This is an email interview with Bivitri Susanti in Seattle, and here in full with very minor formatting change.Like Ari, she is also available on facebook and publishes her notes there.
Short Bio: Hope this is short enough. I went to Law faculty of UI 1993-1999. Wanted to become a successful corporate lawyer J until I found my soul in the 1997-1998 movement. That’s why I took economic law specialty, taught capital market law (you wouldn’t have guessed, huh? J) and did internships in 2 law firms as capital market lawyer and 1 bank as corporate secretary staff to the holding company on my forth year of law school. After May 1998 I changed my mind totally and founded PSHK in July 1998 with my seniors at the law school. Been working there since then; and expanded here and there in the area of NGOs (board PSHK, anggota perkumpulan ICW, Board TIFA, Board ICG Indonesia, etc). Studied for LLM in Warwick, UK, in 2001-2002. And now doing my doctorate at UW Law School, Seattle, US; am on my second year.
You’re back at school again in Seattle, what’s there?
What’s here? Time for reflection on what I have done and have NOT done so far since 1998. And the reflection can be done in a more structured manner; in a logic thoughts with supporting evidence and theories in a dissertation that is.
Back then during the “reformasi” song and dance, you were part of the student movement, how did you get involved?
I involved in some students’ activities at FHUI at that time. Just for fun; I like knowing people and new different things. Some close friends at FHUI knew friends who at that time started to discuss the national situation and students movement. A bit “left” but wanted to have something more inclusive and not particularly related to the then leftist students movement such as SMID and so forth. They took me to the meetings and I enjoyed the discussions and decided to get involved.
Who came up with the phrase “Reformasi”?
Don’t know “who” exactly. I mean, we talked about who had talked about it, but terms like that, in my opinion, can never be traced back to a one single person and even a single discussion forum. Discussions, obrolan warung kopi etc shaped the keywords/ terms/ discourse.
You were in FHUI, what was the general idea of ‘reform’ then?
In 1998? Of course “turunkan Suharto” 
. For law people, we also identified draconian laws such as UU Subversif (now revoked), Political law package, and the need for constitutional reform. But at the university level (KBUI) when organizing protests, we did not really talk about something “structural” and “institutional” much. We concentrated more on the “situasi nasional”, pengamanan aksi, gathering the mass, communicating with other students’ organizations, etc. When we talked about “macro” situation, we talk about the movement as a part of larger social movement, how to link up with other movements in other sectors such as labors, white collar workers, etc.
You understand the laws well. Looking at Indonesia now, how far is it from your thoughts then?
I must say it’s a much better situation than 1998. Many people compare the economic stability, political stability with those of Suharto era, but they forget about things that were not revealed, the high corruption cases, the human rights abuses.
You asked specifically about law, I would say it’s getting better. The judiciary is undergoing reform; it is very slow and requires a lot of attention from the public (I often highly criticize this, too), but the fact that the window for reform is open is already something significant (read Bas Pompe’s book and Dan Lev’s books on this).
Law-making can certainly be highly criticized but who would have imagined at that time that an NGO can actually proposed laws to the legislature? We still have a mountain of homework for reformasi, indeed, but the situation is very different now.
In terms of law, just as a reminder, the fact that we have freer press, freedom of expression, human rights in the constitution, judicial review mechanism, KPK, relatively open judiciary etc are huge steps for Indonesia. Of course in all things said we still should play watch dog: pengadilan harus selalu diawasi, kebebasan media harus dicek, masih ada human rights abuses, masih ada serangan terhadap KPK. But it’s also true in any other countries, even the “super democracy” like the US and Europe.
Kalau kata Chairil Anwar (Kerawang-Bekasi): “kerja belum selesai, belum apa-apa” J
I’m concerned with the lack of public trust in Indonesia. I don’t think democracy could work without sufficient public trust to form a bond between leaders and the citizens. Isn’t this what laws are for?
In short, yes. The long answer could be another dissertation, that’s one of the things I am learning here: about the rule of law and democracy.
How come 10 years after Soeharto and Indonesia still struggles even to commit on fighting corruption? Or am I too much an alarmist?
Of course we are still struggling. Corruption in Indonesia is deeply rooted. For more than half a century already and started actually since the colonial period. It can’t be fixed over night. I once thought about it, years ago, I thought about 2 or 3 generations. Now it’s not even 1 generation. Not that I accept this, pasrah, and think it’s ok J, what I am trying to say is: 10 years is actually such a short time after decades of authoritarian regimes (people usually only think about Suharto time, but corruption started in Demokrasi Terpimpin time, read Lev, Liddle, etc). In indonesian saying: tidak semudah membalikkan telapak tangan. Look at other countries undergoing similar transition. We should not give up and must keep on working.
How do you see today’s university life in Indonesia?
Not good.
You’re the first girl I interviewed so I can’t ask you the tie question. It’s obvious you don’t wear tie to work. Do you ski?
No.
When do you plan to come back to Indonesia?
Don’t know exactly. Too early to think about. Now I think about my future child more and realized that the quality of life in Indonesia is not good for the child (pollution, education, lack of parks and greens, don’t want to take the child to malls all the time, so I really don’t know at this point. I might be based somewhere else close to Indonesia and visit Indonesia often. Or I will go home directly. I don’t know. I do plannings but it’s hard to plan for 3 or 4 years from now, right?
What would you do then?
Teach and doing some NGO works (consultancies and public opinion, just like I have been doing). There are a lot to do still in Indonesia.
“Kerja belum selesai”
