Like many countries, Indonesia can transform its decision-making system to be more transparent and inclusive, particularly on resource allocation and use.
The confidence is really driven by the woman - whether she can have the confidence that there will be enough earning or income to finance all the domestic spending - but also by the middle-income class, which for many Asian countries has become the growth power for the economy.
When millions of dollars and thousands of humanitarian workers poured into Indonesia, we quickly faced the challenge of coordinating our own bureaucracy with the multitudes of approaches and priorities the donor community wanted to pursue.
People feel they are not participating in the decision-making process. Decisions are exclusive to those at the very top. You have grown up with crony capitalism and it creates ever more resentment.
We won't be able to stop disasters from happening. On the contrary, climate change may increase the frequency and severity of floods, droughts and storms. But we are better equipped today to prepare for them and reduce their impact.
When both women and men contribute to a country's economic life on an equal basis, they help building stronger societies and stronger economies.
Corruption, money laundering, and tax evasion are global problems, not just challenges for developing countries.
Changing much-cherished bank secrecy laws is worth the effort. Corruption, tax evasion, and the capture of natural resource revenues undermine the rule of law, weaken the social fabric, erode citizens' trust in institutions, fuel conflict and insecurity, and hamper job creation.
If women had equal access to fertilizer and modern farm machinery, developing countries would produce between 2.5-percent and 4-percent more food.
Financial inclusion helps lift people out of poverty and can help speed economic development. It can draw more women into the mainstream of economic activity, harnessing their contributions to society.
I remember my first meeting with my management team when I became Indonesia's Minister of Finance. I was the youngest person and the first woman ever to hold that job. Everybody else in the room was male. I knew then that I had to work harder than any man to prove to them that I was capable.
If Indonesia improves governance of the fisheries sector and invests in large-scale maritime transport, it can double fish production by 2019.
Infrastructure alone won't end poverty. The World Bank had to learn this lesson, too. While we believed too much in bricks and mortar in our early days, we now understand that bringing together funding, technical expertise, and tested knowledge goes much further.
In the 1990s, I was among those Indonesians who demanded and celebrated the departure of our own autocrat, Suharto, and I joined the new government when he left.
Revolutions and their aftermaths, of course, are always fluid and fickle times, and the outcome is often perched on a knife's edge.
Over time, Europeans have come to rely on governments to protect them from the rougher facets of private enterprise and to look after them in old age.
Asia can learn much from Europe. Trade could be made easier in Asia, and the conditions for doing business could be improved by reducing red tape. In this regard, Hong Kong, Singapore and South Korea have done better than the best in Europe.
Conflicting legislation and regulations, overlapping mandates, unwillingness to enforce land use, elite capture, entrenched attitudes, and lack of incentives to influence behavior are rife in many resource-rich countries.
Economic success without accountability and social inclusion is not sustainable, and new governments often must face tough choices in order to protect the poor and vulnerable.
Women are often paid far less than men, while they also perform most of the world's unpaid care work.
