Indonesia needs victimology to improve the human life under the aftermath
by: Setiawan Liu
Jakarta, March 8, 2023/Indonesia Media – Heru Susetyo, S.H., LL.M., M.Si. Ph.D, is Associate Professor at Faculty of Law Universitas Indonesia. He was born in Bandung Indonesia on January 13th, 1972; Currently, live in South Jakarta with a wife and four children. Earned Bachelor of Law from Faculty of Law University of Indonesia (1996), Master of Law (International Human Rights Law) from Northwestern Law School, Chicago – USA (2003), Master of Social Work from University of Indonesia (2003) and the PhD degree in Human Rights and Peace Studies at Mahidol University, Bangkok – Thailand in 2014. Currently taking another PhD degree in a different field, Victimology, by research (as an external researcher) at INTERVICT Tilburg University, Netherlands.
Becoming permanent faculty member at Faculty of Law Universitas Indonesia, Department of Law and Society since 1996 up to present where he has been responsible to teach Law and Social Work, Victimology, Children Protection Law, Law and Human Rights, Legal Research Method, and Ethics and Professional Responsibility both at undergraduate and graduate program. He is also a non-permanent faculty at Faculty of Social and Political Sciences Universitas Indonesia (Department of Social Work and Department of Criminology) and Faculty of Public Health. As a lecturer at the department of lay, University of Indonesia (UI), and researcher on several issues, including mixed marriage aspects in Indonesia spoke to Indonesia Media (IM) Biweekly, Setiawan Liu about the issues of victimology and its relevance to the situation in Indonesia.
What is the relevance of victimology to the situation in Indonesia?
victimology is a discipline or scientific study of crime victims including the study of the relationship between victim and offender and of the consequences and effects of being victimized. The victimology is such as natural disaster, human rights abuse, technology disaster, chemical factory explosion, or Lapindo mud disaster (in Sidoarjo, East Java), Fukushima nuclear power plant (gigantic wave flooded the reactors, sparking a major disaster), Chernobyl disaster (nuclear accident that occurred on 26 April 1986), Bhopal disaster (chemical accident on the night of 2–3 December 1984 at the Union Carbide India). Victimology includes concerns about an identifiable likeness in victims chosen by serial offenders. Victimology is very important, though the value of human life in Indonesia, sorry to say, is very low. 100 human lives and one life is just the same in Indonesia. Such as the aftermath of Worst Football Tragedy in Malang (east Java) which murdered 134 people, people have forgotten. The old (incident) is forgotten after there is a new one.
What is the significance of victimology in wide-ranging discussion, such as genocide?
Genocide is a process of victimization. Genocide is different from a murder. Genocide is the intentional destruction of a people, usually defined as an ethnic, national, racial or religious group, in whole or in part. That (genocide) is totally different from the Sambo case (the killing of Sambo’s assistant, Brigadier Yosua), which was sparked off by an allegations of Sexual Harassment of his wife. But several crimes committed during the tragic events in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Rwanda, Cambodia, etc could be categorized as “genocidal acts”. From the genocide in Rwanda, approximately 800,000 minority Tutsis and moderate Hutus were murdered. And Cambodian Genocide was an explosion of mass violence that saw between 1.5 and 3 million people killed at the hands of the Khmer Rouge, a communist political group. The genocide was sparked off by a different political affiliation. That is a part of exploring how the field study of victimology is developed.
What is likely to happen if we do not accommodate the field study of victimology in Indonesia?
In short, we really have to accommodate the field study of victimology, which is often considered a subfield of criminology. The two fields do share much in common. Just as criminology is the study of criminals, what they do, why they do it, and how the criminal justice system responds to them—victimology is the study of victims. Victimology, then, is the study of the etiology (or causes) of victimization, its consequences, how the criminal justice system accommodates and assists victims, and how other elements of society, such as the media, deal with crime victims. We have often forgotten the victims. Football tragedy of Kanjuruhan, our concerns are about the suspects, namely Indonesian football Association (PSSI), the organizer of the soccer league (PT LIB), Indonesian national police (Polri). They are the major concerns, ignoring 134 victims and their families. How they died and the survivors still suffer due to tear gas. Another incident, the suicide bombing at Astanaanyar Police Post, Bandung city, West Java, our concerns is about the perpetrator, but ignoring the one police officer which was killed by the explosion. He has three children and how the widow has to feed, pay the children’s school fees, etc. this is very shocking
How do you relate the case of mixed marriage in Indonesia to the role of victimologist?
There are several mixed marriage communities in Indonesia, including KPC Melati. I was invited by the community, to do research to contribute to the deliberation of Bill on Citizenship. So the government of Indonesia will adopt the policy of dual citizenship. It’s a pity for the children (of mixed marriage couples). For them, (the children) find it hard to choose, whether (choosing) the citizenship of father or the opposite. The parents do not want the children in separation, but they really want both of the citizenships. Becoming an Indonesian citizen is important, since (marriage couples) have their families, children who go to school in the country. They have assets too. Let’s say, one of them is German citizen, (the family) can easily go anywhere especially for the children who need to go to school. They don’t have to apply for the visa due to their German citizenship. They enjoy the benefits and privileges (of holding German citizenship), getting discount of school fee (for the children). Moreover, German passport is valuable, not like ours. Therefore they (mixed marriages couples) wish to get dual citizenship. The family is always united. (sl/IM)
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