Stereotypes do our peoples an injustice

This article was published in The Sydney Morning Herald 11 March 2010

I was taken aback when I learnt that in a recent Lowy Institute survey, 54 per cent of Australian respondents doubted that Indonesia would act responsibly in its international relations. Indeed, the most persistent problem in our relations is the persistence of age-old stereotypes - misleading, simplistic mental caricatures that depict the other side in a bad light. Even in the age of the internet, there are Australians who still see Indonesia as an authoritarian country, or as a military dictatorship, or as a hotbed of Islamic extremism, or even as an expansionist power.

And in Indonesia, there are people who remain afflicted with Australia-phobia, who believe that the notion of ''white Australia'' persists, that Australia harbours ill-intentions towards Indonesia, and is either sympathetic or supports separatist elements in our country.

We must expunge these preposterous mental caricatures if we are to achieve a more resilient partnership.