Digital technology that allows unlimited access to space and time allows a variety of groups on Facebook, WhatsApp, Instagram, Twitter, etc., where the scientific community is formed, developed and gives birth to many characters with roles like that of Arief.

Kompas

Daniel Dhakidae

However, no matter how reliable the technology, the man behind the gun like Arief remains difficult to replace, not only because of his greatness, which can be matched by younger generations, but because of his commitment, ethos and ethics in the field of selfless scholarship. For his generation and era, and for the two or three generations below him, Arief\'s role is almost irreplaceable. He was the inspiration for those who loved and hated him. There, Arief Budiman appeared as an activist who never calmed down until death picked him up more than 40 days ago to the eternal calm.

Daniel Dhakidae, General Head and Editor-in-Chief of Prisma, Jakarta.