Indonesia Legal System Analysis

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Legal:
Legal system of a country refers to the laws, rules and regulations and the processes by which the laws are enforced and through which redress for grievances are obtained. The legal system is of at most importance to any country for international business. Legal system of Indonesia is based on the civil law system, which is a mix of customary law and the Roman Dutch law. Before the colonisation by the Dutch, kingdoms ruled the island groups independently with their own custom laws, called as Adat. Influences from foreign lands had an effect on culture and these Adat laws. Some places like Aech in Sumatra follow their own law called the Sharia law, whereas animistic customary law is being followed by an ethnic group in Sulawesi. So the …show more content…

This makes the legal system all the more complex. Indonesia doesn’t follow the common law jurisdictions, but follows the civil law jurisdictions. So their judicial system has various courts under the purview of the Supreme Court, also called as the Mahkamah Agung. One good thing about following the civil law is that it tends to be less adversarial than the common law system, because the judges rely upon detailed legal codes rather than interpreting tradition, precedent, and customs. The judges also have flexibility, unlike that in case of common law system. However, the judges in the civil law system have the power only to apply the law, but those in the common law system have the power to interpret the law. In 1998, the Indonesian authorities established the Commercial Court also called as the Pengadilan Niaga, which handles the issues of bankruptcy and insolvency. Its jurisdiction can be extended to other commercial matters as well. Appeals from the Commercial Court proceed direct to the Supreme Court. There is also a State Administrative Court, known as Pengadilan Tata Usaha Negara, which hears administrative law cases filed against the government. This proves to be an effective court for the benefit of the people of Indonesia. The Constitutional Court …show more content…

Corruption is so endemic in the country that politicians and bureaucrats regard it as a perk of office and openly flout laws against corruption. Corruption has made the judicial process is slow and inefficient, reduced the FDI, level of international trade and the economic growth of the country. Corruption is present right from the nation 's judiciary and law enforcers to the parliament and other key institutions like the police department. A case is found where the former Constitutional Court chief justice was sentenced to life imprisonment for accepting more than $4.8 million in exchange for favourable rulings in regional election disputes in June 2014. This proves that the property rights’ enforcement is uneven and inefficient. No wonder this made the ease of doing business, tedious. Stats show that it takes about 200 days to meet the licencing requirements and that there are about 10 procedures on an average, just to launch a business successfully. The property rights index on the scale of 0 to 100, shows the degree to government enforces the property right laws, the existence of corruption and the degree to which the country’s law protects the property rights. Indonesia ranks 30th in this scale. Higher the score, the more protected are the property rights. The Intellectual Property Rights Index as of 2015, show the following stats

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