In Indonesia, Natural Disasters Are a Security Concern

‘Crucial Importance’ Incidents such as the recent Banjarnegara landslide are more than just humanitarian and economic calamities
Bantarto Bandoro Jakarta Globe 18 Dec 14;

Heavy rain has triggered many catastrophes that cannot be addressed by one party alone. What we saw in Jemblung in Central Java’s Banjarnegara district is a fatal landslide, evidence that humans cannot resist the forces of the nature. This is one of the worst landslide disasters recorded in Indonesia in recent years.

The landslide claimed the lives of nearly 80 people, while dozens remain missing. Around 570 people have also been displaced from their homes.

Local infrastructure was badly damaged in the landslide, preventing rescue teams from reaching certain areas.

Economic activities have also been interrupted as many lost their workplaces and livelihood.

The Banjarnegara landslide highlights the country’s vulnerability to disasters as well the government’s slow reaction, if not total inability, to effectively deal with such chronic catastrophes.

The media has reported the landslide comprehensively and no day passed without discussion of the event.

A Jakarta Globe story published earlier this week titled “Most of Indonesia at risk of landslide,” says among other things that around 9 percent of the country’s 250 million people live in an area at very high risk of natural disaster.

This suggests that Indonesia’s government must consider disasters, be it landslides, heavy floods or earthquakes, from a much more comprehensive perspective. The response of the government in addressing these disasters must make full use of all resources available.

Indonesia has experienced natural disasters from minor floods to devastating tsunamis. In response to the vulnerabilities and risk of disasters, a presidential decree established the Indonesian National Disaster Management Agency (known as BNPB) in 2008.

The existence of BNPB is necessary to help the government respond to national disasters, but it alone is not sufficient to manage and address the widespread impact of future disasters the country will certainly face.

It is not clear if the government’s security planners consider disasters from a comprehensive perspective of national security.

The government in Jakarta tends to responds to natural disasters with actions framed as disaster relief and assistance, rather than through a security lens.

Armed conflict, war or trafficking of small arms and light weapons, to mention just a few, are some of the conventional security hazards constantly reviewed by the security planners to update preventive steps for the security of the nations.

On the contrary, several non-traditional security threats, that can have as disastrous an impact on human security as the more conventional threats, are often overlooked by the agency concerned.

Some of these non-traditional security threats to Indonesia such as flooding, droughts, earthquakes, tsunamis and the recent landslides highlight the need for the government of President Joko Widodo to frame the response through a security lens.

Human vulnerability — especially to natural disasters — must be part of the nation’s security agenda.

The devastating Banjarnegara landslide should not be seen as merely the BNPB’s business. How other government agencies respond to environmental threats and disasters is a key issue and how the response is securitized is of crucial importance.

Because Indonesia has many areas that are prone to natural disasters, it is perhaps not an exaggeration if the government reveals elements of securitization such as landslides identified as existing threats; a multiplicity of securitizing actors, such as the BNPB and other disaster-related government agencies; and the complexity of various agencies — both central and local government.

Thus, when the landslide drew a large number of rescue teams dispatched by various national agencies, the securitization of the landslide conformed to the particular “logic of security” found in security studies, but separated it from a singular type of actor and threat, as is usually found in traditional security issues.

Landslides and other forms of natural disasters can be perceived as threats to human security and the environment, as well as other aspects of national security. The BNPB and the government agencies, such as the military, National Police, and the coordinating office for law, politics and security, are the securitizing actors that play central roles in mitigating the security impact of landslides.

When President Joko Widodo visited the site he was reported as saying the landslides should provide lessons for us on the importance of a balanced environment, suggesting blame on those who convert lands into farms.

The government’s short- and long-term response to the landslide should not only target rebuilding a balanced environment, or only be based on disaster-relief considerations.

Given the severe casualties in landslides, it is not wrong to suggest that Joko should start framing his government’s policy response through a security lens.

When his responses are securitized, the presidential communication would focus on non-traditional security concerns such as human or environmental security issues.

This suggests that, for natural disaster response such as the recent landslide, human security and other aspects of this should significantly influence the framing of the issue at the presidential level.

Bantaro Bandoro is a senior lecturer at the Indonesian Defense University’s School of Defense Strategy, in Sentul, Bogor