Golput? Yg bener aja!

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Ini adalah versi tersunting dari opini yang saya kirimkan ke beberapa milis e.g. PPI-UK, T-Net
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Sebentar lagi Pemilu lho (i.e. 9 April 2009). Apakah rekans sudah punya calon (baik perorangan maupun partai) yg akan dipilih? Idealnya memang kita mengenali caleg dan partai yg kita contreng/tick. Tapi hal ini agak susah bagi kita, apalagi hingar bingar kampanye hanya terdengar sayup-sayup di LN.

Ini mungkin memperkuat sikap apatis terhadap pelaksanaan pemilu dan pada akhirnya menguatkan pilihan tidak ikut pemilu (alias golput). Tidak salah memang sikap ini. Hanya saja, menurut saya, sikap/pilihan tersebut kurang bermanfaat. Please note, sampai beberapa waktu yg lalu, saya juga memilih untuk tidak ikut pemilu. Namun, pilihan saya sekarang berubah untuk aktif ikut pemilu betapapun buruknya pilihan yang ada.

Alasan saya:
1. Golput tidak menghargai 'uang rakyat'. Dana pemilu 2009, sebagaimana dianggarkan dalam APBN adalah sekitar 7,4T rupiah. Total daftar pemilih tetap (DPT) nasional adalah 171 juta, 1,5 juta diantaranya adalah DPT dapil LN (ya kita-kita ini). Jadi biaya pemilu per kepala kurang lebih 43 ribu rp. Sayang sekali lho kalo biaya tersebut disiasiakan karena kita tidak menggunakan hak suara kita. Mungkin bagi kita, uang 43 ribu rupiah itu kecil artinya; tapi perlu diingat bahwa sekitar 50% penduduk Indonesia memperoleh pendapatan lebih kecil dari US$ 2/hari. Apalagi 43 ribu yg sekitar US$4. Mohon direnungkan.

2. Golput tidak akan merubah hasil pemilu. Ada pendapat bahwa angka golput yg tinggi akan menjadi basis rendahnya legitimasi parpol/caleg terpilih. Mungkin pendapat tersebut benar. Tetapi, meskipun legitimasinya rendah, aspek legal hasil pemilu itu tetap kuat. Hasil pemilu (terlepas 'bersih'/tidaknya) tidak dapat digugat hanya karena angka golput (sangat) tinggi (CMIIW/BYKS). Mahkamah Konstitusi mungkin akan memerintahkan pemilu ulang HANYA JIKA terjadi pelanggaran pemilu yg parah (seperti di Jatim misalnya atau daerah lain), bukan berdasarkan golput yg tinggi. Lalu apa gunanya golput? Tidak akan ada yg berubah :(.

3. Golput memperkuat perolehan suara parpol/caleg. Kalau rekans belum menyadari, penentuan perolehan kursi itu berdasarkan jumlah suara sah yang ada di masing-masing TPS (UU 10/2008: 202(1)). Bahkan bila 199 suara dari 200 suara dinyatakan rusak (alias golput 'terencana'), satu suara tersebut akan menjadi dasar pembagian kursi di TPS yg terkait. Parpol yang mendapat suara banyak di TPS tersebut tentu akan gembira karena 'harga kursi' menjadi semakin murah dengan semakin banyaknya suara 'tidak sah' (atau golput). 'Harga kursi' yg seharusnya 100 suara mungkin dirabat (discounted) menjadi hanya 50 suara karena adanya 50% suara golput. Lah kalau begini, maksud 'baik' rekan-rekan pendukung golput ternyata malah dinikmati oleh parpol (bayangkan kalau itu parpol yg rekan-rekan tidak sukai).

4. Golput merugikan caleg 'pemula'. Caleg pemula cum idealis biasanya mengandalkan swing voters dan pemilih suara yg 'sadar'. Mereka mengandalkan 'jualan program/visi-misi' daripada monyet eh money politic. Lah kemana mereka mau 'jualan', kalo 'pembeli'nya (i.e. mereka yg menyebut dirinya 'memilih berdasar nurani/akal') ternyata tidak datang ke 'pasar' (alias pemilu)? Ya bankrut mereka kan. Dagangan 'berkualitas' mereka amat mungkin dikalahkan oleh 'obral hadiah' (utk tidak mengatakan pemberian uang, barang, dll) oleh caleg 'bergizi' karena pemilih 'tradisional' umumnya memilih 'hadiah'. Golput anda membuat pangsa pasar caleg 'pemula' menjadi menyusut.

5. Golput menghambat perubahan. Menyambung alasan (3) dan (4) diatas, suara golput tidak dapat dirubah menjadi suatu kekuatan nyata di dewan perwakilan maupun pihak eksekutif (dan akhirnya juga pihak yudikatif; note: hakim tipikor, MA, KY, MK, dll itu dipilih dan disahkan di DPR --CMIIW; kalo DPR-nya banyak diisi orang brengsek, bagaimana kita bisa berharap perubahan disektor hukum???). Tidak ada dalam DPR kita yang namanya fraksi golput. Apakah suara golput dapat menyalurkan aspirasi kita? Apakah perubahan dapat terjadi bila yang ada di dewan adalah wajah-wajah lama (baik perorangan maupun parpol)? Lebih lanjut, pasangan Capres-Cawapres itu hanya bisa diajukan oleh (koalisi) parpol yang memperoleh suara 20% kursi DPR atau 25% suara sah. Golput hanya akan mempermudah partai 'raksasa' untuk dagang sapi dan mempersulit partai 'gurem' untuk mendorong perubahan-perbaikan.

Menimbang lima alasan diatas, saya melihat cita-cita luhur golput (i.e. perubahan dan perbaikan) hanya akan menjadi angin kosong yang tidak pernah berubah menjadi badai perubahan dan perbaikan. Di negara kita tercinta ini, dengan sistem politik saat ini, 'perubahan dan perbaikan' (albeit besar kecilnya) hanya dapat terjadi bila kita menyalurkan suara kita melalui institusi resmi (/legal). Bayangkan dasyatnya institusi legal tersebut dalam melakukan perubahan cum perbaikan jika mendapat dukungan kita (alias legitimasi 'rakyat').

Bukankah sinyal ini yang muncul pada pemilu 2004 dimana -tanpa diduga- partai demokrat (dan SBY-JK) 'mengagetkan' parpol lainnya dengan perolehan suara mereka. Bukankah dengan munculnya partai demokrat (yg dianggap menampung swing voters dari parpol lainnya e.g. PDI-P, dll), ada parpol yg mulai 'insyaf' dan 'berbenah diri' saat ini. Fenomena "demokrat 2004" (dan SBY-JK 2004) ini seharusnya membuat kita sadar bahwa perubahan dan perbaikan masih bisa terjadi asalkan kita menyalurkan suara kita dengan bijak (apapun kriteria 'bijak' rekan-rekan sekalian).

Jika rekan-rekan merasa muak terhadap sistem politik dan perangkatnya (parpol, caleg, dll) saat ini; mari salurkan suara anda pada pilihan yg 'sedikit buruk' diantara pilihan 'sangat buruk' lainnya. Mari kita kirimkan sinyal dukungan terhadap 'perubahan dan perbaikan' sebagaimana yg (mungkin) pernah dilakukan pada 2004.

Saya paham bahwa pilihan yang ada saat ini rasanya sangat menyesakkan dada dan menyakitkan hati (dan membodohi 'kita'?). Sayangnya, perubahan dan perbaikan yang kita cita-citakan itu kecil kemungkinannya untuk datang atas nama 'dukungan golput'.

Perubahan dan perbaikan melalui saluran ekstra parlemen dan tidak konstitusional itu hanya bisa tercapai bila terjadi anomali sebagaimana kita lihat pada 1998. Masalahnya (atau resikonya), anomali sangat susah 'dikendalikan' dan hasilnya seringkali tidak seideal yang dicitacitakan pada awalnya. Apakah cita-cita reformasi yang mendorong terjadinya anomali '98 sudah tercapai hingga saat ini? (note: ini bila kita masih percaya bahwa Pres Soeharto mengundurkan diri karena tuntutan demonstran bukan karena hal yg lain)

Akhir kata, jika rekan-rekan merindukan perubahan dan perbaikan di negara kita tercinta ini; ayo gunakan hak suara anda sebaik-baiknya dalam pemilu :)

* gambar diunduh dari www.kpu.go.id

When Lives are Discounted: Climate Change and Discounting Principle

The essay aim is to observe the influence of discounting principle in climate change initiatives. In observing the influence, I assume climate change initiatives as simplified investment projects where cost-benefit analysis acts as a primary tool to analyze those investments. My fundamental arguments in against of discounting principle are based on precautionary principles, irreversibility principles, ethical considerations, and its transboundary nature. However, denying the usage and usefulness of discounting practice in climate change initiative will lead to further damage and social-economical-environmental loss. The essay does not propose any novel approach in analyzing projects due to its technical limitation (i.e. space and time). The essay yet, advocates an integrated project analysis which deals with social-economical-environmental interests.

Climate change (or to some extent is known by global warming) is a phenomenon caused by accumulation of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions in earth’s atmosphere and thus altering the climate. It will increase the earth’s temperature between 1.4 – 5.8 Celsius (Houghton et. al, 2001). Moreover, the temperature rise will then caused extreme weather events, increase sea levels, floods, droughts, and changed agricultural and land-use patterns. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) was then founded in 1988 –by the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) and United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP)– to develop consensus on climate science and economics. Its first Assessment Report was influential in the forming of UNFCCC (United Nations Framework Convention on Climate change) (IPCC, 2007). In 1997 the Kyoto Protocol was adopted to the UNFCCC as a platform to mitigate climate change.

The Kyoto Protocol offers three platforms to mitigate the climate change problems i.e. emission trading (ET), joint implementation (JI), and clean development mechanism (CDM). The protocol is a cap-and-trade system where every ratifying country is given emission limit (the “cap”) and then each country can trade their emission rights. ET is a market mechanism (similar to stock exchange market) to host emission trading, while the JI is a mechanism for industrialized countries to get emission credits by investing in emission reducing projects in another industrialized countries. The CDM is similar to JI only that CDM participants come from industrialized and developing countries.

The protocol implies that countries (and ultimately, firms) have to invest in cleaner production method either in the countries itself or in another countries and to invest in emission reducing projects such as forestation. Firms, under neoclassical approach (and to some extent, other non-neoclassical approach) are profit seeker and therefore firms see climate change initiatives as investment projects.

Investment analysis involves concept of Time Value of Money (TVM). In brief, the TVM implies that money value is changing over time where present money value is greater than future money value (unless deflation happens continuously over time, which is very unlikely to happen). The future benefits and costs are discounted to the present in order to get its net present value (NPV).

In a simplified mathematical form:

Where: t = time; B = benefit; C = cost; r = discount rate.

By analyzing the mathematical formula, we know that the NPV is depended on three factors, i.e. the amount of benefits and costs, the time, and the discount rate. While costs are in present time (sometime it is simplified as ‘initial investment’), net benefits are in future time. Therefore, the effect of discounting mostly affects the net benefits. The effect of discounting is composed by t and r. The longer the time period (t), the bigger is the discount factor. The bigger the discount rate (r), the greater is the discount factor.

Although the TVM is perfectly acceptable in evaluating pure economic investments however, its usage in evaluating environmental investments should be questioned. The first reason is that the property of environmental investments is not only of economic value but also non-economic value such as quality of life and human life itself. The fundamental debate in using discounting for environmental projects is how we measure non-economic value (e.g. a human life) to an economic value (e.g. is life for sale?).

To put it simple, suppose we know that a forestation project will prevent a land-slide to small village with no economical benefits to a logging firm[1] whilst without the forestation, the land-slide will kill some of villagers.[2] The firm seeing the project as not profitable (only as cost) may then reject the project implementation. Having arrived in this point, we conclude that according to the firm the value of some villagers’ life is much less than the forestation costs. The debate then shifted into whether this behaviour is acceptable.[3] Anther simplified example is that under discounting principle, the present value of 100 lives in 10 years time and 1% discount rate is only 90 lives. Ten lives are discounted and ignored. Is this behaviour ethical?

The discounting principle is a delicate matter to apply in climate change initiatives also due to initiatives’ transboundary nature of benefits and costs. The main question is what is the proper discount rate in evaluating climate change initiatives that applies globally? Up to the moment there is no commonly agreed discount rate for this matter. Different countries and companies have their own discount rate.[4] It is logical that an emission reducing project is rejected in a country while it would have been accepted in another country.

The second reason is that the property of environmental problems is the irreversibility. It means that some environmental damages cannot be undone e.g. species extinction. Meanwhile, most of damages or benefits happen in the future (hence the temporality of the problems) and its possibility to occur is uncertain (hence the uncertainty of the problem risks). Therefore we should treat the discounting principle with care especially when compared to precautionary principle of Agenda 21 (Principle 15).[5]

Therefore, any environmental project evaluation should involve an integrated analysis of social-environmental-economical benefits and costs. The analysis must seek a balance of those three aspects. Failure to do so may lead to a further damage in longer period. For example a pure forest conservation (thus putting attention only on environmental benefit) may marginalise villagers (as they cannot access to the forest products, and thus worsening social aspect) and may ignore economic value of forest products.

Although the essay does not advocate a novel approach to deal with the problem of discounting in climate change however, it encourages the usage of an integrated analysis to give a more comprehensive picture of the climate change initiative’s value. Furthermore the essay argues that a pure discounting practice may become unethical in assessing environmental projects.

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REFERENCES:

Houghton, J.T., Ding, Y. , Griggs, D.J., Noguer, M. , van der Linden, P.J., Dai, X., Maskell, K., Johnson, C.A. (2001) Climate Change 2001: The Scientific Basis, Contribution of Working Group I to the Third Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, IPCC, Cambridge University Press.

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[1] The example is an extreme simplification of real conditions.

[2] We can also say that the land-slide is as the effect of high precipitation caused by global warming.

[3] This kind of debate is prominent in the scope of Corporate Social Responsibility.

[4] Usually firms’ discount rate (or required return) is generated from its financing structure, debt interest rate, risk and expected market return. Meanwhile governments use Social Time Preference by comparing utility over time and generations to generate the discount rate.

[5] The precautionary principle demands that “where there are threats of serious or irreversible damage, lack of full scientific certainty shall not be used as a reason for postponing cost-effective measures to prevent environmental degradation”.

Market Failure and Policy Instruments: Climate Change

This paper aims at discussing CO₂ emissions as the result of market failure and some alternatives to deal with it. In details, I firstly demonstrate why climate change is caused by market failure through greenhouse gasses emissions (GHG) and CO₂ emissions. Secondly I outline and briefly mention several policy instruments available to deal with such problems. Thirdly and lastly, I discussed each instrument’s advantages and disadvantages.

The market usually does not function very well when it comes to public good as the public good has no price in it. Price can be assigned when there is property rights attached to the goods. That is exactly what is happening with public good, it lacks of property rights or is having ill-defined property rights. Imposing property rights means that we give the right to utilize the goods to some one/entities/clubs. Meanwhile, the characteristics of public good are non-excludability and non-rivalry. Non excludability means that it is impossible to exclude some one from utilizing the good. Non-rivalry means that the consumption of the good by an individual does not reduce the available amount for others to consume.

Carbon dioxide (CO₂) and other GHG are emitted to the earth atmosphere. Meanwhile, the atmosphere itself is a public good. It is non-excludable as everyone in the earth can emit anything to it or breathe the air from the atmosphere. It is non-rivalry since my emission does not reduce others’ rights to emit. It does not have price and thus no available market mechanism. In the end, when everyone emits GHG and CO₂ to the atmosphere, then there will be excessive stock pollutions in the atmosphere. Moreover, it is subsequently causing climate change.

However, as the awareness of the danger of climate change arise, countries started to seek out solutions to this problem. The climate change is a complex problem since it is a transboundary problem –i.e. climate change happens in everywhere and is caused in every place- and the existence of spill over –i.e the abatement of one country is enjoyed by other countries, so does the pollution of one country is affecting other countries too-.

There are several policy instruments available that can be used to mitigate the climate change problem. The policy instruments are grouped into three categories that are institutional approaches such as voluntary bargaining, command and control such as emission regulation, and economic incentive instruments such as taxes, subsidies, and tradable emission permits. The underline idea in economic incentive instrument is to give price to the emission so that profit-maximizing firm will also taking into account the opportunity cost of emission into their production plan.[1]

A profit-maximizing firm produces goods at optimal output level of maximal profit. Profit is maximal when marginal costs of firm equals to marginal benefits of firm (MC = MB). However when firm pollutes and the pollution is not priced, it creates social costs/damages to the society. The damages are called externality and are often not calculated in product price. By giving price to the damages –either through subsidies, taxes, or emission trades- the pollution then influences the cost function of the firm. Thus the firm internalizes the externalities.

Environmental taxes or known as Pigouvian Taxes is a practice of assigning taxes to pollution emitted by firms. Taxes are assigned to pollution as it will be less efficient if assigned to inputs or final products.[2] Pollutions are to some extent allowed as in an economic point of view, it is never about achieving zero pollution, and instead it is about balancing the benefits and costs. There are three steps to find the balance between benefits and costs –i.e. the optimal pollution level- that is identifying firm/industry profit function, the social damages function –that is the externality effects-, and the optimal pollution level.

The optimal pollution level is the point where the shadow price of social benefit is equal to the shadow price of cost. The shadow price of social benefit is the reduction in social damages due to a reduction in product produced, while the shadow price of cost is the loss of firm profits due to a reduction of a unit produced. In order to find the shadow price, we should calculate the marginal function –i.e. the first derivative- of firm’s profit function and social damages function. The next step is to equalize the marginal social benefit and marginal abatement costs. Environmental taxes then are applied to this level.

Subsidies work similarly to environmental taxes as at the optimal pollution level both mechanism –the environmental taxes and subsidies- are levied or paid at the same rate.[3] However, as Perman (2003) noted “the two instruments are different in their effects on income distribution”. Taxes caused firms to lose income while subsidies caused firms to gain income. In the short-run and at the optimal pollution level both mechanisms are similar; nevertheless, as subsidies are given in form of lump-sum payment, subsidies may give different long-term effects.[4]

Another mechanism of economic incentive mechanism is marketable emission permit. The idea is that government set an overall industry emission level and let the firms distribute the emission level independent of government intervention. In general, the mechanism works as follow: first, the government set a targeted industry emission level; second, an initial emission permit is distributed to each firm; third, firms sell/buy permit to another firms. This mechanism is also known as the cap-and-trade mechanism. Firms are able to sell or buy permit as they are different in their profit function. A firm may find it more profitable to emit more while other firms may find it more profitable to emit less and sell the excess allowances. Thus, an increase in one firm is compensated by decrease in other firm/s. Tradability is an important characteristic of marketable emission permit that grouped it into economic incentive instruments, otherwise it will be categorized as a command and control instruments.

There are several indicators to compare between above mentioned mechanism that is cost-efficiency and monitoring-administering-and-enforcing-compliance costs, long run effects, double dividend, and equity/distribution. It is obvious that command and control instruments are least cost-efficient compare to economic incentive instruments as compliance costs are usually high. European union emission trading for example estimates that the cost of emission trading is between 2.9 billion euros and 3.7 billion euros compare to 6.8 billion euros compliance costs annually.[5] Among economic incentive instruments, emission trading is the most cost-efficient compare to other instruments.[6] However, command and control may create greater long-run effects in term of technology advancement compare to other instruments as it provides incentive and guidance for technology research. I think that emission trading will give the biggest “double dividend” as it creates a lot of job opportunity. As of distribution issue, taxes may cause bigger effect for consumer –i.e. consumers bear the cost- regardless of polluter pays principle especially when market is of monopoly or oligopoly market.

Furthermore, in the presence of corruption, I think the emission trading will give best results compare to other instruments. The reason is that emission trading will minimize the involvement of civil servant in its operation and thus minimize the possibility of corruption.

Based on above comparisons, I think the best instrument is the emission trading.

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REFERENCES

European Commision. (2005) EU Action Against Climate Change: EU Emission Trading - an Open Scheme Promoting Global Innovation, Belgium.
Perman, R., Common, M., Mcqilvray, J., Ma, Yue. (2003) Natural Resources and Environmental Economics, 3^rd edition.

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[1] Perman, R., Common, M., Mcqilvray, J., Ma, Yue. (2003) Natural Resources and Environmental Economics, 3^rd edition.
[2] Ibid.
[3] Ibid.
[4] Ibid.
[5] European Commision. (2005) EU Action Against Climate Change: EU Emission Trading - an Open Scheme Promoting Global Innovation, Belgium.
[6] Perman, et. Al. Ibid.