THE INDONESIA-UNITED STATES COMPREHENSIVE PARTNERSHIP; Non-Government Sector Findings and Recommendations from USINDO Comprehensive Partnership Forums, Workshops, and Conferences.

In his speech at the United States-Indonesia Society (USINDO) in November 2008 proposing a comprehensive partnership between Indonesia and the United States, Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono called for the partnership to have “strong people-to-people content.”

Following U.S. acceptance of the partnership by Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in February 2009,  USINDO – the pre-eminent bi-national non-government organization supporting the strengthening of United States-Indonesia bilateral relations – decided to create opportunities to engage the non-government sector in the partnership.

From April 2009 to March 2010, USINDO organized three major conferences and eight special open forums, in both Washington and Jakarta, to provide a forum for non-government expert and the public to articulate suggestions for effective components of the partnership.

The two presidents have highlighted democracy, education, and climate change as key subjects of the partnership. USINDO events addressed these three, as well as other topics important to the U.S.-Indonesian relationship, including energy, trade, food security, business and investment, and the security relationship. USINDO is issuing separately its report on the findings and recommendations of educators from 23 U.S. colleges and universities for the higher education part of the partnership, whose July 2009 trip to Indonesia arose from USINDO’s April 2009 conference.

This report synthesizes the results of USINDO’s eleven partnership-related meetings into findings and recommendations to be communicated to the governments and the public in both countries. It thus constitutes a sustained and significant part of the people-to-people content of the partnership to date. As such, we hope it, along with other examples of civil society views, will be appropriately reflected in both public sector and people-to-people activities of the Comprehensive Partnership.

Read Full Report Here.