Election spending and the pressure to recover costs
The commentary identifies money politics as a particularly clear example of electoral ambition overriding moral limits. Its broader concerns include manipulation of public opinion, misuse of power and allegations of interference with electoral institutions.
Separate research reported by The Jakarta Post on June 26, 2026, documents the scale of election spending. Researchers from Gadjah Mada University (UGM) and the Royal Netherlands Institute of Southeast Asian and Caribbean Studies (KITLV) surveyed 478 candidates who contested Indonesia's 2024 local elections in 10 provinces.
The survey found that winning a single district cost successful candidates an average of Rp 36.8 billion, or about US$2.05 million. That amount was roughly 468 times an ordinary Indonesian's annual earnings. Yet candidates' campaign-spending reports to the General Elections Commission (KPU) seldom listed more than Rp 3.5 billion.
The UGM-KITLV researchers also reported that corruption convictions between 2004 and 2024 involved some 171 regional heads and 441 legislative council members. In their assessment, much of that corruption is a predictable result of politicians seeking to recover campaign expenses after taking office.
Why victory is not the only test
The Kompas commentary's criticism extends across presidential, legislative and regional elections. It describes a political culture in which strategic advantage can take precedence over honesty, competing interests can override truth, and the law can become a tool for securing power.
Against that approach, the author argues that politics should serve people's interests and collective welfare rather than merely help politicians gain, retain or enlarge their power. Electoral victory, in this view, does not excuse the methods used to achieve it.
The commentary examines this tension through Machiavelli's The Prince (1532), which concerns power and the preservation of the state. Although his work is often read as endorsing political pragmatism, Machiavelli did not literally write the saying "the end justifies the means." The author's objection is to pragmatism stripped of moral and legal constraints, leaving victory as the sole measure of success.
Responsibility to voters
Max Weber's Politics as a Vocation (1919) offers another way to examine political conduct. The commentary draws on his distinction between the ethics of conviction (Gesinnungsethik) and the ethics of responsibility (Verantwortungsethik): politicians must account for the consequences of their decisions, not just invoke worthy beliefs or intentions.
On that basis, the author rejects political victory as a defense for money politics, deception, manipulation or abuse of authority. An admirable objective does not, by itself, make harmful methods acceptable.
The commentary also invokes Immanuel Kant's categorical imperative, under which people must be regarded as ends in themselves rather than merely as instruments for others. Applied to democracy, the argument rejects treating voters as commodities: buying their votes, mobilizing their interests or manipulating their awareness to advance someone's pursuit of power.
Rule-of-law and corruption measures
International indices cited by Kompas provide additional context on Indonesia's governance record. The World Justice Project released its Rule of Law Index 2026 on October 20, placing Indonesia 75th among 143 countries. That was six positions below its ranking a year earlier, while its overall score slipped from 0.52 to 0.51.
Criminal justice, at 0.37, and absence of corruption, at 0.42, were among Indonesia's lowest sub-scores, according to Kompas.
In its October 31, 2026, report, Kompas also cited Transparency International's 2025 Corruption Perceptions Index. Indonesia's score declined from 37 to 34, leaving it ranked 109th out of 182 countries.
