A State of Over-Legislation

Kompas/Didie SW

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A soft state is one filled with rampant corruption, lazy civil servants and a condition of over-legislation that result in ineffective and flawed rules.

So said Gunnar Myrdal echoing President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo’s recent complaint that our country has so many regulations that it often entangles itself in. There is a staggering 42,000 regulations in the country, comprising laws, government regulations (PP), presidential regulations (perpres), ministry’s regulations (permen), governor’s regulations (pergub), mayor’s regulations (perwali) and regent’s regulations (perbup). All of these hamper our development efforts. This was more or less what Jokowi was complaining about at the 2017 National Assembly at JIExpo in Kemayoran, Jakarta, and last Monday.