Political parties play a prominent role throughout the entire constitutional reform process, from the preparatory stage to the implementation phase. Political parties can also significantly contribute to safeguarding the public interests of constitutional reform processes.
Values that encourage political parties’ participation in constitutional reform processes to safeguard the public interest include:
• Inclusivity of the main political and social voices, including minority groups
• Tolerance for divergent viewpoints and interests
• Transparency of the reform process
• Participation of citizens (information, consultation and representation)
• Consensus building with other stakeholders involved.
While issues related to constitutional reform have not featured prominently in internal party activities, political parties have collectively played a very influential and constructive role.
The three principal beneficial contributions of these interparty dialogue platforms to sensitive constitutional reform processes are:
• Enhancing personal relations and building trust between political actors
• Enhancing political consensus in preparation for reform processes
• Enhancing consensus building on contentious content issues.
Personal Bonding and Trust-building Amongst Political Actors
Elaborating a new constitution or revising an existing one is a delicate and sensitive process. The way power is formally distributed in a society is often subject to change. Constructive relations amongst political party representatives, though not often emphasized, are crucially important for enabling inter-party negotiations and driving reforms.
When major national reform initiatives are based points that all parties have reached consensus on, less likely to be revisited and fundamentally changed after an election or change of power.
This is not to say that these initiatives should not be questioned, debated and endorsed by the wider society (as their democratic legitimacy is crucial) but rather that a minimum level of consensus among parties can contribute in a positive way to policy consistency and predictability. In practical terms, political parties can use their dialogue to develop a joint agenda for political reform.
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Case Study: Indonesia Public demonstrations in Indonesia in 1998 calling for democracy led to the army’s removal of the long-serving President Suharto and the introduction of reforms. These were aimed at reforming the democratic institutional framework to facilitate free elections in 1999, but did not manifest huge ideological disparities at this stage. The pressure for elections soon overshadowed calls for constitutional reforms, with most of the political parties taking part in the elections calling for substantive constitutional change only after they had been held. Once concluded, the custodian of the process of constitutional reform became the newly elected Parliament (MPR). In 1999, a general session of the MPR agreed to undertake constitutional reforms based on consensus and negotiations between the parliamentary parties. The scope of reform was agreed as amending the 1945 Constitutions, which was venerated as an historic document, rather than making a new one from scratch. A parliamentary committee (Panitia Ad Hoc 1 or PAH1) reflecting the composition and political balance in the MPR was mandated to handle constitutional reform. This committee immediately reaffirmed the constitutional principles of the 1945 Constitution, among them the integrationist Pancasila principles and the retaining of the presidential system, although these were not further elaborated on at the time. In addition, it was decided that if no consensus were achieved on a proposal for amendment, the original text would continue to apply. For instance, the controversial debate on the constitutional role of Islamic religion was resolved in this way when parties unable to muster support for legislation based on sharia law conceded the retention of the original text (which in any case was more open ended and could be presented as a win-win outcome). The parliamentary committee held its almost weekly sessions in public and also consulted public opinion via hearings in Jakarta and the provinces. Its work was, however, overshadowed by the euphoria of the time and the onset of campaigning in the presidential elections. In July 2000, the parliamentary committee presented its comprehensive reforms outlining agreed proposals to amend the 1945 Constitution and, in some cases, proposing alternatives if no consensus was reached. The MPR opened new negotiations on the report. Among its membership, supporters of the old order (including conservative military representatives) argued that the proposals went too far. As the spirit of compromise in the parliamentary committee begun to break down, the MPR lacked the procedures required to enable deeper discussion and compromise building, while some members were too new and inadequately informed to discuss the complex report. In reality, only about a third of the proposals in the committee’s report were discussed. Complicating the internal disagreement within the MPR, other interest groups concerned with constitutional reforms, including elites not represented in the MPR, started to attack its credibility as the sole organ of review. By 2002, the MPR had been able to resolve a number of issues, although not without controversy. Issues resolved included the question of decentralization; the inclusion of human rights; the status of the DPR as an elected body; ending legislative representation of the police and the military; and trimming some of the powers of the Executive. These resolutions were only possible because a tactical deal between the parliamentary committee and the two leading parties in the MPR facilitated the emergence of leadership in the executive that would endorse a final amendment package in the face of the absence of full consensus on the amendments. The deal itself was only possible because it went largely unnoticed in the contexts of the upheavals that occurred within the executive for a large part of 2001. Source: Constitutional Reform Processes and Political Parties: Principles for Practice |