Weighing up the worth of ‘viral-based’ policy in Indonesia

The latest social media conversations in Indonesia have seen citizens lament high taxes for goods bought overseas. Previously, the customs office has also decided to restrict the amount of goods individuals can bring from overseas.

These events went viral and became hot topics on social media. People started calling the office “becuk” (a derogatory term indicating low performance).

Staff of Indonesia’s Minister of Finance, Prastowo Yustinus, then asked netizens (a term to describe social media users in Indonesia) on X/Twitter whether they offer feedback to make the current policy change work better, so as to accommodate their needs and concerns.

Following the feedback, the government decided to reverse its policy – namely, not to restrict the amount of goods brought by Indonesian citizens overseas.

Many in Indonesia are calling this “viral-based policy”, and the sentiment on X/Twitter seems to be : “If we don’t make noise about it, to make it viral, it won’t become a policy again.”

The underlying theories of viral-based policy

The term “viral-based policy” has been associated with negative connotations, with some thinking issues would only result in policy solutions when discussed intensively in the media and on social media.

However, it’s expected policymakers should know the issues from scientific research, and understand the evidence on “what works” best to solve the issue.

The lingering question on this is whether policymakers have the capacities to perceive and understand evidence correctly and further implement it in a real policy setting?

Published research has noted the limitation of policymakers in recognising the policy agenda and the regular use of heuristics, or shortcuts, to identify, assess and evaluate the significance of a particular problem, and whether it requires policy intervention.

For instance, in the seminal work Agenda Setting in Public Policy (2007), the author suggests policy actors can frame issues for the purposes of asserting their agenda into the policymaking process.

This suggests policymakers need to make the issue become prominent and catch public attention, while competing with other issues, to enter into policy agenda and to issue policy towards it.

Advocacy Coalition Framework (ACF) theory also recognises the role of coalitions or groups of people in disseminating their shared belief into the policy system to ensure the problem gets noticed and enters into the policy arena.

This theory suggests policies can spread to the government in various ways rather than systematic application of the scientific evidence that address problems and solutions in a linear manner.

We argue that the term “viral-based policy” fits into the realistic thinking of policymaking process, where the application of scientific reports and evidence may not necessarily be the predetermining factors influencing the production of policy instruments.

Ideas from citizens through advocacy and public campaigning may serve as the “shared idea or belief’’ in civil society that provides values for the policymaking processes.

Is it wrong to base policy on the virality of an issue?

While not ideal, this type of policymaking approach is highly viable. When an issue goes viral, it can detect the “mismatch” between the policy goals and policy ends that can cause the policy to become ill-designed.

Policy-learning through inputs and feedback from citizens is also considered another way of public policymaking, which is also marked and enabled by the growth of social media activities.

Policy scholars have also noted that new information flowing from citizens and non-state actors is considered influential for policy reforms or change to the existing form.

This networked governance structure allows for short-term participatory policymaking processes involving numerous stakeholders.

While it’s not considered “meaningful”, the short term could also offer valuable insights, as it often involves the process of gaining inputs in an intense environment.

This happens because the policymakers themselves have asked for such inputs, and provides us with the window of opportunity to insert our evidence and information.

Read more: Young Indonesian voters care about climate change. The politicians don’t

According to Kingdon (1982), on the Multiple Streams Framework, the merging of policy (the need for new instruments), politics (the policymakers’ change of attitudes such as willingness to hear inputs) and the problem (the restriction on the amount of goods) provides the momentum for the policymakers to pursue policy reforms – which can also mean they revert to the status quo/previous policy.

However, the ideal situation might involve emphasising the window for momentum for a more meaningful and robust process of citizen participation that a sound policy requires. The more deliberate and meaningful the participation, the more likely that inputs given are more significant for a more better policy design.

There are risks involved in the prompt, brief opening of the window for the non-state actors (or citizens) to give their inputs.

It only gives a tiny spot for evaluating the policy implementation, which could have been given a longer period to ensure that more, better evidence emerges for post-evaluation policy implementation.

With such a rushed process, it’s understandable that citizens become angry and the government experiences a backlash.

Should this practice be continued?

Indonesia’s policymaking arena, in terms of law-making mechanisms, follows a cyclical, rational, staged linear process, starting from the agenda-setting process, creation of academic reports justifying the urgency of the issue requiring interventions, right through the evaluation of policy options.

The messiness of going back and forth has been captured by 2018 research, in which agenda-setting processes can also happen in the middle stage.

Previous studies indicate that a linear, staged process has hardly ever been achieved in Indonesia’s policymaking processes.

But at the same time, there’s a growing number of actors in policy, such as knowledge brokers bridging evidence and policy, and connecting different stakeholders to gain perspectives signalling the urgency of the issue.

Virality could mean that it’s an urgent issue that needs policymakers’ attention for change and reforms, and thus the practice of making an issue viral, while not ideal, can still hold value.

In that sense, such value should be translated into an opportunity for public engagement to reshape the policy. Thus, engagement might bring more value while taking place in a regular, honest, and consistent way throughout the policy cycle.

The act of making room for engagement in the digital space where the netizens actively contribute their voices in policymaking could continue to be seen as creative, whereas the policymakers gain public support for political purposes.

The controversy, nonetheless, if not managed as part of the engagement strategy with well-planned corrective action, could damage the government’s credibility and the legitimacy of the prevailing policy, therefore undermining its value for the public it impacts. (See introduction of the book).

Therefore, as far as the legitimacy of the policy is concerned, it should be noted that policymakers still hold the roles of sensing, assessing and identifying policy problems and corresponding policy solutions that are evidence-based.

This analytical capacity is what is missing in this process, and thus virality becomes a habitual practice.

We therefore argue that while virality holds values, state actors still hold responsibility for sensing and understanding the inherent problems, and recognising the urgency to address it through differing policy capacities.

This article was co-authored by Anne Aprina Priskila, a Master of Public Policy and Management candidate at Monash University, Indonesia.