DEVELOPMENT PROGRAMME, CULTURAL INTERPRETATIONS, AND SUCCESSFUL IMPLEMENTATION

DEVELOPMENT PROGRAMME, CULTURAL INTERPRETATIONS, AND SUCCESSFUL IMPLEMENTATION*)

PARSUDI SUPARLAN

UNIVERSITAS INDONESIA

INTRODUCTION

Development programmes are basically implemented through socio-economic projects. They are government programmes for improving the welfare and the quality of life of its people, by focusing on efforts to change the patterns of economic life, i.e., by increasing economic surplus and generating capital. Thus, such programmes change the ways of life or the culture of the people. Such an approach sees culture as a blueprint for life or as sets of reference systems for interpretations and actions. Culture is treated as holistic or systematic, i.e., changes in economic life may only be possible if there are sufficient changes in economic culture (as the blueprint for economic activities). This may only be possible if such changes cause changes in other cultural elements which, in turn, support the changes in the economic culture.

The problem facing Indonesia is that it is a plural society, and at the village level there are numerous economic and cultural patterns and levels. At the village level this refers to variations in ethnic cultural but also to historical and ecological variations. At one extreme of the continuum some villages are urbanized while at the other extreme some are isolated and 'backward'. People at the village level respond in varying ways to government programmes as each use their own culture as a distinct reference system. Thus, although development programmes are uniform and unitary at the national level, their implementation at the village level varies depending on the local ethnic cultural patterns and ecological systems. So, a particular programme may be well-received by some rural communities, partially by others, while still others refuse to accept it or to use it to change their existing cultural patterns. Reception of and responses to development programmes thus varies from one culture to another.

This paper tries to show that socio-economic development projects may be successfully implemented and attained by seriously taking account of the cultural factors of the local people, i.e., the culture of the people at the village level. Among the cultural factors which play a critical role in influencing the success of such projects are the cultural interpretations of the local people and their culture are seen as actively playing a role in understanding the meaning and impact of such projects.

The case presented is from Bali, i.e., how the rural Balinese adopt the idea of tourism as a socio-economic development project into an inseparable part of their culture and implement it into tourist services. Tourism has benefited the Balinese socially and economically, and it also generates the maintenance of the Balinese cultural traditions. The critical factor in the success of tourism in Bali is encouragement from the government by giving the Balinese certain amount of space to culturally interpret tourism and implement it accordingly. Thus, they are allowed to invent ways of transforming this socio-economic development project into their own cultural traditions so that its implementation institutionally, and especially morally and ethnically, makes sense for them.

Following Hobsbauwn (1983), such invention of the Balinese culture tradition is seen as a way to mediate between the local ethnic culture and the 'foreign' socio-economic development project. In such an approach, Goffman's classic model of 'front stage' vs. 'back stage' (1959) is also relevant and will be used to explain the nature of cultural interpretation and their expression as invented traditions. Local culture can thus interpret changes in the local culture economy caused by socio-economic development project. Presentation of the Balinese case will be followed by a discussion of the importance of the local culture in influencing the successful implementation of any development programme.

THE BACKGROUND

Bali is one of twenty-seven Indonesian provinces. This province, compared to other Indonesian provinces, is relatively homogeneous, both ethnically and culturally. In this respect it is comparable only to Central Java province. The Balinese have a distinctive culture, very different from other Indonesian ethnic culture. It is a product of centuries of blends of Hindu and local religious traditions. The core value of this culture is Tri Hita Karana or a balanced of relationship among its three elements. These are: (1) to observe religious ritual practices; (2) to work the land and exploit the environment while taking care of them; and (3) to maintain good and healthy relationship with kin, neighbors, and with the community one lives within (Geriya 1985, 15-17).

In this culture the interdependency of constituent parts as an expression of the core cultural value is a way of life; and this is institutionalized in all forms of daily life activities. Any activity deviating from this prescribed rule is prevented and prohibited by members of the community based on Awig-awig or the written customary law of the village community. Any deviation from the spirit of Tri Hita Karana is considered ethically and morally wrong and religiously a sin. It is subject to punishment by the community, the temple, and the gods. The administration of Bali organized following the national bureaucratic system, i.e., each province is divided into district (kabupaten), each district into sub-district (kecamatan), and each sub-district into villages (desa). However, at a village level there is a typical Balinese administration of the rest of Indonesian villages. The Balinese village administration is divided into two parts, i.e., villages of government administration and villages of customary and religious administration. The first typed is called desa dinas (official village) and the second is desa adat (literally: customary village). The authority for administering villages affairs of the first type is above the second, in terms of power but not in administrative terms because desa adat is not formally organized under the administration of the desa dinas.

Under the administration of the desa dinas there are a number of banjar dinas (official hamlet); and under the 'administration' of desa adat are a number of banjar adat (customary hamlet). Customary village and customary hamlet are basically Balinese types of village administration under the Balinese princely kingdoms before Bali became part of the Republic of Indonesia. In anthropological literature Balinese villages are known as autonomous traditional communities (Liefrinck 1889, 233-242; Covarrubias 1988, Vollenhoven 1928). In spite of the fact that under Balinese kingdoms aristocracy was despotic, the village people had the power to bargain with the aristocracy through their autonomous communities and their internal communal organization known as 'village republic' (Liefrinck 1927, 281).

In this 'republic' type of Balinese village organization, presently known as desa adat and banjar adat, every village member is a free man, unservile and unsubmissive to authorities beyond his ties to his village communal organization and activities. Every village is organized into a compact board independent of the authority of other villages or kingdoms. Every village comprises several hamlet (banjar); and every members of the hamlets are members of the village boards as well as of the board of his hamlet. As a member of the board every man is morally and physically for the welfare of his community through co-operative work with his fellow villagers.
As board members their task is to observe the awig-awig or the traditional customary law created by their ancestors. If necessary they could make new rules and laws based on the already existing awig-awig to respond to new situations. Once every member of a village agreed upon the contents of the awig-awig they adhere to it strictly. Any deviation will be considered as wrong and subjects. Decisions as to whether an individual member's actions are wrong or within the scope of the law of the awig-awig are made by the board members. This traditional rule of awig-awig and the village board ship are still effective to present as village institutions.

Awig-awig is not only used to regulate communal life activities but also in other types of villages organization, such as irrigation organizations (subak) and voluntary organization or sekaha. Every member of such organizations has the same vote as the other members also has equal responsibility for the organization and the welfare of its members. Every man will be assisted by neighbors, members of his organizations, in everything related to the organization if he cannot do it by himself. Their help is a matter of duty without any reward other than acknowledgment that he would do the same when they needed help. In this way every member of a village community is morally and physically responsible for the welfare of the other members of the community. Deviating from this rule is wrong, and the hardest punishment is to be excluded from community activities. Anyone so punished loses the right to live in the community, including the abolishment of the right to be buried in the village graveyard and to have the ritual burial ceremony.

Development programmes go down vertically, from Jakarta to the provinces, from the province level to the districts, to sucb districts, and to official villages and further still to official hamlets. Such programmes are instructional and top-down in nature. But when it comes to the implementation of a programme which involves the village members, this programme has to be interpreted and accepted by village members as members of the customary village (desa adat) at the village level and as members of the customary hamlet (banjar adat) if such programme is to be carried out successfully (Geriya, 1988).

This mechanism of interpretation by the customary village and hamlet members is basically an expression of acknowledgement that an official village and hamlet are parts of a bureaucratic system designed to carry out government policy and development programmes from top to bottom. On the other hand the customary village and hamlet are parts of a system which is basically traditional and comprises the actual people who will carry out such top-down programmes.

Tourism As a Socio-Economic Development Project

Bali is famous for its natural beauty and for its artistic, cultural and religious traditions. Although its reputation as a tourist paradise dates back to pre-World war II, it was only in 1969 that the Indonesian government began to pay special attention to its economic potential for tourism. It was a wise decision as tourism is the second largest industry in the world. It is paid for in hard currencies, and, thus it will give a chance to acquire badly needed money for the Indonesia government to purchase modern technologies foe developing the country. Dollars and other hard currencies can be attained through tourism without incurring heavy foreign loans or debts.

The Indonesian government decided to open the country to international tourism, as stated in The First Five Year Plan or Repelita I (Department Penerangan R.I 1969, 168-180). A Master Plan was made in 1971, and by Presidential Decision in 1972, tourism was placed as top economic priority in Bali. Authorities of Balinese province in response to the Master Plan and The Presidential decision, proposed a formula of Cultural Tourism (Pariwisata Budaya). The term cultural tourism meant that Balinese cultural traditions were to be converted into tourist attractions and its promotion left to the local people. The critical point here is then, the response of The Balinese provincial authorities in formulating tourism as cultural traditions into tourist attractions. Equally important is the allocation of the promotion and selling of such attractions to the local people, i.e., members of the villages and hamlets.

Customary villages and hamlets play a central role in the involvement of local people in tourism as development. My informants say that during the seventies discussions on accepting tourism heated up due to fear of pollution and the distruction of religious and cultural tradition. The Balinese fear of tourism may have been felt intuitively from their past experience in dealing with tourists who came to their island. Indeed, there are reasonable grounds for their fears if we consider who the tourists are. Cohen (1974, 525-555), stated that tourists are those who engage in these activities: (1) voluntarily visiting another place for a certain period of time; (2) the reason for the visit is recreational activities; (3) recreational activities are to experience pleasure, something exotic or adventure-some; and (4) through these activities the tourists are freeing themselves form daily routines and boring mechanistic activities, to become new persons.

If we consider who the tourists are, or if we consider ourselves as tourists, the critical points are the need to obtain pleasure. Pleasure does not have an objective standard of definition or limitation. And if such pleasure, an individual and personal desire, is to be satisfied with something exotic or adventuresome, and the Balinese have to feed tourists with their cultural traditions to satisfy their desire, the problem they feel they will be facing will be a situation in which they have to let the tourists consume their sacred cultural traditions as plaything.

Another fear they had during the seventies was that tourists or more specifically Westerners, would bring their ways of life or their Western culture into their community and homes. Thus their cultural traditions would be disrupted by the Western cultures as brought to them by the tourists. This fear may have come out of not realizing that there are three types of tourism.

The first is nature tourism, in which the tourists enjoy the feeling of nature and adventures; the second is culture tourism, in which the tourists enjoy the exotic sphere of a culture through visit to recreational sites, historical buildings, art galleries, museums, and performances. In culture tourism the tourists demand a display of appropriate ethnic culture, a market of ethnic arts with some of these arts defined in terms of the tourists' taste, hotels, restaurants and bars, and other supporting facilities in Western modern cultural standards. These last facilities are a prerequisite for the tourists to come and to feel at home in their adventures in faraway lands. It is exactly as Boorstin said (Boorstin, 1975:77-114) about American tourists: "We expect everything to be relaxing, sanitary, and Americanized if we go to a faraway place". The third is ethnic tourism (Mac Cannel, 1976), in which the tourists are not only satisfied by tourist attractions offered by the travel and tourist bureaus as they see those attractions as superficial. They want to enjoy the exotic cultural sphere through experience, because what they want is the authenticity or originality of the native cultural traditions. They demand to be able to live with the natives in daily life activities.

This ethnic tourism may bring damage to the native cultural traditions as the tourists live in the natives' homes. With their money the tourists could ask whatever they want, to experience the exotic and the mysteries of the native cultural traditions.

But, wisdom came to their elders and leaders, according to these informants, who wanted to get money from the tourists by selling their revised and invented cultural traditions and arts. Thus, the tourists would believe that the cultural traditions and arts they see performed and buy are genuine, although in reality they are only invented traditions or pseudo-genuine ones (Bandem and de Boer, 1981: and Muka, 1980)

Traditional leaders in the hamlets are mostly from the ksatrya caste of the Balinese pseudo-caste system similar to the Indian caste system. Their position as leaders has been weakened since Indonesian independence, and their means of keeping themselves honorable is through formal education, formal position in the government administration or involvement in bussiness. Clifford Geertz noticed that in Tabanan, a town west of Denpasar, the capital city, there were several types of sekaha, voluntary organizations led by the ksatrya or members of the princely families, engaged in various business and trade activities (Geertz, 1973:106-120).

Activities for economic gain in Bali have never been done individually but always through a voluntary organization. Members of such organizations always include members of the family, immediate kin/relatives in the hamlet, and other members of the hamlet or even the hamlet (banjar) itself if an activity needs a large number of people. Leadership for such activities usually follows the waning traditional caste system (triwangsa) in which the ksatrya is generally the leader. But, a ksatrya without enough money cannot lead such an organization because relationship between the leader of a sekaha and its members is similar to a patron-client relationship.

Thus, in response to tourism as development and the demand for economically better living conditions, the upper class, i.e., the ksatrya in the village, take the initiative to organize members of the village into sekaha, and through this organize tourist attractions. Economic gain from selling the invented tradition and cultural things are shared among the members of the sekaha, with the banjar, and with the temples. Thus, the balance or orderly relationship between the individual and his community, his gods, and his natural environment (through the money contributed to banjar) are maintained.

Discussion

The institutional relationship between the local or provincial government and the national government can be seen as a power relationship. The same is also the case with relationship between the local government, as the bearer of national development policy, and the people at the local or village levels. This type of relationship is commonly known as top-down, with decision making in development policy coming from top, i.e., from the national government to the local or provincial government, and from the provincial government to the people at local or village levels.

In such a top-down model the government has the power to impose, through coercion and threat if necessary, a particular development policy upon its people. The people are just tools for attaining policy's ends and they are not really treated as humans.

What is critical about being human is culture, where a person's culture is identical with his being human. It is a share knowledge of the people, the community, and the society; functioning as a set of reference system or 'models for' (Geertz 1973a, 87-125) for interpreting and understanding situation and generating actions and behaviour. It not only generates actions and behaviour but at the same time control them. Without culture human needs would be fulfilled in a human way. When talking about being human most of us, the human of all races, refer to being morally and ethically refined or being civilised. But at the same time most of us also refer to being economically sufficient or advanced to fulfill the human needs for survival, honour and dignity.

The Balinese case of tourism deserves a special attention in view of the theme of this meeting on cultural factors in successful, socio-economic development projects. The first issue is the place of the cultural factors in socio-economic development projects. Socio-economic development projects deliberate and planed efforts by the government to improve the socio-economic living conditions of the people, more specifically their economic conditions. Improvement on socio-economic conditions is not necessarily seen as an improvement by the local people who should implement the program. The critical point in influencing and shaping the people's perception is their culture. People at the village or local level evaluate socio-economic development by using their culture. With feelings and emotions, along with rational economic calculations, they try to figure out what benefit they get if they leave their traditional socio- economic models for behaviour and replace them with new ones. Gain could be in terms of economy, social security or personal honour and respect. Their cultural interpretation leads to decision as to the inclusion of the socio-economic development project into their culture.

Thus, the second issue is the inclusion of the development programme in the local culture as one of the elements of the system of knowledge, i.e., as one of the models for interpreting the environment and generating motivation, actions, and behaviour for socio-economic gains. The problem of replacing one model or reference system for another new one is not that simple. It needs support and justification from other elements of the culture, especially from codes of morality and ethics and from social institutions. The people concerned have to rationalise and justify their decision when facing such a situation. The result could be one of the following: (1) to adopt the new 'models for' by rejecting the old one and thus to change the whole cultural system; (2) to adopt the new 'models for' with a certain amount of adjustment to the old traditional one of their culture; (3) to adjust both the 'new models for' and the existing traditional one so that changes are made both in the 'models for' as well as in other supporting cultural elements as a whole; and (4) to create new cultural traditions separate from the old traditional ones in order to be able to respond properly to the power structure of development as imposed by the government and to cope with problems arising out of gain from development programmes. The case of tourism in Bali is an example of this.

Cultural interpretation and the invention of tradition are not independent phenomena. They emerge out of interaction between the government and the people within the village level, and the patterns of Balinese culture, specifically at the village level. The case of the success of tourism in Bali as a socio-economic development project through the people's cultural interpretation and invention of cultural tradition for tourists services has shown that there is some latitude for interpretation and innovation.

Such latitude may only exist if encouraged and allowed by the government within its power structure. Indonesian development as an ideology is based on the theme of development of total Indonesian Man (Pembangunan Manusia Seutuhnya) meaning that it treats as for and by the people. It is to develop their physical, social, economic, personal or culture well-being based on the national ideology of Pancasila. In this sense of the development of the total Indonesian Man can be interpreted as development from a cultural perspective. It is also in this sense that we talk about the cultural factors in development we are actually talking about development as seen from the cultural perspective, or more specifically from the local people's cultural perspective.

If my interpretation is correct, the way I see development as seen from a cultural perspective is similar to human development, i.e., involving not merely economic and social gains but also human dignity, and codes of ethics and morality. It is in this sense that I see the ideology of 'development of total Indonesian Man' in Indonesia and as applied in Bali in the case of tourism. It is a people-centered approach, which not only emphasises the cultural perspective but with an understanding of social dimension; as culture is only operationalised in daily life activities within social contexts. Thus, social and cultural factors should not be treated as a static entity but seen as dynamic factors.

To summarise, the cultural factors in socio-economic development projects must not only be seen from a cultural perspective but also as implying human development, i.e., human dignity and codes of ethics and morality. In such an approach people are the focus of the development, and they are also the actors who have the ability to consciously select their alternatives from among the available models from their culture traditions to be used in interpreting their situation or environment and in generating appropriate behaviour in response to new ones as the result of development. These are used in order to able to understand their position and adapt to new situations and to gain benefit from them. Hobsbauwn (1983, 4-5), has observed the ability of man to invent tradition or culture in efforts to cope with new situations, as he stated:
However, we should expect it to occur more frequently when a rapid transformation of society weakens or destroys the social patterns for which 'old' traditions had been designed, producing new ones to which they were not applicable, or when such old traditions and their institutional carriers and promulgators no longer prove sufficiently adaptable and flexible, or otherwise eliminated.

The invention of tradition, then, is created by the people themselves, the community or the society. It can be seen as restructuring culture, community, or society, in order to be able to overcome the feeling of rootlessness, of shock or culture shock, in new environments, as product of a search for appropriate tradition or culture. It is a product of history. By inventing tradition the culture becomes enriched and more complex. In the Balinese case, through the adoption of tourism, the culture comprises traditional old elements and new invented ones.

The Balinese case can be seen as the emergence of 'back stage' and 'front stage' in its culture (Goffman 1959). Each functions at a different level and structure of Balinese life activities. The 'back stage' knowledge of their culture id designed for life within their own domestic, private, and scared spheres of activities. On the other hand, the 'front stage' is for dealing with the tourists and foreign elements within their cultural traditions; it is designed to mediate between their being Balinese and their cultural traditions and the foreigners, the tourists, and their cultural traditions. Thus, the 'front stage' is the culture in which revision and manipulation possible, while at the 'back stage' people adhere to the traditions handed down through generations.

In the light of the discussion on development from the cultural perspective, in the Balinese case, it is relevant to treat the invented tradition or the 'front stage' as the new situation. Tourist sites and attractions can be seen as functioning to mediate between tourism as a socio-economic development project in the one hand and the Balinese cultural traditions on the other hand. The new situations or tourist attractions can also be seen as functioning as a buffer or a filter to keep the traditional activities from being changed or destroyed in the structure of interactions between the Balinese and tourism as a development programme. The invented tradition or the 'front stage' is deliberately created and invented to interpret and to implement tourism. It is designed top gain benefits from tourism, and its profits can be used, among other things for maintaining their cultural and religious traditions as prescribed by the Tri Hita Karana. Thus, this mechanism is functioning successfully in implementing development programmes on the one hand while on the other hand it has had a positive impact on the maintenance of the Balinese cultural traditions.

In this model, the dynamic roles of the people, the mediators in the form of invented traditions, and tourism as development programmes, are seen as dialectic and dynamic in their nature. Without the existence of such a mediating factor the local people will not be able to comprehend changes resulting from any socio-economic development project which is imposed upon their structure of life, and thus will not be able to control any negative impact from such programmes upon their cultural traditions. As cultural traditions are seen as resources for human development, culturally and socially, changes that may occur due to development may change the potential of their cultural values as a reference to organise the human quality of daily life activities. This, in turn will affect the ability to comprehend any development programmes imposed upon them in the future. This will affect the quality of the success of such development programmes.

Conclusions

I have tried to show that a development programme in Bali has been successfully implemented by the local people, through stages of interpretations. Such interpretations, as shown in this paper, always use the conditions or potential of Bali, environmental or cultural, as references, whether by the authorities at the provincial level or by the people at the village level.

Interpretations by the people lead to the invention of traditions or cultural things. Their function in mediating between tourism as a development programme, on the one hand and the cultural traditions of the people, on the other hand has been clearly shown. The invention of tradition in mediating these two entities is not only apparent in the case of tourism, but in other programmes as well. An example of this is the way the people at the village level responded to agricultural modernisation, i.e., the intensification of the rice planting system (Geriya 1985 and 1988), and Family Planning Programme (Geriya 1988). Certain revisions were made and rules were created, from time to time, by using their cultural traditions as reference systems and by calculating benefit and profits.

Such a model may only be possible if institutionally there is a mechanism to organise the local people with equal right for everyone, and a cultural system with core cultural values to support and justify such activities. More simply, there should be a tradition of people organising themselves in response to a development programme. In such a situation a development programme has been transformed into the village people's programme. It is a part of the people's cultural system, but it is functioning on a different stage of activities, i.e., at the 'front stage'.

Cultural factors in successful development projects should be seen from a methodological perspective. In this approach cultural factors should not be treated as a separate entity but as an inseparable element of the same importance as the socio- economic elements of a development project. Development project is seen as a system; and in this sense it is seen from the cultural perspective. It is only through this approach that the involvement of the people and their active roles in development projects can be reached to guarantee success. People are not only aware of consequences of the power of the development in changing their cultural traditions but they also, at the same time, make efforts to cope with these negative impacts through their cultural interpretations and their invented tradition.

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*) Paper presented at International Meeting on the Study of Cultural Factors in Succesful Socio-
Economic Development Projects, organised by Indonesian National Commission for UNESCO,
Bali Beach Hotel, Denpasar, 2-5 December