Currently, I am reading a book about a mafia organization in Italy called Cosa Nostra. It is told that the development of the mafia can't be separated from the government's influence. The Italy government was responsible in making the mafia organization get bigger. Since its appearance in 1860s, the government tried to repress its growth so that it would stop its bad activity, which was murdering and torturing people, not just the mafioso but also the people outside the organization. I don't know if that mafia is still exist now or not. But I hope its influence and culture are vanished from the country.
When I read the book, I too remembered Pramoedya Ananta Toer's "House of Glasses". The book was about a government official who often punished, even murdered, Indonesian citizens who did the wrong things without trial. The official was an Indonesian, but he joined the Holland army KNIL (if I'm not mistaken). He was willing to do everything so that he would be still in his position in the army. And in Indonesia, I think this culture is still remain not just in a small scope (i.e. "RT/RW" environment), but also in the biggest scope, the central government.
Many people who are part of government officials or legislative assembly do everything they can to hold out their positions in the institution so that they can always get the advantages, i.e. more compensation, facilities, etc. They even have a will to betray or ruin their colleagues. And I think they too don't think about all Indonesian citizens when they do the bad things. They don't care if what they do may have bad impacts to the citizens. What an ironic condition that is.
Can this culture be changed? If can, how? Some people believe that if we want to change the bad culture of a society, we have to be in the organization which takes control of the society. Why? So that we can change the culture, the rules, the bad things, the bad habits, etc. into the good ones. I know that it's hard to be in the structure because being in it means we have to be ready to give our best to fulfill the public needs. Our responsibility will get bigger than before so that we will have to give our time to do our duty.
But how if we don't like to be in the structure? I think it's okay if we want to stay out of the distance, as long as we keep remind the people inside the structure so that they will always put the citizens' importance as their first priority. How? By doing an organized demonstration or saying the reminding words out loud (via blogs, e-mail, newspapers, posters, hotline call, etc.), so that the people in the structure will always be reminded of what they have to do, their duty, their responsibility.
Hope that this little writing can wake ourselves up so that we can make our Indonesia a better place to live, a better country that will be more independent and there will be less citizens who live in poverty.